Author's note: This is a character/story development chapter and contains no sex.
She knew she was speeding, but she couldn't bring herself to care. Not even a pair of flashing lights in her rearview could possibly make her feel any worse as she drove to the hospital. Her baby was in trouble. Her beautiful darling Christina was taken to the hospital, and her mommy hadn't been there for her. Instead, she'd been in a stupid meeting about headcount, and she'd blown off her husband's texts to focus on her bosses.
It was a heartbreaking reminder that she'd been working too hard and one that she was sure her husband wouldn't hesitate to use as an example whenever they had a fight about those things, which fortunately had been happening less in the last few weeks.
"Fuck!" she swore in frustration as she pounded the steering wheel in frustration. She couldn't worry about any of that right now. Not how her husband was going to be a dick about this later, or even how this was probably all their babysitter's fault. Those recriminations could wait until later. Right now, all Marcy had time for was to get to the hospital and to hate herself for not being here twenty minutes ago.
A few frantic minutes later, she'd parked and rushed into the emergency room to find her husband waiting for her. "I'm so sorry I was late," she said, melting into his hug. "It's just that I was--"
"It's okay," Trevor soothed her as he held her tight. "It's all going to be okay." They stayed like that for a long moment, and Marcy was able to catch her breath.
"Where's Christina," she asked finally, now that she'd gotten herself sorted.
"Christina's fine. I was just in there with the doctor. She's going to be okay. She just aspirated a little milk, is all," he explained patiently.
"But why aren't you in there with her," Marcy repeated, breaking free of his hug.
"Evelyn suggested I come out and wait for you. She's in there with the doctors and Christina right now, so--" her husband started to say, but she tuned him out after the first few words, and after ten seconds of him not saying anything she wanted to hear, she finally exploded.
"You left her in the care of that - that... GIRL?!" Marcy practically yelled, drawing more than a few looks. "You should be in there, not some dumb college student that caused this whole problem to begin with!"
"Look, Evelyn did everything she right. She saw the problem. She dialed 911. She did exactly what we pay her for," her husband protested, but Marcy was furious and walked past him. First, he left their daughter all alone in her hour of need, and then he took their babysitter's side in this. It was unbelievable.
"Where is she," Marcy asked, ignoring everything her husband said. "Where's my baby." First, she was going to make sure Christina was okay, and then she was going to fire that good-for-nothing Instagram addict who let this happen.
That was the plan, anyway. By the time Trevor led her to the examination room she was supposed to be in, though, they discovered that the police had beaten them to it.
"Excuse me, excuse me - my baby's in there!" Marcy said, trying to push past the officer without success. "What do you think you're doing? Is everything okay? Where's Christina!"
"Everything is fine, ma'am," the officer said simply. "We're here on a child endangerment call, and my partner is having a little conversation with you... babysitter, is it?"
"I don't know why you want to talk to Evelyn," Trevor said, "But you can't stop us from seeing our baby, so unless you want me to get my lawyer on the phone right now to start preparing a case of emotional distress and whatever else he deems appropriate, please let my wife see our daughter and have a conversation with Christina somewhere else. You can; she's out of her mind with worry, can't you?"
Marcy was more than a little annoyed that her husband appealed to her irrationality to get the police officer on his side, but as the man finally stepped aside, she couldn't help but note that sexism was good for something.
Inside, they found a doctor holding the sleeping baby and their crying babysitter talking to the police officer as she tried to keep her voice down.
"I'm telling you," Evelyn said, "I don't do anything like that. Not even pot. You can test me!"
"Why did you let them in here," the questioning officer asked, turning towards them as they arrived.
Marcy ignored all that and rushed to the doctor to hold her child. Going to work after maternity leave was hard enough, but going to work after something like this...
"Will somebody tell me what happened for the love of Christ?" Marcy hissed, looking at everyone, including her husband, with suspicion. Someone was to blame for all this.
"Calm down, Ma'am," the second officer told her. He was taller and darker than the first one, and the way he patronized her infuriated her. "After they ran a drug panel on your child, the hospital--"
"You drugged my daughter?" Marcy hissed, glaring at Evelyn, which made the young woman burst into tears all over again.
"We don't think that's likely at this stage, actually. We'll test her, of course, but we believe it was more likely that the formula you use was contaminated somehow. We'd like it if you could let us know what brand you got, as well as where and when you--" The officer answered, boring her to tears. They'd only just started the investigation, and already they were way off.
"Look," Marcy said, slowly and carefully so they wouldn't get confused again, "I don't use formula for my precious baby girl. I pump every night, so there's no way that's possible. It has to be something else." She glared at Evelyn as she spoke, but apparently, they missed that subtle cue entirely because, by the time she was done talking, everyone was still staring at her.
"Ma'am, is it possible that you might have had too much to drink one night and pumped, inadvertently exposing your child to--"
"No!" Evelyn yelled, loud enough to wake up her little Christina, who started bawling immediately. "I - now see what you did..." she accused the officers as she went to work trying to soothe her little girl.
"Ma'am, would you be comfortable taking a drug test so we can--" the second officer asked. This time, his voice had a hard edge to it, and she could tell this conversation wasn't going to go anywhere she wanted it to.
"Absolutely not. In fact, I'm not saying another word to you until I've had a chance to speak with my lawyer," she declared. If they were going to do their job and investigate Evelyn, then she might have been willing to go along with their bad attitudes, but not this. The idea that she would ever hurt her baby girl was ridiculous. "We're going home now, and..."
"Ma'am, could you please hand the baby to your husband?" the officer asked, but she could tell it wasn't a question.
