by Robin Wells
“Nettie—I’d like to start over.”
“No.” The word was a reflex.
“Why not? We could date, like two people who’d just met each other. We could go to dinner and talk—all the stuff we’re doing now. And who knows? Sooner or later, we might even kiss.”
“I don’t want to kiss you.”
“Are you sure?” His fingers moved against her ear again. He leaned in closer, close enough that she could smell his Aramis, close enough that her brain grew muddled and her thoughts got loopy. “I sure want to kiss you.”
All of a sudden, it was flooding her—all the old attraction, all the old tenderness, all the old, sweet memories. He was circumventing her brain. He was getting to her on a primal level.
“Just relax and let it happen,” he murmured, moving closer.
The words were oddly un-Dave-like. He wasn’t a relax-and-let-it-happen kind of guy. Those sounded like the words of someone else.
And she knew just who. Her body went rigid. “Is that what she used to say?”
“What?”
“ ‘Relax and let it happen.’ Is that something Linda said to you?”
He dropped his eyes.
Oh, God—she was right! Annette struggled to open the car door. She was so stiff with anger that her fingers wouldn’t fold around the handle.
“Wait,” Dave said. “Sit tight. Let me come help you.”
“I don’t need any more of your help.”
“Yes, you do. I’ll get your cane, then I’ll help you into the house.”
Damn it. She was still a week away from being able to walk and climb the porch stairs herself. She closed her eyes and pressed her lips tightly together, furious at him, at herself, at the whole damned situation.
She hated that she needed him. Being physically dependent on him was bad enough, but God help her, she was getting emotionally dependent on him, too.
Let it happen, indeed! He was the one who’d let it happen, who’d let the stranger into their marriage, who’d broken their wedding vows. He was the one who’d ruined things.
He held out his hand. It stung her pride to take it, to have him help her out of the car. It burned her ego to feel his arm under her hand as she walked stiffly to the house.
So help her, as soon as she could go up and down stairs safely on her own, she was out of here.
Dave’s pace slowed as they neared the house.
“Damn it, Dave, hurry up. Don’t make me hang on to you any longer than I have to.”
To her annoyance, his speed slackened still further. “Annette, as soon as we get to the porch—grab the railing.”
“What?”
His steps were now mere shuffles. “Grab the railing.” He put his free hand on his chest.
That’s when she realized something was wrong. “Dave?”
He inched forward, up to the edge of the steps, then doubled over.
She reached for the railing—just as he tumbled over and fell into the flower bed.
“Dave!” Panic surged through her chest. Casting aside the cane, she used the railing to lower herself to the ground beside him.
He lay on his side, crumpled in the cypress mulch, his hand over his chest.
“Dave! Dave!” She knelt over him on her good leg, grabbed both of his shoulders, and turned him on his back.
In the porch light, his face was a mottled, bluish purple. “Can’t… breathe,” he gasped. “Nitro. Pocket. Pants.”
She reached into his left pocket and pulled out a cell phone. Dropping it on the ground, she stuck her hand into his right pocket and found a bottle of pills. Her hand shook as she struggled to open it. The lid finally flew off, spraying pills into the mulch, where they landed like flower seeds. Three pills remained in the bottle. She put one under his tongue, then grabbed his phone and dialed 911.
“What’s the nature of your emergency?” asked a maddeningly calm male voice.
“My husband.” The word was out before she had time to think about it. “I think he’s having a heart attack. We’re at…” She looked up at the house numbers on the porch. “Forty-two-oh-nine Cypress Way.”
The man repeated the address in a robotic fashion. “He has a heart condition,” Annette said. “I gave him nitroglycerin.”
“Is he conscious?”
“Just barely. He’s having trouble breathing.”
“Annette.” Dave called her name. It came out as a low, inhaled rasp. “You were the best part of my life.”
“Stop talking like that!”
“Tell him not to talk. He needs to lie still and take deep breaths,” said the insanely calm operator.
“Dave, you’re supposed to lie still and take deep breaths,” Annette relayed.
