by JJ Knight
The glass doors look modern on the crumbling yellow facade of the pasteleria. As I approach, a woman comes outside and locks the door. I run toward her full-out, hoping to catch her before she gets in a car.
But she doesn’t. She heads toward a bus stop, a giant bag under her arm. She stops in front of anyone she sees sitting on a curb or a bench and hands them a loaf of bread.
I reach her and touch her arm.
She turns away from the man who is tucking the bread under his jacket. She is very tiny, about fifty years old, her black hair twisted in a tight knot. Her eyes are kind.
“It’s cold to be out without a coat,” she says. She reaches in her bag for a loaf of bread.
She thinks I’m homeless. I hold up my hands. “I gave my coat to someone a few blocks back,” I say. “I need to know about the man who collapsed in front of the bakery. A homeless man.”
She pauses. “Tony? He loves my rosemary bread.”
“Is he okay?”
“My husband took him to White Memorial Hospital.” She motions up the street. “It’s about a mile or so that way. He was okay last I heard. I think David saw him yesterday. This has been a busy week with Thanksgiving coming.”
I rush out a long breath of relief. “Thank you. I’m looking for him. He’s my wife’s father.”
She reaches out a hand and squeezes my forearm. “I think he will still be there. It was something with his lungs, but nothing too terrible.”
“Thank you, thank you,” I say and start another low-intensity jog. A mile is nothing. And running it will keep me warm.
Chapter 8: Maddie
I lied about my phone. Parker has been so good about waiting for Lily to call him on Thursdays that I unblocked his number.
I should probably go back to my old phone plan and not the one Parker pays for, but right now it seems like too much trouble. I’ve been working extra hours for Anton. Ever since he made the secret mother-of-the-bride dress for some royal wedding, allowing me to choose the fabric, he’s been calling me in for new projects.
I’m on my way to moving up.
But that’s why when Parker calls me on a Wednesday, I see it come through. Lily is just getting out of her bath and I am toweling her down. My phone sits on the counter. Lily glances over at it and sees the picture of Parker.
“It’s Daddy! Can we video chat?”
I frown. Parker obviously thinks that since some time has passed, it’s okay to break the rules. I click the “Ignore Call” button and start combing out Lily’s hair.
Lily’s face crumples into a pout. “Why can’t I talk to Daddy?”
“We’re getting you ready for bed right now,” I say.
“But then I’ll be asleep!” she argues.
The landline rings in the kitchen. I hear Delores walk through the house to check it. Most of those calls are her old friends who don’t like cell phones. I tug Lily’s nightgown over her head. “You’ll talk to him tomorrow for sure. How about we do a video chat then?”
“But I want one now!”
The phone is still ringing, which means Delores isn’t going to answer it. Now I have a feeling it might be Parker, switching to that number since I didn’t answer mine. This fills me with unease. Why would he need me so badly?
The landline is tied to an old-fashioned voice recorder that Delores still keeps. I pick Lily up and rest her on my hip as I walk down the hall.
Delores is staring at the voice recorder, waiting for it to pick up. She sees me in the doorway, and her eyes shift to Lily.
The machine clicks as it takes over the call and starts recording. Parker’s voice comes on the line. “Maddie, it’s Parker. I need to talk to you. I am at White Memorial Hospital. It’s your dad. You need to come to LA right away. Please call me.”
I let Lily slide to the floor, my heart in my throat.
“I’ll call him,” Delores says. “I’ll find out what is going on.”
I try to speak, but my voice won’t come out. Lily takes my hand, seeming to understand something bad is happening.
“No,” I finally manage. “I’ll do it.”
“Mama?” Lily asks. “What’s wrong?”
I bend down to hug her. “It’s okay, baby. Just that Daddy needs to talk to me right now.”
“Can I get a turn?”
“I don’t know. We’ll see, okay?”
She breaks away from me and runs to Delores, burying her face against my aunt’s apron. Raising a child is never easy, but I feel like we’ve been dealt more than our share of hard.
