“Lily?” Liam called.
His voice was calm, but there was something that made Lily drop the bag on the floor and walk right over.
“What’s wrong?” she asked.
Rose’s expression was anxious; she was breathing at twice her normal rate. The shadows falling through the window, from the pines, had masked it at first—the room was violet, slate, purple—but when Lily flipped on the lamp, and the room was light, she saw that Rose was blue.
“What should I do?” Lily asked, panicked.
“Stay calm,” Liam said. “She’s breathing … she’s not choking or anything. Let’s call the pediatrician.”
Lily’s hands were shaking, so he found the number of the doctor in Port Blaise—recommended by Anne. Lily had taken Rose in for her checkup, and everything had been fine. But now, on the phone, Dr. Durance was asking questions that made Lily worry.
“Is Rose anxious? Has she been fussing? Does she feed eagerly? Does she sweat during or after feeding? Skin is bluish?”
“Yes,” Lily answered to all the questions, denial falling away, everything suddenly pointing back to that strange feeling under her fingertips. Yes, yes, yes … She told the doctor about that sensation, and he said, “Sounds like a heart murmur.”
Were heart murmurs serious? No, they weren’t—were they? Lily remembered a girl from school who had one. She had used it to get excused from gym—that was all. Didn’t kids outgrow them? She asked Dr. Durance, and he said, “Usually.”
They called, and were told to bring Rose in. That was the first time Liam insisted on going along—and Lily was too worried to decline. He drove, and Lily held Rose in her lap.
Dr. Durance did a standard exam, found a heart murmur, and immediately referred Rose for further tests at the regional medical center. There, they did a Doppler echocardiogram. Several views were obtained: Rose’s heart was observed beating in her tiny chest, the thickness of the heart wall was measured, and the valves were counted.
Lily knew the test was similar to the many ultrasounds she had had during her pregnancy, home in New England. She knew the doctor would hold a transducer against Rose’s chest wall, and Lily hoped he would remember to warm it. She knew that high-frequency sound waves sent into the chest would return with images of the heart and other structures.
Now, nine years later, she kept her hand on Rose’s chest while her daughter slept. She thought of how intrigued Rose had become with ultrasound—she loved to collect the pictures the doctors printed out for her, and she had done a school project on how ultrasound works the same way bats see in the dark—through sound waves bouncing off objects. At night in Cape Hawk, when Lily and Rose heard bats screeching through the woods, they felt comforted by the tiny creatures, instead of scared.
Still touching Rose, Lily thought of how those first ultrasounds had led to the diagnosis of Tetralogy of Fallot: four complex heart defects. She learned that Rose’s bluish skin tone was due to cyanosis—reduced blood flow to the lungs. It was called Blue Baby Syndrome. But that was just a symptom—the Tetralogy of Fallot was the cause. It sounded like a monster to her, and was one: a four-headed creature, brutally dangerous, fatal if ignored. It required open-heart surgery, so Lily had flown her infant daughter to Boston, one of the best heart centers in the country. And Liam had paid.
“I can’t accept,” Lily had said, panicked.
“You will,” Liam had said. “It’s not for you. It’s for Rose.”
And he had surprised her, showing up at the hospital just before Rose went under sedation. “I have to see my girl,” he said.
Lily tried to hold it together. My girl … That’s what Rose’s father should be saying; emotions seething just below the surface began to pour out. Lily had to run out of the room, sobbing.
“What’s wrong, what did I say?” Liam asked, coming to find her.
“You’re not her father,” she sobbed. “What do you care, why are you here?”
“Of course I care, Lily. I helped deliver her.”
“It never should have happened,” Lily wept, standing in a corner of the hospital corridor, people rushing by without paying any attention—it was the pediatric cardiac care unit, and mothers losing it were a common sight.
“What never should have? My being there?”
