Thanks for reading and sharing your reviews! As always, many thanks to Beth Pryor and KarenES for their on-going support of this story and my writing.
Deacon walked off the elevator on the 10th floor of the hospital and looked down the hall, not sure what he might find. He looked to the left and saw Teddy sitting in the waiting room with Daphne and Maddie. He looked grim. Deacon paused, then turned right and headed toward Rayna's room. As he walked up to the door, Tandy came out.
"Thanks for coming, Deacon," she said, her voice strained.
"Yeah, of course, I mean, Maddie said she was askin' for me and Maddie sounded-she sounded funny on the phone," Deacon replied. "I didn't-I guess I thought I'd be the last person she'd be askin' for when she woke up."
Tandy sighed and brushed her hair back with her hand. She looked more tired than Deacon could ever remember seeing her.
"She's asking for you-only you. It's almost like she thinks you're still together," Tandy explained.
Deacon shook his head. "What do you mean? You mean she doesn't remember the accident? The CMAs? About Maddie?"
Tandy shook her head. "No, I don't think she remembers any of them. Teddy. The girls. She was very upset and confused when they came in earlier. Deacon, Rayna just kept asking for you."
Deacon backed up against the wall in the hallway and dropped down into a crouch. He hadn't been able to say out loud how afraid he was that Rayna wouldn't wake up, but after he got Maddie's call, he had been so relieved. He'd never expected this.
"Deacon, can you go in there?" Tandy asked, interrupting his thoughts. "She's pretty agitated and she wants you."
"Yeah," Deacon replied, as he stood back up. "But what are they saying? Is it? Will she be like this?"
Tandy shrugged. "They don't know. It could be the head injury, it could be the trauma of everything y'all went through before the accident, it could be a fluke. They don't know, Deacon."
Tandy followed him as they walked the rest of the way down to Rayna's room. They paused outside the door.
"Just try to keep her as calm as you can," Tandy instructed. "They don't want her getting too agitated and they don't want her talking. They took the tube out of her throat, but we have to be careful-it could hurt her voice if she doesn't take it easy and let her throat recover from the trauma of the intubation."
Deacon nodded that he understood, then pulled the door open with his good hand and walked into the room.
She looked like she had the day before, except that awful tube was gone from her mouth. Her eyes were closed and she seemed peaceful. He crossed over, sat down in the chair next to her bed and took her hand in his uninjured right hand. He rubbed his thumb gently over the soft skin on her hand and her eyes opened up.
"Don't talk, darlin'," he told her. "The doctors want you to be really careful and take care of your throat and voice."
"Where were you?" she asked.
He reached his hand up and smoothed her hair back. "I'm right here now, Ray. Now get some sleep and we can talk tomorrow."
She nodded and closed her eyes again, her breathing quickly growing even.
Deacon looked up as Tandy walked back into the room.
"She's already more calm," Tandy observed. "Can you...will you stay?"
"Of course," Deacon replied. "But what about the girls? And Teddy?"
"I'm going to send them home," Tandy explained. "The doctor said we should talk tomorrow and I don't know, maybe they'll have some more answers for us? But for now, I just need to make sure that Rayna is okay."
Deacon looked down at his hand folded in Rayna's. "I'm not goin' anywhere."
Deacon stood in the corner behind the chairs where Teddy, Tandy and Lamar sat in front of the doctor's desk.
"It may be a retrograde amnesia," the doctor explained. "It's pretty rare and I think we can hope for the best that it's related to the trauma of the accident and will resolve itself pretty quickly."
"And if it doesn't?" Lamar asked. "What do we do then?"
"Rayna will need some therapy to recover from her injuries. We'll get her started on physical therapy to deal with the trauma from the accident and from the time she was in a coma. We'll also begin with occupational therapy that will work with her memory issues."
"Are you saying she'll never remember our daughters?" Teddy asked. "Nothing about our life together?"
