Breaking Down

Chapter 17

17

Tyler

This afternoon had been painful.

All those apartments, and Gabi looking rather excited about it all.

I shuddered.

And what was that about rent? Like hell I would let her pay the entire thing by herself. I was her future roommate for the next two years, not her new toy.

To top it off, she invited me to another freaking party tonight. What did these people do? Party every night? What the hell?

Shit, this was getting complicated.

Groaning, I parked my truck in the hospital’s parking lot and sat back.

What the f**k had I done? This entire situation was ridiculous.

Debt free, debt free.

It was all I could do not to turn around and ask Gabi to annul this insane marriage.

Debt free, debt free.

With a sigh, I climbed out of my truck and entered the hospital.

The lady at reception nodded at me as I walked past her. Then, I crossed paths with two nurses I saw often and they nodded at me too.

I knew every doctor and nurse and technician who worked on this floor of the hospital—a fact that I hated. A fact that stated things were going from bad to worse.

I paused at the room's door, trying to find the words I would say, but nothing came. For once, my mind was blank. Maybe that was a good thing. Maybe I wasn’t supposed to think too much about this all.

After a soft knock, I stepped into the room.

My father smiled at me from the bed in the middle of the room. “Hey, you. I didn’t expect to see you until tomorrow morning.” He pointed the remote to the TV and lowered the volume. “Everything okay?”

He looked better than usual—a little less pale, a little less tired—which was a relief.

I walked up to his bed. “I should ask you that. How are you feeling?”

“Today is one of the good days,” he replied.

A rare one, then.

“That’s good,” I said, taking the big armchair beside the bed.

He smiled at me. “So, what’s new with you?”

I paused, considering what to tell him. “Hm, I’m planning on moving to a better apartment.”

His smile was gone. “But … why? I mean, our current place stinks, but we can’t afford paying rent for a better apartment. Our financial situation is bad, isn’t it? We can’t afford that, Tyler.”

I sighed. Until yesterday, our financial situation was even worse than he imagined. He had no idea I couldn’t even afford rent anymore. But now things would change. Come Monday, I would pay a lot of our bills and things would start looking up.

I reached over and rested my hand on his arm. “We can, Dad. This time, we can.”

“What do you mean?”

“Just … trust me, okay.”

“Tyler, you’re not doing anything illegal, right? You’re not … playing poker or selling drugs or working for some mafia boss or—”

I chuckled. “No, Dad, nothing illegal.” Not totally illegal. After all, I was married to Gabi. That part wasn’t illegal. “Don’t worry about it. Just worry about getting better, okay?”

He stared at me as if trying to see through my eyes. I must have looked trustworthy because he nodded. “Okay.”