Lily sobbed, thinking she might break apart. When she went into labor, the night Rose was born, Liam had been like an angel sent by God. Lily was all alone, in the rocky wilds of the northernmost part of Nova Scotia, on the run from a man who wanted to kill her, the father of her baby. She was lying on the kitchen floor, wracked by hard labor, screaming out loud because she knew she was safe enough—for no one to hear her.
And Liam had walked in, dropped the books he’d been carrying on the floor, come to her, crouched by her side—a total stranger, at her greatest hour of need.
“What does it mean, that I felt safer having my baby alone than asking anyone for help?” she said.
“You had no one to trust,” he said.
“I didn’t know anyone; I didn’t know whether he might have been looking for me, asking around… . I was afraid someone would tell him.”
“You were all alone, Lily.”
Lily had looked up into his eyes—no one but Liam knew how alone she really was. He knew, because he was too.
She couldn’t tell him about the dreams she had about him—beautiful dreams of a one-armed man leaning over her with tears rolling down his cheeks, holding her, supporting her as she gave birth on her kitchen floor, as he caught Rose as she came out, nestling her and handing her to Lily with his good hand.
Since leaving her husband just weeks earlier, Lily had had dreams of monsters. Frightening, shape-shifting monsters that wanted to eat her alive. Lily had married a handsome, charming man. He could sell anybody anything. His smile was perfect—his teeth so white and straight. But in her dreams, he used those perfect teeth to bite her flesh, drain her blood—just as he’d drained her bank accounts in real life.
He had broken Lily’s heart. She thought of all the lies he’d told her. All the ways he had made her feel their problems were all her fault. She was too demanding, possessive, questioning, he had told her. Any time she suspected him of cheating on her, or being somewhere other than where he said he was, he turned it on her. By the time she found out the truth, her heart was shattered.
In Lily’s dreams, her handsome husband was grotesque, and the shark-ravaged Liam was gentle, beautiful. Life painted such pictures of confusion.
That day in the hospital, Lily had cried in the corner, feeling Liam’s breath warm on the back of her neck.
“Don’t cry, Lily,” he whispered. “The doctors here are the best. She’s in good hands… .”
“I think I brought her heart condition on,” she whispered.
“How? That’s not possible.”
“You don’t know,” she said, pacing. “I was so anxious, all the time I was with him, Rose’s father. I felt such tightness in my chest—I used to think I was having a heart attack. I was afraid, and I felt turned inside out. The baby was inside me all that time, being affected.”
“By your emotions? No.”
“I should have left him sooner,” Lily cried.
“Lily—I don’t know what happened, why you left. I wish you would tell me.”
“I can’t,” she said, upset she’d said as much as she had. Her husband had always been so careful to do everything in secret. He had never hit her—not once. He’d never left even one bruise. She had never called the police—because the things he did weren’t illegal. They were murderous, but not illegal. No one would believe Lily, that her husband was a killer.
“You can,” Liam pressed. “I’ll do anything I can to help you… . You already got away from him. I’ll help make sure he never hurts you again.”
“You don’t understand,” Lily said. “The law isn’t on my side. If you’re not a victim of domestic violence, you don’t understand. He was a predator.”
&
nbsp; “I believe you.”
“And do you also believe that Rose is here because of what happened to us before she was born? Because it’s true. We both have broken hearts.”
“If you say so,” Liam said solemnly, touching her face. “I do believe you.”
“Thank you.”
“Then listen to me, Lily. Whatever he did to you, I want you to know this. You and Rose can count on me—forever. No matter what you need, I’ll give it to you.”
“I can’t—”
“If you can’t for yourself, do it for Rose,” he said. “I’m a biologist, not a doctor. But I know this—the two of you were imprinted on my heart the minute I helped bring Rose into this world. I never thought I’d say this, Lily—I’ve never been married, never been engaged, never been a father. I’m none of those things to you and Rose, but I’m yours for life. It’s just the way it is.”
“Liam—”
“It’s just the way it is,” he repeated, his blue eyes serious and steady. “Like it or not.”
