Up The Ante

by Trebelhorn, PJ

  “Thank you…” Ash looked at her nametag then back into her eyes. “Betty. You have no idea how important this is.”

  Ash went to the lobby but couldn’t sit still. She paced as she waited. After a few moments, she saw a man walk to the desk. He looked so much like Jordan there was no doubt in her mind he had to be her brother. She watched as Betty pointed toward her and then the man was on his way over.

  “Hello,” he said warily as he held a hand out in greeting. “I’m Matthew Stryker, Jordan’s brother. Can I help you?”

  “I need to see Jordan. Is she here?”

  “Who are you?”

  “I’m sorry, how rude of me.” She shook his hand and tried to smile, but all she could think about was how Jordan probably didn’t want to see her. “My name is Ashley Noble, if that means anything to you—”

  “It does, actually. Jordan was just talking about you at breakfast this morning.” He motioned for her to follow him outside the front entrance. “She isn’t here right now. I convinced her to go to my hotel room and rest for a bit. We were both up most of the night waiting for news about our mother.”

  “Wow, I’m sorry, again.” She chided herself and tried to get her head where it was supposed to be. “How is your mother doing?”

  “As well as can be expected. It’s still going to be a few hours before they’ll let us see her, which is why I sent Jordan away.”

  “I don’t know what she told you, but I’m begging you to help me. I need to talk to her.”

  He looked away for a moment and shook his head, obviously waging a battle in his head as to whether he should help. He mumbled something under his breath she couldn’t make out, and she thought maybe she should strengthen her position.

  “Look, I know you don’t know me, but I love her. I love your sister, and I hope to God she’s not in the closet with you.” She felt her face flush but she refused to look away when he turned toward her. She relaxed when he laughed.

  “She’s not, but I think she’d be pretty pissed at you if you outed her to me or anyone else. In fact, she’s going to be pissed at me for this, but the hotel is down the street about a mile on the left. Room two twelve.”

  “Thank you,” she said before giving him a quick kiss on the cheek. “I’ll tell her I held you at gunpoint for the information.”

  She heard him laughing as she ran back to her car. She only hoped she and Jordan would be laughing together soon.

  Chapter Thirty

  Jordan had taken a quick shower and was just about to crawl into the bed when there was a knock at the door. She smiled because she knew Matt would follow her back here. He had to be exhausted. She was just happy he’d gotten a room with two double beds.

  “Hold your horses, Matty.” She turned the deadbolt and pulled the door open to a sight that stopped her in her tracks. Ash stood before her looking nervous and mad as hell at the same time. “What are you doing here?”

  “You promised we could talk, so I’m here to talk.” Ash pushed her way past Jordan without an invitation. There was no doubt she was angry with Jordan, and she couldn’t blame her. “You’re going to explain to me what about your life is so damn complicated that you refuse to enter into a relationship when you’ve made it pretty clear you love me.”

  Jordan sighed and ran a hand through her hair as she took a seat at the small table in front of the only window in the room. This place was a far cry from the Rio All Suites Hotel and Casino, but it was nice enough for a short stay.

  “How did you find me?”

  “I came home last night and was pissed you’d left without a word.” Ash waved her off when Jordan started to protest. “I didn’t see your note until this morning. You were right, Jan didn’t give me the message, but I called her right away and she told me you were in Flagstaff, which I assume is something you left out of the note on purpose. There’s only one hospital in Flagstaff, so finding it was pretty easy once I made up my mind I was coming after you. I met your brother, by the way. Nice guy. I promised him I’d swear I held him at gunpoint until he told me where you were.”

  “Sure you did,” Jordan said, unable to stop the smile forming on her lips. After a moment of contemplating what to tell Ash, she shrugged. “I’m sorry, but I did try to call you.”

  “The battery in my phone died as soon as I got to work yesterday. I tried to call you when I realized you were gone.”

  “I turned the phone off. I didn’t want to talk to you.”

