by Alex Lucian
Once again I held up a hand, halting him. “No.” I searched for my shirt, but I felt like I couldn’t even think past getting myself to the airport.
“Let me help you,” he said.
I snapped. “Help me?” I asked, my voice several octaves higher than normal. “You’ve done nothing but distract me all summer, Leo.” I spied my shirt crumpled in a corner across the room and snagged it, yanking it over my head.
“I know you’re upset right now—” he started.
“Just shut up!” I yelled, throwing up my hands. “I considered not visiting my parents for you. I’m so stupid!” I grabbed my purse from the floor and swung the strap on my shoulder as I left the room, running down the stairs and out the door before Leo could catch up with me.
I was in my car and backing out of the driveway when Leo stepped out his front door, so I accelerated, needing distance from him as soon as possible.
My phone on the passenger seat buzzed and I picked it up, seeing a text from my mom with a flight time and airline. It was a few hours from now, so I knew I’d try to get standby on another flight to D.C. as soon as possible. I dropped my phone back on the passenger seat and then spied Leo’s cleats on the floor, caked in dirt.
Then, finally, I started crying.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
After my flight landed at Ronald Reagan in D.C., I called my mom from baggage claim to let her know I was ready. I tried to do my best not to look at the name on my most recent call list: Leo.
The two-hour flight had done nothing but make me think, replay my last conversation with him over and over. I’d been mean to him, which seemed to be my knee-jerk reaction whenever I was upset. He’d called me around the time I got to the airport, but Logan was so packed that I hadn’t bothered answering, not when I was in a hurry to get on the soonest flight to D.C. It wasn’t until I was standing at the curb waiting to see my mom’s car that I realized I didn’t have anything with me besides the contents of my purse. No cell phone charger or even change of clothes.
Spying the black SUV my mom drove, I moved down the arrivals line to where she was pulling in. The moment her arms circled me, I sagged in relief. “I’m so glad you’re here,” she said. She wasn’t crying, but from the look on her face as she’d approached me, I was sure that was because she’d spent so many hours crying that she didn’t have any tears left.
Her floral perfume was comforting and I gripped her tighter, thankful to be reunited. When she pulled back, she brushed my hair from my face. “I feel like I haven’t seen you in forever,” she said, a sad smile on her face.
“Just a few weeks,” I quipped.
“Come on,” she said, gripping my wrist and leading me toward her car. “Let’s go to the hospital and see your father.”
I waited until she was buckled before asking, “How’s Dad?”
“Well,” she sighed, signaling and then pulling out into the traffic. “He’s stable. That’s about all we know at this point. He had some scans and tests and we’ll find out soon how…” her voice drifted and I could tell she was doing her best to stay strong for me.
“Okay,” I said, deciding not to make her finish her answer. I still had a dozen other questions, but I didn’t think it was fair to ask them right then, since she had just recently seemed to stop crying.
“Tell me something good, Scarlet. What have you been doing all summer? We have fifteen minutes before we’re at the hospital, and I want to just be a mom talking to her daughter about normal things right now.”
What could I tell her, really? “Classes have been remarkably easy,” I began, nervously playing with my cell phone in my lap. “I’ve been working at the shelter, of course. Hanging out with Liza a bit.”
“Oh, that’s good.” My mother may have thought Liza was a little wild, but she had liked how Liza always managed to pull me from my shell. “How’s Liza?”
“Good.” Even though I hadn’t seen her in a couple weeks. “She’s busy at the bar.”
“How’s Leo?”
I nearly choked on my own saliva at that before remembering that my mom knew about our rides into the city several times a week. She didn’t know about … the other stuff.
“Leo’s fine. Busy.”
“Mrs. Madsen mentioned you two have been hanging out together a bit more. That’s nice.” She turned her head to me and smiled a genuine smile—nothing curious or questioning about it. I often forgot that Mrs. Madsen and my mom were friends, so it wasn’t surprising that they talked while my mom had been away.
