The Pretty Lady and the Cowboy (Songs from the Heart)

by Lee, Dana

  “But isn’t heavy drinking pretty typical of college kids?” I was still trying to deny the obvious. I wanted Ally’s problem to be easy to fix. Despite everything the doctor was telling me, I was still hoping that her pinky swear promise would be enough to keep Ally sober.

  “Sure, lots of kids drink at parties. But I see in her records that she’s arrived here before under the influence in the middle of the afternoon, and even in the late morning. That suggests a deeper problem. Plus, alcohol poisoning is usually the result of binge drinking, downing five or six drinks in rapid succession. And it’s serious. When she came in she was having seizures and her heart was beating at less than half its normal rate. Alcohol poisoning can be fatal.”

  My mind kept silently protesting, “Why? Why would she do such a thing?” I had no idea.

  The doctor had no answer either. She simply said, “I’ve written down the names of a couple of therapists who specialize in alcoholism and also the number of the local chapter of AA. If she were my sister, I’d go to an AA meeting with her. What she needs to learn is the difference between promising you that she won’t drink… and making that promise to herself.”

  I was having trouble processing all this. “When can I see her?” I asked.

  “Right now if you want, but she’s asleep and we’d like to keep her that way, so no talking just yet.”

  Jess and I followed the doctor down the hall to Ally’s room. She was on the far side, a curtain separating her from another patient. She looked terribly young and vulnerable.

  I turned to Jess. “You’d better get on home. I’ll really need your help tomorrow if I spend the rest of the night here.” The only chair in the room looked hard and uncomfortable, but I had to stay with Ally. I had to make sure she came out of this all right.

  Jess didn’t protest. “Call me if you need anything,” she said, giving me a hug good-bye.

  I spent a long time standing at Ally’s bedside, stroking her hair. How had this happened to my baby sister? What should I have done to help her? What could I do now?

  I sat down in the hard chair, thinking, puzzling. Questions swirled around in my head but I had no answers to any of them.

  I took out my phone and checked for messages. Nothing. I was about to shut it down but suddenly I remembered something Levi said—something about asking him for help with Ally if I needed it.

  Immediately the private side of me, the part of me that Dad had trained never to ask for help, rebelled. I turned the phone off. No, this was a family problem, a private problem.

  But I had to admit that I’d tried solving this all by myself. I’d tried bribery, tough love, laying down the law. The result of those methods was lying right here in front of me on an IV, too drunk to even know I was there.

  I turned the phone back on and began texting. I knew Levi was still performing, but he’d get the message later. I had all the time in the world. I’d be here all night. I typed, “ALLY PROBLEM. I NEED HELP. JK.” I didn’t bother with abbreviations. I wanted the message to be crystal clear.

  Then I turned off the ringtone, set the phone to buzz, and stuffed it in the pocket of my jeans. I sat back and looked out the window. I watched Ally. I closed my eyes and tried to doze. I walked up and down the hall for a while. Nothing I did made the time pass any more quickly.

  I knew Levi’s concert wouldn’t be over until nearly midnight. And who knew what he might have to do afterwards—what autographs he might have to sign, what photographers he might have to pose for, what journalists might want a quote. Then, from the deep recesses of my mind, came the thought, “And what gorgeous blondes he might be meeting up with.”

  I had almost forgotten about the mystery woman. Shoot, now wasn’t the time I wanted to be reminded, either. But you know how nearly impossible it is to force yourself to not think about something. Sitting here worried, alone, with too much time on my hands, I couldn’t get her out of my mind. I went over every detail of the dress she had worn when I first saw her with Levi after the concert (especially that plunging neckline), the possessive way she had held onto his arm and led him away, the kiss on the cheek he had given her at the sidewalk café. My mind kept chanting, “Who is she? Who is she?”

  Thanks, subconscious. Sure am glad you came through and gave me something besides Ally to worry about.

  Not.