And then the doctor had called them in. It was time for Rose to be wheeled away for open-heart surgery. Standing there as they took her daughter away, Lily thought her own heart would explode—but Liam held her hand. He held it the whole time Rose was in surgery. The team performed a double bypass on her baby daughter, using the Blaylock-Taussig shunt.
When the doctors emerged, Lily let go of Liam’s hand. What he had said was nice—very noble. But Rose had survived the surgery, and now Liam could go back to his own life and they’d continue on with theirs. The surgeons explained to her and Liam that the procedure was merely palliative, until Rose grew big enough for more-extensive surgery.
“More?” Lily asked, feeling her knees go weak.
“Ms. Malone, Tetralogy of Fallot means that there are four different defects. Rose will need extensive, complex open-heart surgery to reconstruct her heart. A hard road lies ahead. But Rose is amazing—strong, a fighter.” They kept talking, but Lily stopped listening. She just shut down, unable to take it all in.
“We can’t go through all this,” Lily said to Liam, sobbing again when the doctors left.
“Yes, you can. You have to.”
“I can’t,” she cried. “I can’t watch her suffer!”
“Lily, my mother couldn’t stand to see me suffer after we lost my brother. I had a lot of surgeries too. But she just … went away. I needed her, just like Rose needs you. I promised you, and I’ll never break it—I’m going to help you. Anytime you need to be strong, call me and I’ll help. The doctor is right: Rose is a fighter. You’ll see. She’s a miracle girl.”
“A miracle girl,” Lily murmured, grasping the phrase, looking up with red, swollen eyes.
“She is,” Liam said. “I knew it from the minute she was born.”
“How?” Lily asked.
“Well,” he said. “I’ll tell you sometime.”
Now, nine years later, they were all still on that same hard road. Lily sat by Rose’s bed. The balloons Liam had brought were still tied to the rail. They had fizzled out some, but Rose refused to let them be taken away. Lily looked at her watch—Liam still wasn’t back. She tried to needlepoint again, but her heart wasn’t in it—she couldn’t concentrate on the canvas.
She constantly told him she didn’t want him there, but the truth was, when he wasn’t, she felt empty. During the nine years since leaving Rose’s father, she had become very strong and sure of herself. She had done a lot of research on domestic violence, realized the danger she’d been in. She had dealt with her guilt over staying as long as she had, and her grief over having to leave behind everything she’d left. She was a fighter, like Rose.
But at moments like this, she realized how much Liam’s promise had meant to her. Being so strong and tough, she didn’t want to rely on anyone else. Liam was in a category all his own—he wasn’t “anyone else.” She told herself that the promise was for Rose. Rose loved him—that was for sure.
So, on Rose’s account, Lily stood up from her chair and went to the window. The World War I monument shimmered in the reflecting pool. A few doctors and hospital visitors had pulled park chairs into the shade and were reading beneath the trees. Lily pressed her forehead against the glass, trying to see the heron. She couldn’t—the bird wasn’t visible from here.
And neither was Liam. Maybe he had finally gotten tired of strong-arming her into letting him keep his promise. She could hardly blame him.
The thing was, she realized she’d never gotten him to tell her why he’d first called Rose “the miracle girl.” Maybe she hadn’t wanted to hear, was afraid to believe. But knowing the difficult surgery that lay ahead for Rose, the one that might finally fix her heart, Lily thought that now would be a really good time for her to hear that story. She found herself hoping Liam would come back soon.
Chapter 18
Liam pulled into the hospital parking lot just before eight—he wanted a chance to see Rose before visiting hours ended, and he was elated by what he had just seen on his computer screen—MM122 blinking away, safe and alive, but in a spot so completely unexpected, he had failed to plug the GPS coordinates into the program—because it had been too unlikely.
Walking into the lobby, climbing into the elevator, he was struck by the juxtaposition—from the wild, fresh air of Cape Hawk to the hermetically sealed atmosphere of the hospital. When would Rose be well enough to stay out of places like this? Liam’s excitement over finding Nanny disappeared, replaced by a physical aching for Rose’s confinement—the nine-year-old girl he loved, having to spend so many summer days imprisoned in here, in her body.