“Let me know what he says,” Delores says. She was always a fan of my father’s and didn’t side with my mother, her sister, when everything went sour. She didn’t believe Dad deserved to be thrown out on the street.
I back out of the kitchen and retrieve my cell phone from the bathroom counter. Parker has left a voice mail there too, same as on the landline.
I go to my room and close the door. I take a steadying breath. I should have tried harder to find my father. Regret for all the choices I have made in the last five years crashes over me like a tidal wave. He was always a kind and gentle man, despite his failings. The drinking. The other woman. He doesn’t deserve to die alone in a hospital.
If that’s what is happening. I guess it is time to find out.
I punch in Parker’s number.
He answers instantly. “Maddie, I have him here. Your father.”
“How is he?”
“You want to talk to him?”
I sink onto the bed, tears pricking my eyes. So he isn’t dead. “Yes, yes, please.”
My father’s voice is gravelly and slurred. “Madelyn?”
“I’m here, Daddy.” I can’t say anything more, my throat is so thick.
“Your boy here found me again.” He coughs, and his breathing is loud and labored. It goes on for several moments as I grip the phone with fear.
After a minute, he says, “Told you he was a good one.”
I swipe at my eyes. “He is.”
We’re quiet for a minute. Just knowing my father is on the other end of the line calms me down. “You’re in the hospital?” I ask.
“Messing up my social calendar,” he says. He tries to laugh, but this brings on more coughing. I hear an alarm go off and my panic spikes.
Nothing happens for a minute. “Dad?” I say. “Parker?”
Parker comes back on the line. “Just another coughing fit,” he says. “It set off some oxygen alarm.”
“What’s wrong with him?”
“Pneumonia. His lungs are damaged, so it’s worse on him.”
“Is he going to be all right?”
“I haven’t talked to a doctor. I’ve only been here an hour. Thought I’d call you right away.” He hesitates. “I thought you’d want to know.”
“I do. Should I come there?”
“I can have the doctors call you. They might be able to tell you how serious it is.”
In the background, I can hear a murmur of people talking. “Are they helping him?”
“Yes, they’re shooting something into an IV and putting something on his chest.”
“Oh my God.” I jump from the bed and look around. My suitcase is under the bed. I drop to my knees to drag it out. “I’m coming. I’m taking a plane first thing.”
“Will you bring Lily?”
I pause. Is this some ploy? “I don’t know.” I sit back on the bed. “Parker, how did you find my father?”
He’s quiet for a minute. I can feel my racing heart beat against my ears.
“I went looking for him.”
“Why did you do that?”
“I couldn’t be with you. I just wanted some part of you.”
For a moment, I can’t breathe. My eyes burn and my chest is so heavy that I can’t talk. I’m wrong, I think. I’ve been wrong about this. Parker is the one.
He’s always been the one.
“I’m bringing Lily,” I say. “I’ll be there tomorrow.”
&nbs
p; “I’ll be there to get you,” Parker says. “Just tell me when.”
“I will,” I say. Then I hesitate. I don’t know where we are with all this. If I’ll have to explain what happened. The messages. The threats. If we go there, we’re heading straight into all that. But instead, I just say, “Thank you.”
“I’ll do anything for you,” Parker says. “You just have to say the word.”
I hold the phone a minute more, then say good-bye. I know he is telling the truth. If I ask him to stop fighting, he will. If I tell him to stay away, he does.
I just don’t know what I should do.
Chapter 9: Parker
Even with Delores in the picture, it’s just about the best thing ever, seeing Maddie and Lily come down the escalator at LAX.
Lily is wearing a red coat and her pink boxing gloves. When she sees me, she breaks away from Maddie and takes off in a dead sprint.
“Lily!” Maddie calls out, but then she sees me and lets her go.
