Greg placed Steve on the digital scale.
The kitten protested weakly.
Denise crouched beside him.
“What was his last weight?”
“Two hundred thirty-one grams.”
“When?”
“Four this morning.”
Greg looked at the display.
Two hundred twenty-eight.
His face went still.
“He lost three grams.”
Denise nodded.
“That can happen between feeds.”
“But you said he should be gaining.”
“Overall, yes.”
Greg lifted Steve immediately.
“What’s wrong?”
“We don’t know that anything is wrong yet.”
“He’s eating less than Susan.”
“A little.”
“He slept through the last feeding.”
“Kittens sleep.”
“Not when I touch the bottle to his mouth.”
Denise looked at me.
I could see her recalibrating.
She had probably worked with dozens of foster volunteers.
She had perhaps not worked with Greg.
“Let’s not jump ahead,” she said.
That phrase had never been effective with my husband.
“What do we do?”
“Keep him warm. Offer smaller feeds more frequently. Track everything.”
“How frequently?”
“Every two hours for now.”
Greg nodded before she finished.
“We can do that.”
“We can,” I repeated, deliberately emphasizing the plural.
He glanced at me.
Denise showed us how to check hydration and gum color.
She explained signs that would require immediate veterinary attention: extreme lethargy, difficulty breathing, inability to swallow, falling temperature.
Greg memorized every word.
I wrote them down because I knew what fear did to memory.
Before leaving, Denise touched his arm.
“Greg.”
“Yes?”
“Don’t turn one bad weigh-in into a catastrophe.”
“I won’t.”
She looked at me.
I gave her the expression wives develop after decades of marriage.
Denise understood immediately.
“Call me if anything changes.”
After she left, Greg sat beside the box.
Steve was tucked against Susan beneath the edge of Michael’s blanket.
“You heard her,” I said.
“Yes.”
“One weigh-in.”
“I know.”
“Say it.”
He looked at me.
“One weigh-in.”
“Good.”
Greg set an alarm for two hours later.
Then another.
And another.
By midnight, the kitchen counter looked like a field hospital.
Bottles.
Formula.
A notebook.
Thermometer.
Scale.
Greg recorded every ounce Steve consumed.
At 12:15, Steve drank poorly.
At 2:20, a little better.
At 4:10, worse.
Greg stopped pretending not to be frightened.
“He’s fading.”
“We don’t know that.”
“Look at him.”
Steve lay curled against my palm, impossibly small.
His breathing remained steady.
But there was less fight in him.
I felt it too.
“Call Denise.”
Greg already had the phone.
She answered on the third ring.
After listening, she told us to meet the rescue’s veterinarian at the clinic.
Ten minutes later we were in the car.
Greg drove.
Too fast.
“Slow down.”
“I’m going five over.”
“You’re going fourteen over.”
He looked at the speedometer and eased off.
The carrier rested on my lap.
Susan cried intermittently.
Steve made no sound.
I slipped my hand beneath the blanket and touched him.
Warm.
Still breathing.
“Come on, Steve.”
Greg glanced toward me.
“Is he moving?”
“Yes.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yes.”
At the clinic, a young veterinarian named Dr. Patel met us in scrubs beneath a winter coat.
She took Steve immediately.
Greg tried to follow through the treatment-room door.
A technician stopped him gently.
“You can wait right here.”
“I’m his foster.”
“I know.”
“I know his feeding schedule.”
“The doctor will come speak with you.”
Greg opened his mouth.
I touched his arm.
“Stay.”
He looked at me as if I had asked him to abandon the kitten.
“Greg.”
He stopped.
We sat in the waiting room.
The fluorescent lights buzzed.
A television mounted in the corner played a muted cooking program no one watched.
Greg bounced his knee.
After twelve minutes he stood.
“Sit.”
“They should know—”
“They have the chart.”
“I should tell them he aspirated a tiny amount at the midnight feed.”
“You already told the technician.”
“Did I say which nostril?”
I stared at him.
He rubbed his face.
“Right.”
He sat.
Five minutes later he stood again.
This time I let him pace.
Watching him, I began to understand something uncomfortable.
This was the kind of moment Greg had been unconsciously seeking.
A crisis.
Something fragile.
A clear need.
But now that it was here, there was no satisfaction in him.
Only terror.
The fantasy of being indispensable disappeared the moment usefulness met helplessness.
Dr. Patel finally came out.
Greg crossed the room before she reached us.
“How is he?”
“Stable.”
His shoulders dropped.
“But he is weaker than I’d like.”
“What’s causing it?”
“We’re checking a few possibilities. He may simply have been more compromised than his sister when you found them.”
Greg stared through the treatment-room window.
“Can you fix it?”
The question was so naked that Dr. Patel softened.
“We can support him.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
I touched Greg’s elbow.
The veterinarian did not take offense.
“With neonatal kittens,” she said, “sometimes we can do everything correctly and still lose them.”
Greg’s face emptied.
“No.”
Dr. Patel paused.
