Beeping and Whirring Constantly

When I was eight years old and in awe of my older brother, Ben – who could do an ollie on a skateboard without falling off even once, already had his green belt in taekwondo and was allowed to stay at home alone when Mum needed to race to the shops to buy milk – I got into a fight at school.

A new kid, Gregory Blake, had joined my class a month earlier. He’d moved from the big city and was having difficulty with the playground dynamics of our small country school. Gregory was shy, a little wimpy, and wore glasses. I was tall for my age and already stronger than most boys in my year, let alone boys in the years above me. I was also playing football twice a week, for both the school and the local youth club. In other words, I was not only a tough bastard physically, but a school hero. (Our school was all about footy. Soccer players were shunned for reasons I still don’t understand.) Gregory Blake decided, in his first week at school, that I was his best friend.

He followed me around like a puppy, and bought stuff for me from the school canteen. I’d only have to mention I’d like a packet of chips and he’d be at my side a few minutes later with them. It took me quite a while to realize, I’m ashamed to say, that he wouldn’t spend his lunch money on his own food in case I casually mentioned I wanted something.

Gregory’s parents were rich. Not more-money-than-God rich, but better off than anyone else’s parents at our school. But Gregory’s parents rarely did anything with their son. They didn’t come to any school events, nor wait for him to finish class inside the school grounds, like the other parents. It wasn’t until years later, when I was old enough to truly ponder Gregory’s behavior, that it dawned on me he was lonely.

Because I’ve never been a horrible kid, I never told him to go away. My other friends – friends I’d had since kindergarten – thought he was annoying. I just shrugged and let him tag along.

He skimmed the surface of my daily radar, filled the hole in my stomach whenever the food my mum packed wasn’t enough, and occasionally said something funny enough to make us laugh about the other boys in the playground. Those somethings were most likely so witty they went over our heads, but eight-year-olds are not discerning in their humor. When Gregory said Richie Gribble was a “mouth-breathing knuckle dragger” we all laughed ourselves silly. My “real” best friend at the time, Lochie Perkins, laughed so much snot came out his nose.

The next day after school, Richie Gribble cornered Gregory outside the sports equipment shed and beat the crap out of him. He was found crying and bleeding by the school groundskeeper. He’d pissed his pants, had one of his front teeth broken, and his glasses were nowhere to be seen.

He never came back to school.

The kids didn’t know what had happened until the day after the fight. No one knew where Gregory went. He never contacted anyone at school to let us know.

I found out what Richie had done halfway through our afternoon art lesson, when Lochie leaned over and confessed he’d told Richie at footy practice what Gregory had said about him. I remember looking at Lochie like I didn’t know him. Like he was a stranger. I’d slept at his house more than once. We’d shared our lunches since we were five. I knew everything about Lochie, about how he was going to be a racing car driver when he grew up, how he didn’t like when his big sister walked around the house in just her underwear, and how his doodle sometimes got hard when she did, which made him feel weird.

Lochie was no friend of Richie Gribble, nor was he a dobber. And yet, here was my best friend fessing up to the fact he’d told Richie what Gregory had said about him even though we both knew Richie would hurt Gregory because of it.

Why?

When I asked Lochie that very question, he shrugged. “Dunno.”

That afternoon – outside the same sports equipment shed where he’d beaten Gregory – I turned Richie’s nose to a mushy, bloody pulp. Knocked him on his arse.

That night, as Mum sat beside me on my bedroom floor, her hand resting gently on my back, disappointment on her face, I understood something far beyond my eight years: I wasn’t just angry at Richie for beating up Gregory. I was angry at Lochie as well. I’d taken my disappointment with my best friend out on the school bully, and while my big brother crowed about it the next day, and told everyone he was proud of me for sticking up for a friend, my disillusionment with Lochie tainted the joy I felt at Ben’s approval.

Lochie had betrayed the trust of someone who’d been “with us”. Sure, Gregory hadn’t ever been to either of our houses, but he’d sat with us at lunch, he’d shared his food. Lochie had eaten more than one Frosty Fruit icy-pole purchased by Gregory. Gregory had been hurt because his trust had been betrayed, and for reasons my eight-year-old brain couldn’t truly fathom, I’d been hurt as well. And that betrayal had made me angry enough to hurt someone in retaliation.

