Best Practice (Special Delivery Book 5)

by J. A. Armstrong

  Davey put his arm around his sister. “It’ll be okay, Dani.”

  “It will be okay,” Tess agreed.

  “It wasn’t for you,” Dani whispered.

  Tess moved to kneel in front of her daughter. “Dani,” she lifted Dani’s chin. “I know that you are scared and upset. So am I.” Dani’s doubtful gaze tugged at Tess’s heart. “I am. But no matter what happens in the future, you need to know that Grandma loves you very much. And, nothing will ever change that, sweetheart. Don’t expect the worst.”

  Dani threw herself into her mother’s arms. Tess sighed. Tess, you really should take your own advice.

  ***

  Wednesday

  Tess stood outside the door to her mother’s room and took a deep breath. Here goes. She walked into the room to a sight she knew would never become familiar—tubes and lines, beeps and blips. It made her shudder slightly. With another deep breath, Tess approached the bed. “Mom?”

  Mary Sinclair opened her eyes and looked at Tess. She smiled weakly. “I told you not to come.”

  Tess sighed. Can’t you just be glad to see me. “I needed to make sure you were okay.” She was surprised when her mother took her hand and squeezed. “How are you feeling?” Tess asked.

  “Tired,” Mary replied.

  “Are you in pain?”

  “Not really. Whatever they’re giving me seems to be taking care of that. I’m all right, Tess.”

  Tess had promised herself that she would not become emotional. Seeing her mother lying in the hospital bed shattered that possibility. She began to cry. “Mom…”

  Mary held Tess’s hand gently. “Shh,” she hushed Tess. “Don’t you start getting all upset now. You’ll be madder than hell at me in a day or so.”

  Tess chuckled through her tears. Her mother’s sentiment, while playful held a nugget of both truthfulness and remorse. Tess recognized both clearly. “I hope so,” Tess said.

  Mary closed her eyes again. “How are the kids?”

  “They’re good. They’re with Rebecca and Brad.”

  “Mm. What about that little guy?”

  Tess smiled and wiped away the tears from her cheek. “Brooke has him. She took him for a walk while I came in here.”

  Mary nodded. “You go on,” she said.

  “Mom…”

  “No; you go on and find her and take that baby home for the night. I’m fine. I’ll be better when they let me out of here,” she said.

  “Mom…”

  “Tess, I mean it. This is no place for a baby. Besides, if Brooke had to take time off to be here, I doubt she wants to spend it in here. Go back to the house. And, bring your father with you.”

  “He’ll never go for that,” Tess laughed.

  “Make him.”

  “Make him?”

  “You are my daughter. Put your foot down. I need to sleep a bit anyway.”

  “I’ll try,” Tess promised. She leaned in and kissed her mother’s head. “I love you.” Tess noted the tear that slipped from beneath her mother’s closed eye. “I’ll come back…”

  “Don’t you come back here today,” Mary ordered.

  Tess sighed. Difficult to the last. “Then I will be here in the morning.”

  “Okay.”

  Tess was surprised at the response.

  Mary opened one eye slightly. “Bring me a donut.”

  Tess laughed. “I’ll see what I can do.”

  Mary closed her eyes again.

  A donut? They must be giving you some good drugs.

  ***

  “Hey, Dad,” Tess greeted her father when he walked through the door.

  Chris smiled at his daughter and his grandson. “Where’s Brooke?”

  “She went up to take a shower.”

  Chris sat down on the couch beside Tess and tickled Ethan’s feet. “He is so big.”

  Tess grinned. “And, he is sooo silly,” she kissed Ethan. “How was Mom?”

  “Oh, you know, determined to send me packing.”

  Tess nodded.

  “They think she’ll be home Friday morning.”

  “That soon?”

  “Yeah. She’s doing well. I think she’ll feel better here.”

  “Probably.”

  “She was worried about you.”

  “Me?” Tess asked.

  “That surprises you?”

  “I’m not the one who is sick.”

