Dr. Brandt: Chapter 37

Cameron and I were on day three of our vacation, and this place was nothing short of paradise in every sense. Punta Mita was mind-blowing, to say the very least. The tropical area felt like an island of its own.

From the white sand beaches to our fantastic villa, I woke up every morning content to my core.

“What’s on the list today?” Cam asked, walking out of the shower naked, knowing I would appreciate the chance to ogle him.

I pulled my hands up behind my head and into my pillows, allowing the blankets to slide down from where they covered my breasts, offering him a little something too.

His eyes sparkled like the cobalt blue color of the ocean water just beyond our master suite.

“I’ll take this as my invitation,” he said as he climbed onto the bed, crawled over my body, and his deliciously hard cock rubbed against my abdomen. “God, I want you, baby.”

I ran my hands up his back, knowing we’d start the day like this as we had every other day since we’d arrived.

“What are you thinking about?” Cam asked as I sipped my fruity cocktail.

I pushed my hair from my face as the wind blew it around. “About how happy and relaxed I am,” I said, smiling at him.

“That’s because you’re finally living a little, and you’re not strapped down by worry and stress.” He leaned over and kissed my forehead before he stood. “I’m happy that you’re enjoying yourself.” He shook his empty beer bottle. “I’m getting another. Do you want the bartender to make you another cocktail?”

“I think I’ll switch to water. It’s only two in the afternoon, and I’ll be too drunk to eat dinner tonight if I keep this going,” I laughed.

“Back in a sec,” he said, then walked back into the villa where, for some ridiculous reason, we had a chef and bartender at our beck and call.

I brought my attention back to the ocean, watching it sparkle in so many iridescent ways, and genuinely proud of myself for not bugging Jacks this entire vacation.

The rustling of the palm trees in the breeze, and the waves crashing into the shore, were hypnotic, and I was so thoroughly relaxed that I could’ve fallen asleep.

“Jessica,” Cameron said softly, most likely not wanting to startle me.

“Mm?” I said, stretching a little, realizing I was about to doze off from the combination of the alcohol and the soft, warm breeze.

He ran his hand over the top of my head. “Baby,” he said, and my eyes widened when I saw him kneeling at my side.

Holy shit. Was Jackson right? Is Cam going to propose?

“Cam?” I said with a laugh and a smile. I was more nervous than excited at the thoughts running through my head. I wasn’t sure I was ready to take this step. This careless lifestyle had agreed with me so far, but I wasn’t sure I should jump right back into an engagement. “Umm, what are you doing?”

I smiled bashfully, knowing precisely what he was doing. This was Cameron, and spontaneous was his middle name.

But his expression didn’t change with my smile, and it confused me. Something wasn’t right; I could sense that now.

“I’ve arranged for the jet to be prepared to take off within the hour. The captain assured me that he would be at the airport in thirty minutes and the plane would be ready. We can’t waste any time.”

“Oh my God! Is it Jackson?” I screeched. It felt like a building had landed on top of me. I couldn’t feel anything but pain, stabbing my heart and taking the oxygen from my lungs.

I should’ve known something bad would happen while I was off living in some euphoric fantasyland with Cameron. God help me! What have I done?

Calm the fuck down, and get ahold of yourself, Jessa!

“Tell me what happened,” I demanded, my voice grave but controlled.

I stood up, still bracing myself for the worst.

Cameron was as solemn as I was. “We need to get to the hospital. I need you to sit down. I need to tell you about our son’s condition.”

“Holy shit,” I cried, starting to crack.

No, no, no!

I sat down, and Cam knelt in front of me. My heart was racing, my palms were sweaty, and my legs trembled as a numbing sensation fell over me.

“No,” I shot up again, practically knocking Cameron back on his ass, feeling like I had to run to get to my son but had no clue which way to go. Where was he? Was he okay? Did…did the worst happen?

“Goddammit! What happened to my son? Is he dead? Tell me right fucking now! Is Jackson dead, Cameron?” I screamed at him like a lunatic and felt completely disconnected from my body. “Where is he?”

