Page 50 of Rescued
I wish I knew the answer to that. “I hope so.”
The truth is, I don’t know. No one does. Not yet. Thingslookbetter, but that doesn’t mean anything.
His heart is beating, but he’s not breathing on his own. Would he be, if not for the vent? I also don’t know that. Plus, we don’t even know if he suffered brain trauma. We won’t until he wakes up.If he wakes up. I shake my head. No.When. When he wakes up.
“You have to be okay,” Luca whispers, his finger brushing Arlo’s pinky. “You’re my best friend. I haven’t had a lot of those, so that means you have to be okay.”
The machines answer for Arlo. Whirring. Beeping.
Luca looks at me. “What did the doctors say?”
Dragging a hand over my face, I take a deep breath. “They’re keeping an eye on his lungs. Smoke inhalation is dangerous. If they pull the tube too early, he might need to be reintubated.”
Luca nods slowly.
“They’re monitoring him for neurological response too.” I shouldn’t have said that part out loud. Luca doesn’t need to bescared by that, but keeping the thought to myself is painful. It’s hard enough being terrified. It’s even worse to be terrified alone.
“What does that mean?” Luca asks, eyes snapping to mine.
I force my voice to be steady when I speak. “It means that…” I have to pause, swallowing hard. “He was without oxygen. He had no pulse. We don’t know for how long before we found him.”
“But you all got his pulse back.”
I nod. “We did.”
“And his oxygen is good now,” Luca points out.
“It is.” Because a machine is breathing for him.
“And he’s healthy and young. He’ll bounce back, right?”
“I hope so.”
It’s all I can offer.
“He’s going to be in pain when he wakes up,” I whisper, carefully reaching out to cradle his hand in mine.
Luca’s eyebrows draw together. “What do you mean? Because of the burns?”
I nod. “That, and he has broken ribs.”
Because you fucking broke them.
I press my lips together, clenching my jaw to keep myself from crying.
“But…” Luca studies me, his eyes soft and assessing. “You saved him, though.”
I inhale a deep breath. “We don’t know for sure.”
“You ran into the house,” Luca says, voice shaky and thick. “Austin said you didn’t even wait. Said you ran right in and broke all protocol.”
“I did. I don’t regret it.”
But it still doesn’t mean he’ll pull through. It doesn’t mean that he won’t have neurological issues. It doesn’t mean he’ll be able to breathe on his own.
“You love him. Austin told me you called him baby boy.”
That’s what ends up breaking me. Tears spring to my eyes, and I drop my forehead to the edge of Arlo’s hospital bed in my attempt to hide them from Luca.