But by the time he got to the floor, he’d calmed himself down, set the expression on his face. He paused at the door to her room.
Lily had pulled the chair next to the bed, and was needlepointing while Rose read. Liam saw the way Lily’s dark hair fell across her face, sharply angled and neatly cut, a raven’s wing. It blocked her vision, but Rose looked up from the book, over her mother’s head, and saw Liam standing there. He put on his biggest smile for Rose.
“You’re here,” Rose said.
“Wild horses couldn’t keep me away.”
“Are there wild horses in Nova Scotia?”
He looked deep in thought. “Wild eagles, I should have said.”
“Or wild whales.”
Lily smiled, but she seemed to be looking everywhere but at Liam. He couldn’t quite figure it out—usually she had no problem just gazing at him head-on, with that inscrutable look in her eyes. There was most often a challenge in Lily’s gaze—her chin tilted slightly up, as if saying “Bring it on.” But right now, she looked almost fragile, as if the fight had gone out of her, her hands trembling as they held the canvas.
He wanted to ask, but he knew he had to wait until they were out of earshot. So instead, he unpacked the bag Anne had sent.
“Anne wanted me to give you these things,” he said. “Your friend Jessica made this pillow—”
“My best friend!”
“Well, that’s obviously how she feels too.”
“It’s Nanny,” Rose said, touching the embroidered whale. “It smells like home.”
“Filled with Cape Hawk pine needles,” Liam said.
“Why does it say ‘Bring Rose Home’?” she asked.
“She misses you,” Lily said as she gave Rose a secret look of pleasure and triumph.
“She does,” Liam said. “The Nanouk Girls are helping her make more of these, and they’re selling them at the inn, to raise money to get you well as soon as possible. Nanny wants it too. Rose, she’s telling you in as strong a way as possible.”
“I want to get well,” Rose said with a tiny voice.
“You will,” Lily said. “You are getting well. It’s happening right now, every minute.”
“Jessica also made these,” Liam said. “For you to give the nurses.”
He watched Lily and Rose look through the plastic bag of pinecone jewelry, and suddenly Lily excused h
erself, dropped her needlework, and walked out into the hallway. Liam wanted to follow her, but Rose was watching her mother anxiously, so he stayed.
“Why did she go out?” Rose asked.
“Maybe she went to get the nurses,” he said.
“We’re going to Boston tomorrow,” Rose said.
“I know.”
“Did you see Jessica? I thought maybe she wanted a new best friend. I wouldn’t blame her—I’m not there anymore.”
“You’ll be home soon,” Liam said. “And it seems to me that she has only one best friend—you. That’s why she wants to ‘bring Rose home.’ ”
“She and Nanny are waiting for me?”
“Rose,” Liam began, not even knowing how to tell her. It seemed so scientifically impossible—he hesitated to mention it, until he was able to tell for sure.
“Are you coming to Boston with us?” Rose asked, interrupting his thoughts.
“I wouldn’t miss it,” he said.
“Sometimes I wonder …” she said, stopping herself. Liam didn’t push, or try to urge the words out of her. He just waited. She cleared her throat. He saw all the tubes and wires going in and out of her body, listened to the machines whirring and clicking around her. He wanted to pick her up and hold her, tell her that everything would be all right. But Rose knew too much for such platitudes. Her nine-year-old eyes were wiser than those of most of the professors he’d had in college.
“What do you wonder, Rose?”
“I wonder what Mom would do without me. I’m all she has.”
Liam saw her reaching across the bed to hold his hand. He started to squeeze her fingers, but she reached past his good hand and held his prosthesis instead. Her tiny hand, tinged blue, with those clubbed fingers, grasping his big, fake, clunky hand. The gesture touched and shocked him, and he had to fight from showing it. Rose stared into his eyes.
Luanne Rice Page 18