“He’s not dead, Jessica.” Cameron’s voice was deep, smooth, stern, and precisely what I needed to stop hyperventilating and take a deep breath.

He put his arms around me as I stood shaking and lightheaded, feeling I might faint at any second from the loud ringing in my ears.

Cameron pulled me back, steadying me and holding tightly onto me. “He is in a coma. It is not deadly,” he continued before I could utter a word, “but I need more answers than the vitals Jake relayed. I need more information, and I need to help our son.”

My brain must’ve confused what Cam had told me. There was no way Jacks was in a fucking coma. No way.

I stepped back into my body with a vengeance and took control. I couldn’t listen to this nonsense. I needed to hear something that made sense, and this wasn’t it.

“No, he’s not. He’s with Jake and Ash,” I said. This could’ve easily been some crazy nightmare I’d conjured out of guilt for leaving Jacks in the first place.

“Jessa, listen to me,” Cameron’s voice was authoritative. “The housemaids are packing our things,” he pulled his phone out of his front pocket and stared at it, “and the car is here to pick us up. We need to leave now.”

“This isn’t a nightmare?” I asked, feeling the weight of the truth from underneath my cloak of instant denial.

“No,” he said, his voice calm and steady. “But we need to get to Jacks immediately so I can assess his condition and decide my next steps to save him.”

You can’t help Jacks if you are freaking out, Jessa! Help or get out of the way! My internal demands felt like they came from another person. Maybe it was my fucking guardian angel; who knows? But I do know that something washed over me, abating my panic and turning it into laser focus.

“Do the doctors know what happened?”

“I’m waiting on a call back from Dr. Fremont. He’s the physician caring for Jackson until I return. They’re running scans on him, and we’ll have those results within the hour. I’ve already called ahead to my medical team, and they are calling in the ones I specifically requested for surgery if that is my decision. Unfortunately, I won’t know more until we arrive at the hospital, so we desperately need to leave.” He took my elbow in his hand, “Are you able to walk? Your legs seem a bit shaky.”

“Yes, I’m fine,” I said. “We need to go.”

“Please, have the luggage transported to the airport. I’ll ensure the next commercial flight brings them to LAX, where they will be received,” Cam said to one of the housemaids frantically running around, gathering our items that were strewn all over the place.

Ring! Ring!

The sound of Cam’s phone as we sat silently in the car nearly made me jump out of my skin.

“Yeah, you’re on speaker, Collin,” Cam said, looking at me.

“Jessa is next to you, I’m assuming?” Collin questioned seriously.

“She’s right here and can hear you,” Cam said.

“Okay, good,” Collin said.

“Where’s Jake? Was he with him?” Cam interjected.

“Jake is still with him. He told me to call you both and run interference while he stayed with Jackson and Dr. Fremont.”

“I barely got vitals from Jake before I had to take the call from the hospital,” Cameron said. He looked at me, “I told them to bypass calling you since you were with me.”

“Fine,” I answered, not caring about these details. “What happened, Collin? I need to know exactly what happened to my son.”

“Apparently, he went into a seizure, and as he began coming slowly out of it, another seizure followed, and then another. His seizures were back-to-back, not even five minutes apart,” Collin said. “Jake says Jackson had maybe four seizures before he fell into this comatose state. With the vitals Jake gave me, I can confirm he’s scoring a five GCS.”

“What the hell is that?” I snapped.

“Sorry, Jessa,” Collin said. “It’s the Glasgow Coma Scale.”

“It’s how we rate the extent of impaired consciousness in patients who may suffer any form of acute medical or trauma-like situations,” Cam explained.

“Being rated a five on that scale,” Collin interjected, “while not great, it simply means that yes, he’s in a coma. And Cam, I’m only confirming what he’s already been assessed at, given pupil dilation and his responses to sensory.”

“I’ll know more when I arrive,” Cam said. “I’m just perplexed, trying to piece together why he went into a coma in the first place. I’m more concerned about the back-to-back seizures in a short period.”

“Right and with no recovery before the next,” Collin added while I felt myself growing numb again.

I couldn’t believe this was my son we were discussing.

“It sounds like status epilepticus,” Cameron said, leaning forward and pinching the bridge of his nose.