I’d regretted it the moment it happened. The second Richie fell to the ground – blood and snot spreading over his top lip in a disgusting mustache, tears leaking from his eyes, his hands trying to protect his face as he blubbered “No stop I’m sorry I’m sorry” over and over – I regretted it. But I never said sorry to him. And I never had a sleepover at Lochie’s place again.

I need you to understand the significance of this little window into my personality. I may no longer be that eight-year-old boy with blood on his fists and righteous anger in his heart, but I still have the same core values and opinions. And I still – no matter how much I wished otherwise – have the same visceral reaction to my trust being shattered.

And what I’d just learned, what Amanda had just told me?

Yeah, my trust was beyond shattered.

Before I knew what I was doing, I was on my feet, towering over both Chase and Amanda. Furious. I’m a big guy. I’m not called Brendon the Biceps in any kind of ironic way. I’m a big guy with a latent strength beyond the norm, and I was pissed.

Torn apart.

Everything I thought I knew about Amanda, every opinion I had …

It wasn’t just that either. In the few hours since discovering I was a dad, I’d ridden an emotional rollercoaster the likes of which I’d never experienced before. I’d ridden that fucking rollercoaster and, in patented Brendon Osborn optimism, saw the best in it. I’d accepted I was a father, I’d accepted my life had irrevocably changed, but I’d moved beyond the loss of holding Tanner as a baby to already placing myself in his life. Running with him, playing with him. Living life large with him.

I’d done that. In a short time, yes, but that was who I was. I’d already gone there, in my mind, in my heart.

And now Amanda was taking that away from me as well. Not just taking it away. Ripping it from me. Tearing it to pieces in front of me. And as ugly as it makes me sound, I couldn’t help but wonder if the only reason I was there was because our son was sick.

Bone marrow.

I’d paid enough attention in my one semester of Human Biology 101 to know exactly the significance of the words bone marrow when connected to leukemia. The significance was that I wasn’t here to be a father … but a donor.

Amanda hadn’t asked me to come to her, to be in her life, because she missed me. She needed me to come to donate my bone marrow to my dying son.

And yes, she was correct: the chances of a parent being a match were rare, but still there. I knew that from my studies as well. Amanda must have been beyond desperate to call me after all this time. To reveal to me the secret she’d kept for so long. She’d have to know I’d be angry, hurt. But that fact didn’t assuage my anger. Not at all.

I curled my fist and glared at them both, an empty ache in my chest even as anger continued to spread through me. “I’m assuming you’re not a match?”

She shook her head. I could see she was wracked with grief at the meaning behind that unspoken no, but I was too angry to let it stop me.

“You’re not a match, so you call me. You kept the fact I have a son from me for over a year and a half. You decided I wasn’t important enough to be in his life, not significant enough to be in his life. Until me being in his life is what’s needed to keep him alive.” I swung around to stare at Chase, standing beside her sister, hugging her with one arm. “And you ask me what I’m going to do about it? As if I’m the one who’s fucked up?”

Amanda sobbed, her eyes swimming with tears and grief as she stared up at me. My insult was brutal. Harsh. Callous. I knew that. But I was angry. So very angry. And so very hurt. Fuck, I’ve never felt so hurt, so helpless and … and … weak, in my life.

Life. It all came back to life. To living.

“I’ve run out of fucking time, Brendon,” Amanda cried, her face contorted with wretched pain. “This is not how I wanted to tell you. Since the day I found out I was pregnant I’ve tried to work out how to tell you, knowing how much it would change everything. And then when Tanner started to get sick … From the day he was diagnosed I tried to work out how to tell you, but I was scared.” She dragged her hands though her hair. “And now I’ve fucking run out of time and our son is dying and all I know is I need you. Here. I need you here to save him, to save us. I need you, his father.”

I glared at her. “His father. The one who never got to be his father until you needed—”

“Hey!” Chase shoved at me, planted her small hands square on my chest and shoved. I staggered back a step and glared at her.

Chase glared back. I could see she was shaking. Trembling. I could see she was scared, facing me down like this, but like Richie all those years ago, she was copping the rage I felt for someone else.

