Hayes’s voice cut through the darkness. “Hey, we’re here,” he announced. “Let me drop you off, and I’ll park and meet you inside.”

I nodded and opened the door, not looking back as I closed it.

When I got to the information desk, a woman with kind eyes directed me to the recovery unit. I texted Jim that I was on my way, and he met me in the lobby, greeting me with a quick hug as I got off the elevator.

“You didn’t have to come all the way here,” he said gruffly. His eyes were red and swollen, and he looked like he hadn’t slept in a week.

“I know,” I said. “But it’s important for me to be here. Plus you need someone to get you coffee.”

Jim ruffled my hair after I said this, a gesture that I knew meant Thank you, I love you, I’m glad you’re here. He and my mom weren’t particularly big on expressing their feelings, and Jim especially spoke more through gestures and acts of kindness than he did through words. It had taken me years to learn this, to come to terms that I was the only one of the three of us who needed to verbalize…well, everything.

“How’s Mom?” I asked, trying to keep the tears at bay.

“Resting,” he said. “But she’s awake if you want to say a quick hello.”

I followed him down a long hallway, lit up in a dull-yellow light. The sound of hospital machines beeping and ringing around us blended together to form a depressing melody.

We shuffled into a nondescript room, where my mom sat propped up in a hospital bed, her shoulder-length gray-brown hair spread out against crisp white pillows. Her skin was sallow, and an IV stuck out of her arm.

“Francesca Marie,” she said. Her voice was hoarse but still, I could hear the disappointment. “What are you doing here? You’re sick.”

“Mom, you had a heart attack,” I said, guilt filling me head to toe. I dragged a gray plastic chair over to the side of her bed as Jim plopped into the armchair in the corner of the room. “Did you really think I wouldn’t come the second I heard?”

She smiled at this, and her eyes shimmered with the gloss of tears, though not a single one left her eye to travel down her face. She was a master at holding in a cry.

“I told Jim not to bug you so you could sleep off your migraine.”

“I’m okay, Mom,” I croaked.

I would need to come clean with her about everything soon, but now was not the time. She reached a pale hand out, and I took it in both of mine and gave her a squeeze.

Her gaze went from affectionate to inquisitive in an instant, her brows sharpening on her tired face. “How’d you get here?”