  Chris nodded. “Tess,” he began cautiously. “I know this has to bring back…”

  “Don’t,” Tess warned gently. “I know what you are about to say; please don’t.”

  Chris sighed. “It’s on all our minds.”

  Tess was positive that her brother was on everyone’s mind. In six days, it would be the twenty-third anniversary of her brother’s death. Tess never forgot the day. She also did her best not to dwell on it. Usually, she made a point to spend the day doing something fun; something that David had loved like fishing with the kids. He would have wanted it that way. Tess knew that. This year, a harsh reminder was staring her in the face. She’d felt it the moment that she had walked into the hospital. She’d felt a lot of things—so many things that Tess was not sure how to separate them.

  “I’m sure that’s true,” Tess confessed. “Mom is not David.”

  “No.”

  “Dad, I…”

  “Say no more,” Chris held up his hand. “I understand. She worries. You know that.”

  Mary did worry about everyone. Tess didn’t doubt that. She sometimes felt her mother’s “concerns” created more issues than they ever sought to solve. “I’m all right.”

  “Hey,” Brooke came into the room.

  Tess looked up gratefully. “My turn,” she said. She handed Ethan to her father. “Would you mind?”

  “Mind? Ethan and I have a lot of catching up to do,” he said.

  Brooke chuckled and took over Tess’s seat.

  “I’ll be back in a few minutes,” Tess said.

  “Take your time,” Brooke replied. She turned her attention to the pair seated beside her. “How was Mary tonight?”

  “Tired and bitchy,” Chris said with a grin. “She wants to come home.”

  Brooke nodded. “That’s a good sign.”

  “She doesn’t do well in hospitals,” he offered.

  “I think I can understand that.”

  “Brooke?”

  “Yeah?”

  “How is Tess—really?”

  Brooke thought for a moment. Tess had been quiet all week. It wasn’t that she wasn’t talking; she just avoided any conversation about her mother’s illness or the reason for this trip. Brooke respected Tess’s need to deal with things slowly and on her terms—not on anyone else’s. Brooke intended to give Tess the space she needed. When Tess was ready, she would open up about her feelings. Brooke knew that as well.

  “I think she’s just trying to muddle through it right now. She’s worried. She’s worried about Mary and you, and she’s concerned about the twins. You know her; she hasn’t given much thought to herself.”

  “That’s what worries me,” Chris said. Brooke was curious. “She was the same way when we lost David. She was only nine but you would have sworn she’d aged twenty years overnight.”

  Brooke listened attentively. Tess had confided many of her feelings in Brooke over their years together. She frequently spoke of her older brother and she candidly recalled how the dynamic in their family had shifted after his death. As Brooke listened to her father-in-law, she began to realize that there was one thing Tess had not expressed in any detail—how had Tess coped?

  “I don’t think I realized it until recently,” Chris said.

  “What’s that?”

  “Tess took over. She was nine but she took over. I don’t remember consoling her. I remember her trying to comfort Mary. I remember her getting Gary breakfast when Mary didn’t want to get out of bed. She kept to herself unless she was taking care of one of us.” Chris looked at Ethan and bounced him on his
knee. “I can see that in her now.”

  Brooke made no comment. She needed to process what Chris was telling her. Tess had kept to herself after her brother’s death. That didn’t surprise Brooke. Tess had friends. She was amicable and funny, but she could also be guarded with her feelings at times. Tess was a natural caretaker. At least, that is how Brooke had always viewed her wife. And, Brooke still believed it was in Tess’s nature to be giving. Chris’s memories also shed some light on who Tess was. It was no secret to Brooke that Mary Sinclair had shut down emotionally after the loss of her son. Brooke had a new understanding of that. She hoped she would never find herself in a similar situation. Brooke prayed that whatever the future held, she would always find the strength to be present for her family. Looking at Ethan as he smiled at his grandfather, Brooke found it easy to fathom how loss could devastate a person to the point of emotional isolation. She sighed.

  “Not surprised by what I just told you,” Chris surmised.

