“He is. Ridiculously healthy. The man is thin, for fuck’s sake.” Carter sounded as shocked as he did.
The ride up in the elevator was totally silent, and he assumed Carter was feeling a lot like he was. Just… stunned. Worried.
Kind of helpless.
Geoff appeared on the next elevator, and he and Carter both jumped up out of their chairs.
“Hey.” Geoff went right to Carter and into his arms. “What do you know so far? Just the heart attack?”
He nodded. “That’s it, yeah. And he’s in surgery.”
“Okay. Let’s go talk to the nurses at the desk, see what we can see.” Geoff offered him a weak, watery smile. “Has he shown any signs of being sick?”
“He was exhausted and wound up after work last night, and I went over just to give him some company. This morning he woke up with a headache. Like a migraine or something. He could hardly sit up. It was bad. He was pale and just looked really awful. Can you find out how long they think he’ll be in surgery?”
“Of course. Come on. Let’s do this.” Geoff went up to the desk. “Good morning. We’re Troy Finch’s family. We just arrived.”
There was the nonsense with the paperwork, with registering his boy, and a metric ton of signatures for Geoff.
It felt good that Geoff hadn’t hesitated at all in calling him family. He honestly wasn’t sure where he stood with these two, but that was a solid start at least.
They didn’t really find out anything new after all of that, just that Troy had been found by a jogger, and that someone would be out with a status soon. He slumped into a chair with his arms crossed, just staying quiet. He didn’t have words for any of this. Not for how the worry felt, not for how he felt about Carter right now, or himself either. Everything about this just felt wrong. Wrong, and unfair.
“I don’t understand. Troy’s the healthiest man I’ve ever met.” Geoff shook his head. “He was a smoker, sure, but he stopped.”
“I ordered pizza last night. Maybe I should have ordered salads.” That was stupid and he knew it. They were all just grasping at straws right now.
“And I should have told him to stay home,” Carter sighed. “I was an asshole.”
Geoff snorted. “And what would have happened if Troy had collapsed at home? Saul would have found him this evening?”
Oh, God. That would have been… he didn’t want to think about that. He shrugged, feeling stupid. “I probably should have insisted he let me drive him to work, though.”
“Stop it. You two stop. He’s going to need us when he’s out of surgery. We all have to focus.” Geoff could snap when he wanted to.
Saul glanced over at Carter and then gave the man’s knee a squeeze. It wasn’t an apology exactly; he was still mad. But he was mad because Carter had been an ass of a boss, not because he thought this was Carter’s fault or anything. Geoff was right, it could just as easily have happened in the kitchen.
“He’s right.”
Carter sighed dramatically. “I hate when he’s right.”
He fought a grin because it just didn’t seem appropriate in the moment, but he couldn’t hold out long. He snickered, and that made Geoff huff out a laugh, and then he was giggling. “I bet you do.”
“You have no idea, man. He’s going to milk this for months.” Carter reached out and squeezed his hand. “He’s going to be fine.”
He nodded and squeezed back. He really didn’t know what to say.
“Mr. Lee?” A tall man came through a door to the left, pulling on a doctor’s white coat.
They all stood in a rush, and Saul thought for a second he might just pass out.
“We’re his family. How is he?” Geoff sounded so confident.
“I’m Dr. Marks. Troy is resting. He’s very strong and he made it through surgery just fine.” The doc smiled. “Now, everybody breathe.”
Saul took a huge breath on cue, not realizing he’d been holding it. He thought he heard Carter do the same.
Geoff nodded. “Good news. Thank you.”
“It is. He was pretty weak when he came in. His myocardial infarction—the heart attack—was caused by a congenital valve defect he probably didn’t even know he had. It’s more common than you might think. He didn’t arrest, which was good because we don’t know how long it was before he was found.”
Saul sighed. “Might have been twenty minutes.”
The doctor glanced at him. “Then he was very lucky. We’ll keep him under for a day or so to make sure the valve repair is doing its job and then once he’s released he’ll need meds and therapy…” The doctor waved a hand. “We can talk about all of that later. Come on, I’ll take you back. I’m sure you’re all anxious to see him. You’ll have to scrub up and visit one at a time. He’ll be going to ICU for a bit, then the cardiac unit from there.”
Scrub up? ICU? Wasn’t that for really sick people? Didn’t the doc just say Troy was okay? He had a lot to learn about hospitals.
His phone buzzed as they were walking, and he pulled it out to find a text from Emma.
Where ru?
Oh shit. He was supposed to work today. He texted back, quickly. Troy is in the hospital. He’ll be ok but can I have the day?
Oh no! Of course. I got this. Call me later.
Thanks Em. Will do. He sighed. She was going to have a hell of a day. Hopefully she could call someone in to cover for him. Craig was always looking for more hours.
He followed the others. He wanted Geoff and Carter to go first, and then he was hoping they’d go home. He had Troy’s truck, and he just wanted to be alone with Troy for a while.
“Did you want to go in first, Saul?” Geoff asked. The question was gentle, careful, almost tentative.
“No. No… thank you, Geoff. Really. You go ahead. I’ll go last if that’s okay with you guys.”
Geoff nodded and went to scrub and he and Carter sat, waiting their turn.
“This shit never gets easier, does it?”
How the hell did he know?
“You’ve done this before?” He sure hadn’t. He had no idea what to expect when he went into that room.
“Yeah, with my dad.” Carter sighed softly. “And then with my younger brother.”
Oh, man. Had Carter lost them both? He’d lost his dad when he was really young, but he had a bunch of siblings and his mom too. He couldn’t imagine what he’d do. He leaned back in his chair and glanced at Carter. “That really sucks. I’m sorry.”
“Oh, my dad is still with us. Thomas had issues with heroin and his body couldn’t handle it.”
Heroin. That shit was ugly. Or so he’d heard. “That must have been hard.” That was okay to say right? The last thing he needed to do was put his foot in his mouth today.
“I don’t know. I think it was less hurtful than the constant backsliding, to be honest.”
He reached over and rested a hand on Carter’s shoulder. He’d heard stories. Addiction was a disease with no cure. But that was literally all he knew about it. “I’ve been lucky I guess.”
“That’s good. I’m glad.” He searched for sarcasm, but there wasn’t any.