“She fucked up, Osmond.” Chase narrowed her eyes and slid her arm around Amanda’s shoulders again. “She knows that. She’s known that since the day Tanner was born and you weren’t there to hold him. Do you have any fucking clue how many times I’ve watched her holding your son and gazing at him with tears in her eyes, full of regret that she hadn’t told you about him? Do you have any clue how many times Tanner’s fallen asleep in her arms to Amanda telling him about you? About how incredible his daddy is. Huh. Incredible, my ass. You have no idea of many times I found her staring at your picture on her phone, as Tanner slept in her arms. None.”

“Chase …” Amanda whispered. “Don’t … please …”

I doubted Chase heard her. She was either too intent on tearing me a new one, or she couldn’t hear her. Whatever the reason, she didn’t turn her sneer from me. “And of course, you have no idea how many hours she’s cried since the doctor told her your son has leukemia, but trust me, she’s cried enough for both of you. And when she knew she had to call you, when she had to face her fear of you hating her, she still did it. She stepped up. She did what was best for your son and called you. So stop acting like a fucking caveman and step up yourself. Step up and show me why she’s never stopped loving you. Step up and—”

“Enough,” Amanda snapped. She gripped her sister’s upper arms. “Enough, Chase.” Her words were clear. Modulated.

Chase shook her head. “I hate this, sis. I hate … He’s dying. My nephew is dying … and all you two care about is your pride? Who did who wrong? Do you really think it matters now? Do you really think your pride is going to help the situation? You fucked up, sis. He knows that. You know that. So get over it. It’s done. It’s time to move forward and get your fucking acts together. Now.”

She shrugged out of Amanda’s hands and ran from the living room.

A part of me wondered how the door didn’t splinter with the force of her slamming it shut behind her. The rest of me still raged. I fixed my eyes on the back of Amanda’s head, waiting for her to turn. To face me. To look at me.

“She really does like you,” she whispered, her shoulders slumping.

The wounded attempt at humor sheared at any control I had left. “I don’t give a fuck,” I snarled. “I’m not here to be liked. I know that now. I’m here to be cut open.”

Amanda slumped further, hunching over herself, head down. Her shoulders shook as a raw sob tore from her. “I’m sorry, Brendon. I’m so sorry. I wish I could tell you how sorry I am.”

“Sorry for what, Amanda? For not telling me about Tanner? Or for ever meeting me in the first place?”

She turned then. Fixed me with a level stare, her shoulders no longer shaking. There was steel in her eyes. “I will never be sorry for meeting you. Never. Not even the you standing before me now. If I’d never met you, I wouldn’t have Tanner, and he is the most incredible, beautiful, wonderful thing I’ve ever had in my life.”

I drew in a slow breath. The you standing before her wasn’t a good one. He was resentful and furious. I recognized that, and yet I couldn’t let it go. It was Richie Gribble and Lochie all over again.

“Now,” she went on, wiping at her cheeks with the back of a shaky hand, “if you can put your hatred of me aside for a while, I’d like to take you to meet your son. If you still want to meet him, that is.” She was trying to be strong, to be fierce. I could see that. I’m ashamed to say, I didn’t care at that point.

I had no clue how she’d imagined this all going – my arrival, my reaction to her news – but I doubt it was facing down a resentful Brendon. Amanda had never seen this kind of emotion in me during our time together. Hardly anyone had seen this emotion in me. The last person was probably Richie Gribble. For her to be standing there now, alone, and facing me down … it took courage. But I couldn’t applaud her for that at the moment. I don’t know if I ever could.

“Tell me honestly, Amanda,” I said. “Do you think I would walk out that door now and not go see my son?”

A sigh fell from her. Eyes closing, she slumped, all defiance and bravado gone. “No, I don’t. As much as you hate me, and I don’t blame you for doing so, I know you. I know you won’t do that.”

I stood motionless for a long moment, staring at her, wishing to fucking hell I had some access to a time machine. Some way to reset the last three years, to remove her completely from my life. And then I let out a sigh of my own, one of self-disgust and frustration. It was true I’d been rattled, but rattled or not, I was still me. And I didn’t do regret. Nor did I waste time and energy wishing for something totally out of my control, and wanting to change my past was very much wishing for such a thing.

