by Rose, Kristi
My breathing is shallow. My heart is racing. I glance at my watch and tap the screen, wondering why it didn’t give me an alert. Tyler’s seizures can be ugly. And they ravage him. Afterward, he’ll sometimes throw up or collapse from exhaustion. All of which is manageable. But to have to go to the emergency room tells me this is big. Too big. And no alert on my watch means it might not be a seizure. My mind races with all the awful possibilities.
I speed down the street, not even sure I closed the garage. My knees shake as I make the ten-mile drive from the beachside of Daytona to the mainland toward the hospital.
“Please let him be okay,” is all I can say.
Chapter 17
Tuesday Night
Adhering to the mundane but necessary laws of operating a vehicle and using the roadways -- stopping at red lights, not tailgating, and parking in a legal spot -- is a certain form of torture.
My kid is in the emergency room, and having to be law-abiding is asking too much from me. I speed as I cross over from the peninsula to the mainland. And in my haste in taking a corner, I cut it sharply and jump a curb.
Finally, I arrive. I park in the first spot I find then sprint to the emergency department. I pause just inside the sliding doors and scan the room. I spot Dax leaning against the counter of the nurse’s station, chatting with a guy in a long white lab coat and a stethoscope around his neck, and two nurses in teal scrubs. They’re laughing at whatever he’s telling them.
My blood pressure shoots through the roof, and I see red. Literally. A red overlay of color, brought on by my fury, tints the world in front of me. All I can hear is the sound of my breathing combined with my rapidly thumping heartbeat.
I stomp toward Dax. When he sees me,] he smiles and waves.
“Where is he?” My voice quivers from pent up anger and fear. My volume louder than normal.
“He’s with Doug.” Dax looks confused.
The nurses’ station separates us. I slap my hand on the laminate surface. “You said you’d take care of him. You said he’d be okay. Someone take me to my child,” I fairly scream.
From behind me, Tyler says, “I’m right here, Mom.”
I turn, bracing myself, because I have no idea what I’ll see.
My son is riding my brother’s shoulders. He’s holding a balloon that says Get well soon. He looks fine. He looks healthy. There’s a streak of dirt on his cheek, but nothing else amiss.
I sag with relief. “What happened?”
Doug lifts Tyler off his shoulders and sets him on the ground. “If you hadn’t hung up on me, I would’ve told you.”
Tyler skirts around me and runs to Dax. “This is for you.” He hands him the balloon.
I’m confused. I try to put the pieces of this puzzle together, only it seems I’ve grabbed the wrong ones. Dax hops from around the counter to get closer to Tyler.
“I love balloons,” Dax says.
On his right lower leg is a brace acting as a temporary cast that goes from his ankle to slightly above his knee. The brace's slight bend at the knee keeps Dax's foot from touching the ground.
I gasp. “You? You’re the one that’s hurt? Not Tyler?” My question is rhetorical, yet affirmation would go a long way. Even though I can see Tyler is fine, my brain hasn’t made the switch to accepting it yet.
“Yeah, ding-dong,” Doug says. “Dax has a tibial fracture.”
I gasp again and cover my mouth. Between my fingers, I say, “Didn’t you break your tibia junior year of college?” We hadn’t been dating, but I remember the story and how he’d rehabbed for so long, afraid an injury would keep him from the draft.
“Yep, this one’s not in the same spot, though. This fracture is on the tibial shaft.” He nods to the doctor. “This guy called it a toddler fracture. That makes me feel big and strong.”
He takes the balloon from Tyler. “Thanks, buddy, you were such a good friend when I stepped in that hole. Means a lot to me that you were with me the whole time.” He wraps Tyler in a hug.
I face Doug and give him a look that tells him to fill me in.
Doug shrugs. “Tyler got the ball and was running it in. First touchdown of the game and for Tyler. Dax was running down the field on the sidelines with him, cheering him along.”
Dax laughs. “Yeah, only I was running backward and not watching where I was going.”
