Mmmm… Well, I've spent this evening listening to Get Cape. Wear Cape. Fly. (great band), and now, listening to .com/watch?v=iS9Jxh1l7zo&feature=search, I'll write Chapter 15.

Mistakes Already Made

Chapter 15

Bridget sighed with contentment, staring into Eric's eyes. They were waiting for the nurse to come back with their son, and Carmen, Lena, and Tibby had given them some alone time by leaving to wait in the hallway. Eric's eyes were very dark brown, almost black, and Bridget wondered if there was such a thing as truly black eyes. If there was truly black anything. There was always a fleck of brown, or a fleck of something bright that wasn't black, no matter how dark it looked. Bridget wondered at Eric's eyes, and he wondered back, thinking about their blueness, and the way they seemed to hold the whole ocean in them. They were the blue of the sea – not the green sea, not the one polluted with garbage and junk people had carelessly thrown into it, but the true blue that it once must have been, before there was any land to destroy it. That was Bridget's eyes – they were the color of pureness and simplicity.

"What should we name him?" Eric asked, breaking the silence.

"I was thinking of Marley," Bridget said.

"Marley…" Eric considered, and Bridget was suddenly afraid he wouldn't like it. "I love it."

Bridget beamed. Eric beamed back.

"Bridget Vreeland and Eric Richman?" a nurse asked, walking into the room. "Your baby is in the NICU. Third door on the left, second floor. You should probably wait a while before going, until you feel ready-"

But Bridget was up and out of the bed and charging out of the room.

"Can my friends come?" she asked the nurse.

"No, family only."

Bridget gave her friends a sympathetic pout before starting down the hallway. Her father was there now, and he joined her. Eric came up behind her, saying things like, "Are you sure you feel alright?" and "We can wait."

"Yes, I'm sure, and no, of course we can't wait!" Bridget gave him a fake glare. He pretended to be hurt. Bridget's dad shook his head. He didn't say anything.

"Okay, Bee. We need a middle name," Eric said as they stepped into the elevator.

"What's the first name?" Bee's dad asked.

"Marley," Bridget responded.

There was a silence, and then Bridget's dad patted her hand. "Beautiful name, honey. I'm sure he's a wonderful little boy." But he looked worried.

And then it occurred to Bridget. Marley had been born in the 22nd week of pregnancy. That was early. Way too early.

"Wait, dad…Do you think he'll be okay?" Bridget asked. "Is he – I mean, do they survive that early?"

"Well, he's in an incubator now, I'm sure, and he's probably hooked up to a lot of living support. They do have a chance of survival born this early." Her dad looked slightly afraid to be telling her this.

Bridget glanced at Eric. It had never, even once, occurred to her that the baby could die. "A chance of survival? Not a chance of death?"

"I'm sorry, honey, but preterm babies often have lots of complications."

"Complications? Like what?" They were on the second floor now and were heading down the hall to the third door on the left.

"Well, sometimes their lungs haven't fully developed, or their heart, or their brains…There's surgery that can be performed, but this early is…it's a toss-up, honey. You never know – Marley could survive." He said the name Marley really weird, like it carried too much emotion to just be thrown through his voice box casually.

"Mmmm," Bridget hummed absently, opening the door and walking into a huge room full of incubators. The babies were varying sizes, but they all looked pretty much the same: tiny. Very, very tiny. Some were hooked up to a lot of machines, some were hooked up to one or two machines.

They found Vreeland, and Bridget was almost too afraid to look inside. Marley was going to be hooked up to tons of machines, she knew. She didn't want to see that.

But she really wanted to see her baby boy. So she looked. And there he was. Tiny. Hooked up to machines. And he did have her hair. Bridget had to smile. Someone else would have The Hair. There were little gloves to put your hands into the incubator and hold the baby, and Eric went first. Bridget looked around as Eric stroked the baby, talking to it softly. There were a few other parents in here, all looking tired and stressed. Bridget was the only one in a bloody hospital gown. She felt self-conscious about it, which was strange for Bridget, because she never much cared what other people thought. Well, it was shaping up to be a strange day.

"Here," Eric said, moving aside and letting Bridget see Marley again. Bridget put her hands into the gloves, and tentatively touched her baby's cheek.

Suddenly, she felt like crying. She couldn't bear the idea that Marley might not live. She couldn't bear the idea that another Marley could die.

"Maybe we should leave," she said quickly, pulling her hands away and turning to Eric.

"No, no…We should stay. He's a beautiful baby, Bee," Eric said, not sensing her distress.

"No!" Bridget felt frantic. "No, we have to leave. We have to!" She thought she might cry. She didn't want to cry. She never cried.

"Why?" Eric asked.

Bridget's dad was pretending not to hear, because that was what he did best. He didn't hear when Bridget was upset.

"Come on, let's go," Bridget said, tugging at Eric's wrist.

Bridget's dad would have let her go. He would have stayed and let Bridget leave because he didn't want to handle her pain on top of his. Or maybe he just couldn't handle it. Maybe that was it.

But Eric came. Bridget dragged him all the way out to the hallway and back to their room, past a wondering Carmen, Lena, and Tibby who let them pass, no questions asked.

"What's wrong, Bee?" Eric asked.

"Marley's going to die!" Bridget wailed, bursting into tears.

"No…No, he's not," Eric said calmly, looking a little less calm than he should have.

"Yes he is! Everyone who I've ever cared about always leaves!" Bridget had no idea where this was coming from, but it felt right.

"No. That's not true." Eric grated his teeth together. "That is not true at all, Bridget. Your friends haven't left. I haven't left. Marley won't leave. I promise." Eric squeezed Bridget's hand.

"You promise?" Bridget asked, looking up at him through watery eyes. He looked so sincere he believed he could actually promise such a thing and mean it.

"I do." Eric smiled. Bridget smiled. And then a tear escaped Eric's right eye, and Bridget leaned in closer to him. She meant to wipe it away, but it didn't quite work out that way.

Eric met her halfway, and their lips joined in a new way that they hadn't the first time. Now there was history. There was true feeling. It wasn't empty, like an empty promise of happiness. It was full and real, and it was better than anything Bridget had ever imagined.

Guys! You're falling down on reviews! C'mon, I want reviews because I am a greedy, hungry girl who needs reviews because I love them. Please.

Anyway, I'm going on vacation on Friday, and I'll be returning midweek the following week. I'll take my laptop and work on this story, and maybe get ahead in updates for when school starts so I have some reserve. Internet access is a big IF. So I'll update IF I can. Which I probably won't. So. I'll still try and get in as much as I can before I leave on Friday, but I'll be pretty busy beforehand, so it may only be a chapter. 3 you guys.