14
Third Person’s POV
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“Is there any family member of this homeless begg..”, The doctor was cut in the between by Sophia when he was about to call Brandon a ‘BEGGAR.’
“He is my ex-husband.”, Her words were laced with anger, and she glared at him.
“Oh! I’m sorry, Ms. Weasley.”, The doctor apologies. “We were just asking that question for the formalities.”
“We will handle the formalities, doctor. Please check on the patient and let us know what is wrong with him.”, Eden said, sensing the pissed mood of Sophia.
Once the doctor left, Eden pulled Sophia into a hug to divert her mind. “Calm down, Sophia. He just misunderstood Brandon as …. Umm, someone else.”
“I can’t see… him in.. this state, Eden.”, She started crying, wrapping her hand around Eden. “Please do … something.”
“What can I do, Sophia? I’m a werewolf, not a magician.”, Eden joked and then hissed in pain when Sophia stomped her heels on her feet. “Oouchh… that hurts!!”, She complained, on which Sophia cried and laughed at the same time.
“Excuse me!!” A nurse gained their attention, and they looked at her. “These are the belongings of the patient which were in his clothes,” She said, handing over a card, phone, and some cash.
“Thank you!!” Eden took those from the Nurse’s hand.
“Can you please tell me what is wrong with Brandon?” Sophia asked in a low tone, scared with the thought that what if …. what if something major disease would be traced then? Her mind was filled with all types of negative thoughts from the moment Eden told her that Brandon was now a heavy drinker.
She had seen a lot of people dying from the consumption of a lot of Alcohol.
“I’m not sure, but I think one of his kidneys has stopped working.”, Nurse replied, on which Sophia took a few steps backward. “Well, this is not confirmed yet. But there is a high chance that this can be the reason. As for now, we have taken a sample of his blood to estimate GFR (glomerular filtration rate), and once he awakes, we will have to take the sample of his urine to estimate ACR (albumin-to-creatinine ratio). Please, excuse me now.”, Saying this, the Nurse walked away.
Eden turned around to check on Sophia and found her crying bitterly. Eden had seen her sad all these sad at the thought of her Ex-husband and past memories. She hardly used to cry non-stop.
“Sophia…” Eden didn’t know what to say. Her situation wouldn’t have been different than her if Arya would have been there instead of Brandon.
At the same time, Brandon’s phone rang; Eden looked at it before speaking, “Some Bruce is calling. Do you know this guy?”
Sophia nodded before swiping the phone. She controlled herself from not crying while talking to him but failed badly. Thankful, he didn’t ask anything and was coming here.
And when he would be here, she would get to know what had happened in all these years that had changed so much like if he was north pole previously then now he was the south pole.
At that time, Eden remembered that she had forgotten to share all these things with Arya, so she mind linked her.
‘Hey babe, you won’t believe what happened today.’, Eden said
‘If you won’t believe what happened here!’ Arya responded.
‘What? What happened? Are our pups fine?’ Eden asked in tension.
‘Yeah! They are fine, but approx half an hour before ______” Arya narrated everything that happened.
‘So, you are coming over here with pups!’
‘Well, I didn’t have any choice. Both wanted to come after hearing her mother’s crying voice, and then they related it to Brandon’s sickness.’, Arya replied. ‘Now, you tell me how did you meet Brandon and how the hell everyone landed in the hospital?’
Now, this was Eden’s turn to explain everything to Arya.
‘Is Sophia okay?’
‘No. I haven’t seen her like this before. She is crying like Calvin, who doesn’t listen to anyone whenever he cries.’
‘So, what do you think? How will she react to seeing all of us there? What if she didn’t want the pups to meet their father?’ Arya asked in tension.
‘Whatever will happen, I will take responsibility for everything about that card incident in case that topic will be raised.’ Eden replied, ‘Come here soon, babe! Love you.’
‘Love you too, mate.’
****
After half an hour!!
When Sophia’s gaze landed on Bruce, she got the second shock of the day because he was carrying both her kids. She couldn’t understand how the hell he reached near them. She forgot to cry seeing them. If they were her strength, then they were her weakness too. And she knew if she could cry in front of them, they would cry a lot more than her.
“Mom! Mom!”, They both forwarded their hands toward her, and Sophia took them in her arms one by one carefully. It wasn’t that they were not heavy; it was just she was habitual of picking both of them at the same time.
“We are here for you, Mom. You don’t have to cry NOW.”, Calvin said, wiping her tears.
“Yes! We heard you crying over the call and came quickly near you because we are your strength, right?” Colton asked.
“Hmm!!”, Sophia nodded. She couldn’t speak a word because all of a sudden, she felt a lump in the thought. And there, everyone thought that they were here for their father. A part of them was her for their father, but what worried them the most was their mom was crying like a baby.
Whenever they used to get hurt and cry for no matter how long, she was always there for them to console them till they returned back to normal.
Today, it was their turn to do the same. After all, their mom always used to say that they were her strength.
Both the kids wiped her tears off their sides and kissed her.
“Your kids are too sweet and intelligent, Sophia.”, Bruce said with a small smile.
Sophia just gave him a weak smile and looked at him. He looked almost the same except for the wrinkles and some of the grey hairs, while Brandon had changed beyond recognition.
“How is our dad now?” Calvin asked cheerfully. “Is his headache gone?”
Before Sophia and Eden could answer his question, a Nurse interrupted them.
“Patient has gained his consciousness. You guys can meet him.”
“Yeee… time to meet dad!!” Calvin said. “Mom, let’s go inside.”
