It’s almost morning as I sit in a plastic chair that makes my ass ache, watching machines breathe for Sophia's lifeless body. In the ambulance on the way over, Sophia flatlined and my entire fucking world shifted for a second time.
Blood on her brain from head trauma sent them right into surgery the minute we hit the ER. I paced that hallway for two hours before the doctor came to say the damage was extensive but we got to her just in time. Now we were just waiting for her to wake up.
Or at least, I was.
Sophia had no one else waiting for her. Just me.
Stiles filled me in after he booked her prick husband. Married just four years, Sophia’s husband had dozens of calls for domestic disputes but he’d never been arrested. Sophia wouldn’t press charges; he was smart and left no evidence of his assaults. Seems Sophia had no family here in Chicago, but her husband is another story.
“Stephen Sommers? Like the Supreme Court Judge Sommers? His prick lawyer son?” I gritted my teeth as I got the answer to why Sophia never pressed charges.
“The very same. Sophia’s neighbors were lining up to give statements about tonight and every night like it before. Hate the prick. Say she doesn’t make a move he hasn’t approved of first. Guess her meeting with a lawyer other than him wasn’t approved of.” Knowing she had possibly started looking into divorce was a good sign, at least.
“Guess not. Hope this is reason enough to call him again.” I had plans to tell her once she woke up she didn’t have a choice. I wasn’t controlling like her prick husband but I wasn’t about to let her go back to him.
“Any word on what that fucker said? About a baby?” Stiles asked this just before he headed out and I took vigil beside her.
“Yeah...she’s uh...” The news had almost made me sick, “She’s pregnant. Didn’t tell me how far along. Baby is fine, for now.” Stiles shot me a look full of questions I had no answers for.
“Jess...you think it might be....” Sighing, I shut that down before he even says it out loud.
“Nah. No way. Not mine.” Stiles doesn’t believe me. Hell, I don’t believe me.
It’s entirely possibly Sophia is pregnant with my child. It’s been almost three months since our first weekend together. I swore we’d been careful but I couldn’t be sure. I knew the second time we hadn’t, so anything is possible.
I could not consider that possibility. Not when the chances of losing her were very real. I couldn’t consider losing both her and a child that might be mine.
For hours, I looked back and wondered how I had missed it all. I was a fucking cop, I was supposed to see the signs. Not that she was married. That hadn’t exactly stopped me before, to be honest.
No, I was wondering how I missed the abuse.
Looking at her tawny skin in the dim moonlight, I see plenty of signs I’d missed before. Faded bruises. Marks at her shoulders, scars at her slender throat. Marks anyone else might see past. But not me; not someone trained to see the signs. Not someone who had learned every dip and curve and saved it to memory.
How could I have missed the scars?
How could I have looked into her eyes and not seen them?
As I reach out to smooth her tangled hair away from her lovely face, I see it. Fluttering at her eyelashes, the barest lift of her chest. I know I should alert the nurses, but I can’t move. I need to see her come back to life. Need it before I can breathe right again.
“J-Jess? Jess?! Jess!” Sophia thrashes a little beneath everything she’s hooked up to, calling out for me.
Something kicks hard in my chest. She called out for me. For me. Not her prick husband or anyone else. For fucking me. I take her hand as I press my own to her chest, stilling her.
“Still, baby. Relax for me, yeah? Let me get the nurses, ok?” As her hand clutches at mine, I realize she’s trembling all over, eyes wild as they search around the empty room.
“Where...where is he? Is he...here?” I shake my head, lowering to catch her gaze, touching her chin.
“No, baby. He’s in jail. Going to stay there if I got any say in it, too. Look at me,” Calmer now, she looks up at me with watery eyes, “I’m right here, Soph. Going to be right here, no one and nothing is going to hurt you like this ever again. You hear me?” A sob bursts from her chest as she looks away.
“Jess....I am...so...sorry. So ashamed.” Resting a hip on her bed, I bend closer still, waiting for her to meet my gaze again.
“Look at me, Sophia.” I wait for her to have a moment, wait for her to catch her breath and then those eyes swing my way again.
A kick to my chest comes again. This time it nearly sends me to my knees though. Trust is bright in her eyes, battered as they may be. Sophia is terrified, ashamed, embarrassed; yet she looks at me as if she’s never been hurt before.
It’s all I need to know I won’t ever let her be hurt again.
“We’re going to get through this. I promise you.” It’s the first promise I ever remember making to a woman. Sure as hell the first I actually fucking mean.
“We are?” Sophia gazes up at me, eyes hopeful, breathing heavy as I press closer.
We have a lot to talk about. Most pressing her impending divorce and the little bean growing in her belly. Why she lied to me. Why she went home with me that weekend and why she saw me again after. But none of it matters now.
Earlier I wasn’t sure what the hell truly mattered.
But, looking at her as she watches me with trusting eyes full of hope, despite everything she’s been through, I know what matters.
Sophia matters. Her baby matters. Mine or not. We matter.
I told her once and I intend to tell her again and again.
She’s it. I don’t know how or why. But, Sophia is it for me.
“Yes, we, baby. Told you. You’re it for me. I’m a lot of things, Sophia. Stupid ain’t one of them. No matter what, we’re making it through this. Because I ain’t lucky enough to find something like this again. I ain’t letting it go now that I found it. No matter what it takes.” I kiss her forehead, eyes closing as my own fears, my own doubts, flood me. None of that matters though.
Sophia alive, breathing easy as I touch her—when I know she hasn’t breathed easy since I touched her last—that's all that fucking matters.
The rest, it’s all just details. Details we can figure out when we need to. And right now, I don’t need to.
I just need to feel her breathe. Need to feel her live.
Once I do, I can breathe again too. And it’s then I realize I was never really breathing either. Not before her and not since.
We may have details to figure out, but right now, we’re breathing. Breathing easy together.
Living, breathing. Isn’t that all that really matters?
The End