Love, Zoey

Chapter Eleven

Zoey's p.o.v.

       "Okay baby, I need you to listen to me." Lilly's big bright eyes looked up to find mine. "We are going to go see daddy. Daddy got hurt so we can't be crazy around him. I need you to be calm."

      "You're fooling yourself if you think she won't freak out over seeing him."

        I shrugged. Truth is I have no idea what her reaction will even be. She could be afraid, happy or confused. If he was badly damaged she might not even go to see him.

        "I don't really know what her reaction will be. I just want her to know the severity of the situation."

         "She's not even two!" She laughed loudly.

          "Doesn't hurt to have all my bases covered."

         She closed her book and turned, giving me a serious look. "How do you think he will look?"

         I shrugged. "I have no idea. I want to believe that he will be smiling and happy. That it will just be like old times and he will try to get me to go on a run with him even though we were both up late with Lilly." I brushed Lilly's baby hairs from her forehead. "I want to tell myself that everything will be fine and that magically it will."

         "I don't know what I will do if we walk in and he is messed up to the point of being unrecognizable." Her hands twisted together in her lap. "I still remember when he was sixteen and had a mishap on the field one day at practice. His eye was so swollen and his entire face looked different. Somehow he didn't look like my baby."

        The grumpy man beside me the opportunity to 'shh' us again.

        Lilly giggled up at him and stuck out her tongue. "You need to control your child."

        America shot him a glare. "Sir. I am sorry if my granddaughter is bothering you, but there is nothing I can do. You choose to get here late and take the seat next to a young mother and child. She can not control her any more than you can control the trees in the wind."

He looked irritated and quickly shoved headphones onto his head and stayed silent for the rest of the flight.

**

      "We can catch a taxi just outside." America's hands were full with our bags and I held both Lilly, the diper bag, and her car seat.

         "Can we take one straight to the hospital or do we need to get a rental car?"

        America paused on her way out of the building. "I'm not sure. If we got a rental than we wouldn't have to worry about getting everywhere, but it will take longer than a taxi."

         I secured the sleeping Lilly in my arms. "We should get a taxi then later tonight one of us can come back to get a rental." I pointed out the long line of people waiting. "It will definitely cost more, but it will mean less waiting to see Beck."

          America knew my argument made sense and she hurried outside waving her arms high in the air for the closest taxi's attention.

***

         I hated hospitals. There was something so terrifying about them.

         The stiff white colors and sharp smell of bleach easily reminded me that people died here.

         Beck almost died here.