“I’m not saying that will happen.”
“He was fine yesterday.”
“He looked stronger yesterday.”
“I got him out.”
“Yes.”
“I got him warm.”
“Yes.”
“He ate.”
“Yes.”
“Then why is he worse?”
Dr. Patel waited until Greg looked at her.
“Because saving something once doesn’t give us control over what happens next.”
I felt the sentence reach him.
He looked away.
The veterinarian explained that Steve needed fluids and monitoring for several hours.
We could leave him there.
Greg immediately refused.
“I’m staying.”
“The clinic won’t be staffed in the waiting area all night.”
“Then I’ll sit in the car.”
“Greg.”
He looked at me.
I could see the old reflex.
If he remained nearby, perhaps nothing terrible could happen.
If he watched closely enough, perhaps loss could be negotiated away.
I lowered my voice.
“They know what they’re doing.”
“He knows us.”
“He has known us for two days.”
“He knows our voices.”
“Maybe.”
“He settles when I hold him.”
“I know.”
Greg’s eyes filled.
“I left my mother alone the night she died.”
The words came from nowhere.
Dr. Patel quietly stepped away.
I stared at him.
“What?”
“I went home.”
“Greg—”
“She told me to.”
His voice dropped.
“She said I was hovering. She told me to go home and sleep.”
I remembered that night.
Greg had arrived home after eleven.
He had been exhausted.
His mother’s caregiver was there.
Everything had seemed stable.
At six the next morning, the call came.
“You didn’t leave her alone.”
“I left.”
“Because she asked you to.”
“I should have stayed.”
“No.”
“You weren’t there.”
“I was there when you came home.”
“You weren’t in that apartment.”
“No. But I know she had someone with her.”
Greg’s jaw trembled.
“She died before I got back.”
I finally understood why a kitten’s declining weight had ripped open something so old.
This was not Steve.
Not entirely.
This was Susan.
The woman, not the kitten.
The apartment.
The unanswered phone call.
Every goodbye Greg believed he might have prevented by staying useful a little longer.
I took his hands.
“You could not have kept your mother alive by sitting beside her bed.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Yes, I do.”
“No.”
“Greg.”
He pulled away.
“You don’t.”
I let the silence stand.
There are arguments you cannot win by force because the other person has been rehearsing the opposing case for twelve years.
Dr. Patel returned.
“We’ve started fluids. His temperature is improving.”
Greg turned immediately.
“Can I see him?”
“For a minute.”
She led us into the treatment room.
Steve lay wrapped in a towel inside a warmed enclosure.
He looked impossibly fragile.
Greg placed two fingers against his side.
Steve moved.
Barely.
But he moved.
“Hey, buddy.”
Greg’s voice broke.
“Daddy’s here.”
This time the words did not frighten me.
They broke my heart.
We stayed for exactly one minute.
Then Dr. Patel asked us to go home.
Greg resisted.
I did not argue.
I simply picked up the carrier containing Susan and walked toward the door.
After several seconds, Greg followed.
In the parking lot he stopped beside the car.
“I feel like I’m abandoning him.”
“You’re leaving him with the person most able to help him.”
“That doesn’t feel different.”
“It is.”
He looked back toward the clinic.
“I hate this.”
“I know.”
“What am I supposed to do?”
“Go home.”
“And?”
“Feed Susan.”
“And?”
“Sleep if you can.”
“And?”
“Wait.”
Greg laughed bitterly.
“Of course.”
“What?”
“The one thing I’m terrible at.”
We drove home in silence.
At sunrise, Susan drank nearly an entire feeding.
Greg wrote it down.
Then he sat beside the carrier without moving.
At eight twenty-three, his phone rang.
He answered before the first ring finished.
“Hello?”
I watched his face.
“Yes.”
A pause.
Then his shoulders collapsed.
He closed his eyes.
“Oh.”
My stomach turned.
I stepped closer.
Greg listened for several more seconds.
Then he opened his eyes and looked directly at me.
“He gained four grams.”
I exhaled so sharply it became laughter.
Greg laughed too, though tears were already running down his face.
“He’s more alert.”
I covered my mouth.
“When can we get him?”
Greg listened.
His smile faltered.
“What do you mean, transfer?”
I stopped.
The voice on the other end continued.
Greg’s expression changed from relief to confusion.
Then concern.
“All right,” he said slowly. “But why would he need a specialist?”
He listened again.
When the call ended, he lowered the phone.
“What?” I asked.
Greg looked toward Susan sleeping beneath the blue blanket.
“They found something on Steve’s exam.”
My relief disappeared.
“What?”
“He has a heart murmur.”
Click here to continue reading: PART 9: Steve’s Heart Murmur Turned a Fragile Foster Case Into a Choice Greg Couldn’t Fix With Effort, Vigilance, or Love Alone
For Three Weeks Greg Left Our Bed After Midnight, and One Missing Family Keepsake Made His Explanation Impossible to Believe
Part 8 of 24