“Got to say this,” Dave gasped. “May never get another chance.”
He thought he was dying. Terror filled her.
“Dave, just lie still.”
“No. You need to know. Annette—love you. Always loved you.” His breathing was labored. His face looked like unbaked bread dough. “That’s why Linda left. Because I’d never love her like I love you.”
He was dying. Oh, God—if he died, she’d die, too.
“Don’t you dare die on me, Dave Charmaine.” She shook him. On some back burner of her mind, it occurred to her that it was probably a bad idea to shake a man having a heart attack, but she couldn’t help herself. “Do you hear me? Don’t you dare check out after making me fall for you again.”
“Ma’am?” The operator’s voice sounded through the phone on the ground beside Dave.
Tree frogs and cicadas burst into a loud chorus. Dave went limp in her arms.
Annette picked up the phone, frantic. “He’s unconscious! I need help!”
“Is he breathing?”
She bent down and put her ear to his mouth. Nothing.
“Ma’am? Are you there?”
Ignoring the operator, she fit her mouth over Dave’s. He tasted like home. Oh, God, she loved this man. She’d never stopped loving him. He was the best and the worst of her. Together they’d made and lost a son—unspeakable joy, unfathomable grief. She loved him. Why hadn’t she fought for him when Linda had tried to lay claim to him?
Damn it, she’d fight for him now. Despair morphed into desperation, desperation into determination. She blew into his mouth, willing him to breathe. She pulled back, stacked her hands on his chest, and pumped on his stubborn heart, willing it to beat. “Damn it, Dave, I’ll kill you if you die on me!” She dipped her head and filled his lungs again, then pumped his chest again.
She repeated the cycle for what seemed like forever, until the wail of a siren cut through the night. She continued alternating the chest compressions with hard huffs of air into his mouth, until a medic took her by the shoulders.
“We’ve got it, ma’am.”
Another medic rushed up with a stretcher. She stood back and watched them set to work, her hand over her mouth, her heart splitting apart along seams she hadn’t even known had mended.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
“Mrs. Charmaine?”
Annette felt Katie grip her fingers as the surgeon called her name in the surgery waiting room at Our Lady of the Lake Hospital in Baton Rouge. Actually, it was both of their names. What a weird thing to notice—but then, a person tended to notice weird things when she’d been up all night, worrying and praying and bargaining with God.
Annette had phoned Katie seven or eight hours ago and told her that Dave had been helicoptered here for emergency open-heart surgery. Katie had immediately driven to Baton Rouge to join her. She’d said that Zack had wanted to come, too, but Katie had insisted he stay home with Gracie.
Annette looked up at the scrubs-clad surgeon, trying to read his face, her heart quaking. “Yes?”
The lines in the doctor’s face shifted into a smile. “Your husband came through just fine.”
It was a good thing she was seated, because otherwise her legs would have buckled. “Oh, thank God.”
/> “We ended up doing a triple bypass,” the doctor said. “He should have had the surgery when we first recommended it.”
Annette frowned. “When was that?”
“About eleven months ago.”
Dave had known he’d needed surgery for eleven months, and he hadn’t done it? He hadn’t even told her. It took an effort to pull her focus back to the doctor.
“There was very little damage to his heart. He was fortunate.”
“Fortunate,” she echoed.
“He’s going to be in intensive care for the next forty-eight hours. You should go home and get some rest.”
“No. I’ll stay here.”
“Are you sure? You can only go in to see him once every two hours, and then only for ten minutes at a time.”
“That’s okay. I don’t want to leave him.” Ever. Ever again.
The doctor nodded. “He’s in recovery right now. We’ll let you know when we transfer him to ICU.”
“Thank you.”
The minutes ticked by like hours. At length, a nurse came and got her. “Mrs. Charmaine? You can see him now.”
She hobbled in, leaning on the cane and Katie’s arm.