  # # # # #

  I must have dozed off because the next thing I knew it was nearly three a.m. and my phone was buzzing.

  “H’lo,” I said.

  “Woke you up again, didn’t I? Maybe someday I’ll get to do it in person,” Levi said.

  This was exactly what I’d been wishing for: some sense that he wanted our relationship to continue.

  And this was exactly the wrong moment for it. I couldn’t wrap my head around it right now, couldn’t respond to it. It was like being given a chocolate truffle while you were in the middle of getting your wisdom teeth pulled. Or like getting the bike you’d been wishing for the day after you broke your arm.

  “It’s Ally,” I said. “Again. I just don’t know what to do.” I briefly told him what the doctor had told me.

  “Where are you?” he asked. “Give me a few minutes to wake Jim and I’ll be right over.”

  “But it’s the middle of the night,” I said. I desperately wanted the peace and security I felt whenever Levi put his arms around me. But beyond that, I had no idea how he could help me. And I knew he must be exhausted.

  “JK, I’m still wound up tighter than a drum—takes me hours to get to sleep after a concert. Tell me where you are.”

  I gave him the address. “Thanks,” I said simply.

  “Room number?”

  I told him that, too, and then settled back again to wait.

  Chapter 16

  I was wide awake after that. A nurse came in to check on Ally. She removed an empty IV bag and hung up a new one. She took Ally’s blood pressure, but Ally hardly stirred, just pulled her arm away slightly and moaned a bit. The nurse checked to make sure Ally’s airways were clear.

  “Sometimes we need to intubate in cases of alcohol poisoning,” she said. “But so far so good with your sister.”

  I guess that was one thing to be thankful for.

  Levi arrived seconds after the nurse left. I stood to greet him and he gently wrapped his arms around me. I took a deep breath, feeling safe, if only for the moment. Levi was a master of saying nothing at exactly the right time. We just stood there, my head on his chest, breathing together.

  I finally found my voice. “I just don’t know what to do,” I said. “The doctor said I should start thinking about treatments for alcoholism.”

  Levi pulled back enough so he could look into my eyes. “I can only tell you what worked for me,” he said.

  “Did your sister have an alcohol problem, too?” I asked. I wasn’t sure what he meant.

  He smiled ruefully down at me. “JK, I’m an alcoholic.”

  I could feel myself tensing up again. I took a deep breath, tried to puzzle out what this meant. For some reason, Ally’s comments about Levi’s ex-wife sprang into my mind.

  “And your divorce?” We had never mentioned his past. He looked a little surprised that I knew he had been married before, but he didn’t shy away from answering.

  “She couldn’t live with my drinking. Even after she left me, it took me a long time to figure out that I couldn’t live with it either. I’m afraid country music and booze have a pretty long history together.”

  I remembered Dan’s comments about the ambulances that line up like taxicabs outside country western concerts.

  “And what worked for you?” I asked.

  “Rehab. Lots of therapy. AA. A few guardian angels. Alcohol is a darned hard habit to break.”

  I found myself pushing out of Levi’s embrace. I could feel a kind of panic setting in. “And now?” I asked, trembling.

  “Now I try to stay sober, one day at a time.”

  Try, he said. Meaning he didn’t
always succeed? Meaning he was always one drink away from disaster?

  “I don’t know if I can handle this,” I said. “First Ally, now you?”

  “It’s a lot to take in,” he said. Once again, he showed his talent for calm understatement.

  I was silent for a long time. “Is this what you’ve wanted to talk with me about?”

  “It is. I’m not perfect, JK.” He hugged me tightly to him.

  “No one is,” I said, and kissed his cheek.

  “I hear that ‘but’ in your voice again,” he said. Honestly, I had never known anyone who could read what I wasn’t saying as clearly as Levi did.

  “But,” I hesitated, then took a deep breath and continued. “I’m not perfect either. And just now I don’t think I can handle the fact that you and Ally share the same…” I trailed off, not knowing what to call it—disease? I finally settled on “problem.” “You and Ally share a potentially lethal problem. I’m worried to death about Ally and that’s all I can manage to deal with.”

