by Alana Terry
“That’s what I thought you were saying.” I’m too defensive. Too hot-headed right now. It’s because I haven’t slept. Who could expect me to have a rational conversation after what I’ve been through in the past twenty-four hours?
“No, that’s not what I was saying. But I’m seriously concerned that it’s what you were thinking.”
I roll my eyes and start walking back to the hospital, hoping he’ll follow me. “That’s not what I was thinking. I just thought you were ...”
“What? Thought I was what?” He grabs my arm.
I yank it free. “I thought you were ...”
“An irresponsible jerk who’s going to abandon his little girl when she’s sick? Man, Tiff, what sort of person do you think I am?”
“I only meant ...”
“That we’d be better off split up?” he finishes for me.
“I never said that.” I quicken my pace. It’s cold out here, and I want to get inside.
“You didn’t have to say it. Geeze. Is that what this whole four months have been to you? Some sort of experiment? Why the heck did you marry me in the first place if you didn’t think that we would stick together?”
I whip my head around and stop dead in my tracks to face him. “Of course I thought we would. At least I hoped so. But that was before ...” I clench my jaw shut. Do I want to make this worse?
“Before what?” His shoulders are squared. His jaw set.
I should leave now. Leave and talk to him again in the morning once we’ve both had time to cool off.
“Before what?” he demands again. He clenches his hands into fists.
“Nothing.” I can’t do it. As sick as I am of all this bickering, as annoying as he gets when he falls into these broody moods, a pathetic part of me wants to hold onto him. Wants to hope we might still find a way to make this work.
It’s not time to pull the plug. Not yet.
I start moving again. He grabs me by the back of my hoodie. Yanks me around to face him. “Don’t walk away from me.”
“Get your hands off me.” I glance around. There’s a few people within shouting distance. If I need to, I can make him let go. He won’t dare touch me a second time.
“You know,” he begins. His face is close to mine. So close I can feel the heat from his anger. I’m the one who did this to him. I should have never let things escalate like this. “I came to Seattle ready to make things right. That car my mom and I drove out here? It wasn’t a rental. It was a Christmas present. She bought it for us.”
I don’t know what to say. I recall what I detected as that hint of kindness in Patricia’s voice when she called the hospital room. If I had known ...
“I was going to sell the Pontiac. Already know a guy from work who said he’d buy it from me once he gets his tax return. You know what? I was going to use the money to get us a place in Seattle. That’s where I was this afternoon. Looking for apartments close to the hospital. Care to guess why? Because I was willing to sacrifice anything for our daughter.” He shakes his head. “You don’t even know who I am, do you?” He’s disgusted with me. I can see it in his eyes.
“Listen, I’m sorry.” What else am I supposed to say? So this was some big, stinking mistake. That happens. It’s where we go from here that matters.
Jake doesn’t respond.
I swallow my pride and try one more time. “I had no idea you were ...”
“No idea?” he interrupts.
I grit my teeth to keep from screaming out in frustration. Will he let me get a word in?
“No idea,” he repeats with a sarcastic laugh that’s totally unlike him. “Yeah, I kind of figured that when you and your doctor friend were making out in our daughter’s hospital room.”
It’s a cheap shot and a lie, and he knows it. I see the trace of shame hit his face. It’s up to me now. The ball’s in my court. I can placate him, explain to him one more time how Eliot’s just a friend I randomly met in Seattle. I can gush over his mother’s generous gift, a gift I’m sure doesn’t come without a few dozen invisible strings attached, strings that are bound to tie us down for years to come if I accept it.
Or I can walk away. Take my chances. Just me and my daughter.
Whatever decision I’m going to make, it’s got to be final.
“I don’t even want to look at you right now,” I tell him and turn back toward the hospital. Toward my daughter.
I’m four or five steps away before he calls after me. “Tiff, wait.” We both know that’s what he’s supposed to say now. His voice isn’t even all that convincing.
