-taylors Pov-
I'm done with a shower and resting in bed with Ellie sound asleep beside me when I get a phone call and put in on speakerphone as I just can't bring it to my ear, it hurts too much.
"am I speaking with Mrs. Alwyn?" a male voice says. "Yes, that's me"
"i'm from the police station and wanted to give an update on your case. The driver of car that crashed with you died instantly but there has been a development and we know have a suspicion for what happened wasn't an accident" he says, and my eyes widen, and I get out of bed and into the bathroom just in case Ellie wakes up.
"What do you mean? How do you know?" I ask and sit down on the floor leaning against the cabinets. "The driver was a frequent visitor of mr wiles in prison so given the situation yesterday where you and your oldest gave statements that supported further imprisonment of Mr. wiles we believe that this might be an act in retaliation of such statements" he says.
I feel sick to my stomach and want to throw up... Of course Adam had a hand in this, that son of a bitch can't let go of me. Part of me think I should have known he was up to something, but here we are with my husband fighting for his life. We could all have died, but something tells me that was exactly what he wanted to happen.
"so we are going to investigate further, and eventually we need you and your daugther to come in for interviews so we have all the information but given the state of your situation we can wait, and we will investigate in the meanwhile. We will keep in contact with your lawyer Mr. passman and communicate between him. We just wanted to call you personally and tell you what we know so far" he continues, and I try to take it all in. "oh ok. Then I will hear from him. Thank you for calling me" I tell him and try to keep my cool but it's hard to keep the tears from flowing.
After we hang up, I can't take it anymore and burst into tears. Once again is my relationship with Adam putting my family in mortal danger and I can't help but blame myself. If I never had said yes to a date with him early 2015 I could have avoided all of this. If I never let him into my life my family wouldn't be in this kind of danger now. My actions all those years ago has potentially killed my husband and I can't forgive myself for that. First, he kidnapped my six-year-old but now he is resulting to trying to kill us all. When will this stop? Is this the worlds way of making me pay for my poor choices?
My boyfriend from almost 20 years ago is still haunting us and trying to infiltrate our lives, and that's on top of the danger my job brings to our lives. That's what I was scared of fifteen years ago when I was pregnant with Ellie, I was scared that my job and my past was going to hurt the family I was building. That's why I was holding back on starting a family in the first place, but I did because I wanted to keep the baby and realized how much joy motherhood brings to my life. I wouldn't trade my children for anything, but I do feel guilty that having me as their mother brings a constant danger to their lives. Even locked up behind bars Adam is putting them in danger.
And then there is my amazing husband, the love of my life and my best friend. He was the one I had been waiting for my whole life, the daylight at the end of a dark tunnel. When I meet him I finally felt like myself and that I could be who I always wanted to be. when I meet him, I felt like it didn't matter what the world outside said because we had one another. He brings out the best in me, he completes me, and I like to think that I bring out the best in him too, at least that's what he tells me.
The fact that there is a chance I don't get to ever look into those ocean blue eyes again or hear his soft British voice is terrifying. He makes me strong; he makes me a better person. I can live without him, I'm a strong independent woman, but I don't want to. I don't want to ever life a day without him by my side. I don't want to live in a world where there Is no more him.
Eventually I pull myself up from the floor and splash some water on my face. Nothing is getting better by sitting here sobbing alone, I need to get a plan in place, and I need to take care of my children. When you have three kids that depend on you, you can't fall apart. If I fall apart they will fall apart too and then there will be no one there to hold them together. It's my job as their mom to help them.
So carefully I make my way downstairs and leave Ellie asleep on my bed. She fell asleep crying and snuggling into my side. I think it was in a combination of pain and being terrified of what happened and being scared for her dad.
Aurora and kenzie are in the playroom watching tv so I go to join my parents and joe's mom. It's so nice of her to fly in so we have another set of hands here. Ever since I met her she has taken me into her family like I was her own daugther, and our bond has grown stronger over the years. I know I can come to her with anything, even if I have an issue with joe, and she will listen to me and offer advice if I ask for them.