“Yes. We’ve spent some time together.”
“That’s great, Scarlet. I’m really glad.”
I wasn’t sure how to take my mom’s answers. Was she lightly questioning me? Was she giving me her approval? Surely, she wasn’t. As much as my mother liked Leo, I couldn’t see her approving of our arrangement as it were.
“Well, it’s my first summer where I’m not studying a lot, so it’s been nice being able to see people a little before vet school starts.” As soon as the words were out of my mouth, I wanted to take them back. My father had just suffered a stroke and heart attack and I was talking about leaving my parents to go to a school across the country in less than two months.
“I know, honey. You’ve worked so hard for this. It’s good to see you fighting for what you want.”
Again, I wasn’t sure if my mom’s responses were veiled advice or not—because they seemed to be speaking right to my heart. “Well, I just want to make you both proud.”
My mother made a sound that sounded like a tsk, but when she looked at me, her eyes were watery. “Oh honey,” she said, reaching a hand over to touch my cheek. “Going to vet school doesn’t make me proud; I’ve always been proud of you.” She dropped her hand and turned back to the road as the street light changed color. “I just don’t want to see you work yourself so hard all the time.”
I was confused. I’d worked so hard, my whole life, to live up to the expectations my parents had—I was a preacher’s daughter who didn’t fit into the typical mold, so I’d made up for my shortcomings by throwing myself into my studies with an almost punishing work ethic. I’d gone into the veterinary field because I loved animals, yes, but also because I wanted my parents to be proud of the woman they raised. I didn’t mess around in college, never dropped a class or even skipped one, all to make them proud.
“Listen, Scarlet,” my mom said, interrupting my thoughts, “I can practically see the wheels in your brain cranking and turning over and over. I’ve often wondered if we were a little too hard on you with our hopes for your education and future success. You’re your father’s daughter, and so I assumed that your hard work and tenacity was a good thing. And now,” she glanced at me, “with your father in the hospital—I’m afraid.” Her voice was a whisper. “He’s had high blood pressure for years and hasn’t slowed down once—for anything. I don’t want that to happen to you too.”
My chest ached from the breath I held as I stared at her. I’d never really thought of myself as being like my father, but now that my mom was saying this, I couldn’t stop comparing us. He worked every single day—if he wasn’t ministering to the congregation at large, he was advising couples on upcoming marriages or marriages in turmoil. He worked both youth group nights and helped out at the church-sponsored soup kitchen. He had a hand in every single thing in his church, because that was who he was. And while I wasn’t an active member of the congregation, I had thrown myself into my studies for three years straight—not once taking the easy way. If there were extra credit opportunities, I took them. Not because I needed to, but because I could. I could count on two hands the number of parties I’d attended in three full years of school, which worked out to less than one per month. I’d been an atypical student, pushing myself to be the best, the hardest worker. And now my mom was essentially telling me to slow down.
“I’ve worked so hard,” I said. I didn’t know what else to say.
“You have, Scarlet. And I worry. I w
orry you’ve worked yourself so hard that you went from being a child to being an adult immediately without enough fun in between.”
“I can still have fun in vet school,” I protested, but we both knew that wasn’t true. Vet school would be a different atmosphere, in a different state, and as introverted as I was, I wouldn’t spend the next several years attending social gatherings.
“I’m just saying that I don’t want you to feel pressure from us. If you want those things for yourself, then great—I’ll be proud of you. But if you don’t want those things and you change your mind, I’ll still, forever and always, be proud of you.” The unshed tears finally spilled over and down her cheeks and I blinked to keep my own at bay.
A couple minutes later, we were walking down the hallways of the hospital to room one-fourteen. I was shocked by how quiet the hospital was, and felt like I was disturbing the peace as my mother opened the door and I followed her. After we washed our hands in the small sink, she led me past the curtain to his bed.