“I don’t hate you, Amanda,” I said with a small shake of my head. The words scratched at the silence. “I just …”

I couldn’t finish. I didn’t know what I just was.

“Okay.” She nodded, a brief dip of her head, and let out another wobbly breath. “Okay. Would you like me to take you to meet Tanner now?”

I returned her small nod with one of my own. “I would.”

“Okay. Just let me get my keys.”

I didn’t move as she walked passed me. For a second, the urge to thread my fingers through hers and tug her to my body crashed over me, and was gone just as quickly. I had no clue if it was an instinctual urge, a base sexual urge, or something deeper, something profound, but like so much of my feelings at the moment, I didn’t want to know.

So I didn’t reach for her, didn’t take her hand in mine. Instead, I turned my gaze to the window in the far wall and watched blankly as the trees moved in the summer breeze beyond.

A few minutes later, I heard the sound of keys jingling.

“Are you ready?” she asked behind me.

I let out a soft grunt. Was I? Could a guy ever be ready for something like this?

Turning on my heel, I gave her a small nod. “Yeah. I’m ready.”

“Want to put some shoes on?”

Her question made me blink. A hesitant smile curled her lips.

“I mean, I know you Aussies are laid back and all, but … shoes might be a good idea for where we’re going.”

I didn’t ask where that was. I knew. How could we be going any other place than the hospital? But I knew I’d crack if that word was uttered aloud. I suspect Amanda knew it as well.

I’d never felt so fucking brittle.

Climbing into Amanda’s small hatchback ten minutes later, I looked over the back. There was the evidence of Tanner’s existence. A baby seat was strapped onto the bench seat, its upholstery a brightly colored collection of trains and trucks. Resting in the seat was a child-size baseball cap, a smiling cartoon lion on its front, TANNER printed beneath it in cheery letters. Hanging from the handgrip above the window was a mobile made of equally colorful shapes. On the seat beside was an overnight bag, open, with some of its contents spilling out. My gaze snagged on a pink bra. I recognized that bra, remembered taking it off her more than once in Sydney. Remembered throwing it over my shoulder once in playful exuberance. It had become stuck on my bedroom’s ceiling fan and proceeded to circle above us as we made love …

“I keep a bag ready in the car.”

At the sound of Amanda’s soft voice, I dragged my eyes – and my mind – from the bra, to look at her where she now sat behind the driver’s wheel.

“In case I need to stay over at the hospital.”

There was the word. An invisible fist smashed into my gut. Cold and brutal.

I drew in a swift breath, willing my expression to stay relaxed. “Do you do that often?”

She started the car and put it into gear. “More recently than at the … at the beginning.”

With that, she pulled away from the curb. The drive to our destination was quiet. Neither of us spoke much. There were questions in my head but I couldn’t ask them. For good or for bad, I’d sunk into an introspective funk.

Amanda occasionally commented on the traffic but I wasn’t sure if it was to me, or to herself.

I don’t know if it was the first street sign for the New Dawn Children’s Hospital that released something in me, but as I watched it grow larger through the windscreen, and then disappear behind us as we passed it, I shook my head. “You didn’t pick me up from the airport in your own car because you didn’t want me to know? About Tanner, I mean?”

Amanda flicked me a quick glance. Her grip on the steering wheel tightened. “Yes. And no. Chase had offered to collect you while I tidied up the house. I was in the middle of it when she came around. I was freaking out. It wasn’t until she pointed out I’d hidden all evidence of Tanner that I realized that though. I thought I was cool.” She grunted and rolled her eyes. “Hiding anything that belongs to your son is far from cool though. Chase sat me down, looked me in the eye and told me I had to get my act together. And then, just in case I didn’t get her point, she repeated it in sign language and added a few fuckings in there for good measure.”

My laugh surprised me. “I can see Chase doing that.”

Amanda smiled, her eyes on the busy road. “Yeah. She all but stopped swearing aloud when Tanner was born. Reserved her foul language for signing. It’s about the only time she does sign, when she wants to swear at someone or something.”

“A considerate aunt?”