Doug says, “Stepped right into a hole and fell back.”
“Snap,” Tyler says. “We all heard it.”
Dax adds, “I think it’s the beginning of a sinkhole. Sucked me right in and wouldn’t let go.”
I clasp my hands to my cheeks. “I’m sorry I accused you. I—”
Dax holds up his hand as he straightens. “I get it. Let’s get out of here. The pain meds are kicking in and making me tired.”
The doctor reminds Dax of his weight-bearing restrictions and his follow-up orthopedic appointment. He thanks Dax for his autograph. An orderly comes out from a room marked Storage holding crutches.
“Finally found some big enough,” he says and hands them to Dax. “But you still have to ride the wheelchair out of here.”
“Let me go pull up the van,” I say. “Come on, Tyler.”
“I’ll wait with Dax,” he says, and takes Dax’s hand.
I nod, cast Dax an uncertain look, feeling as if my apology wasn’t enough, and wanting to say more, but after a moment’s hesitation, I head outside to bring the van around.
We get Dax tucked into the minivan and Doug says to Tyler, “I’ll send your mom the video of your touchdown. Well done, kiddo.” They tap fists. Tyler beams.
Dax says, “I can’t wait to see the part where I go down.”
“It’s priceless, dude.” Doug gives Dax a slap on the shoulder, then walks away.
I pause, with my hand on the gear shifter, “Where are you staying?”
“Hotel on the beach.” Dax reclines his seat and closes his eyes.
“Where do you live right now?” I can’t believe I don’t know the answer.
“I was staying at my parents’. I haven’t looked into real estate since I wasn’t sure where I would land.” His voice is quiet as if he’s about to drift off.
“You can’t stay in a hotel by yourself.” I’m thinking through the options.
“Please don’t make my mommy come and get me,” Dax says with a laugh.
“You can stay with us.” Taking care of him would assuage me of my guilt to a degree.
“That would be awesome,” Tyler says.
Dax puts his thumbs up.
“Let’s go by your hotel and get your stuff,” I suggest.
Dax cracks an eye open. “I don’t have the energy to get out of this car but one time.”
“Is it a lot of stuff? I can go grab everything really quick. Unless you’d rather I didn’t.”
Still with one eye open Dax says, “You mean check out and stay with you?”
I nod and resist rolling my eyes. “Yeah, that’s what ‘stay with us’ means. Somehow I don’t think you’ll magically heal by tomorrow and be able to get on your bike and go about your business.”
Tyler adds, “In our house when you’re sick, Mom gives you the ironing board.”
Both of Dax’s eyes are open now and he looks over his shoulder at Tyler, wincing slightly from the move. “That sounds awful. Maybe you should [ital.] call my mom.”
Tyler laughs. “No, it means you can be on the couch with the ironing board next to you. It’s loaded with all your favorite foods, and you get all the TV you can watch.”
Dax smiles at me. “Sounds like heaven. Sign me up.” He falls back against the seat, then digs in his front pocket. The right leg of his jeans has been cut off at the knee and he looks like a hot mess. His elbow is scraped, there’s a tear in the right shoulder of his shirt, and dirt on that side.
From his pocket, he pulls out his hotel key and hands it to me. I stick it in the cup holder and head back across the bridge to the beachside.
An hour la
ter, we’re back at my house with Dax tucked in on the couch. I had to cut his jeans off him entirely. He’s now wearing baggy athletic shorts and a clean T-shirt, and snoring softly.
After a shower, I get Tyler to bed. It not until he’s breathing evenly in a sound sleep that I take a deep, freeing breath. He’s okay. Dax is okay. Everyone is okay. My nerves are shot.
For what’s likely the tenth time, I watch the video Doug sent me of Tyler running to make a touchdown and Dax running backwards down the field cheering him on. My heart swells. His affection for Tyler is clear. I’m relieved because my attachment to Dax grows by the minute. And that comes with a fresh fear I’m not sure I know how to manage.