  “Too bad, because now it looks like you don’t have a choice.”

  Jordan nodded. She certainly couldn’t argue the point. She’d never realized Ash was such a feisty one. She begrudgingly admitted she liked the quality in her. If she’d reacted this way when Ash ended their affair, who knew where they might be now? But no, she thought as she shook her head slightly, we’re here now, together, because of everything that’s happened in the past fifteen years. Neither of them had been ready for a permanent commitment back then. Ash had thought she was, which was why she’d chosen to stay with her husband.

  “I can’t explain to you why I can’t be in a relationship.”

  “Bullshit.” Ash began to pace between the two beds. “You’ve already told me you’re single, right?”

  Jordan nodded mutely.

  “And you’re not dying?”

  “No.”

  Ash continued to pace and Jordan watched the subtle shifts in her facial expressions as she apparently thought about what to ask next. She stopped a couple of times and looked at Jordan, but then she’d shake her head and start pacing again. Finally, she threw her hands in the air and sat on the edge of the bed less than a foot from Jordan. The intensity in Ash’s eyes almost made her crumble. But she resolved Ash would never know about her MS.

  “Fine, Stryker, if you won’t talk about the elephant in the room, then allow me.” Ash took a deep breath and blew it out. She only called her by her last name when she was pissed about something. “You have multiple sclerosis and you’re scared to death about what the future holds for you. You don’t want anyone feeling sorry for you, and I get that, I really do. But if you think I’d stay with you just because I felt sorry for you, then you don’t know me very well.”

  Jordan sat there, stunned. Where had all that come from? From the box of medication on the bathroom counter in the hotel? She felt her mouth moving, trying to speak, but there was nothing coming out.

  “I saw your meds,” Ash told her as though she could read her mind. “I recognized it as the same thing Maria takes. I did some research into MS, and it doesn’t have to be as scary as you or I think it might be.”

  “So you’ve known since the night you took me to the hotel from the bar?” Jordan was happy to rediscover her voice, but it sounded strange to her. Almost like she was about to cry. “How could you not have told me?”

  “You mean like you told me about it instead of just saying it’s complicated ? Jesus, Jordan, I figured you didn’t want to talk about it, so I didn’t want to bring it up. I kept trying to get you to talk, but you can be so damned stubborn sometimes.”

  “I take it Maria knows?”

  “Yes. I needed to talk to someone about it.”

  “The day we went to the Grand Canyon, you were inside the store paying for the gas, and she tried to get me to admit I had MS.” Jordan looked at her, trying to discern if it had been Ash’s plan all along to trick her into confessing it to Maria. As far as she could tell, Ash was as genuinely surprised by it as Jordan had been. “I wondered for a moment if you’d put her up to it, or if she just noticed little things most people wouldn’t as being symptoms for MS.”

  “I didn’t put her up to it, Jordan. And if I’d known she would do that, I never would have talked to her about it.”

  Jordan nodded, sensing Ash was being honest with her. She didn’t know what to say. She wanted to be mad to learn Ash had known about the MS all this time and said nothing, but how could she be? But her knowing didn’t change anything. Jordan would
never allow anyone to pity her.

  “I’m glad you know, Ash. Because now you understand why nothing can come of this.”

  “What? No, Jordan, I don’t understand. Not at all. I understand you’re scared, but I want to be there for you. I love you, and I want to spend my life with you, baby,” Ash said as she got down on her knees between Jordan’s legs, her hands resting on Jordan’s thighs.

  “And if I’m confined to a wheelchair next year? Or next month?”

  “You could fall down a flight of stairs tomorrow, break your back, and be confined to a wheelchair. Or hell, I could. Nobody knows what the future holds, but I know this—I don’t want to face a future without you. I let you go once, and it was the worst mistake of my life.”

  “If I can no longer be self-sufficient? If you have to feed me and change my diaper? Roll me over every so often so I don’t get bedsores?”

