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The truck skidded to a halt, barely stopping in time to miss the vehicle in front of them.
"Fuck!" Blaine yelled. He slammed his fists against the steering wheel, causing both his passengers to stare at him in surprise. "Of all times to have my cellphone turned off. How could I have done something so stupid, especially since I promised Dad I would look after Mom while he’s gone to Houston. God, he's gonna kill me."
Throwing the truck into neutral while they waited for the light to change, he drew Trent closer to his side and buried his face in the younger boy's hair, seeking comfort in the fierce embrace Trent offered to him. "I'll kill myself if something…."
Trent's kiss halted his words, and Blaine allowed himself to get lost in it, pulling away only when the blaring of a horn reminded him the light had turned green. The second he finished shifting gears and put his truck in motion, he captured Trent's hand and pulled it into his lap, holding it tightly as he sped toward the hospital.
"I'm sorry our special night has been put on hold," he told his boyfriend, "but I'm glad you're here with me. You have no idea how much that means to me." Leaning forward so that he could make eye contact with the girl sitting beside Trent, he apologized to his older sister. "And I'm really sorry I yelled at you, Angel. You kinda caught me in the middle of something important." He aimed a tight smile at Trent and lifted his hand to kiss it lightly. "I know that's not a good enough excuse for tearing your head off but…."
"Explain it to Mom and Dad," Angel replied angrily. "They're the ones you'll have to answer to if something goes wrong tonight."
Blaine released Trent's hand and slammed his fist against the dashboard. "I'm such a fucking idiot. What in the hell was I thinking?"
"Well, if you had been thinking with your head and not your dick, we wouldn't be having this conversation now, would we?" Angel sniffed and wiped the tears from her eyes. "What if Mom loses the babies? What if… oh God, Blaine." She buried her face in her hands and cried softly. "What if something happens to Mom? What if she dies?"
Blaine reached across Trent and grabbed his sister's nearest hand, pulling it away from her face. "Look at me." He waited patiently for her to comply. "You gotta quit thinking about the ‘what ifs.’ We need to concentrate on being there for Mom. She needs our love and support right now, not our fears."
"But…."
He squeezed his sister's trembling hand. "Love and support, Angel. And we gotta have faith, faith that everything's gonna be okay."
The hospital's ER came into view as he uttered his last words and before he could even park his truck, his sister was out the door and running for the entrance. It wasn't until his own door opened and Trent pried his hands from the steering wheel that he realized he was still sitting in his truck staring blindly at the five-story building in front of him.
"Blaine?"
He slid out of his Toyota Tacoma and into the arms of his boyfriend, clutching at Trent's slighter frame. "I'm scared, Trent. Fucking scared."
Soothing hands rubbed up and down his back as Trent echoed the words he’d said to his sister only seconds ago. "Gotta have faith, Budman."
It was a full sixty seconds before he could regain his composure and once he did, he softly kissed Trent on the mouth and whispered a husky 'I love you' before letting go of him.
"Let's go find my Mom."
+++++++
Trent glanced at his watch for what had to be the millionth time and sighed wearily when he saw that only five minutes had passed since the last time he’d looked. He was the sole occupant of the waiting room, with no one to talk to and nothing to read. Blaine and his two sisters had been taken to a private conference room to speak with their mother's doctor.
Trent glanced at his watch again. His friends had been gone for over an hour, and he was starting to worry bigtime. Not only was he worried about the fate of Mrs. A and the twins, but he was also worried, actually make that terrified, of how Blaine would react once he found out who had actually turned off the cellphone.
He scrubbed his face with his hands and moaned low in his throat. This was to have been the night he gave his cherry to Blaine and because he wanted their time together to be as special as possible with no interruptions from Blaine's nosey sisters, he had turned off his boyfriend's cell. He had no idea that Mr. Matthews was out of town on a business trip and that Blaine had been designated ‘Man of the House.’ If he had known that fact he would never have touched the phone, especially with Mrs. A being so close to giving birth. Shit, he might be a little slow about some things but he definitely wasn't slow about that.
Trent jumped up from his seat and started pacing again. "Blaine's gonna kill me." He stopped suddenly and stared out the window at the darkness outside. "Or worse, he's gonna hate my guts and kick me out of his life." He banged his head against the glass. "I'm sorry, Budman. I'm so damn sorry."
"Trent Anderson?"
He glanced over his shoulder and discovered a nurse standing in the doorway, beckoning him to her side. "Yeah, I'm Trent Anderson," he answered as he walked towards her.
"Blaine Matthews asked if I would come find you. He would like for you to join him in the nursery."
