Chapter 18

After what had seemed like an eternity, the flat line on the monitor had given way to a jagged spike… then another… and another. And now, almost an hour later, Dr. Hoo finally returned to the waiting room. Before he could so much as open his mouth, Bill stood and faced him.

"I know you people always try to make things sound better than they are, but I don't want any of that bullshit. Just tell us what's happening."

The doctor nodded. "All right. Just as I suspected, he's having trouble recovering from the blood loss. The residual shock of it actually caused a cardiac arrest. However, as I'm sure you saw, we were able to restore a fairly regular pulse, and, for now, he's stable. He's heavily sedated, because there's no guarantee that this won't happen again. We want him resting until we're sure he can recover."

"And what are his chances of that?" Bill asked quietly.

"Officially, I can't say yet."

"Unofficially, then."

Dr. Hoo smiled slightly. "He lost a lot of blood very fast, but he's strong, and he's fighting. All he has to do is make it through the next few days. I don't want to make any promises, but I, personally, believe he can do it."

Bill sank back into his chair next to Elizabeth, running his fingers through his hair. Elizabeth nearly smiled. He looked just like Will.

On his way out of the room, Hoo added, "You can go back and sit with him for a while if you'd like. No more than two at a time, though, please, or the nurses will have my head."

They all nodded, and Elizabeth said quietly, "Thank you."

After the doctor had left, Jack looked at Bill and Elizabeth. "You two go. Take as long as you need. Ana an' I can wait."

Ana nodded in agreement, so Elizabeth and Bill got up and left.

The first thought that entered Bill's mind when he walked into his son's room was that he looked so young, almost like a kid laying there. He was reminded suddenly of the last time he had seen Will in a hospital, when he was fourteen. He had broken his left arm in a bike race with a boy from school whose favorite pastime was picking on the "little paisley boy." Will may have broken his arm, but he had won the race, and he had sat there grinning like a hero the entire time they were setting his arm. There were no such smiles now. Will lay there, frighteningly still, his pale face contrasting starkly with the dark brown curls that rested against his forehead.

Bill sat heavily in a chair next to the bed, brushing a hand over his son's hair. "Oh, Little One…"

Moonlight gleamed coldly on the metal of the gun barrel as the sound of the shots shattered the night. Three shots, one after the other. She counted them silently. One, two, three…

Everything was black. She couldn't see. And then there was Will, looming up out of the darkness in front of her, covered in blood, an enormous mass of red.

"Why didn't you save me, Elizabeth?" His voice sounded far away; he was being drawn away from her, and she couldn't bring him back. She tried to say something, to tell him that he was sorry, that there was nothing she could do, but she couldn't speak. She could only watch as he faded from sight.

"Why didn't you save me?"

Elizabeth woke with a start, shivering. She was curled up in a chair in Will's hospital room. Bill sat next to her. He reached over, rested a hand lightly on her arm.

"Are you okay?"

She nodded slowly, rubbing her eyes. "It was just a dream. A bad dream," she admitted.

"Do you want to talk about it?" Bill asked quietly.

Elizabeth looked at Will, at the thick bandages that covered the wounds in his chest. "I should have saved him."

"What?"

"I should have saved him!" Elizabeth repeated. "When he pushed me out of the way, I should have pulled him with me or – or something."

"Elizabeth," Bill said firmly, sliding his chair closer so he could see her face. "This is not your fault. Frankly, it's incredible that he was able to move fast enough to get you out of the way. You couldn't have saved him as well. No one could have; there wasn't time."

Elizabeth shook her head. "I still feel like it's my fault."

Bill sighed. "I know how you feel. Believe me, I do." He also turned to look at Will. "When he first came to live with me after his mother died… he broke my heart. Every time I looked at him, I could see in his eyes that he was scared, he was upset, he was angry… he was lost. And I started to feel like it was my fault. I started to think that somehow, she had died because of me, because I left. I watched Will struggle to deal with what was happening, with his entire life turning upside-down, and I blamed myself for letting it happen, for not being able to help him. It didn't even make sense. His mother had cancer. She didn't find out until four years after I left, and even then she didn't tell me. My leaving had absolutely nothing to do with it, there was nothing I could have done to change it. But I still blamed myself."

"And what did you do?" Elizabeth asked. "How did you deal with it?"

"For a long time, I didn't," Bill answered. "It tore me apart, but I couldn't make myself stop believing it. But I remember when it finally went away."

"When?"

Bill smiled. "The first time Will hugged me. When he accepted me as his father… as his family. That took a year. A whole year of beating myself up over something that wasn't my fault. It's not worth it, Elizabeth."

She looked over at him. "What do you mean?"

"It hurts, blaming yourself like that. And it's not worth it. You have to accept that there was nothing you could have done, nothing you could have changed. And you have to move on. Can you do that?"

Elizabeth nodded slowly. "I think so."

Bill squeezed her hand. "Good. Will would want you to."

She attempted a weak smile. "I know."

The silence in the room was broken suddenly by the sound of a phone ringing. Elizabeth pulled it out – Ana had volunteered to retrieve it for her the day before – and frowned as she looked at the screen.

"Who is it?" Bill asked, noticing the look on her face.

"My father. He – he doesn't know what happened. I haven't told him. I don't think he really approves of Will, to be honest."

"You should answer it," Bill urged. "If he hasn't heard from you in a few days, then he's probably worried."

Elizabeth nodded. "I'll go outside."

"Don't bother," Bill said, standing up. "I'll go get us some coffee from the cafeteria." He left.

Elizabeth answered the call. "Hi, Dad."

"Is everything all right, Elizabeth? You sound… tired. Worried."

Elizabeth bit her lip, unsure of what to say. "I'm… I'm at the hospital."

"What – "

"At the hospital, Dad, not in the hospital. I'm fine. It's…" She swallowed hard, watched Will's chest rise and fall for a moment to remind herself that he was still there, still alive. "It's Will."

"What happened, sweetheart?"

Her heart broke at the term of endearment, and suddenly she wished he was there. "He took me out for dinner, just like our first date. Afterwards we went for a walk by the river, and – "

"He was shot?" her father asked quietly.

Elizabeth was silent for a few seconds, startled. "How – how did you know?"

"It was on the news," he answered. "There was a shooting along the Thames three nights ago. The police just picked up the suspect earlier today, based on the description given by 'the victim's girlfriend,'" he said, quoting the report. "I imagine they'll need you to identify him."

"I suppose so," Elizabeth agreed.

"Is he going to be all right?" he asked suddenly.

"We don't know yet," Elizabeth answered.

"Let me know if anything happens."

"I will. But Dad… I thought – I thought you didn't like Will."

There was a brief silence, then he replied, "I was uncertain, at first. But you love him, and I want you to be happy, little girl."

Elizabeth closed her eyes, genuinely smiling for the first time in days. "Thanks, Dad. I'll call you when I know anything, okay?"

"Okay. I love you."

"I love you, Dad."

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