‘You can leave forever. And NEVER EVER return back to me for any reason because the contract is already OVER.’ Brandon’s word rang in her ears.
She didn’t want to meet him. Seeing his face after all this time would remind her of the time when they had officially met each other and from where their story had begun.
“Calvin, I…”
“Excuse me, Ms. Weasley.”, Another nurse interrupted her. “The doctor is asking for your presence in the cabin to discuss Mr. Haysert’s report.”
‘PERFECT,’ she thought in her mind.
“Kids, I will meet your dad next time.”, She said, putting over of them on the ground. “For now, I have to meet the doctor to know your dad’s condition, okay?”
“Okay!!”, Colton nodded.
“And the moment important thing, I had told you that your dad was on an adventure trip, right?”, Both the kids nodded their heads. “He was in the forest where there was any network or signal. In short, without any facilities and proper food, nothing. That’s why he doesn’t look like the same person that he was once.”
“He looks like Tarzan now?” Calvin asked, furrowing his eyebrow
“Sort of.”, Sophia lied. “But he is still your dad, who loves you both a lot and also had sent gifts for your birthday after coming out of the forest, and then he fell sick.”, She added on more lie. Well, two actually, or say the web of lies.
“Okay, Mom.”, Colton nodded.
She kissed the cheeks of both the kids before looking at Bruce, “Please stay here with kids. In case one has to handle the situation.”, She said indirectly and stood up on her feet. “Eden, Arya!! Come with me.”
“I’m coming with you, Sophia. You can ask either of them to stay here.”, Bruce said. “I want to know what is in the report.”
Eden saw Colton pinching Calvin’s arms and signaling him to enter the room. They both silently entered the room, and Bruce and Sophia were busy in, busy figuring out who would stay.
“You three are trained with all the lies. I will mess up badly. So, I’m going toward the doctor’s cabin.”, Saying this, he looked down to say BYE to both kids, but TADA, they were not there. Even Sophia noticed that at that moment.
Bruce peeked inside and found they were trying to climb on Brandon’s bed. And finally, with the help of a nurse, they were on the bed in the next moment.
“They are smart.”, he chuckled before leaving. Sophia, too peeked inside and saw them with Brandon.
“Arya!!!”
“Don’t worry. I’m staying.”, She said with a smile. And after that, both Sophia and Eden left toward the doctor’s cabin, who had held not-so-good news with him.
*****
Brandon had closed his eyes but wasn’t sleeping with both his babies and walked inside the room silently. The Nurse that had informed everyone was inside and was surprised to see them instead of any adults. They smiled at her and kept fingers on their lips, signaling her to keep quiet. That Nurse looked at them in amusement.
Then they tried to climb onto the bed silently, but the height of the bed in the hospital was more than the bed at their home. So, in the end, the Nurse helped them.
Brandon felt some movement on the bed and quickly opened his eyes.
“Boooo” Calvin shouted, raising his hand near his head and fingers in a claws design.
Brandon’s jaw dropped seeing both the kids who looked so familiar to him.
“I told you, Calvin. Dad won’t get scared.”, Colton said, arching his eyebrow in a duh tone. Just like him.
Brandon got the second shock of the day, hearing DAD from a kid, and the third shock of the day was the other kid had just behaved like him.
Yes! The first shock was that both of them looked just like him.
‘It means Jake wasn’t lying last night. Maybe he had seen the same kids.’, he thought. ‘But their face, matching with mine, can be coincidence, right?’ Because the only woman I ever slept with was my Ex-wife, and as long as… hold on? Could they be Sophia’s and my …’
“Dad! You don’t look like the way Mom had described us. But you will have to get back into shape, right Colton?”
“Yes! We don’t like these long hairs like Tarzan and these long mustaches and beards. You won’t be allowed to kiss us in this look.”, Colton said, touching Brandon’s rough hair and beard and mustache.
That was when Arya came inside the room, and her eyes changed for a while, looking at Brandon.
‘What a werewolf is doing here?’ Brandon wondered.
“Aunt Arya! Finally, we met our dad.”, Calvin chirped.
“Calvin! Hold your excitement, sweetie! Your dad is still ill, and Sophia will expect from both of you not to disturb him a lot.”, Arya said indirectly.
And Brandon understood her hint because Arya could have used the word ‘your mother’ instead of Sophia, but she didn’t. She willingly told him what he was unaware of until now.
“I’m not disturbing him, do I, Dad?” Calvin asked innocently.
These were my babies. MINE. Tears started dwelling in his eyes looking at them, he wanted to talk to them, but he couldn’t; for the first time, he was feeling ashamed that his mouth was stinking that bad that his babies my run away, smelling his foul scent.
“Tell us, dad! Are we disturbing you?” Colton asked this time.
He reached his hands near the cheeks of the twins and shook his head in NO. Now, he could relate that it was one of them who had used that card to buy toys. It was one of them who wanted to give a signal that he was there and was waiting for me.
It was his babies who were the reason that today, he was in this country, near Sophia and his hidden babies. He tried to sit on the bed with difficulty. The Nurse reached forward to him to offer help. He stopped her by showing his hand and then opened his arms for his babies, who quickly ran into his arms.
He pressed his lips tightly to control the pain below the ribcage because he didn’t want to ruin this moment.
“I missed you so much, dad.”
“Me too, dad.”
“Now, we will never let you go on any type of adventure trip.”
“You will stay with us just like the parents of other kids.”
All these years, Brandon wanted to die, and for the time when he didn’t want to die. He could sense that the pain he was constantly feeling wasn’t some random pain.
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#TBC