by J. Daniels
My father had just revealed there was a chance he hadn’t suffered a heart attack. His exact words being, “Your mother exaggerates.”
“Okay, you need to tell me exactly what the doctor said,” I insisted, directing my words at either of them, not caring who answered, just needing an answer. “Was it a heart attack, or what? What are they saying?”
My mother’s quietly admitted “They aren’t sure” came at the exact time as my father’s conceited and overly confident “Nope.”
I pinched my eyes shut and shook my head. Oh, my God. This was beyond frustrating.
“Mom,” I snapped, looking to her again and waiting to continue until after her head turned and her eyes pried off the numbers flashing on the screen. “You said on the phone you were in the ambulance and they were telling you Daddy was having a heart attack.”
“Well, that’s what the paramedics thought,” she replied, brow tightly furrowed. “He was showing symptoms of it. Chest pain. Shortness of breath. And he was sweating like crazy. They assumed that’s what he was having.”
“I was sweating ’cause it was so goddamn hot in that attic and I was working up there,” Dad offered up, tugging at the collar of his hospital gown. “Christ. Get me my shirt. If I’m gonna be waiting around, I’m doing it in my own clothes.”
“You are staying in that gown until they release you.” Mom slapped his hands away, then pushed against his chest when he tried getting up. “And if you were sweating ’cause of the attic, how come you were still sweating in the ambulance? It wasn’t warm in there.”
Dad waved her off with a dismissive hand, looking away as he revealed, “They were poking at me and you were saying the Lord’s prayer. I thought I was dying.”
“Oh, so it’s my fault you were showing symptoms? Is that what you’re saying?”
Mom was leaning over the bed with her hands on her hips now. And I knew if I didn’t step in soon, she’d probably throw my father into heart attack symptoms once again.
“So the paramedics thought it was a heart attack, but the doctor doesn’t think that’s what it was?” I asked, interjecting.
Holding her scowl, Mom straightened up, stared at my father for another breath, then turned to look at me. “They’re waiting on some test results, but it could still be serious even if it wasn’t technically a heart attack,” she replied.
I breathed deep. Stay calm, I told myself. If you freak, she’ll freak, then freak out on him, and that can’t possibly be good for his heart, attacked or not.
“Okay.” I nodded, reaching up and gathering my hair over one shoulder. I twisted the strands into a bundle so my hands stayed busy and my mother couldn’t see how badly they were shaking. “Well, we just need to stay positive and wait. That’s all we can do,” I told them both.
Mom nodded once, agreeing with me, then reached for my father’s hand and squeezed it on the bed. “That’s all we can do,” she repeated, softly smiling at him.
Keeping his hand, she reached back and pulled the chair closer to his side, sat it in, passed the smile she was wearing my way, then lost it when her eyes slid over my shoulder and focused behind me.
She stood out of her chair, lifting my father’s hand off the bed and gripping on to it with both of hers. I spun around then and saw who my mother was reacting to. The muscles in my legs tightened and my knees locked.
My God…
It was Jamie, only older by a handful of years, I was guessing. And instead of board shorts, the man wore a white lab coat and had a stethoscope around his neck. Instead of overgrown wave-tousled hair and a permanent five o’clock shadow, he was clean-cut, close-shaven, and more GQ than model gone rogue.
He was Jamie G-rated. Smoke-free lungs, I was sure, and most likely had no idea how to pick a lock.
I preferred my boys dirtied up and restraining order persistent. This man probably took no for an answer. Jamie took it as a challenge.
Still, wow, the genes in this family were unreal. The McCade parents should’ve kept producing. They couldn’t go wrong.
Dr. McCade stepped forward and glanced up from the paper in his hand. “All right, so…” He paused, noticed me in the room, and lifted his brows in question.
I studied his face.
He had the same high cheekbones as Jamie. Same thin nose and ocean blue eyes. Same lean-muscled physique and summer-touched skin. Beautiful.
