Chapter 8 - The Revelations
Hours later, the harsh lights of the recovery ward felt softer, though the air in the private hospital room remained heavy with unresolved tension. I woke up slowly, shivering slightly as warm intravenous fluids pumped through my veins. My body ached from head to toe, a deep, bone-deep soreness that reminded me of the balcony's icy grip.
Jacob sat in a chair beside the bed, his eyes red and swollen from crying. When he saw my eyelids flutter open, he leaned forward, grasping my hand and pressing it tightly against his cheek.
"Clara," he whispered, his voice thick with emotion. "Oh, thank God. Thank God you're awake."
"The... the baby?" I managed to whisper, my throat scratchy and dry. "Is our baby okay?"
Jacob swallowed hard, a fresh tear spilling over his lower eyelid. "The baby is in the NICU. Because you were twenty-eight weeks along and suffered severe hypothermia and shock, they had to deliver prematurely. But... the doctors said that because the cold shock slowed down cellular metabolism just enough before the abruption became total, it bought precious minutes that actually saved the baby from complete oxygen deprivation. Miraculously, our little boy is fighting hard and stable in an incubator."
I closed my eyes, letting out a ragged sigh of relief as tears streamed down my temples.
Just then, the door to the hospital room creaked open. Brenda walked in, followed hesitantly by her mother. Brenda’s usual defiant swagger was entirely gone; she looked pale, jittery, and visibly uncomfortable under Jacob's piercing glare.
"Clara," Brenda stammered, stepping toward the bed. "I... I just wanted to see how you were doing. I mean, nobody told us it was going to get that serious. I was just joking around, you know? It was just a prank—"
Before she could finish her sentence, Jacob stood up so violently that his chair scraped loudly against the linoleum floor.
"A prank?" Jacob shouted, his voice echoing off the hospital walls with venomous fury. "You locked my six-months-pregnant wife on a freezing balcony in November, mocked her through the glass, and left her to freeze unconscious while you sat inside drinking wine! Clara almost died, and our son was dragged into the world ten weeks early, fighting for every breath in an incubator!"
Brenda flinched, stepping back. "Jacob, come on, don't exaggerate. She's always so dramatic—"
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"Get out," Jacob said, pointing a shaking finger toward the door. His voice was dangerously quiet now, cold and absolute. "Get out of this room, get out of this hospital, and never speak to us again. As far as I am concerned, I no longer have a sister."
Brenda’s mother gasped, stepping forward to defend her daughter, but one look at Jacob's face silenced her instantly. With humiliated tears stinging her eyes, Brenda turned on her heel and fled the room, slamming the door behind her.