It was Amanda’s turn to laugh. “Maybe. Something tells me Tanner will be well-versed in signing profanity when he’s …” She petered off. Anguish crossed her face. The expression made my chest tighten. “When it was time for Chase to go get you,” she continued without finishing the sentence, “I knew I had to do it. I didn’t want to and yet, at the same time, I did. I didn’t want to face you, I knew when I told you it wasn’t going to be good, but the thought of seeing you …” Another one of those quick glances came my way. “As I said before, I was selfish. I wanted to see you so much it hurt, and I wanted to see you not as the deceiving mother of your child, but as the girl you fell for back in Sydney. So I took the Speeding Dragon.”

Her confession scraped at my fraying nerves. A dark lick of anger stirred in me again. I swallowed it, fixing my attention on the road ahead. As if sensing the tension Amanda didn’t say anything else.

We stayed that way right up until we pulled into a parking space at the hospital. When Amanda killed the engine, neither of us moved. I was hit with a powerful urge to tell her to reverse out, to drive me to the airport. If I was at the airport, I wouldn’t be here, I’d never have to see …

It was Amanda’s soft hand on my arm that jerked me from the futile and cowardly reverie. I looked at it, noting the chewed nails, the ratty quicks. Gone were the neat nails with their white tips I remembered. There, on her hand, was a wordless story of a harrowing nightmare I hadn’t been aware was happening. Ignorance is bliss. And yet I couldn’t help but think, in this case, there was something innately empty about it as well.

“I know I’ve said this so many times the words probably mean nothing now,” she said, “but I’m sorry.”

I raised my gaze to her face and met her eyes, saw the heartache in them. The grief. The worry. The fear. The absolute terror.

“I know,” I said, covering her hand with mine. It wasn’t an acceptance of her apology, but it was an acknowledgement of what she was going through. It was the best I could give her at that moment. Maybe it was the best I’d ever be able to give her. And to think only a short while ago I was contemplating marriage, a future together, all three of us …

We climbed out of the car. No matter how I tried, I couldn’t not stop to look at that baby seat in the back and its smiling-lion baseball cap. At the name written in happy letters beneath that lion.

“Bren?”

I dragged my eyes from the cap and offered Amanda a smile. “I’m okay.”

“But not gravy?”

“Not gravy,” I answered honestly.

She nodded. “Let’s go.”

You know that smell hospitals have? That distinct smell of disinfectant, artificial air and food? I’m very familiar with that smell – Mum’s a nurse, remember? I’d spent more than one day of the school holidays whiling away the hours in the waiting room when child-minding plans had fallen through and there was no choice but for me to go to work with her. Added to that, playing football for most of my childhood and teenage years, the emergency department was my friend growing up. The smell of a hospital never instilled in me any sense of dread or heartache like it did for most people.

The second I exited the main foyer, however, and entered the hospital proper, with its distinct, ubiquitous, chemical-clean smell, my gut clenched and my mouth turned dry. A cacophony of electronic beeps from monitors, buzzers of patients in their rooms, doctors and nurses discussing said patients, all assaulted my ears, the horrible circumstances for me being at the hospital turning the familiar sounds into something harsh and jarring. Twisted the sickened sensation building like a storm inside me.

“Hi, Amanda.” A woman in pale green scrubs approached us from the opposite direction as we walked up the corridor toward a closed door. “How are you doing today?”

Amanda stopped and smiled at the woman. They spoke. Amanda indicated to me with another smile and a wave of her hand. I know I should have connected to the conversation, but I couldn’t. My head was roaring. My pulse was choking me. The door loomed before me. Closed to the rest of the world.

Above the door was a sign. ONCOLOGY. I stared at it. My gut clenched.

“Bren?”

I jumped at the feel of warm fingers on my arm and jerked around. Both women were regarding me – Amanda with a soft smile, the woman (was she a nurse?) with an apprehensive frown.

“Brendon,” Amanda continued without removing her hand from my arm, “this is Julie. Julie is the head nurse of the Oncology unit.” She gave Julie a warm smile. “She looks after Tanner for me when I’m not here.”

I looked at the woman, opened my mouth, then closed it again. Jesus, what was wrong with me?