  “You know, you’re the one here who has a preconceived idea that I would stay with you because I felt I had to. Because I might pity you.” Ash squeezed her thigh to get her to look at her. She did feel sorry for her, but not because she had MS. It was because she’d managed to convince herself she had to face this alone. That no one could ever truly love her. “If it gets to that point, I wouldn’t stay with you because I had to, I’d stay with you because I want to. Because I love you, and I would want to take care of you, just like I’d hope you would do for me if I ever needed it.

  “But since you seem so determined to play the if game, let me ask you a question.” She waited until Jordan gave a slight nod before continuing. “If I’d left my husband all those years ago and we’d built a life together, would you have left me when you were diagnosed? So you wouldn’t have to wonder if I was only staying with you out of some sort of obligation?”

  Jordan just stared at her, her eyes filling with tears. Ash wanted to hold her, but now wasn’t the time. She’d said what she needed to say, and it was up to Jordan now. She stood and kissed Jordan on the cheek before walking to the door. Before leaving, she turned back to her.

  “I don’t want you to answer that now, but I want you to really think about it. If you can honestly answer yes, then I swear you’ll never hear from me again. But if your answer is no, I’ll be in Las Vegas. You know where to find me.”

  With that, she walked out, leaving Jordan crying. It was the hardest thing she’d ever done, but Jordan needed to do some soul-searching. That wasn’t something she could do with Ash hanging around waiting and putting pressure on her to make a decision. Her own tears started to fall as she pulled out of the hotel parking lot and headed back home, wondering if she would ever see Jordan again.

  Chapter Thirty-one

  Matt called Jordan to tell her they’d be allowed in to visit their mother in about an hour, so she quickly got dressed and headed back to the hospital. Since Ash had left over an hour earlier, Jordan hadn’t been able to sleep. The question she’d asked kept replaying over and over again in her mind. It was a valid question, and even though she hadn’t responded at the time, she knew what her answer was.

  No.

  No, she wouldn’t have left her. What she wouldn’t have given for Ash to be there by her side when she’d received her diagnosis. It had felt like someone punched her in the gut. After all the MRIs and brain scans and nerve tests, she’d never expected to be told she had MS. The doctor had mentioned it as a possibility early on, but her brain dismissed the notion. How could a few muscle spasms and some tingling in her arms and legs, and occasionally her scalp and face, be something as scary and unknown as MS?

  She’d been told it was deemed an “orphan disease” because so few people in the world had it. Being classified that way also meant there wasn’t much research into a cure because only about four hundred thousand people in the U.S. suffered from it.

  She didn’t remember driving herself back to the hospital, but she found herself exiting the elevator and walking to the waiting room to find Matt.

  “Where’s Ashley?”

  “She went back home.”

  “What did you do?”

  “Go to hell, Matt.” Jordan was really not in the mood to put up with his know-it-all attitude. “Have you seen Mom yet?”

  “I was just in there for a couple of minutes.” He looked hurt by her insult, but Jordan couldn’t muster enough energy to care at the moment. “She’s still asking for you.”

  “Why?” They’d never gotten along very well. Before Jordan left for college, they both seemed to do everything they could to avoid each other. As a result, Matt usually ended up being their go-between. He shrugged, and Jordan knew it was because he was well aware of their difficult relationship.

  Jordan paced, wondering what was so urgent she kept asking for her. Maybe she was adopted. God, that would be wonderful. But she looked at Matt and knew it wouldn’t be wonderful. And the two of them looked so much alike. She reached out and grasped his hand for a moment before he told her what room she was in. She hugged him briefly then walked down the hall to find her.

  She stopped just inside the door and was shocked at what she saw. Her mother looked so frail. So different than she had when Jordan was in Flagstaff less than a month ago for her birthday. She was hooked up to various machines that were all beeping out their own tunes. The doctor looked up and smiled as he waved her over.