Chapter 18
Late Tuesday Night
“Why are you standing there looking scared and worrying your hands?” Dax stretches on the couch while watching me.
I went into the living room to check on him and take an extra blanket, only to find him awake. Midnight is fast approaching.
All evening, I’ve felt like a horse’s ass for my behavior at the hospital. Besides owing Dax an apology, I want to make sure he understands my reaction. He seems chilled, but he’s also medicated.
I stand at the end of the couch near his feet, still dressed in my cutoff shorts and T-shirt. My toenail polish from this afternoon looks like a hack job, smeared and chipped. “I was awful to you. I rushed in and jumped your case. I made a bad assumption.”
He nods. “You were awful.”
I clasp my hands to my face in horror. “Was I really?”
“You just said you were.”
“But I thought you’d disagree with me.”
“Would you believe me if I did?”
I shake my head.
He does a one shoulder shrug. “There you go. So let’s just move on from it because nothing I say will make you think otherwise. I’d rather talk about how you can make it up to me.”
I take in a deep breath. Humiliation from my earlier behavior spreads across my chest like a light sunburn, leaving my chest feeling warm, the red blotches blossoming. “You mean, more than letting you stay here and catering to you?”
Dax’s narrowed eyes and pressed lips tell me he’s considering my response. Then he says, “Yeah, other than that. Tell me. Were you scared when you saw I was injured?”
I move to sit on the arm of the couch, my feet on the cushion. “No. I was relieved it wasn’t Tyler.”
Dax frowns. “That doesn’t make me feel good. Lie and tell me it terrified you.”
I laugh. “When I came in, you were joking with the doctor and nurses. I knew you were okay.”
“Fair point.”
I confess something I’d been holding back from him. “But that away game last year, when you played the Chargers and you took that hit from their safety, I was scared then. You went down like a sack of rocks and didn’t move. Those were the longest minutes of any game I’ve ever watched.”
He looks pleased. “Did you watch all my games?”
I shrug as if it's neither here nor there. “I watch a lot of football. Sometimes it was a game you were in, and sometimes it wasn’t.” No lie there. Only I omitted that I watched as many of his games as I could.
He seems only slightly satisfied. “I would’ve been scared, too, in that game, if I’d been conscious. When I came to, I was confused. I knew something was wrong.”
“I really wanted you to let them cart you off.”
He tucks his hands behind his head. “I had the wherewithal to know if I did that, I was definitely sitting out for several games.”
“Which wouldn’t have been a bad thing,” I point out.
“In hindsight,” he says with a smile. Because seven games later he sustained another concussion.
“Was it that last one that clinched the deal, made you get out?” I tuck the tips of my toes between the cushions.
He rubs a hand over his face then puts it behind his head. “It was a couple of things. The first was, I struggled to remember the playbook. The second, my parents happened to be in town for that game where I got my last concussion. My mom brought pictures of my sister’s kids, and I couldn’t remember their names.” He makes a point of making eye contact. “They’re seven and four. I’ve had plenty of time to remember their names.”
The balloon Tyler gave him is weighed down by a heavy plastic heart tied to the string. It floats by the couch and I play with the string, making it bounce up and down. “And anything else? Not that losing your memory wasn’t enough.” But I knew Dax. I knew something else had scared him.
“I was at practice, and we were going through a play. One we’d done several times. One of the guys was having a hard time, or maybe it was me. I don’t know. But I lost my cool. Said some ugly things and ended up in a slugfest with him.” He shakes his head with regret. “Thing is, I liked this guy. Never had a problem with him before. Afterward, he said something off-hand about not being myself. I went to the doctor, and he said I was staring down a barrel at long-term brain issues if I got any more serious head injuries.”
“I never heard about a fight between you and a teammate.” The team had done a good job keeping it out of the press.
He wags his brows “Following me, were you?”