“I think that may be what occurred,” Collin agreed.

Cameron looked at my confused expression. “Status epilepticus is when either a seizure lasts longer than five minutes or more than one seizure happens in under five minutes.”

“How did this happen? How could that happen?” I questioned, dropping my face into my hands, wishing I’d been there for my son when the seizures had taken a turn for the worse.

You should’ve expected this instead of running off like a fucking schoolgirl with no responsibilities! I scolded myself. You knew his seizures were worsening, and you still let him stay behind.

The guilt echoing in my brain was deafening, but I needed to concentrate.

“His seizures had advanced and progressed, but not to the point that I thought SE would be something he’d be facing in the near future,” I heard Cam say to Collin and me.

“And that was why you ordered more scans because it seemed the seizures were becoming more frequent?”

And why we should have never left him until we knew more, I thought, crying into my hands.

I felt Cam’s hand running calmly over my back.

“Right,” Cameron answered Collin. “The seizures were occurring more often, but definitely not at a rate that they would potentially consume him like this.”

“After working with adult patients with Jackson’s medical condition for so long, I agree with your assessment. I wouldn’t have imagined SE would become an issue for him.”

“But it has,” Cameron answered. “I just need to determine the next steps to help him and bring him out of this comatose state.”

“Do you think you may move forward with the surgery with him in the coma?” Collin questioned.

“Not sure,” Cameron said. “I need to see the scans and go over labs and bloodwork. Fuck, I hate that I’m not there!” Cameron growled.

I pulled my face out of my hands, my rage matching Cameron’s.

“What the fuck were we thinking to leave the country with my son sick like this?” I questioned Cameron accusingly.

“Because he wasn’t sick like this,” Cam seethed. “If I saw this shit coming, I would’ve pressured you both to go through with surgery after I saw his first scans.”

“Bullshit,” I snapped back.

“Jessa,” Collin interrupted us as we escalated the conversation in the back of this SUV. “If Cameron were God, he would’ve known. Honestly, this happened, and it will be fixed. You have every right to be pissed, but please understand that the brain is a mysterious entity. We can’t predict everything that will happen. We just can’t. We can only control what we can control.”

“If I saw Jackson’s left hemisphere acting out of character and could have predicted an anomaly with his epilepsy, yes, you damn well better believe I would have mandated this surgery as his physician and as his father who loves him.”

“I just don’t understand,” I answered, furious at myself and becoming angrier at the world by the second.

Cameron’s hand covered my fidgeting ones. “I understand that more than you know,” he said to me. “I need to see why he took such a harsh turn so suddenly,” he returned his attention to Collin. “But, to answer your question, Col, I don’t know if I’ll operate on him and perform the surgery at this point. I can’t be sure.”

“I have operated on comatose epileptic patients before,” Collin said, “and my surgeries were successful. If you need my input on anything, please know that I will happily advise.”

“I appreciate that,” Cam answered. “I’ve assisted on two other surgeries in such conditions, but the patients were stable. I need to see those scans.”

“All right. If I hear anything, I’ll call, but I’m sure you’ll hear from Jakey first. Both of you stay strong. We’re all in this together for Jacks.”

“We’re just arriving at the airport,” Cam said. “We’ll be there soon.”

“I’m calling Warren, and I need to call my parents,” I finally said, having had enough of hearing about this shit and knowing we had a minimum two-hour flight before we got to my comatose son.

This was an absolute worst-case scenario, and half the reason we hadn’t put any stress on Jacks for the surgery was that I’d been fucking around with Cameron.

It was the entire fucking reason, actually. Cam and I were out here living it up billionaire-style, high on life without a care in the world, and that was why my son was in a coma instead of recovering from a surgery he should’ve had a month ago.

All this happened because I started screwing off and letting my responsibilities to my son slide. I’d permitted myself to let go of my burdens and unwind while my son’s condition progressively worsened. What kind of mother does that? And what kind of a man lets her?

This was all the product of me acting irresponsibly. I was ashamed of myself and took full responsibility for my son’s condition.

When my son needed me most, I was gone, and I’d never forgive myself for that.