My father was pale, eyes closed and hands placed one over the other on his stomach. It was a pose I’d seen thousands of times—my father napping on the couch, usually. The main difference here, besides the location, was the fact that a half dozen machines surrounded him, with wires coming from places all around his body. The steady beeping of the machines around him reminded me of exactly where we were and I joined my mom in a chair she pulled up for me beside hers, right next to his bed.
“The doctors think he’ll wake soon,” she whispered and grabbed my hand. Her fingers were cold against mine and she squeezed them tight. “We should talk to him, so he knows we’re both here.”
I nodded, swallowed past the thick lump in my throat. Seeing my dad so frail and motionless was alarming. He’d always been a loud, jovial man. It was part of what made him an excellent pastor—his voice reached every single person in his congregation and he made sure to shake the hands of everyone as they left, giving them a smile of encouragement for whatever it was they were going through.
“Switch me spots,” my mom said, standing up and leaving the chair closest to my dad. “Talk to him.”
“Hey, Dad,” I said, my voice creaky. “It’s Scarlet. I’m here.”
“Mrs. Jennings,” a voice called from the doorway. We both looked up and I saw a doctor in a white lab coat, motioning for my mom to follow him into the hallway.
“The good news is we believe that your husband suffered a mini-stroke.” I picked up my dad’s hand in mine, immediately missing the reciprocating squeeze he gave me every time I grabbed his hand. I strained my ear toward the door.
“The chance of having a cardiac disturbance is elevated after having a stroke. Typically, any cardiac complication happens within three months following a stroke, but in your husband’s case it was minutes.”
I heard my mother say something, but I couldn’t make out exactly what. I squeezed my dad’s hand and rubbed a thumb over his knuckles.
“It may take us several days to get a better picture on how big the heart attack was, but his brain scans are encouraging—we didn’t see any abnormalities. We’ll know better when he wakes up, the extent of damage caused by the stroke and heart attack. But this is reassuring right now.”
At the same time that my mom sagged against the door, I sagged in my seat. I felt as if I’d been awake for a hundred hours at that moment and all I wanted was a nap. I heard my mom thank the doctor and then she returned to the room. I stood to give her a hug as she approached the bed and did my best to keep my own emotions in check. I wanted to be strong for my mom and, as she silently cried in my arms, I kept it together, patting her back and hair.
“I’m going to go find the hospital cafeteria,” I told her. “Want a coffee?”
She nodded, and I left the room as quickly as I could, letting out a breath and feeling the stress of the last few hours tighten its hold on me. I asked a receptionist to point me in the direction of the cafeteria and then, on my way, I pulled my phone out of my purse. I had two missed calls, one from Liza and one from Leo. I wasn’t ready to call Liza back and tell her everything that was going on. And after how unkindly I’d treated Leo, I wasn’t ready to call him either.
I moved to my texts, seeing two from Leo and one from Liza. I opened Liza’s first, figuring that would be easier to read.
Liza: Hey! Let’s get together tonight? Tomorrow? You can fill me in on all of your naked acrobatics and I can drink my jealousy away.
I debated texting her, telling her I was in D.C. and my dad was in the hospital. But that didn’t feel like something I should do over text, so I put the thought aside and moved onto Leo’s, taking in a deep breath.
Leo: I hope you’re okay. That your dad is okay. I hate that you were upset when you left, especially with how things ended tonight.
That one was sent first, with another following it ten minutes later.
Leo: I want to be there for you. If you’ll let me. I care about you. Just … please. Call me. When you can.
I rolled my thumb over his words and felt my face grow warm. For the second time that day, Leo had been the one to cause me to cry.
Chapter Thirty
When the light in my bedroom turned from black to gray to the soft yellow of the sunrise, I rolled out my bed. At most, I’d gotten three hours of fitful sleep. Every time I’d shifted on my bed, punching the pillow underneath my head, I thought about Scarlet, wondered about her dad, then rolled through the things she’d said to me before taking off.