"Taylor what do you need from us? we are all here to support you and I'm staying for as long as you need my support" Liz says as I join them in the living room after taking some pain medication.
"Thank you for flying all this way. I don't really know what I need. I... it hasn't really sunk in yet. I do need help with the girls and trade sitting by joes' side" I tell them and then I look behind us to make sure there aren't any kids around and speak really quietly "and the police just called. The driver was a frequent visitor of Adam. So this is most likely not an accident" I tell them and take a deep breath, so I don't break down in tears again.
"That man need to let go off you" Liz says and rub my back "yeah, now I just wait for my lawyer to contact us after they have done more investigations. They want to interview both Ellie and I but wait a bit, so we are feeling better. We aren't supposed to stress, do physical or mental exercise"
"Well, I'm staying in the guest room, so I got the girls, and your parents are helping too. You need to focus on healing so you can be there for joe and the girls. You need to take care of yourself first so you can take care of them. If you get burned out or hurt, you can't help any of them. We are here so lean on us honey" she says, and I lean my head on her shoulder.
"are we taking the girls to the hospital?" my mom asks, and I sit up again and nod "yeah, the girls wanted to see him. I don't think they should be coming there all the time as it's not good for kids to be around all that, seeing him like that almost has me in a breakdown so I can't imagine what it's like for them. Plus, they want to keep the volume down there so he can relax. I got to talk to him for a bit but quietly. And there are a lot of other really sick patients that I walked by. There was even one that was actively dying, and I don't want the kids to see that stuff. It's not that we shield them from the fact that people die, but this is hard enough" not to mention that we haven't told the kids how bad off joe really is. We have told them that it's a brain bleed and that he has bleeding in his abdomen, but not that the odds of survival of patients with acute subdural hematoma is bad. It's not that he can't get better, there is around a 20-30% chance but it's a 50-90% chance of mortality and that's not something I want the girls to worry about. I don't want the get the girls hopes up too much or lie to them, but I don't want to worry them too much when it's still so early and we don't have much to go on yet. We know that his brain needs time to heal and that they are watching the abdominal bleeding, that we know. But we don't know if the brains pressure will increase and that will cause damage or if the bleeding in the abdomen will grow and he will need surgery for that too.
"They are your kids so that's up to you. We are just following your lead Taylor" Liz says and I'm thankful for that. I need to make the decisions that I think is right for them. It's not that I won't take suggestions from them, I will for sure. But I know the girls in a way they don't, and I know joe in a way they don't. I know that joe wouldn't want them there all day every day. I know that joe would want them to have consistency back as soon as possible and go back to their daily routine. They will of course get to see him and get age-appropriate information about what's going on, but I know that joe wouldn't want them to have too much of a burden on them or feel like they should be there all the time.
We have talked about what we will do if one of us got really sick or injured, about how long we would keep treatment going if there was no improvement or if we want extraordinary measures. It was a hard conversation, but I know how important it is to know where the other person stands, and we wrote it all down so if anything happened, we could have a written thing to go off if we didn't remember.
** flashback 2022 **
"Taylor I've been thinking about something" joe says after putting Ellie down for a nap. "yeah, what's up?" I say and put down my computer and go to join him in the living room.
"We are married now which means we are each other's executive in the case that one of us got sick or injured. I know that's not something we ever want to happen, but I think we should have a conversation and some sort of plan... and you know... what our wishes are if one of us were to pass away" he says, and I bite my lip.
Just the thought that something could happen to joe makes me sick to my stomach. I can't imagine what life would be like without him and I don't want to think about it, but I get where he is coming from.
"Okay. But let's write it down because I don't want to have to rely on my memory" I say and grab my computer again and open up a document. "Where do we start?" I ask.
"well, the first and obvious question is about extraordinary measures? And what kind we would or wouldn't want" he asks, and I bite my lip again. I don't know where to start so joe goes first, and I write. "I want a chance to fight to get back to you. But if the doctors say that enough is enough, I want you to listen to that. If you want, you can seek a second opinion but don't keep it going for too long and wreck your brains. If they say that its time, I need you to let me go" he says and wrap his arm around my shoulders.