I roll my eyes. “Okay, one wish.”
He glances over the back of the couch at where the bedrooms are. Then looks back at me. “For you to get naked.”
Tyler’s out like a light. He had a full day, too. He fell asleep seconds after his head hit the pillow, and I closed his door to keep from waking him. Question is, will I be comfortable having sexy time in the living room where, if Tyler suddenly woke and came out, we’d get busted?
No, I might not be fully comfortable, but I’m willing to give it a go. I need to be close to Dax, to hold him and show him I’m thankful he’s okay. That today’s emergency was manageable.
And, weirdly, the relief that followed the fear that my child had been hurt makes me want to experience life on a more thrilling level. Maybe to prove life isn’t so precarious after all.
I tug the balloon down and twist off the plastic stop that keeps the helium in. I put the balloon end to my mouth and suck in.
In a Minnie Mouse voice, I say, “What would you like me to take off first?” I stand, one hand thrust out to the side and gesture up and down my body. It takes everything I have not to laugh.
But Dax does. He sits up quickly, winces, but gestures for me to hand him the balloon. I do.
He sucks in some helium. “Girl, I don’t care. Just take it all off because I love looking at every part of you.” His words are sweet, but the altered voice makes them silly, and I laugh.
I take back the balloon, pinching the tip between my fingers. I unfasten the button on my jean shorts and shrug them to where they’re riding low on my hips. Then I take in a hit of helium.
“You just lay there and enjoy the ride, mister,” I say. “Because this is what I have planned.” I have to take a second hit of helium to go into the details. There’s absolutely nothing sexy about the high, squeaky pitch of my voice. But there is something tantalizing about telling each other what we want and what we plan to do. Who cares how it sounds?
He gestures for his turn. Before he takes in any helium. , he says, “I’m hard as a rock. Should I worry that even with a squeaky Minnie Mouse voice, I find you so goddamn sexy?”
I let my shorts fall to the floor and then climb on top of him, mindful of his brace. I straddle him.
He takes in helium. In a squeaky voice, he says, “Take your shirt off, please. Pretty please.”
We laugh. The balloon is empty. He tosses it aside. Going slow, I pull my shirt over my head. He removes my bra.
“I’ll happily break both legs if I can get this again.”
“We haven’t done anything yet,” I say.
“No, but I already know it’s going to be amazing. I sure wish you’d been there when I came to after those concussions.”
His hands are on
my boobs and mine are on the elastic of his shorts.
He suddenly grabs my hands and goes still. “Wait, Tyler? Are you sure he’s asleep?”
When he considers my child, my feelings for him grow even stronger.
“He’s asleep, and he’s generally a sound sleeper. If he has a seizure, we’ll hear an alarm.” I tap my watch. “And this will warn us.”
He nods slightly as if considering what we’re about to do. “Okay, but let’s make it quick.”
I laugh and get back to undressing him.
There’s nothing quick about our lovemaking. With me on top, I have full control. I tease as I caress my body against his. And without words, using our hands and bodies to express our needs and feelings, I take him in slowly and fully.
He groans.
I gently ride him, keeping my strokes rhythmical, each one bringing us closer to the precipice of pleasure.
As we reach our climax together he sits up, pushing deeper inside me, wraps his arms around me, and holds tight.
Chapter 19
Wednesday a week later
Every day for the last seven days, I reminded myself not to get used to Dax being around. Even balanced on one crutch, he’s helped around the house, and just that little extra opens up enough breathing room for me to get my schoolwork done.
My mom didn’t hesitate to turn over after-school care to Dax either. Doug thinks she is testing Dax for staying power. I made sure to tell her he wasn’t staying. Last thing I need is Mom dropping off wedding magazines or something equally embarrassing.
I tell her what I know. Dax is here for a few weeks. Truth is, we never talked about why he doesn’t have someone come get him and take him to his mom and dad’s. Only that he says being at his parents’ house is wonderful and hellish at the same time.