Lily crashes into my legs. I pick her up and let her wrap her arms around my neck. I didn’t think I’d get to see her for half a year. I’m so grateful that I can’t even talk.
Maddie and Delores catch up to us. Maddie’s got on a leather jacket and jeans. Her black hair flows across her shoulders. She looks timid and a little afraid. I want to know why. I want to know everything that’s happened, why she ran, why she put me off.
But it has to wait. Delores’s sharp eyes pierce me like a warning shot.
“You want to go straight to the hospital?” I ask.
“We should probably drop our bags off somewhere.”
“We can leave them in the car,” I say. Colt has loaned me one. For the first time I’m regretting selling the red Porsche. Or maybe not. Maybe I can get something more family friendly. An SUV, maybe. I picture a minivan, and for the first time in what feels like years, I crack into a smile.
We head over to baggage claim, Lily still clinging to me like a monkey. I settle her in an easier position to carry and we watch the overhead sign flash for the arrival of the bags.
“I learned to spell your name,” Lily says. “Now I can write Mama, Lily, and Daddy.”
“That’s amazing,” I tell her. “You’ll have to show me.”
She starts to scramble down. “I have it in my backpack!”
Delores points at the baggage circling on the conveyor belt. “There’s one of ours.”
I step forward to nab it. By the time I’ve collected their suitcases, Lily has wrestled a piece of paper from her tiny backpack, even with the boxing gloves on. She holds it up expectantly.
The words are barely legible, scrawled in red crayon. But she’s done it. “You’re very good at it,” I say.
She beams up at me.
“Put it someplace safe so I can carry Mama’s suitcases,” I say. I shoulder one bag and extend the handles of the others. I look up at Maddie. “I’m not too far.”
We look like any other family coming back from vacation. Despite all the trappings of my fighting life, especially lately, with magazine interviews and intimidation tapings, fitting new fight shorts with even more sponsors, and girls like Cam hanging around, I like this. It still works.
We approach Colt’s car. “A Mercedes, Parker? Really?” Maddie’s voice is full of disapproval.
“I just borrowed it from Colt,” I say quickly. “I’m not blowing bucks everywhere.” And it’s true. I haven’t bought a single thing, other than the engagement ring. I don’t know what direction my life is going. I’m just stashing it.
“Well, I like it,” Delores says, sinking into the plush backseat.
Well, what do you know? The old bird actually said something nice.
I get in the front seat and turn around. “It actually comes with a driver normally. You want him to cart you around town?”
Delores pats her mass of gray curls. “Maybe I could go up and down Rodeo Drive a time or two.”
“That can totally be arranged.”
Maddie buckles Lily in the back. “We should pick up a booster seat,” she says. “Maybe after the hospital?”
I start the car, frowning. I should have thought of that. Maddie slides into the passenger seat beside me, but she isn’t looking my way. She stares out the window like she’s being watched.
“You okay, Maddie?” I ask.
She nods but still won’t look at me.
“Are you staying with your mom or will you stay with me?” I ask. I had a cleaning service go through my apartment this morning, hoping Maddie might be willing to come there.
Delores leans forward at that. “I’m sure Verna will want to see her granddaughter.” Verna is Maddie’s mom.
“I know,” Maddie says, and there’s dread in her voice.
Delores pats Maddie’s shoulder. “It will be all right. My sister is difficult, but she can be managed. I did it our entire childhood.”
I stuff down my disappointment, but I know there’s still a chance Maddie won’t be able to handle her mother for long and will end up with me. “Offer’s open,” I say.
Then I start the car and we head toward the hospital.
Chapter 10: Maddie
I’m not sure what to expect as I follow Parker down the corridors of the hospital. My mind has conjured the worst. Dad, painfully drawing his last breath. Or worse, dying before we get there.
Delores and Lily are waiting down in the cafeteria until I see if it’s okay to bring her up. Lily can be tamed with ice cream. I’m grateful for Delores. She’s already called my mother to let her know we are coming. She’ll be a good buffer between us.