  “And?” Levi asked.

  My whole soul was rebelling against the direction this conversation was headed. But I had to be honest and answer him.

  “And I think I need to devote all my energy to Ally for now,” I said, hoping I wouldn’t have to be more specific than that.

  But Levi said, “Meaning?”

  “Meaning, the next two days may be critical for her. I can’t cope with anyone else’s problems right now—not yours, not mine…” I almost said “and not ours,” but I caught myself just in time. I had to be realistic. There was no “ours.” Two days from now, Levi would be gone, I thought to myself. I couldn’t bring myself to say it out loud.

  I was hoping he would protest, hoping he’d tell me that life could be just the way it was in his songs, that together we could do anything. But he didn’t. He pulled me to him one more time, gave me one last kiss on the forehead, and then walked out of Ally’s room. I could hear his footsteps echoing down the hallway.

  I sat back down in the hard chair next to Ally’s bed and closed my eyes. Tears streamed down my face and my body was wracked with silent sobs. Here in the infirmary with nurses and janitors walking up and down the hall, with Ally passed out in the bed next to me, I had never felt so alone in my life.

  # # # # #

  Somehow, despite everything, I guess I managed to fall asleep. The next thing I knew the clock on the wall said it was twenty minutes after seven and a nurse was coming in to check on Ally. She was still asleep and didn’t stir much when the nurse checked her blood pressure and changed the IV bag again.

  I tried to stretch out some of the kinks in my arms and legs that sleeping upright in an uncomfortable chair had given me. The nurse told me that they’d be waking Ally up soon and that she would probably be released later that day, assuming all the alcohol was out of her system. I asked the nurse to please let me know if there was any change in Ally’s condition and wrote my cell phone number on a slip of paper I dug out of my purse. Then I gave Ally a kiss on the forehead and left. She and I needed to talk. Again. But even more seriously this time.

  Since Jess had driven, I called a taxi company for a ride. While I waited for someone to show up, I tried to focus on what I was going to do about my little sister. And I tried not to think about the one person in the world that every cell in my body was yearning for. I told myself that if Levi had been serious about me… well… he would have stayed with me last night, he would have protested my decision not to see him again. He wouldn’t have just kissed me on the forehead and walked out.

  In a perfect world, what would he have done? Really, I had no idea. What my heart yearned for was the classic fairy tale solution where the prince sweeps the heroine off her feet, the magic coach takes them to the castle, and the real world and its problems somehow disappear into the mist. What I had instead was the reality of a sister who needed my undivided attention right now, and the revelation that the man I loved—

  I stopped myself, willing myself to quit being as head over heels, crazy in love with Levi as I knew I was. It didn’t work. Each door I considered opening seemed to be the wrong one. The Ally door led to more troubles, no end in sight. And the Levi door? Would it even open? And if it did open, would there be anything at all on the other side?

  My mind was spinning. Between waiting for the taxi and the ride back, it was nearly an hour later when I reached my place and wearily climbed the stairs. On top of everything else, I was facing a long, hard day at the store. I needed a few minutes of peace and quiet, a hot shower, some breakfast.

  What I got instead was a phone call from my dad’s sister, Esther. Auntie Esther lived in the small farming town of Westford, Connecticut. She has never married, had been a high school teacher, then a principal, then a superintendent of schools in the last several years before she retired. She has never needed a man in her life and over the years she made sure I knew that women could be strong and independent. In her late seventies now, she is one of the people I cherish most in the world.

  “Auntie Esther!” I said, picking up the phone. I tried to make my voice sound cheerful.

  “How’s Ally?” She never wasted words and this morning was no exception. “The infirmary called last night when they were having trouble reaching you.”

  Right. She was on the emergency contact list for Ally. I should have known.

  “She’s sleeping it off right now. Honestly, Auntie Esther, I’m feeling like a total failure at this guardianship business.”

