by Alexa Davis
I groaned and started to nod. “Is that jerk nurse still here?” I asked, trying to whisper. It sounded loud in my ears, and from Logan’s answering chuckle, I knew it was definitely louder than I intended.
“Yes, she’s still here. She’s making sure you’re okay to move before they take you to your room.”
“She had some ice; may I have another piece?”
Logan’s fingers came into view with a small chip of ice. He placed it into my mouth, and I closed my lips over his damp fingers as he slid them across my chapped and cracked lips.
“She is Jenny,” the irritated voice snapped from somewhere over my shoulder. “And she is at the end of a sixteen-hour shift that was supposed to be twelve hours.” Her voice softened, and she added, “But I’m not irritated with you, Sugar. You were a trooper. We’re all very proud of you.”
Logan’s fingers appeared with another chip of ice, and I gratefully accepted it.
I heard them talking about moving me to my room and putting me in a real bed so I could get rest, and then the floor beneath me started moving. I watched the wheels of the gurney roll over the metal strip into the elevator and down another hall, too fast for me to count tiles but not fast enough to overcome the sluggish sensation I had where my arm met my IV.
In my room, I watched shoes shuffle by me as they adjusted my bed, moved machines and my IV cart, and got more nurses in to help transition me to the bed without damaging or opening my surgical wound. I tried to lift my face out of the headrest, but a hand gently held me down.
Logan bent down to look at me from under the gurney. “Don’t move, baby, I know you’re getting antsy, but if you shift too much, you could cause a leak.”
“You’re full of shit, Logan,” I drawled.
He chuckled. “Okay, but they do have a lot of tubes to move at the same time as they move you.”
I sighed and blinked slowly. “Tell me you can’t see the catheter,” I whispered.
He chuckled and stroked my cheek. “No, baby. All I see is a small patch of skin around your incision site, where they cut away the sheet and taped it down. Those stitches look pretty badass though.” He smiled at me, and I laughed.
“I can sit and compare scars with George, but he’ll still win,” I laughed.
“He knows what a rock star you are. Don’t you worry about that.”
“I wiggled my toes,” I mused. “Did they move?”
He tilted his head and glanced around my side. “What do you mean?”
“Watch my toes.” I wiggled them again.
“They moved,” he chuckled. “You’ll be running five-minute miles, and I’ll be eating your dust in no time.”
He was pushed back by the nursing staff and, in moments, the world was right side up again. I glanced up at ceiling tiles, which were remarkably like the floor tiles I’d been forced to stare at for the better part of an hour, and listened to the instructions the head nurse gave me. Then, suddenly, it was just Logan and me, alone in the room. Neither of us spoke for a few minutes, but he held my hand and rubbed his thumb across my knuckles.
“My toes work, which means that in a couple of hours, my legs should carry me right to that bathroom to clean myself up and use a toilet.” I sighed and leaned back with my eyes closed.
I couldn’t have closed my eyes for more than a moment, but when I opened them, the sky outside my tiny window was dark, and Logan was gone. I called for a nurse and asked for help to navigate the tubes and devices I was attached to so I could get up, but I was told I had to wait for the attending to see me on his rounds.
My mother’s tiny form appeared in the light from the hallway. “Are you awake, Heidi?” she asked in a low voice.
“Yes, Mom. I just woke up.”
She stepped in and turned on a light, blinding me for a moment. “I ran into your boyfriend as he headed out. He isn’t coming back, is he?” Her tone was so disapproving I wanted to ask her to leave, but I bit my tongue.
“Mom, I just woke up. That’s why my light was out when you arrived.”
She rolled her eyes and sighed dramatically. “Is that your way of telling me you want me to turn the light out?”
“No, it’s my way of telling you that you should’ve asked first.”
She shook her head and reached over me, her arm banging against my face as she turned out the overhead light.
“Mom, why are you here?” I asked as I used the bed controls to turn on the gentler corner light.
Almost as if he’d felt my distress, Logan walked in with to-go cartons of food from the cafeteria.