Parker stops in front of a door that is partially open. “You ready?” he asks. He’s adopted this cautious attitude in the last half hour, since we got in the car. I know I’m not being as kind to him as I could. I’m just so lost about all this. What to do or say.
“Thank you, Parker,” I manage to get out. At least here I don’t feel like I’m being watched. “For finding him. For bringing me here. For all of it.”
His eyes meet mine for a moment, and I’m hit with the pain he’s feeling. I know I’m causing it. I can’t do anything about it right now. I’m hoping at some point this week I can tell him. Maybe we can figure something out. I just think about Vegas and know that this is bigger than he ever thought it was. And he doesn’t control what happens. It seems that they do. This group of fighters who play by their own rules.
Parker knocks on the door and pushes it wide. I step in first, quietly, not sure if Dad will be awake.
He’s sitting propped up on the bed, but asleep. An IV drips into his hand and an oxygen tube goes into his nose. A monitor beside him follows his heart rate and oxygen.
His breath rattles. I would know his face anywhere, even as mottled and red as it is. He’s lost a lot of his hair, thin and gray and showing his scalp. It’s longish, covering his ears. His bony shoulders are sharp beneath the pale hospital gown, and his fingers are gnarled on top of the white sheets. But he looks better in a lot of ways than the last few times I saw him on the streets. He’s clean and dry.
I approach him slowly, not willing to wake him up. There’s a chair by the bed and I sit down on it, still looking at him. I want to remember all the best times with him, when I was little, before Mom became such a shrew. Even now as an adult I can’t sort out the chicken-egg problem. Was she so terrible to him because he started drinking, or did he start drinking because she was so terrible?
They must have been happy once. I glance up at Parker. He’s standing by the door. He gestures toward it with a question — do I want him to leave?
I shake my head for no. I like having him there, despite everything going on between us.
Dad starts coughing, a terrible deep sound from low in his chest. He snatches up a cloth from the rail without even opening his eyes, covering his mouth.
Then he’s fully awake, sucking in a difficult breath that ends in another retching cough. I jump from my chair and reach for him, rubbing
his back. I can feel each bump of his spine through the gown.
After a minute of this, it settles again. When he looks up, his eyes are red and watery. “Madelyn?” he asks.
But this starts another round of coughs. One of the numbers on the monitor goes red and starts beeping. Parker leaves the room, I assume to get a nurse.
They are back in less than a minute. The nurse looks over the machine. “Spit out anything you cough up, Mr. Greco,” she says. “Work it out.”
I stay behind him. After another moment, it calms down again and he sits back. The nurse takes the cloth and hands him a fresh one. “You’re doing good,” she says.
“What’s happening?” I ask her. “I’m his daughter. I just got here from New York.”
She cocks her head. Her short brown hair is a helmet. She wears salmon-colored scrubs over her stout figure. “Your husband here said you were coming.” She cuts her eyes at Parker. “Didn’t realize you were so far away.”
Husband! I tighten my fist. We will deal with that later. “I travel,” I say. “How is he?”
“Double pneumonia. Both lungs. His bronchial tubes are compromised due to smoking and living like he does.” She looks down at my dad. “He was in ICU a few days while we got him healed up enough that he could start coughing it out. Full antibiotic regimen.”
“But he’ll be okay?” I ask.
“The doctor can tell you more,” she says. “But he’s improved a lot since he got moved here.” She pulls a thermometer from a cup by the monitor and sheathes it in plastic. “Just a lot of gunk to clear out.” She sticks the thermometer in Dad’s mouth.
Parker leans against the wall. Dad spots him and gives a little salute. “Your husband has been very devoted to his father-in-law,” the nurse says.
I glance back at Parker. I remember what he said when he called. I just wanted some part of you.
Yes, I’ll have to talk to him soon.
The nurse checks the reading. “I’ll be back in a little bit,” she says. “You’re looking good, Mr. Greco.”