Fleeing was a better word, actually. Not that I could blame her. I couldn’t really be mad at her for what she’d said, though the words seared into my brain almost twelve hours later.
You’ve done nothing but distract me all summer … I’m so stupid.
It actually would’ve been easier if I could be mad at her, if I could’ve fought back against what she said. But I couldn’t. No, the thing that tied my tongue down and shackled my ability to get defensive against the daggers she’d slung at me was a bone-deep shame.
I hadn’t given her one reason to believe that I actually cared for her. Not one. And among the thousands of new, terrifying thoughts that I had for her, I’d only given her vague statements and indistinct declarations.
So I couldn’t really blame her for viewing me as a distraction. Nor could I blame her for her silence. Of course, I was hoping that it meant her phone had died, or her dad was doing so well that she wasn’t even thinking about anything that was going on outside of the hospital.
But it still left me feeling uncomfortable, how we’d left things. I dressed quickly, grabbing the first clothes I set my hands on and made my way downstairs. My mom had always been an early riser, and when I turned the corner into the kitchen, she looked up with surprise from her seat at the kitchen table.
“You’re up early.”
“Yeah,” I said, pouring myself a cup of coffee. I added a pinch of sugar and blew on it before sitting across from her. “I’m guessing you heard about Pastor Jennings.”
She hummed, nodding her head. “It’s so sad. I was actually texting with Margaret a little bit ago.”
“How is he doing?”
The smile she gave me was sad, and it made my mouth dry out. “He’s still in ICU. He was stable last night, but I guess they had a rough morning. They’re still trying to figure out the extent of the damage from the stroke.”
My head jerked up. “A stroke? I thought it was a heart attack.”
She lifted her eyebrows at my tone, but nodded. “It was both. He had a mini-stroke, a TIA, and that triggered the heart attack. How did you know already?”
“Scarlet told me. We uhh, we met up with Adele last night and she got the call while we were still together.” I took a sip of coffee, my mind racing. They weren’t in town, so it wasn’t like Scarlet and her mom would have visits from church members, or other family members, which I knew they didn’t have many of anyway. Obviously I didn’t know a lot about strokes, or heart attacks, but I knew th
ey were serious. Serious enough that he was in Intensive Care. “Mom, do you know what hospital he’s at?”
“Sure, why?”
I pushed my chair back a bit and scratched at the back of my neck. “Can I borrow your car?” Ugh, I fucking hated asking that. It made me feel like a child, more than staying in their house all summer did.
“Leo—”
“For a couple days?”
Comprehension dawned in her eyes, then her face softened into a smile. “Honey, why do you want to drive down there?”
I tilted my head to the side, raising my eyebrows like really, Mom? You can’t figure this out?
“You two are,” she swallowed, and the way her eyes brightened, the way her tone rose with excitement made me sad. Just a little, because who knew if Scarlet even wanted to see me. “Are you dating?”
“Don’t get too excited, Mom,” I said carefully, turning my coffee mug counter clockwise. “But … but I like her. A lot, actually. And she’s probably feeling like she has to be really strong for her mom. That’s got to make it hard to process anything for herself.”
“I would imagine so.” My mom propped an elbow on the table and rested her chin in her hand, pinning me with a serious look. “But if you go, Leo, you better make sure you’re only doing this for her. Now isn’t the time to make some grand declaration, if you haven’t already.”
I laughed, the sound empty of any humor. “Trust me, no declarations have been made. She probably wouldn’t even believe me right now if I did.” I shook my head, then rolled it around on my shoulders. “I just want to be there for her. Make sure she’s okay.”
“Is it too soon for me to pretend she’s my daughter-in-law?”
“Yes,” I said, standing up from the table. I took another sip of my coffee before dumping the rest into the sink. “Now can I borrow your car?”
“No, I need it.”
“Mom, the train will take forever.”