  “No,” Brooke answered. “But,” she continued. “Tess gives because that is who she is. I don’t have any doubt that losing David impacted who she has become, but she doesn’t try to take care of anyone out of obligation. It’s because she loves you.”

  Chris smiled warmly. He looked back at his grandson. “He looks so much like her.” Chris chuckled. “I’d almost think he was hers.”

  “He is,” Brooke said. Chris looked at her. “In every way that matters; he is. Watch when she comes back into the room.” Brooke grinned. “He’ll hold out his hands and start babbling. He won’t stop until he gets back in her arms. He’s been that way since the day he was born.” Brooke stopped talking and watched Ethan for a minute. He did look a great deal like Tess. He looked quite a bit like his siblings too. She wondered if Chris might guess who his biological father was. “Tess was the first person to hold Ethan. I was so nervous,” Brooke admitted. “Like he was glass and I might break him. I don’t know what I would have done without her.”

  “You would have been fine,” Tess’s voice carried from behind Brooke.

  “Baaaa.. Mmmuuu… mmmuu…mm,” Ethan rambled and held out his hands the second he heard Tess’s voice.

  Brooke raised her eyebrow at Chris. “See what I mean?”

  Tess looked at Brooke and shook her head. “I’m not going to ask what you two were talking about.” She reached out and took Ethan who immediately grabbed hold of her hair and babbled some more.

  “I was saying that Ethan reminds me of you,” Chris offered.

  Tess looked at her son and shrugged. She saw Brooke every time she looked at him. Ethan’s eyes were hazel; a combination of them both but they sparkled with mischief just like Brooke’s. At the tender age of seven months, he already sported long fingers and Tess often wondered if he might take to the piano or the scalpel just as Brooke had. “You’re just like your Mommy,” she said.

  Brooke looked on affectionately as Ethan clung to Tess. Sometimes, she had learned, people saw what they wanted to see. Ethan resembled both sides of his family. When Brooke looked at her son she saw Tess. When Tess looked at Ethan she saw Brooke. That’s how love worked. Brooke startled when her phone rang. “Hello?”

  “Brooke?”

  “Hi, Dani.”

  Tess’s ears perked.

  “What are you guys doing?” Dani asked Brooke.

  “We were just visiting with Grandpa,” Brooke said.

  “Oh.”

  “What about you?” Brooke asked.

  “Nothing.”

  Brooke sensed that Dani needed to talk. “Hold on, Dani.”

  “Everything okay?” Chris asked.

  “Yeah, I think so,” Brooke said. She and Tess had agreed not to let Chris and Mary know how rattled Dani had been about Mary’s surgery. “Probably something with her drum lessons.”

  Tess pursed her lips doubtfully. She offered Brooke a strained smile.

  Brooke leaned in and kissed Tess on the cheek. “I’ll meet you upstairs.”

  Tess nodded. I wonder what that’s all about?

  “Hey, Dani,” Brooke continued the conversation as she climbed the stairs. “Want to tell me what’s going on?”

  “Is Grandma okay?”

  “Didn’t Mom call you earlier?” Brooke inquired.

  “Yeah, but that was after school.”

  You are so much like your mother. “Grandma is doing pretty good, Dani. She’ll probably be home on Friday.”

  “Really?”

  “Really.”

  “Can we come then?”

  Brooke forced herself not to sigh audibly. “Grandma is going to be pretty sore for a while,” she said. “I think maybe this summer we can all come down.”

  “Oh.”

  “How about if Mom and I call you from Grandma’s room tomorrow and you can say hello?”

  “Really?” Dani brightened.

  “Sure. I know she was disappointed that she couldn’t come to visit.”

  “Can she?” Dani wanted to know.

  “Visit?”

  “No, can she talk on the phone?”

  Brooke chuckled. “Yes, Dani, she can talk on the phone. She was just really tired today.”

  “Brooke?”

  “Yes?”

  “Is Mom okay?”

  Brooke smiled. Oh, Dani. You are your mother’s daughter; always worried about everybody else. “She’s okay. How about you? Only one more day of school.”