“Just leave me alone.” I call over my shoulder, keeping my eye on the huge man walking toward us. If Jake gives me a hard time, I’ll scream rape and get this Good Samaritan to intervene.
“Tiff, please.” There’s a hint of sincerity now in his tone, but it’s too late. Never look back.
My life motto.
CHAPTER 80
I can’t believe it’s Christmas Eve. Six hours left before midnight, and I’m still stuck here at Children’s.
At least Natalie’s doing better. That’s the good news. Her temperature is back to normal as of yesterday morning. A small Christmas miracle, maybe, or else the result of good medicine. There’s talk that if she holds her stats steady for the rest of the day, the doctor might decide to extubate her before long. I’m not about to get my hopes up, but it’s nice to know she’s not getting any worse.
Haven’t heard from Jake. Not a phone call. Not a text. He hasn’t stopped by to see our daughter unless he’s inherited some kind of Japanese-American ninja skills that allow him to sneak in during the five minutes it takes me each morning to heat up cold coffee from the parents’ lounge.
I haven’t heard from Eliot, either. Dr. Jamison, I should call him. It’s just as well. He probably feels awkward about what happened with Jake. Doesn’t want to make things worse. His number’s stuck in my phone, the one with the dead batteries, so I couldn’t get in touch with him even if I wanted to.
Which I don’t.
It’s been quiet around here the past few days, as I’m sure you can imagine. No calls. No visitors. It’s like Natalie and I are stinking Christmas ghosts that nobody can see. Nobody wants to think about us. It’s too depressing. But it hasn’t been all terrible. It’s given us a lot of time together. I talk to her quite a bit these days. I tell her about the people who love her, Grandma Sandy so far away in Massachusetts. The little boy Sandy and her husband adopted, who I guess is Natalie’s uncle even though he’s only in fourth or fifth grade. In an especially generous moment, I even told her about Grandma Patricia and how she took care of her those first few months out of the hospital.
Those aren’t the only grandmas, either. We talk about Grandma Lucy quite a bit, Natalie and me, when no one else is around. Talk about the faith she had that Natalie would be healed. I don’t know if Grandma Lucy’s still in the hospital or if she’s passed away already or what, but Natalie and I sometimes pray for her. It makes me feel weird, though, because Sandy’s husband said we shouldn’t pray for people who’ve already died, but since I don’t know one way or the other, I figure God will have to understand. Besides, if Grandma Lucy’s in heaven now, that means she’s even closer to God so her prayers must be making that much more difference. I don’t know how solid that is biblically, but it’s comforting to think about.
I kept checking the Safe Anchorage website for updates on Grandma Lucy until my phone completely died on me. Apparently she was suffering from water around her heart sac or something like that. Sounded serious. I spent a lot of time on the comments, reading what people posted. Found out quite a bit about her life, actually. It’s interesting stuff. Someone should really make a book or a movie about it. I guess she grew up in China. Had missionary parents there. Lived through some big war. I couldn’t figure out which one, but it sounded pretty intense. After she got back to the States, she kept on having all kinds of adventures. I guess she was a sort of missionary lady for a while
, even into her old age. Spent some time in the Middle East teaching English. Someone mentioned meeting her a few years ago in China, so I gather she went back there from time to time. Had all kinds of grandkids and great grandkids.
There’s a place where you can sign up for regular email updates about Grandma Lucy’s condition, but my battery died as I was typing in my address.
Just my luck.
Other than that, and of course everything with Jake, things are going pretty well. I mean, Natalie’s getting better. Looks like my fears about her never coming off the ventilator were unnecessary. I don’t know how much longer we’re going to be here, but I know it won’t be forever. One day, they’ll take out that breathing tube. She’ll be strong enough to go home ...
Don’t ask me where home is. I don’t know. Not yet. But I’m going to figure it out. That huge doctor, the one who came in with the itty bitty chaplain to talk to me about Natalie’s care? Turns out I was right and he’s not a medical doctor, but he’s got some crazy advanced degree in social work, and I guess one of his jobs is to help people like me get set up with services. He’s been on vacation for the past two days, but he’s coming back to work right after Christmas. I’m sure together we’ll figure out some sort of a game plan.