Oh, God—he looked like death. A tube protruded from his throat, connecting him to a machine forcing air into his lungs. “Dave—I’m here.” He didn’t move. Annette lifted his hand. It was cold and limp.
“I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere.” She leaned down and spoke into his ear. “And damn it all, you’d better not go anywhere, either. We’ve still got a lot of living to do.” His fingers moved in her hand. He opened his eyes for a second—just long enough to look at her. The ventilator was taped over his lips, so he couldn’t have moved his mouth, yet she could have sworn he smiled. He closed one eye, and then the other.
The nurse gasped. “It looked like he winked at you!”
“He did,” Annette said. She squeezed his hand, her heart light—light and buoyant and floaty, free of the anger and resentment that had weighed it down for so long.
Gracie: Remember the guy who runs the book store who’s kinda like my granddad? He had a heart attack 3 days ago.
Megan: OMG Is he ok?
Gracie: Yeah. He’s in the Baton Rouge hospital for a week or so. Katie and Annette r staying at a hotel there 2 be with him.
Megan: So ur living alone?
Gracie: Nah. Zack is here.
Megan: How is that?
Gracie: OK. He lets me drive his car. Mine won’t be delivered for another 2 weeks.
Megan: Bet U can’t wait! How’s school?
Gracie: Totally sucks, except for biology and chemistry. How’s yours?
Megan: Awesome. John Rogers invited me 2 the homecoming dance.
Gracie: OMG!
Megan: I know. I’m going 2 the mall with Jana 2 shop for a dress.
Gracie: I’m jealous. I can’t fit into anything but yoga pants. My belly is gi-normous.
Megan: How’s the baby?
Gracie: OK. The placenta’s still low, though.
Megan: Bummer. Gotta go. Jana’s here.
Gracie: Have fun!
Gracie closed her phone and rolled over on the bed, fat tears plopping down her cheeks. She wished she could wear cute clothes and look forward to things like the homecoming dance. She wished she could go to the mall and hang out with other kids and just have a normal life.
It wasn’t fair, how completely one bad decision had changed everything. She wished she could get a do-over. She wished she’d never gone to that guy’s truck or never gone to that stupid concert at all. She wished like crazy she wasn’t pregnant.
Guilt soaked through her. What kind of expectant mother had thoughts like that? She was going to be a lousy mother. What if she couldn’t love the baby? What if she hated it? What if all she felt for it was shame and loathing, like she felt about herself when she thought about the night she conceived? She grabbed her pillow, hugged it tight, and cried.
“Thank you so much for letting me stay here,” Annette said as she limped into Zack’s house a week later. Zack followed behind her, carrying her and Katie’s suitcases. Annette was still using the cane, but she was walking without holding on to anyone. “I hate to be in your way.”
“You won’t be in the way,” Zack said. Well, that wasn’t exactly true. As long as Annette was in the house, he was pretty sure Katie wasn’t going to visit the garage apartment. But that was a sacrifice he’d willingly make; he was glad just to have Katie back in the house. During the past week while she’d been in Baton Rouge, he’d missed her more than he’d known he could miss anyone.
“I tried to tell Katie that I’m perfectly capable of staying on my own at Dave’s place, but she wouldn’t hear of it.”
“We’ve already settled this,” Katie said firmly. “You were just released from therapy this week. It’s not a good idea for you to be staying alone yet.”
“When Kate makes up her mind about something, there’s no point in trying to change it,” Zack said.
“Isn’t that the truth. My son used to say that she could out-stubborn a rock.”
The mention of Katie’s husband made Zack’s chest tighten. He placed Annnette’s suitcase on a chair by the window. “We’d like Dave to come stay here, too, when he gets out of Sunnyside,” he said. Dave had been discharged from the Baton Rouge hospital on the condition that he stay in the facility’s rehabilitation wing for another two weeks.
Annette smiled. “That’s very sweet. But by then, I’ll be more than strong enough to care for him.”