  “Mrs. Stryker, your daughter’s here to see you,” he told her. He replaced the chart at the foot of the bed and put a hand on Jordan’s shoulder. “Keep it brief for now. She’s still weak and sliding in and out of consciousness.”

  “Right,” she said with a nod. She watched him leave the room and seriously considered following him, but then she heard her mother’s voice, so quiet she almost thought she imagined it. She turned and saw her mother reaching out for her. Jordan took her hand and stepped up to the bed. She leaned in and pressed her lips to her cheek. “Hi, Mom.”

  “Jordan,” she said with what looked to be a smile. Jordan wasn’t completely sure about that though, since the right side of her face seemed to be paralyzed. “You came.”

  “Of course I did,” she answered.

  “Wasn’t sure you would.” She closed her eyes for so long Jordan wondered if she’d fallen asleep. Then she opened them again and looked right at her. “I was a horrible mother to you.”

  Jordan didn’t know what to say. She wasn’t going to argue the point because, well, it was true. She had no memory of either of her parents ever telling her they loved her. All they ever did was fight. Not just the two of them, but all four of them. Nothing she or Matt ever did was good enough for their parents. Of course, that changed as Matt got older and he apparently became the golden child.

  Jordan stood there watching her mother, amazed at the recognition she could see in her eyes. She’d been surprised when Matt told her she’d asked for her, and even more surprised after she arrived to find out she was still asking for her. Her times of clarity never lasted this long. Maybe the stroke somehow managed to fix whatever wires had been loose in her brain.

  “You always tried so hard to please your father and me, and we never appreciated it. I don’t think either of us were ever cut out to be parents. I hope you know I’ve always loved you, in my own way. I just never knew how to show it. I’m so sorry.”

  “Mom, you should rest,” Jordan said, trying to fight back the tears. “I love you too.”

  She was surprised to realize she meant it. She and Matt had always had food to eat and a roof over their heads, which was more than some kids had. She’d never seen it that way while living through it, but she could appreciate it now.

  “I’m so proud of you. You’re such a beautiful woman. I just want you to be happy. You deserve that, Jordan.”

  Jordan lost it then. She supposed it was as much of an acceptance of her homosexuality as she was ever going to get, and it was a hell of a lot more than she ever expected. Her mother squeezed her hand weakly and turned her head away from her. Jordan let go of her hand and leaned over t
o kiss her cheek again.

  “Get well, Mom. We can spend a lot more time together when you get out of here.”

  She walked toward the door and was almost there when she heard the beeping of the heart monitor stutter and then it let out a shrill constant tone. Jordan turned to look at her mother. She had the presence of mind to step out of the way when the door crashed open and medical personnel hurried in to try to save her.

  But it was too late. Jordan had the eerie feeling she’d only managed to hang on as long as she did so she could tell her those things. She felt a sense of peace knowing her mother’s love for the first time in her life.

  *

  “What’s going on?” Matt asked as she walked down the hall toward him. She took his hand and led him to a chair.

  “She’s gone,” was all she said.

  “The doctor said—”

  “She’s gone, Matt. I’m sorry.”

  She expected him to cry. She expected him to fall to pieces. But he didn’t. He stood and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close. She hugged him back and they stayed there like that for a few moments.

  “Did she tell you whatever it was she needed to tell you?”

  “Yeah,” she said as she pulled away with a nod. “Yeah, she did.”

  “Good. I’m going to wait here and take care of whatever I need to take care of. Why don’t you go back to the hotel?”

  “No, I’ll wait with you.”

  They sat in a comfortable silence waiting for the doctor to come let them know their mother had passed away. After a few minutes, Matt turned toward her in his chair.

  “What did she say?”

  “She wanted to make sure I knew she loved me.”

  “Wow. Had she ever told you that before?”

  “Not once.” Jordan smiled and met his eyes. “It was nice to hear. She also told me I deserved to be happy.”

  “You do.” Matt nodded and glanced down the hall toward her room. “Speaking of which, don’t you need to go after Ashley?”