“Juliette,” he greeted her with a nod. The sliding tray I needed to eat was tucked behind my mother’s chair in the corner of the room. “Could you please slide the table over here?”
“You’re really going to eat in front of me?” my mother asked, her voice dripping with judgment.
“Heidi needs to eat. If you have a problem with that, you can leave.” Logan sounded angrier than I’d heard his voice since the day he’d almost decked Eli.
“No, no, it’s okay. I can wait a little longer. But I really appreciate you making sure I have something to eat. It’s been what, almost twenty-four hours?” I chuckled and pointed to the table. “You go ahead. I’ll eat after Mom heads out.”
Logan’s jaw worked as he stopped himself from saying whatever it was his eyes were telegraphing at her.
I saw her smirk and his discomfort, and all I wanted was time alone with him to explain why she was that way, and time alone with her to assuage her need to be the center of attention, so she’d go back to ignoring me. Logan set the food on the table and waited by the door, standing with his arms folded across his chest like a bouncer. I wondered if he felt like one, too, watching the tiny, gray-haired troublemaker from across the room, hoping she crossed the line so he could strong-arm her out of the room.
We were like a diorama pretending to be real folks, no one moving, no one speaking. I envied them both for their ability to get up and walk out whenever the deafening silence became too much even if both stayed out of sheer obstinacy. Finally, my mother heaved a sigh and stood, shoving her chair out of the way with a loud thud. I laid there, gaping like a fish, but Logan jumped in and quickly moved the table over my bed and started adjusting it, tilting the head up to sit me up a little more vertically, and raising the whole bed so my food was within easy reach.
He’d bought me all the junk food I always avoided, a cheeseburger, French fries, some fried chicken, and a burrito; all of which were quickly becoming too cold to eat anyway. He opened the other clamshell and showed me the salad inside.
“Thank you.” I smiled.
He shrugged. “I wasn’t sure that you’d want to eat, so I brought something that could sit for a while and still be good.” He set the upholstered chair back where my mother had been sitting and then returned to his post by the door.
My mother glared balefully at him, then smiled thinly and tucked her purse up over her shoulder. “I have to work early tomorrow, but I’ll come see you once you’ve had some time to rest,” she explained, and I saw the real her hidden behind the attitude and the cold shoulder. I’d scared her, and she was waiting for the other shoe to drop. I didn’t know what to say to make her feel better. Just once, I would’ve loved for her to make me feel better. Like she had when I was little, and Dad was still just on a work-trip when he disappeared for weeks at a time.
We couldn’t hug around the table and tubing, even if hugging was still something we did, so she waved goodbye and walked out the door, brushing past Logan without acknowledging him.
He waited a beat, then glanced down the hall in the direction of the elevators. “I think it’s safe for me to sit,” he teased as he pulled the chair as close to the side of the bed as he could get. “How are you holding up? Honestly.” He held my hand, and a stupid smile split my face.
“I’m in a lot of pain, but it’s… manageable. I feel like I was stabbed with a hot poker in my spine. But whatever meds I�
��m on make it just not matter to me that much.”
Logan’s eyebrows raised, and he blew out the breath he’d been holding. “Can I get you some help?” His tan face was lined with helpless concern. I remembered the same look on my dad’s face once upon a time, before my illness had driven Mom too far off the deep edge for him to stick around.
“No. Just relax and sit with me. I don’t think I’ll be much good as a company though. You’ll be out of here before you know it.” I meant the words to make him feel better, but anger flashed across his face.
My brain was mushy and dull from the medication and exhaustion, and I let him sit silently beside me while I pretended to fall asleep. I listened to him leave, grateful to finally be alone with my pain and fear. The bed was my prison, but also my oasis. I was trapped here until the attending released me. But here in the hospital bed, I was beyond reproach. Not by my virtues, but because of the very illness that trapped me here. It wasn’t that he wouldn’t argue with me. He couldn’t make himself raise his voice at me while every tube that ran from my body to some machine or other was a physical reminder that my life was in danger. That my life might still be forfeit if I wasn’t kept in pristine emotional condition.