Trent followed the woman down the hallway and the closer they got to their destination the harder it was for him to breathe and the faster his heart pumped. Why was Blaine in the nursery and not with his Mom? Why did he send a nurse to fetch him? He tugged nervously on the collar of his shirt. If Blaine was in the nursery did that mean Mrs. A had given birth to the twins? Maybe things were okay. Maybe he had dodged the bullet.
His moment of reprieve was brief, and his fear escalated into the stratosphere when the nurse walked past the entrance to the nursery and directed him to a room whose door was marked, 'Authorized Personnel Only.'
He was left standing just inside the doorway, and it took him a few seconds to adjust to the room's dim lighting. He immediately knew things were bad when he caught sight of the priest speaking in hushed tones to Blaine. His boyfriend was sitting with his back to him, and it was actually the priest who noticed his arrival.
"Blaine, your friend is here."
He saw Blaine raise an unsteady hand to the older man's shoulder and whisper his appreciation. "Thanks, Father Antoine, for everything."
"I'll be with your mother if you need me." The priest leaned down and hugged Blaine before straightening and nodding at Trent as he exited the room.
"Trent?"
Blaine had turned his head to the side when he called out his name, and even with the subdued lighting, Trent could see the tears glistening on his boyfriend's cheek. He felt his heart plummet to his feet. Something was wrong, horribly wrong.
He quickly moved to stand behind Blaine and wrapped his arms around him, pressing a kiss to his damp cheek before asking, "Are you okay, Budman?"
Blaine didn't answer immediately. He, instead, reached up with his left arm and gripped the back of Trent's neck, pulling him down for a long, hard kiss that was tainted by tears. He maintained contact with Trent even after the kiss was over, holding onto his hand as if his life depended on it.
His voice rough with emotion, Blaine started to speak. "For some reason Mom and Dad really had a hard time agreeing on names for the twins. When they asked me for a name…" Blaine aimed a small smile at him, "I, of course, gave 'em yours." Pulling back the blanket that covered the recognizable bundle he held in his lap, he whispered, "Meet Richard Trent Matthews."
Trent felt as if a hand was crushing his heart when he gazed down at the baby Blaine was holding. The infant looked perfect, and it took him a couple of seconds to realize the baby wasn't breathing, wasn't moving….
Wasn't alive.
Knees buckled immediately and he dropped to the floor, his gaze never wavering from the infant. He watched his boyfriend carefully place the baby in the crib that sat on the other side of the chair. His whole world shattered when Blaine leaned down and kissed his dead brother before covering its face once more.
"Blaine, I…."
The edges of his vision began to gray, and Trent actually thought he was going to keel over. Fuck, what had he done? This baby, who carried his name, was dead, dead because of him. Blaine would never in a million years be able to forgive him.
He found his gaze fixated on the small bundle wrapped in blue, and vaguely heard Blaine explain the reason for its death. Something about the placenta pulling loose, the cord wrapped wrong - he didn't understand one thing Blaine was telling him. All he knew was that one of the twins was dead and it was all his fault.
He tried again to apologize, to offer up some sort of explanation, but his words were cut off when Blaine pulled him to his feet and hauled him into his arms, kissing him with such tenderness it brought tears to his eyes.
"I know this sounds stupid," Blaine confessed, "but since he was gonna be named after us I started thinking of him as ours, your’s and mine… a little brother you and I could raise. But now…."
Ignoring the pain in his ribs, Trent held onto his boyfriend as hard as he could, matching tear for tear, kiss for kiss. It wasn't long before both of them were exhausted by their emotions. He eased Blaine back down into the chair, electing to take a seat on the floor so he could be close.
Blaine wrapped his arms around his middle and rocked back and forth, his gaze fixed on the crib beside him. "Dad's never gonna forgive me for letting this happen, for not being there for Mom when she needed me the most." Halting his rocking, he reached out and gently laid his hand upon the infant's motionless chest. "Please forgive me, little brother. Please forgive me for being…."
Trent jumped up and ran out of the room, his guilty conscious clawing at him with each step he took. He couldn't handle Blaine's grief, not when it was he, himself, who was the primary cause for it. His thoughts tormented him all the way to the truck, and he stood there, banging his head against the window, cursing his stupidity and his cowardice. Only a few minutes had passed when a familiar pair of arms slipped around his waist and embraced him.
"I'm sorry, babe. Didn't mean to dump all that shit on you." Blaine turned him around and kissed him repeatedly while running his hands up and down his arms. "It's not your fault I screwed everything up and totally ruined our special night together."
Guilt ridden to the max, Trent slapped his hand over Blaine's mouth and stopped the flow of words. "You got it all wrong, Budman. None of this is your fault." He moved a step back and took a deep breath, preparing himself for the end of his world.
"I'm the fucking idiot who turned your cellphone off. Not you. Me. It was me, Blaine. I'm the one responsible for all this."
To be continued . . . .