“Julie, this is Brendon,” Amanda’s hand slid from my arm to find my fingers, “Tanner’s dad.”

A flicker of sympathy filled Julie’s face and then the apprehension dissolved into a wide, welcoming smile. “Hello Brendon. It’s wonderful to meet you. I can see where Tanner gets his looks from.”

I blinked again. I couldn’t connect. I couldn’t …

Amanda’s fingers squeezed mine. Not hard. Just a wordless message to let me know there was a connection. Hers and mine.

“G’day,” I said, although to be honest, it may have come out as a blurting sound, nothing like a word. “How’re you going?”

Julie gave Amanda a wicked grin. “Oh, I see what you mean about his accent.”

“I know,” said Amanda.

I turned to look at her. She shrugged up at me, her cheeks pink.

“Your mom and dad are in there at the moment, hon,” Julie said, her focus back on Amanda. Her grin faded, once again a warm, gentle smile. “And Chase.”

“Thanks, Julie,” Amanda said. “How is Tanner?”

It didn’t escape me that she let go of my hand. I should have been relieved, given how angry I was with her. Instead, I felt … lost.

Julie gave her a funny little head nod. “He’s waiting for his mommy.”

“I’m here. And so’s his daddy.”

Julie turned her smile to me. “It was nice to finally meet you, Brendon.” And with that, she left, walking down the corridor away from us.

“You okay?”

I swung my dry, hot stare to Amanda and nodded.

“Me too.” She approached the door, pumped waterless disinfectant into her palms from the dispenser, and then gave me a nervous smile. “Let’s go.”

Without another word, she pushed the door open with her shoulder and crossed the threshold. After disinfecting my own hands, I followed.

Taking that first step through the door was difficult. Daunting. And at the same time I wanted to run through it and find the son I didn’t know I had, before the universe tilted and threw my life into chaos once more.

We were a few steps along the corridor of the Oncology ward when I saw him – a man in a brown tweed suit, glaring at me from the open doorway of a room just past the nurse’s station.

Charles Sinclair.

Amanda’s father straightened, his eyes piercing and direct behind the lenses of his rimless glasses. His jaw bunched. I drew a slow breath. To say he’d never been my biggest fan was an understatement, but the contempt radiating from him surprised me.

Amanda took my hand in hers as we came to a stop in front of him. “Dad, you remember Brendon?”

Charles ran a slow inspection over me, as if cataloguing every crease and wrinkle in my shorts and T-shirt and filing them under FAIL.

I offered my hand. “Mr. Sinclair.”

He didn’t take it. “You’ve been conspicuously absent in my daughter’s life, Osmond. At a time when she – and your son – needed you the most. Can’t say I didn’t expect it, to be honest. I always knew you weren’t—”

“Dad,” Amanda groaned, embarrassment and regret filling the sound. “I told you not to—”

“I would have been here, Chuck,” I said, dropping my hand and ignoring his not-so-subtle insult, “but until two hours ago, I had no clue I had a son.”

His eyes narrowed behind his glasses. The lenses were spotless. Meticulously cleaned. “And why’s that, do you think? Why do you think my daughter didn’t want to let you know you’d messed up her life, hmm? What does it say about you that she’d rather face this alone than with the Neanderthal who got her—”

“Dad,” Amanda snapped. “Enough.”

He stopped talking, but he didn’t stop glaring at me. There was some serious hate there. At that point in time, I didn’t give a flying fuck.

“Excuse me for being rude, but this Neanderthal is here to see his son, not stand in a corridor and trade insults with you.”

His chest puffed up. It was a ridiculous sight. He stood no taller than my chin and was reed thin. And yet there he was, a father defending his child, protecting his child, with the only weapon he had – words.

Would I be equally as combative if the situation was reversed?

I didn’t need to think about the answer. I was ready to do whatever was needed to help a son I hadn’t met yet. There was no doubt in my mind I’d use more than words to protect Tanner if necessary. I’d use every weapon I had at my disposal.

“I’m sure we’ll be seeing each other again while I’m here, Mr. Sinclair,” I said, forcing my voice to be calm, composed, despite the turbulent state of my mind. “I hope we can put the hostilities aside until my son’s life is no longer at risk.”