Attitude was everything, after all.
27. Logan
The longer the doctors kept Heidi in the hospital, the further she withdrew from everyone. It started with her mother, but I felt her reticence to talk to me, and finally, she requested no visitors at all. My family had tried to break through the walls, but Heidi was determined to spare herself from the emotional baggage that came with having a family.
I couldn’t blame her. She’d lived a solitary life through sickness and health most of her life, really. Seeing her swallowed up in that bed, so emaciated that her collarbones stood inches away from her chest, made the pit of my stomach ache with the need to hold her.
Even with her hair gone and deep purple bruises under her eyes, Heidi was the sweetest, most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. I watched her lock away her pain and put a smile on her face as her mother started in on the nurses down the hall.
“Want me to go save them or let her wear herself down on them a little before she comes in to see you?” I teased.
Heidi scoffed and shook her head. “When she’s on the warpath, she’s like the Energizer Bunny. She never runs out of steam until she’s taken everyone else down first.”
I grimaced and moved to the corner where I lounged. She’d asked for us both to be here after days of no news from her and getting the runaround from her doctors. I was willing to play nice with Juliette if it meant I got to see Heidi.
Little tendrils of Heidi’s hair peeked out from the head scarf my mother had brought her as a gift, and the purple under her eyes was gone. Even though she was still too thin, it made my chest tight to see how much healthier she looked. I made a mental note to buy something chocolate and expensive for the nursing staff on the floor, who had obviously taken good care of her, and a bottle of ancient single malt for Doctors Patel and Thomas for keeping Heidi around.
I opened my mouth to tell Heidi what I was thinking when Juliette blew into the room on a gust of frigid air, and my mouth snapped shut, biting off my first word. Heidi glanced at me to let me finish, but I shook my head and pressed my lips together and pasted on a thin smile for her mother.
“I thought you said I was getting a little alone time with you, Heidi. I wasn’t expecting to see your friend here.”
My jaw dropped, and I felt hot rage climb my neck as I took a step forward.
“Mother, stop. Just stop, okay? Logan has been there for me through everything. He isn’t Dad, and even if he was, it’s none of your damn business who I choose to love.” Her words pierced me, and for a moment, I thought my heart had stopped.
“Okay, Heidi. I’m finished.” I glanced over at Juliette, pleased at her subdued demeanor as she sat. I hoped I was seeing a new side of Heidi, one that would allow me to move forward with my plan for our future together.
“I have some news for you both. I’m telling you together, because I don’t want to have to ever say this again, and I want to know you both understand.”
“You have our undivided attention. Go ahead,” I encouraged her when my mouth finally regained the ability to speak.
“The doctor will be in shortly, but since you two can’t seem to play nice, or even take a minute to get to know one another—”
“Oh, I know all I need to about him,” Juliette interjected. “He’s just another wanderer, pretending he can settle down with one woman because it’s the only way to get into her bed.”
“Oh, for the love of God!” I cursed.
Heidi held up a hand to me. “He’s gotten lots and lots,” she glanced at me and smiled, “and lots and lots of sex from me, Mom. I’m not a child, and you have no right to assume I’m making the same mistakes you did. I gave Logan every chance in the world to walk away, and here he is, moving out of his place and making room for a new life that I’m invited to be part of.” She looked my way again, and my grin was so wide it hurt my face. I could feel my heart pounding in my chest the way it only did when I had one of those “once in a lifetime” shots.
“What’s your news, Heidi? I can’t tell if it’s good or bad, because the moment Juliette starts in on me, all I feel is bad juju. I’m too nervous to wait any longer.” I wanted whatever she needed to tell us out so Juliette could storm off again, and I could finally be alone with Heidi after a week of being shut out.
Before Heidi could say another word, Dr. Thomas rapped on the door with his knuckles and poked his head in. “Mind if we join you?”