The doctor looked down at Rayna's records and back up at the anxious faces across from him. "I'm very sorry, Mr. Conrad, but it's as I said-the brain is a mysterious thing. It can confound and amaze us all at the same time. Your wife, Ms. Jaymes, she will know her children, but whether or not she's able to regain those memories of their childhood is still just something we don't know."
Deacon cleared his throat. "Uh...so, what...what can we do to help Rayna?"
"We need to be supportive, Mr. Claybourne. No matter what else is going on with all of you, right now you need to meet Rayna where she's at, not confuse her and agitate her. For now, I'm going to recommend that we limit her visitors to those who she does remember-her father, her sister and you, Mr. Claybourne. There will be time for her to learn more about her life, about the children, but for right now we're just going to try to limit the stimulus that will challenge her brain and create anxiety for her."
"So what do we tell my daughters?" Teddy asked. "They want to see their mother."
"And they will, Mr. Conrad. We just need to give it a day or two. I'm going to suggest that we bring one of our Child Life specialists up here to talk with the girls and try to explain to them what is happening. I think that it's important for them to understand what's going on with their mother, but we also need to make sure that we aren't unduly frightening them."
Lamar slammed down his hand on the desk. "Just figure out what the hell you people need to do to help my daughter. No matter the cost."
"Daddy!" Tandy called out as she put her hand on her father's arm.
Deacon shook his head, then turned and headed out of the office. He'd heard enough of the medical stuff-what he needed was to see Rayna. That would tell him more about what she may or may not be able to do.
"Deacon?"
Deacon turned from where he had been waiting outside Rayna's room to find Maddie standing there.
"Did they tell you what's wrong with Mom?" Maddie asked. "Last night-last night she didn't know who we were."
Deacon pulled Maddie toward him, into his arms. "I know it's scary, honey, but your mom is tough. She's gonna be okay." He ran his hand over her hair as she continued to cling to him.
"Honey?"
Deacon looked up from Maddie to find Teddy standing there. He loosened his embrace and Maddie turned to Teddy.
"Hey, honey-I need to talk to you and Daphne," Teddy said. He looked over at Deacon and shook his head, then led Maddie back down the hall to the waiting room without saying another word.
Just like Teddy, Deacon thought as he turned to head into Rayna's room.
She was still asleep. The nurse had said that they needed to make sure that she was maintaining a level of consciousness, but that with the head injury, she would also just need a lot of rest and calm to recover. He walked over and sat down in the chair, again. He'd slept there next to her last night, not letting go of her hand.
He looked up at the sound of a knock at the door. It was Scarlett.
"Thought you might need some clothes and things. And I brought your pills," Scarlett said as she walked in the room and set the small bag down next to Deacon's chair. "How's she doing?"
Deacon shrugged. "They don't really know. We'll have a better idea when she wakes up today, I guess."
"Deacon?"
Deacon and Scarlett looked over to find Rayna's eyes open. Deacon stood up and moved over next to Rayna's head.
"Can...can…" Rayna paused to clear her throat.
"Let me call the nurse, Ray," Deacon said. He reached over for the call button next to her bed.
"I should go," Scarlett said. "I'm prayin' for you, Rayna." Scarlett reached over and touched Rayna's hand before she turned to leave.
As the door closed behind Scarlett, Rayna reached for Deacon's hand. "Who?"
Deacon wasn't sure what to say. He didn't want to confuse her, further, but then Rayna would have to learn all of this eventually.
"We can talk about it later, Ray. Look, here's the nurse." He turned to the nurse who had walked into the room.
"Good to see you awake again, Ms. Jaymes," the nurse said. "I'm going to call your doctor, but I can also get you a cup of ice chips, if you want to try that."
Rayna nodded.
Deacon hadn't been sure what to expect when Rayna woke up. He couldn't tell if it was the throat issue that was making her communication so stilted or maybe it was something more dire-was the problem bigger than just her memory?