Charles’ nostrils flared.

I turned to Amanda before he could respond. “I’d like to see Tanner now.”

She nodded.

Flicking her father a quick look, she squeezed my fingers tighter and led me into the room he guarded.

I noticed three things the moment I entered the small space: the walls were covered with images of colorful balloons and equally colorful birds; there was medical equipment everywhere, beeping and whirring constantly; and in the middle of the room was a high bed, on which sat Chase and a little boy with his back to me. He was wearing Optimus Prime pajamas.

My feet stopped working. I think my heart did as well. I couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe.

“Tanner,” Chase said, tapping him gently on the knee as she directed a grin my way, “look who’s here.”

The little boy twisted on the bed to look where Chase was now pointing, and everything I’d ever felt in my life to that point – everything – faded to insignificance.

Gone was the blond Mohawk of the photo I’d seen earlier, but not the devilish delight in his face, despite the oxygen tube threaded into his right nostril and taped to his cheek.

Oh God, he was beautiful.

Blue eyes flittered over me, a curious frown pulling at his forehead for a second before his gaze found Amanda.

“Mommy!” Pure love and joy filled his face. He wriggled about, raising his hands – his little pudgy-fingered hands – toward Amanda. “Mommy.”

Amanda went to him. In two steps, she was on the bed with him, folding him into her body with gentle arms, kissing his head, his cheeks, his eyes. He giggled, his small hands finding her hair, her ears, as she did so. She kissed him and cuddled him and cooed words I couldn’t make out from where I stood. She loved him, adored him.

And I couldn’t move.

I. Couldn’t. Move.

I stood frozen just inside the room, with Charles Sinclair at my back, watching my son and the girl I’d loved with all my fucking heart, and I couldn’t move.

“He’s a happy little treasure.”

I started at the soft murmur to my left. Amanda’s mother stood beside me, her gaze on her daughters and grandson. She looked older, much older, than the last time I saw her. Older, and so very tired. If Tanner was visually a younger version of me, Jacqueline Winslow-Sinclair was an older version of Amanda.

Still smiling, she slid her attention up to me. “And a fighter. Don’t forget that, Brendon. He’s a fighter.”

I swallowed, staring at her.

“Bren?”

I looked at Amanda, perched on the side of the bed, holding Tanner on her lap. Tanner, for his part, looked busy investigating how the earring in her left earlobe worked.

She gave me a smile I could only describe as nervous. “Wanna come over here? There’s someone waiting to meet you.”

I swallowed again. Why was my mouth so dry? My pulse pounded in my ears, so hard I was surprised the hospital didn’t shake.

“Tanner?” Amanda lowered her smile to our son and jiggled her knees a little, pointing at me as she did so. He giggled. “Can you say hello to Brendon?”

With another giggle, he reached for her finger. He didn’t look at me. Not at first. It took Amanda another jiggle of her knees, which elicited another delighted giggle, and another point of her finger my way, before he did. He gave me a solemn look, pushing his body closer to Amanda’s.

“Say hello.”

Pushing deeper into Amanda’s chest, Tanner studied me, catching his bottom lip with his top teeth. It was such an Amanda action. It tore at my heart. As did the dark smudges beneath his eyes, and the pallor of his skin.

It hit me then. I had no clue at all what stage of leukemia Tanner was in. None at all. I had no fucking clue about anything about my son except he was sick. And he was right there. Right there.

He’s a fighter. Jacqueline’s murmured words replayed in my head. I looked at him watching me. What must I look like to him? This massive guy he’d never seen before, looming large in the doorway …

Was he scared? Like me?

He’s a fighter …

I moved, closing the small distance between us in two steady paces, and squatted down onto my heels directly in front of him until I was just below his eye level. I gave him a warm smile. “G’day, Tanner,” I said, keeping my voice soft and gentle as I rested a hand on Amanda’s knee. Not touching him, no matter how much I wanted to. “I’m Brendon.”

He gazed at me, face half pressed into Amanda’s breast, teeth still on his bottom lip, and didn’t say a word.

“Tanner,” Amanda said, brushing her fingers over his head. “This is your daddy. And now that he’s here, hopefully you can start to feel better.”