“So you’re going to stay in Chartreuse for good?” Gracie asked. Her mouth was purple from licking a grape Dum-Dum. The girl was trying to act indifferent, but she wasn’t fooling anyone. She was clearly thrilled to have Katie and Annette back. She’d been bouncing around all afternoon, helping get the place ready for their arrival, and now she was glued to the two women’s sides.
Zack was glad to see it. Gracie had been glum and morose and unnaturally silent lately. He had a feeling she was having a hard time at school, but she refused to talk about it.
“Dave and I haven’t had a chance to really discuss our plans yet,” Annette said.
“But you might stay,” Gracie persisted.
“It’s possible.”
“Awesome!” Gracie gave a big purple grin.
“Totally awesome,” Katie said, smiling just as wide.
Zack had talked to Katie daily, and she’d told him that Annette had had a complete change of heart where Dave was concerned. “Those two belong together,” Katie had said. “Neither one has really been happy since they’ve been apart.”
After a week without Katie, Zack was beginning to know how they felt.
Katie was curled under the green-checked comforter reading a romance novel when she heard a knock on the door. “Come in,” she called.
Gracie opened the door.
Katie put down the book, delighted at the unexpected visit. She had texted and called Gracie while she was in Baton Rouge, but she’d really missed the girl. “Come in!” She patted the bed beside her. “Sit down. How are you doing?”
She shrugged. “Okay, I guess.”
“What’s on your mind?”
Gracie sat on the bed. “Well, I’ve been thinking.”
“Yes?”
“Next time I go to the doctor, I think I want to know the sex of the baby after all.”
Katie smiled. “So you can pick a name and clothes and stuff?”
“Sorta. But more because I don’t like the idea of the doctor knowing something about my baby that I don’t know. It seems dumb to be deliberately ignorant.” She looked at Katie. “What do you think?”
It was the first time she recalled Gracie actually asking her opinion about anything. Katie considered the question thoughtfully. “I think it’s a personal choice, and it’s entirely up to you.”
“Did you know my sex when you were pregnant with me?”
Katie’s throat grew thick. “No. The doct
or said I was better off not knowing. He said it would only make me more attached, and that would make it harder for me to do what was best for you.”
Silence loomed between them for a long moment.
“Do you think giving my baby away would be best for him or her?”
It was the second time Gracie had asked her that question, so it must really be weighing on her. Katie answered straight from the heart. “No.”
“Why not? I’m the same age you were.”
“But you have resources I didn’t have. You have Zack and me. You’ll be able to get an education and afford child care.” Katie hesitated, then decided to just go ahead and say what had been on her heart for months. “Gracie, sweetheart, if you don’t feel ready for motherhood, I would be honored to raise your baby.”
“No.” She shook her head, her mouth tight. “No way. It’s my baby.”
“I understand.” Katie lifted her hands. “Totally. I just wanted to lay that out as an option. I also want you to know that I’ll be here to help in any capacity you want or need.”
“I don’t intend to lean on you.”
“I admire your independent spirit. But I’m here, and I’ll be happy to babysit if you want a night out or anything.”
“Okay.”
Gracie looked down at the comforter and traced one of the green squares with her finger. “My mom said you picked out my name.”
“Yes.”
“Why did you name me Grace?”
Katie grinned. “Because you were amazing. Why else?”
“Seriously.”
“Because it’s such a beautiful word. It means God’s unmerited favor. In other words, love without any strings. It’s affection and forgiveness and protection and beauty, all wrapped up together—and we don’t have to do anything to earn it. He gives it to us regardless of how badly we behave.” She grinned. “That concept seemed like the most beautiful thing I’d ever heard.”
Gracie sat very still for a moment. “What were you going to name me if I was a boy?”
“Joseph. I thought that he must have been the best man who had ever been born, if God trusted him to be Jesus’ earth dad. Plus he listened to his dreams. He was thinking he shouldn’t marry Mary when he found out she was pregnant, but he had a dream where an angel told him to go ahead and take her as his wife, so he did.” Katie smiled at Gracie. “I think that’s a good example of listening to your heart.”