  “What part of her behavior do you figure is your fault?” she asked.

  Tears came to my eyes. “Just about all of it,” I said. “I feel like I haven’t given her the love and understanding she’s needed since Dad died.” My throat was knotting up and I could hardly speak.

  “And if you’d just loved her hard enough, that would have prevented her from abusing alcohol?” she asked.

  “Y-yes,” I said. I was choking back sobs.

  “Katharine, sit down and take a minute to calm down,” my aunt said. “I need to tell you something that your father should have talked to you about a long, long time ago. Or that I should have discussed with you, since it was always clear to me that he couldn’t do it.”

  I grabbed a box of tissues and sat down on the couch. I blew my nose. I took several deep breaths.

  “Okay,” I finally said. “I think I’m ready.” I couldn’t imagine what she had on her mind.

  “You were a small child when your mother died,” she began, “and your father, bless him, believed your memories of her should all be happy ones.”

  “She really was a saint in his eyes,” I said. “I’m pretty sure that was why he never remarried—no one else was ever good enough.”

  “But as it happens,” Auntie Esther continued, “your mother wasn’t a saint. Your dad told you that the night she was killed in a car crash, a drunk driver was at fault.”

  “Yes,” I said cautiously. I had been angry with that driver every day of my life since then. I still had nightmares in which I saw a car driven by some faceless, nameless driver speeding out of control toward me. I was haunted by the thought that my mother had watched as another car, and her own death, sped toward her.

  “Well, what your father never did tell you was that your mother was the drunk driver. There is a hereditary thread of alcoholism that runs in her family. Ally may have a genetic predisposition to alcohol abuse.”

  Her words felt like a slap in the face. My mother? Not a victim, but at fault in the crash that killed her? But after the initial jolt, I felt fragments of memory sliding into place like pieces of a puzzle. Things my father said, things he refused to speak about, suddenly began to make sense.

  “That can’t be,” I said, not wanting to believe it. Even though her words rang true, part of me was still in denial. “My dad loved my mother!”

  “Of course he did. Do you think we can only love people who have no problems?” she asked. I couldn’t help thinking about Levi. Maybe that’
s what love was really all about. Maybe love was what gave two imperfect people the strength to face life together. But I forced myself to stop thinking about Levi. I had closed that door and was going to have to live with the consequences.

  Auntie Esther was going on. “Anyway, the point isn’t what can or can’t be,” she said. “The point is that I’ve given you information, knowledge. Knowledge is power. You can use this knowledge to help Ally. And you can use it to stop blaming yourself.”

  I tried to tell myself that it was kind of like having a toothache and finding out you had a cavity. Okay. Now you could take steps to do something about it.

  Right.

  “It’s going to take me some time to process this,” I said.

  “But you will. And it will make you stronger,” she replied.

  “Auntie Esther,” I said, “there is no one else like you in the whole wide world.”

  “God doesn’t make the same mistake twice, eh?” she said. I could hear the wry smile in her voice.

  “That’s not what I meant, and you know it,” I said, smiling through my tears. “I’m not getting my hopes up yet, but I’m beginning to understand a lot of things that never made sense before.” Now if only I could make use of that understanding.

  “I’ve always had great faith in you, Katharine.” I could feel myself gaining confidence from the strength of her love.

  “You’ll be here for Thanksgiving, won’t you?” she asked, abruptly changing the subject.

  “I wouldn’t miss it,” I said. “I hope Ally and I will both be there. Love you, Auntie E.”

  Chapter 17

  Thank heaven The Finish Line was insanely busy all morning. I didn’t have time to eat lunch, and I was grateful for the fact that I had almost no time at all to think. I called the infirmary several times to check on Ally and got progress reports. I was told that she had woken up briefly, had eaten a little toast, was dozing off and on. Finally around 2:00 p.m., a nurse informed me that Ally was complaining of a terrible headache, but that she was stable and could be picked up after 5:00 today.