Chapter 2 - Was I Bad?
Vanessa didn't answer.
She followed the stretcher instead, lifting her skirt away from the wheels.
“Rose, sweetheart, tell Daddy what happened.”
Rose turned her face against Grant's hand.
“Give her room,” a paramedic said.
“I'm her mother.”
Grant stood.
“No. You're not.”
For the first time that morning, Vanessa stopped smiling at the people watching.
At the hospital, Grant's sister, Leah, arrived with his daughter's stuffed rabbit and a phone full of unanswered calls.
“I told the planner to send everyone home,” she said.
“You don't have to handle anything else.”
“I should've been there.”
Leah sat beside him.
“You're here now. Stay useful.”
An emergency physician named Dr. Patel explained that Rose had a fractured forearm and needed monitoring after hitting her head.
They were checking her carefully.
Grant nodded at every sentence, afraid that if he interrupted, he would miss something that could keep her safe.
When he was allowed back, Rose looked impossibly small beneath the hospital blanket.
Her flower-girl dress lay folded in a clear belongings bag.
“Are the flowers okay?” she asked.
Grant pulled his chair close.
“We don't need to worry about flowers.”
“I picked the little ones. She likes little ones.”
He took her uninjured hand.
“Rosie, you don't have to talk about it right now.”
She studied the ceiling.
For a moment, he thought she was falling asleep.
Then she whispered, “Daddy... was I bad at being her daughter?”
The room seemed to tilt.
“No.”
He said it too quickly, too loudly, and made himself soften his voice.
“No, baby. You weren't bad. You didn't do anything to deserve getting hurt.”
“I tried not to ask.”
“Ask what?”
“For things.”
He couldn't speak.
“But I wanted a hug before she got married.”
Grant bent over her hand and kissed each tiny knuckle.
He wanted to ask a hundred questions.
Instead, he pressed the call button and asked for the hospital social worker.
His daughter needed someone who knew how to listen without putting words in her mouth.
Outside the room, a uniformed officer waited beside Dr. Patel.
“Mr. Holloway,” the doctor said, “there's something else we need to discuss.”
May you like
She glanced toward Rose's closed door.
“Some of the bruising we documented doesn't appear to be from today's fall.”
