FLY BOY - Completed

Chapter 26

It was a large room that housed four beds, each of which were curtained off. Rylie pointed towards the area on the left side of the room closest to the window, indicating that she would find Dayden there and then he stepped aside and allowed River to go in alone. As she passed by Rylie, he whispered that he would wait for her outside the room. River didn't hesitate, she carefully nudged the curtain until she found the opening and then pulled it back just far enough to slip inside. 

The first thing she noticed was that Dayden's eyes were closed, yet thankfully he was breathing deeply. He was sound asleep. He looked pale, yet still she thought he was beautiful. There were lots of tubes and machines hooked up to him, but thankfully she noted that there were not as many as there had been with her father. She noticed too that they had the head of Dayden's bed cranked up pretty high and his head was surrounded by pillows keeping him propped up in place.

He wasn't wearing a shirt and River could see that the part of his muscular chest that peaked out above the covers was wrapped in bandages. There were more bandages covering up his many cuts and it looked like there might even be a couple of stitches on his head just above his left eyebrow. River cringed at the number of bruises she saw covering his upper body, all of which were turning a lovely shade of purple. She imagined there were even more bruises covering his lower body hidden beneath the covers. 

A soft female voice had River peaking out of the curtains towards the open doorway. She saw Rylie in conversation with a dark haired, middle aged lady, who was dressed in blue scrubs. She had a nice smile and at first glance kind of reminded River of her own mother. She watched as the lady nodded at Rylie and then made her way towards River.

River immediately backed into Dayden's area and took a seat beside his bed. The lady in scrubs offered a soft hello to River as she made her way around to the opposite side of Dayden's bed where she checked out the machines that were attached to Dayden in some manner and then checked the bags of medicine that dripped into his arm. She jotted down some notes in a file that must have been Dayden's. 

When she was done she placed the clipboard under her arm and made her way around to River. She offered River her hand as she gave another soft hello and introduced herself as Doctor Evans. River nodded in reply not wanting to wake Dayden. The doctor's warm smile put River at ease and set off a familiar pang in her heart that River often experienced when she missed her mother. To hide her emotions River turned back towards Dayden and placed her hand over his on his bed. His normally warm hand was a cool temperature, which bothered River more than she could say. 

Seeing that Doctor Evans was about to leave, River quickly asked if the doctor could take a moment to explain to River what happened to Dayden. The doctor replied with another genuine smile and then leaned her hips back against the bed rails at the foot of Dayden's bed. She placed his file next to her on the bed and then clasped her hands together in front of her. She spoke slowly and clearly as she explained that Dayden had sustained two broken ribs most likely she figured from the beating that he had received. She said that the injury had probably been made much worse by the impact of the landing he would have made from his parachute jump. 

River tried to recall if Dayden had mentioned anything over the radio as they had been flying to the base camp, but she was sure he had not. Thinking back though, she recalled that his voice might have sounded a little strained at times. She couldn't help but feel guilty that she had not noticed. She was probably just too wrapped up in the excitement of seeing her father and hadn't thought enough about all that Dayden had gone through. 

The doctor seeing the remorseful look on River's face, patted her hand gently as if to tell her to stop worrying and then continued with her explanation. She said that Dayden had been seated out in the waiting area when the receptionist noticed that he seemed to be in a lot of pain.