  “Yeah.”

  “You don’t sound happy about that?” Brooke noted. She swore she could hear Dani’s shrug over the phone.

  “When are you guys coming home?” Dani asked.

  “I’ll be home Saturday afternoon. Mom’s going to stay a couple more days.”

  “Oh.”

  “Do you want to talk to Mom?” Brooke wondered.

  “Nah, she’s probably busy.”

  “She’s never too busy to talk to you; you know that.”

  “It’s okay. Brooke?”

  Brooke chuckled. She is full of questions tonight. “Yeah?”

  “Well…”

  “Dani?”

  “Nothing.”

  Brooke wasn’t sure how to proceed. Both the twins were incredibly sensitive. They expressed their sensitivity in dramatically different ways. Dani was the more independent of the two. She tended to deal with her fears, frustrations, and even her sadness by pouring herself into a project or an activity. In that way, Brooke thought Dani mirrored Tess a great deal. Davey, on the other hand, was often impulsive. His emotions frequently led to outbursts or brooding. It wasn’t common for Dani to struggle with articulating her needs or her questions. Brooke neither wanted to push her daughter nor did she want to dismiss what she surmised was a need for reassurance.

  “Hey, listen, I know we are far away right now, but I hope you know you can still talk to me—or Mom.”

  “Yeah. I should go. I have to finish studying for my history test.”

  “Okay. I’m sure you’ll ace it.”

  “Maybe.”

  “What’s it on?”

  “History,” Dani deadpanned.

  Brooke laughed. “Goodnight, Dani.”

  “Bye, Brooke.”

  “Hey, I miss you; you know?” Brooke was pleasantly surprised by Dani’s response.

  “I love you, Brooke.”

  “I love you too.” Brooke set her phone down on the bed and stared at it.

  “Everything okay?” Tess asked.

  “I’m not sure.”

  “The kids having issues?”

  “No,” Brooke looked over at Tess. “I don’t think so. I think Dani’s missing us.”

  Tess put Ethan in is portable crib and made her way to Brooke. “Maybe we should cut this trip short.”

  “Oh no,” Brooke replied.

  “Maybe we should.”

  “Tess, the kids will be okay for a few more days.”

  “Maybe.”

  Brooke snickered. Tess glared at her. “I’m not laughing at you,” Brooke said
. “You just sounded exactly like Dani did a minute ago. The kids are okay.” Brooke gently pulled Tess down onto the bed beside her.

  “I hated seeing her there,” Tess admitted.

  “I know.”

  “I’m worried about my dad.”

  “He seems to be handling everything pretty well.”

  “Yeah, but that’s what he does.”

  “I’m not sure I know what that means.”

  “He doesn’t let on how he feels,” Tess explained. “He just pretends like everything is normal.”

  Brooke nodded. “You know as well as I do that everyone deals with illness differently.”

  “Yeah, I know.” Tess needed to redirect her focus. “Did you talk to Rachel?”

  “Yeah. She said Mike’s dad is the same. Not able to talk yet, although Mike says he seems to understand what is going on.”

  “God, that has to be so frustrating.”

  Brooke nodded. “Are you tired?”

  “Why? Does it show?” Tess poked.

  “Only a little.”

  Tess laughed. “And, I didn’t even have to pull out my lasso of truth.”

  “Did you bring your jammies?” Brooke teased.

  “No.”

  “No?”

  “No. You know the rule for sleeping at my parents’ house.”

  Brooke shook her head. “You mean you have to sleep naked too?”

  “Seems fair,” Tess replied evenly. “Unless, for some reason you object.”

  Brooke pulled off her shirt and then proceeded to pull off Tess’s.

  Tess laughed. “The operative word in that rule is ‘sleep,’ honey.”

  Brooke shrugged. “That’s okay with me.” She pulled off the rest of her clothes and climbed into the bed.

  Tess smirked.

  “What am I missing?” Brooke asked.

  “From where I am standing, pretty much everything.” Tess winked.

  “Why do you still have clothes on?” Brooke questioned.