I guessed he worked out of this hospital? Durham was only twenty-five minutes away. That wasn’t too long of a commute.
Damn. I wished Jamie’s commute was only twenty-five minutes from here. I was dying to talk to him. And I would, as soon as I knew for sure what was going on. I didn’t want to worry him if this was nothing. I needed answers first.
“This is our daughter, Tori,” Mom shared, reading the question in Dr. McCade’s eyes. “She just got here.”
“Hi,” I said, hands still twisting my hair into a tight coil.
He offered a friendly smile and a genuine, “It’s nice to meet you, Tori. I’ve heard a lot about you.”
I smiled back, giving that to him while internally hiding my amusement.
Full sentences. Polite. Total G-rated Jamie.
“Did you get the results back?” Mom asked. Her voice was small and stressed.
Dr. McCade nodded, looking toward the bed. “To the EKG, yes, and I’m confident in stating I do not believe this was a heart attack, Mr. Rivera.”
“Oh, thank God!” Mom cried, bending down and pressing repeated kisses to my father’s hand.
I let out an anxious breath.
“However,” he went on, voice somber and drawing my head back around. “From the results here and the preliminary blood work, I do believe you are showing signs of heart disease.”
The air in the room went colder. My stomach knotted up and my hands tightened around my hair. I heard the change in my mother’s cries, her weeps of joy becoming distressful and doom-filled.
“What does that mean?” I asked. “What is that?”
“It’s when plaque builds up in the arteries that supply blood flow to the heart,” he answered, bringing his arms down in front of him and gripping on to his left forearm, his left hand holding the test results. “This is usually something that happens over time, and the symptoms, such as the chest pain, that feeling we thought was indigestion, those are all signs of it. It’s something that can be life-threatening if it isn’t treated. It can lead to more serious conditions, such as a heart attack, but…” He paused and directed his attention to my parents. Mainly my mother, I was guessing. “There are treatments we can do. Medications. Lifestyle changes, taking some of that weight off, Mr. Rivera, like I suggested…”
I looked at my father’s large, protruding belly. It strained the material of his hospital gown.
He played Santa at the company Christmas parties every year. Kids loved him.
My mother released my father’s hand and shot him a glare. “I told you he said you needed to lose weight,” she hissed.
Dad scoffed, folded his arms across his chest, and looked back to the doctor, brows pinched together in irritation.
“On top of your pressure being elevated, your cholesterol is high as well. We’ll need to bring that down. The weight loss will help with that, but I’m going to start you on some medication for it for now, as well as for the hypertension. That really should’ve been started already.”
“Daddy,” I scolded, turning to look at him. “You haven’t been taking those?”
“I was getting to it,” he returned. “Just got the prescription a few days ago, goddamn it. You and your mother need to relax. You heard him.” Dad jerked his chin at Dr. McCade. “I didn’t have a heart attack. I’m good to go, right? Get my meds and then I’m outta here.”
I looked back to Jamie’s brother, catching the shake of his head.
“You’ll be here through Monday, Mr. Rivera,” he informed my father. “I’ve ordered you a stress test. That’ll let us know for sure if this is heart dise
ase. I don’t want you leaving without getting that done.”
“And they can’t do that today?” Dad gestured toward the door, face tensing even further and turning red behind his salt-and-pepper beard. “Got all these doctors and nurses here. What’s everybody doin’? Get ’em in here. Let’s go.”
“John,” Mom cautioned.
“Daddy, what’s the rush?” I asked. “If you’re here, they can at least keep an eye on you. That’s not a bad thing.”
“Princess, I don’t like hospitals,” he scoffed, leaning back against the pillow and folding his arms across his chest again.
“You need to fast for that test, sir,” Dr. McCade advised him. “Monday will be the soonest we can do it.”
“Oh, for Christ’s sake.” Dad shook his head, jaw clenched tight. “Well, I tell you what, if I’m gonna be here for two days, starvin’ to death, I’m puttin’ on my pants.”
“Oh, my God,” I moaned, hand coming up and covering my eyes.