The “we” turned out to be him, Dr. Patel, and another doctor I’d never seen before. All three had pleasantly blank faces, but between Heidi’s cryptic words and the carefully schooled expressions on all the doctors’ faces, my gut began to churn.
“So, how are we holding up, Miss Heidi?” the third doctor asked, and I felt a hot stab of anger that she’d been keeping us all away while she was learning about her prognosis. We’d all been there for her, even Juliette in her strange, jealous way. Heidi saw the look on my face and shrugged, suddenly nervous, or afraid I’d start a fight with her in front of them all.
“I’m as well as I was this morning, Dr. Castle.”
He nodded and patted her leg, and my frustration turned to jealousy in an instant. I bit my tongue, but glanced at Juliette, who was watching me with a bewildered expression. In that brief moment, she went from hating me to being on my side, all because her anger and jealousy were reserved for the man she thought was stealing her daughter’s attention. The epiphany about how broken the woman must have been made me hurt for her, and for Heidi. Both women wanted the other’s love. Neither of them was willing to simply ask for it.
“Well, I suppose we should get to brass tacks, shall we?” Dr. Patel moved up beside Heidi and leaned her forward so he could examine her wound. “All closed up, the stitches were pulled and everything is nice and cool, no redness. No outward appearance of infection.”
“That’s great!” Juliette blurted, sitting up in her chair a little straighter. It was the first real smile I’d seen from her, and it changed her entire appearance. Suddenly, I saw so much more of her in Heidi than I had, that I almost smiled with her. But a glance toward my girl and I knew the bad news was yet to come.
Dr. Thomas flipped back the blanket and said, “Now, wiggle your toes.” Heidi did, but it seemed a little slow and the movements were tiny. “Good job. Now, push against my hand. He pushed his palm against the bottom of her foot and shoved until her knee was bent.
Heidi took a deep breath and pushed, or tried to. Her leg didn’t move. It didn’t even shake with exertion from trying to move, but I could see sweat beading up on her forehead as she struggled to make her leg obey.
“I can’t,” she panted, and he let her leg slide back down until it was horizontal. He switched to the other foot and repeated the process, pushing her leg into a de
ep bend and asking her to push. This time, her leg moved a little, trembling the whole time, until she gave up and begged him to let her stop.
Dr. Thomas patted her leg and stepped back, making notes with the new doctor, while Dr. Patel addressed us. “As you can see, Heidi isn’t regaining the use of her right leg the way she should, and her left leg has no strength to it whatsoever.”
Juliette let out a small cry of despair, and before I realized it, I was standing behind her with my hand on her shoulder, fighting tears of my own.
A small hand rested on top of mine and Juliette sniffed and patted my fingers. “What do we do now?”
Dr. Patel glanced at Heidi.
“Now, I start physical therapy to walk again,” Heidi answered. “The nerve damaged can’t be fixed, but there’s a window of opportunity where I can retrain my body, so that’s what I’m going to do. I’m done at the park tomorrow when I’m released, and I’ll be taking a page from Logan’s book and selling my house.”
My mind went into overdrive, making a list of what my next place would have to look like so she could be comfortable and mobile in the space. “I can start working on—” I started, but she cut me off.
“That won’t be necessary, Logan. I won’t be moving in with you or going back to the ranch, as nice as it was there.”
Juliette let go of my hand and leaned forward. “So, you’ll come back home then?”
“No, Mom. I’m not going home with you either. I need to be able to focus on me and my recovery, which means I’ve got to be away from you both. I’ll leave Hope with Callie, if that’s okay, until you get a place. I don’t want to be a bother, but they already have a rapport.”
I shrugged my shoulders and shook my head. “Of course, she will. Hope will always have a home.”
Heidi sniffed back tears as her eyes got shiny, and her nose turned pink. “I’ll miss her a lot. But, ah, rehab facilities aren’t exactly pet-friendly.”
I made a mental note to bug Callie until she got her service animals into every Texas physical rehabilitation hospital, but silently nodded.