I’m a little surprised at myself that I’m not thinking about Jake more. I guess there was part of me that was so certain it would end like this, I’m not too upset by it. I’m not a big sobbing mess or anything like that. It’s not like this is my first breakup.
So things are all right. Whenever I get too worried about what the future will hold, like how I’ll manage to support my daughter when she’s too sick for me to go to work and I don’t know a single soul in Seattle, I just remind myself to breathe and take things one step at a time. It reminds me of this little cross-stitched verse Sandy’s got hanging up in her kitchen. I’m sure you’d recognize the passage if you read it, the one about birds and flowers and being anxious, all that stuff.
You know what? It’s good advice whether you believe in God or not. Do not worry about tomorrow.
I’m giving myself an early Christmas present by promising to remember that one simple rule.
CHAPTER 81
The nurse pops in. It’s funny how kind everyone acts on Christmas Eve. Honestly, if it were me, I think I’d be ticked if I had to work through the holiday, but I’ve noticed the hospital staff today are in really good moods. Compassionate, I guess is a better way of putting it. Like they feel sorry we’re here over Christmas and are going out of their way to be extra nice to us. I don’t really appreciate the sympathy part, but I do like the added effort.
Today’s nurse is wearing candy cane scrubs and matching earrings. Kind of festive, even though she’s a little too old to pull off the cute Christmas elf theme. “Guess who got a package?” she asks, and I take the large box, wondering who in the world would be sending me something. I just hope it’s not Patricia. I may have read that woman wrong the whole time she lived with us — either that or she’s such a master manipulator I don’t even know what to think of her anymore. All I know is I don’t want to be indebted to someone like her.
But the package isn’t from Patricia, thank God, and I don’t even have to read the return address label to recognize the flowing cursive handwriting. Man, how many years has it been, and I still know Sandy’s handwriting like I’ve been living with her up until last week.
Tiffany Franklin. She’s one of the only people I was close to who never called me Tiff. It didn’t bother me, either, like it would with most people.
It takes me a minute to work my way through all the tape, but with the help of some scissors I borrow from another nurse (this one in snowflake scrubs), I get the box open.
It’s a typical care package, the kind Sandy used to send me before I changed addresses and the two of us lost touch. There’s some girly things, hair brushes, lip gloss. Does she think I’m ten years old? The nail polish is a deep magenta color. I might try it if I get bored.
She’s included a few other things too, things that are so Sandy. A Ziploc bag full of cookies and brownies, a snowman picture colored as sparsely as possible with a note that it’s from her adopted son, and a mug stuffed with at least a dozen different types of tea bags.
I miss her so much, especially around Christmastime. I can picture all the crafts up on her mantle, things her kids made decades ago that she’s kept throughout the years. So many colors. There’s no coordination. Not at Sandy’s house. Not at Christmas. But the chaos is a theme in and of itself, and it’s a happier-looking sort of décor than what you’d find in any fancy home magazine or upscale department store.
There’s a letter, and I nearly give myself eye strain until I get used to reading her cursive again. She’s so encouraging. There’s Bible verses all over it, as well as some references she probably wants me to look up on my own. Who knows? Maybe I will.
Everything she writes, I can hear each single word in her motherly, doting voice with that Southern drawl. Man, I miss home. Remind me again why I ever left?
Dear Tiffany, I’m praying that you’re out of the hospital by now with that precious daughter of yours, but if not, I want you to know that God’s still on the throne and he still has a fabulous plan, both for you and your sweet little Natalie. I won’t presume to know what the good Lord’s doing right now, but I want to encourage you to trust him even through the heartache and stress and sadness that’s come your way.