That was my father’s biggest worry. That his ass would show if he stood up. Not that he could have serious heart problems. This was so embarrassing.
Dr. McCade let out a chuckle. Hearing that, I dropped my hand and turned to look at him.
“You can put on your pants,” he said, grinning at Dad and popping out those glorious McCade family dimples. Sheesh. “Just keep the gown on so we can access the leads on your chest.”
Dad made a noise in his throat, a grunt in compliance, before shifting his attention to my mother. “You’re gonna have to call Cal and let him know I’m not coming in on Monday. Give him a heads-up.”
Cal was my father’s second in command at the factory. He kept things running smoothly there when Daddy actually put time in at the office.
“I’ll take care of it,” Mom said sweetly, patting his shoulder. “You just focus on getting healthy.”
“Right,” he muttered, looking away as if he was irritated at her, too, but reaching up and grabbing hold of my mother’s hand.
I smiled. Fighting and loving. They did it better than anyone.
Although Jamie and I seemed to be getting pretty good at that as well.
“I’ll be in later to check on you,” Dr. McCade said, meeting my eyes when I turned back around. He grinned at me, jerking his chin. “Legs,” he said as a farewell.
My cheeks warmed. Jamie told his entire family my nickname.
I totally loved that he did that.
After Dr. McCade stepped out of the room, I walked over to the side of the bed, leaned down, and gave my daddy a kiss on the cheek, getting a “love you, princess” paired with an arm squeeze in return. Then rounding the other side, I received a bone-crushing hug from my mother, waiting until after she was finished before I asked if I could borrow her phone.
“Of course. Let me just make a couple calls first,” she replied, spinning around and digging through her purse where it hung on the back of the chair. “Tillie and Georgette are probably going crazy through all this waiting.”
Tillie and Georgette were my father’s sisters, both living out West, Tillie in California and Georgette in Arizona. They adored my father more than anything in the entire world. His name wasn’t John to them. It was Johnny, or Baby Brother. Baby Brother especially when they were doting on him, which happened nearly every time they came out to visit and absolutely every time they got him on the phone.
I swore they thought he was still ten years old sometimes the way they mothered him.
While my mom got to work on her calls, I claimed the other chair in the room and collapsed into it, drawing my knees against my chest. I wrapped my arms around them and dropped my chin on top.
And then I got comfortable.
Unlike her phone calls with me, my mother never kept it brief with Tillie or Georgette, but I always thought that had more to do with them and their insistence on staying on the line to gab. And in this circumstance, with my father being where he was, I knew she needed to give them their time.
So I waited.
I watched as nurses came in to check my father’s vitals. I laughed at the serviceman they sent in after my father complained that the TV wasn’t working right, laughing because my father was telling the man how to do his job, then threatening to pop the leads off his chest and do it for him when he was taking too long with it.
Luckily, the man finished up before that threat was followed through with.
While my mom was waiting for Georgette to return her call, telling me I could use the phone after, I listened to my parents bicker about everything from the temperature in the room to the definition of fasting, which my father insisted allowed for occasional bites of food and one full meal.
After the twenty-minute call with Georgette, I finally borrowed my mother’s phone, stepped out of the room, and dialed up Nate first. I told him about my dad and that I would be in tomorrow to cover my shift, then thanked him profusely when he said to handle things here and not to worry about it. He would see me on Tuesday.
Seriously? Best boss ever. I was never being unprofessional again.
Unless Jamie called or texted, then I’d just be extra careful about it.
I would’ve called Syd after speaking to Nate, and I wanted to, her voice would’ve been nice to hear, but I remembered just as I was dialing that she was having her mom time with Brian. That was important and something I didn’t want to disturb. And since my father’s situation was no longer life-threatening, or as life-threatening as we all thought it was, I figured I’d just wait and fill her in when I got back to Dogwood.
I wouldn’t stress her out and take away from what she was experiencing. Never. She needed this.