Even hearing him saying that he would want me to let him go is so crazy to me. I would search for any inch of hope to get him back to me, but I can see his point because that's exactly what I would want too.
"and in terms of what I would and wouldn't want done. I feel like as long as it's helping and there Is hope I would want the help. But if it's only going to prolong the inevitable, that they know I will die it's only a matter of time, I want to be let go. I don't want to die a slow painful death where one organ after the other stops working. If there is no chance of be getting better, I need you to let me go. And if my brain dies, I want to donate my organs, anything they can use give it. I have no use for it anymore anyway so give it all." he says, and I close my eyes and lean my head on his shoulder.
"i mean I feel the same way. I wouldn't want you to watch me suffer if there is no getting better. But I don't know how I could ever let go of you joe" I say and turn my head to look at him as a tear roll down my face, so he cups my head and kiss my forhead. "Love this is the worst-case scenario. I have no intention of getting into an accident or get suddenly and reservable I'll. But we need to have a plan just in case so you or I don't need to stand in it and not know what the other person thinks. It's better to agree and write it down beforehand and hopefully we never need to use it. Hopefully we die of old age wrapped in each other's arms, but we never know what is going to happen"
Now it's my turn to speak "I want all the same things. And if I die, I want a casket and I want you to get a cemetery spot that could fit both of us. I in the case that we are both dead I want us to be buried together forever" I tell him and write it down.
"Now Elliana. If I were to land in the hospital and its bad, like life-support and complicated stuff but still alive. I don't want her to sit by my bedside all day every day. That's not good for kids, her or if we have more kids one day. I don't want that for them. Sure she should be allowed to visit but I don't want her to see me like that every day it won't help her at all. If she is old enough and truly wants to drop my everyday consider it but for the most part, I want her to go on with her everyday routine. I think that's best for her if things get to that point. When things are crazy consistency is the most important thing. And I would want you to take time to take care of yourself. Don't spend all day every day at my bedside wearing yourself out. Take time to take care of you so you can be there for her and me. And if you need to choose, if she needs you go to her. I don't want you to pick me over her, your most important job is being a mom"
** end of flashback **
"Yeah, they're my kids, but they are his too. And we have talked about it, what we would want. Thirteen years ago, or so we wrote a directive on my computer. Not one that we took to a lawyer or anything, but we wrote it, printed it out and kept it in a binder where we have other health related documents. It was important for us to have it just in case so the one of us making the decisions would know what the other would want. It was joes' idea" I tell them. At the time I didn't want to do it because I thought that nothing like that would ever happen, but now I'm glad that we made it because now I know what he would want. I do keep a copy of it on my phone too just in case we are out and about, and I can't get home to the file. But the hard copy is here.
"i'm sorry you even have to think about these things Taylor" Liz tells me, and I wipe away my tears "well he is your son too. So I'm sorry for you too. And of course, if you have any wishes just tell me and I will adjust" I tell her.
"I might be his mom, but Taylor you're his wife and the mother of his kids. These are your decisions and sounds like joe has already told you what his wishes are. I'm just here to support your girls, him and you. He wanted these decisions to be yours, that's why you're his power of attorney if anything should happen to him" she says, and I force a smile at her even though smiling makes my head hurt a lot.
Then I figure I should tell them all joes wishes so they know too. And they patiently sit there and listen to me tell them what he told me and what we agreed on. I want to do this while the girls aren't listening because that's not something they need to think about.
A while later it's time to head back to the hospital so the girls can see him before kenzie and aurora goes to gymnastics.
"Aurora and kenzie. Could you girls get your gymnastics clothes on so we can leave now. We will trop by daddy on the way and then grandma will take you to gymnastics" I tell the girls who run up the stairs to get ready while I go to wake Ellie up.
"Ellie honey?" I ask her and she groans and roll over in bed "you can sleep more if you want but I'm leaving now to go see daddy. So If you want to see him today you need to get up" I tell her and brush her hair out of her face and kiss her forhead.
I'm nervous of bringing them there, but I know that they need to see him so I need to keep calm and take them to their father.
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