You’re stronger than you know, sweetie, and that’s not just because you’re a smart, capable, and bright young woman (which of course we both know you are). You’re powerful because the Holy Spirit lives in you. Maybe you think he’s gone. Maybe you think you’ve wandered too far for him to ever pay much attention to you, but those are the lies the enemy wants you to believe, darling. The truth is God has never left you. He lives in you, and his love for you is just as strong as it was so many years ago when you accepted him into your heart and made a commitment to live your life for him.
I know it hasn’t been easy since then, sweetheart, but I do know that there hasn’t been a day that’s gone by when Carl and I haven’t gotten down on our knees and asked God to bless you. To show you how deeply he loves you, no matter how far you may have strayed, no matter what mistakes you may have made in your past.
The Bible says that God is gracious and compassionate, slow to anger and abounding in love. Do you know what that means, darling? It means there’s absolutely nothing — and when I say nothing, I truly mean nothing — that will separate you from his love. It’s right there in Romans 8, and if you’re in need of some extra encouragement today, I think you’ll find it in that passage. No matter what happens, precious, no matter how many trials you and your sweet baby girl Natalie have to go through, they’re only meant to draw you closer to God. The choice is up to you. You can get angry. You can shake your fist at heaven and ask God why he’s making you both suffer like this. Or you can curl up in his lap, rest your weary cheek against his breast, and soak in the love and comfort he has for you today.
I don’t know everything that’s happened since the day you professed your faith in Christ and Carl baptized you. But I do know that whatever you’ve done, you can’t pluck yourself out of God’s hand. He is the Good Shepherd, who knows the voice of his sheep and calls them by name. That means he’s calling you. Tiffany. Calling you to trust him. Calling you to shake off the pain and shame of the past. To forget whatever regrets or fears or anxieties are holding you down. To cast your cares upon him because he cares so much — so much — for you. You are precious and honored in his sight. He takes great delight in you, just like you delight in your sweet little baby.
And now, my dear, I have a special prayer for that beautiful daughter of yours. My grandbaby Natalie. I don’t pretend to know if God will heal her now or in heaven, but I know for a fact that her healing will come. And my prayer for her is that for however long she has on this earth, whether a few days or weeks or a hundred fu
ll, rich, healthy years, my prayer for your precious Natalie is that she will always know deep in the core of her soul how much she’s loved. By you, by her daddy, by Carl and me, but most of all by her heavenly Father, who’s had his hand on her sweet little life from the moment she was conceived.
Nothing is an accident, darling. Nothing is out of God’s control. And nothing is too painful or too tarnished that he can’t redeem it. Any mistakes, any guilt, any fear — he’s bigger than all of those. So trust in him, honey. He promises to never leave you or forsake you. You’re his beloved daughter. Think how much you love your baby. Tired and exhausted as you are, you love that precious darling. Now imagine how much more God, your perfect heavenly Father, loves her. No matter what happens, know that he’s holding her in the palm of his hand.
I love you so much, sweetie. I hope you never forget that. Carl does too, and so does your brother Woong. In fact, he’s the one who helped make those gingerbread cookies and the brownies too. But be careful because the brownies have nuts, and I don’t know if you’re going to share with Jake or any of your friends at the hospital or anything, but I forgot to write a note to warn people with allergies.
The next several paragraphs are filled with family news. Who would be coming over for Christmas. What foods she’ll prepare. I can almost smell that maple syrup glaze on the ham. The yeasty bread rolls she makes every holiday. My nose tickles with the feel of sparkling apple cider.
I don’t think I’ve had a taste of that stuff since I left home.
Home. Not anymore. But it’s the closest thing I’ve got right now.
There’s a PS at the bottom of the page. I don’t know if this plug’s the right size or anything, but we had an extra one lying around, and I thought maybe you could use it.
I throw aside another bag of Christmas baked goods and find a charger for my phone. I can tell it’s the right style before I even test it out. It’s like that missionary story of the little girl who prays for a baby doll and finds one in the boxes of food aid. Who told those do-gooders to add something like that at the last minute?