Unfortunately, not calling Syd meant not getting Jamie’s number from her. And since I didn’t have it memorized yet and relied solely on it being programmed into my phone, I was stuck. I couldn’t call him.
I couldn’t ask him how his meet went. I couldn’t explain why I had been silent with him for hours.
It worried me. I didn’t want Jamie thinking I didn’t care.
When his brother came back into the room to check on my father two hours after we last saw him, I charged at the man like a woman off her meds, gripping his lab coat and begging for Jamie’s number, getting it, then letting go and calmly thanking him for everything he was doing for my dad, currently and what he’d done in the past.
I received an amused response to my insanity, McCade dimples and a billboard-worthy smile, then I snuck out of the room again and made my call.
It went straight to voice mail.
“Damn it,” I whispered, listening to Jamie’s recording as I dropped my head back against the wall. The line beeped. “Hey, it’s me. Um, so, this is way late, I should’ve called you earlier, but I’m in Raleigh at the hospital with my parents. My dad sorta had a heart attack scare. He’s okay. They don’t think that was it. Or at least your brother doesn’t. He’s here.” I laughed a little, looking down at the speckled tile floor. “God, you two look so much alike, it’s weird. Anyway…” I paused to exhale a breath. The fingers on my free hand curled under my uniform shorts. “My dad’ll be here until Monday so I’m gonna stay for a while. I don’t have my phone on me, so when you get this, can you call this number back? I really wish you were here. Or I was there. I miss you. God, I miss you.”
I shook my head at myself.
It had been a day. One day. That was it. I saw Jamie yesterday morning before his flight out and I was acting as if it had been weeks, or months. I was starting to forget what he smelled like. If I wasn’t terrified of the thought, which I completely was, I’d drive straight to the ocean and stick my face in it.
Lifting my eyes when movement caught my attention, I watched Jamie’s brother exit my father’s room. He saw me and offered a kind smile.
I waved back, hoping he knew how grateful I was for everything he had done and was doing for my dad, and watched him move down the hallway and disappear into another room.
Then I grinned into the pho
ne and whisper-pleaded before hanging up, “Never cut your hair, okay?”
* * *
I was at the beach.
Or at least near it. I could smell the water all around me. The salty air. The end of summer sunlight.
Dream Jamie.
God…So, so good.
I lifted my chin and inhaled lungfuls through my nose. My body hummed and my toes curled inside my sneakers. It was the best smell in the world. Jamie and the ocean and Jamie and sand and sunlight and Jamie Jamie Jamie.
I wanted his smell to fill me and stay there. I never wanted it gone. I never wanted to wake up.
I moaned softly inside my dream when the smell seemed to curl around me and tighten, drawing me nearer to it. I smiled and buried my face there. I burrowed closer, begging a quiet please to God to keep me under.
Dream Jamie chuckled. His laughter shook my body and warmed the skin beneath my overgrown bangs. I pictured his self-righteous smirk and sky-colored eyes. I felt his smooth, sin-speaking lips press to my forehead.
Like, really felt them. Felt them felt them. His laughter, too.
And his arms around me and his body beneath me and his heartbeat under my hand and please please please don’t let me wake up.
“Baby,” his soft voice whispered.
And even that felt real. Sounded real, too. Jamie’s breath on my forehead. His voice seeping into my ears and into my heart. His finger under my chin, gently lifting and wait…
I peeked my eyes open, slowly because I was scared. Scared of leaving my dream and the Jamie I could feel, here, right here, right now, because I knew the second I opened my eyes, he would be gone, back to his hotel room in Florida.
And I would go back to struggling for comfort in an unforgiving hospital chair that had needed new padding a good ten years ago.
Only now even as I slowly woke up, it felt like the most comfortable place in the world. Huh…
Breath catching in my throat, my eyes fluttered, barely opening, lashes obstructing my reality, then the finger under my chin added pressure, craning my head back and I gasped the second I felt his full, perfect mouth nibble and nip at mine before pressing into a kiss.