The Mommy Plan

by Susan Gable

  “My, how considerate of you.” Cherish’s mom struggled forward in the sloped seat, her drawn eyebrows clearly showing her disbelief.

  “That’s us. Considerate.” Cherish elbowed Molly once again. “Right, Molly?”

  “Uh, yeah, sure. Considerate. Totally.”

  “I thought you girls were busy making firefly wishes?” Nolan asked, also sliding forward on the double seat.

  Cherish shrugged. “Been there, done that, got bored.”

  “Bored, huh?” Nolan picked up a stick and poked the fire, sending a flurry of sparks upward.

  They both nodded.

  He prodded the fire one more time, then laid the stick on the ground alongside his chair. “Well, we have this perfectly good campfire, and I hate to see it go to waste. How about I tell you some stories?”

  “What kind of stories?” Molly asked.

  “The only kind you tell around a campfire,” Nolan answered, slipping off the chair to sit cross-legged in front of the fire. He tipped his head downward and looked up at them, the fire casting weird shadows over his face. “Spooooky stories.”

  Tyler’s cries echoed out the open window from the Driscolls’ bedroom. Cherish’s mom stood up. “That’s my cue to leave.” She slapped Nolan lightly on the shoulder as she passed. “One hour. And if they can’t sleep tonight, you get to stay up with them.”

  “Yes, hon,” Nolan called after her. “Whatever you say, dear.”

  The girls giggled.

  “Sit down, you two. Be sure to stay close enough. Don’t want the bogeyman to get you.”

  Despite the warmth from the fire, a shiver crawled up Molly’s spine as she plunked herself down in the dirt in the circle of flickering light. She leaned over to her best friend and whispered, “You’re so lucky. Nolan’s cool.”

  “Hey, no whispering over there. Are you ready for a story?”

  They both nodded.

  “Did you ever hear the one about the monkey’s paw?” Nolan’s voice dropped down low on the final words.

  “Ooh, no,” Molly said. “Tell us.”

  “I don’t know, it’s pretty scary. I don’t want to end up with you girls camped in my bedroom tonight.”

  “Tell us, tell us,” they begged together.

  “All right, if you’re sure.” Nolan began the story, voice spooky.

  Another shiver crawled up Molly’s back. This had to be the best night of her life. Now, if things were going as well on Dad’s date with Miss Rachel, she’d really be a happy camper.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  HE COULDN’T WAIT FOR THE meal to end.

  Distracting Rachel from the painful memories triggered by the lasagna was driving him to distraction.

  To still their trembling, James tightened his fingers around her thigh, resisting the temptation to stray a little higher.

  She inhaled sharply and froze in place, save for her widening eyes. Her pupils dilated, all but obscuring the blue of her irises.

  He swallowed hard and completely stilled himself.

  “James.” Rachel’s voice held a breathy note of desire. Her body shifted slightly forward, pressing against his hand.

  He unglued his tongue from the roof of his mouth. “Damn, Rachel.” His heart pounded. He removed his hand from her leg and gripped the edge of the table till his knuckles turned white.

  She sighed, disappointment filling her eyes.

  He swallowed a groan. “Rachel, if I don’t get my hands off you, I’m never going to be able to walk out of this restaurant. You still might have to walk in front of me.”

  “Really?”

  He nodded.

  “Oh.” Wonder and amazement rang in her whisper, leaving James to ponder what kind of idiot her ex-husband had been to make her so question her potent sensuality.

  “You sure made short work of this lasagna.” The waitress scooped up the empty plates. “Now, what can I get you folks for dessert?”

  The tiny shake of Rachel’s head told James all he needed to know. He wanted to shout with joy. “Nothing, thanks. Just the check.”

  “That’s all been taken care of. You folks enjoy the rest of your evening and the rest of your time at Camp Firefly Wishes.” The young server tossed James a saucy wink, then walked away.

  “I’m sure we will.” He dropped a few bills on the table. “Shall we go?”

  “Oh, my God. Oh, my God! Henry!” A woman’s frantic voice carried from the front of the restaurant. “Help! Oh, please, someone help him!”

  James’s chair rocked back and forth on its legs as he jumped up and dashed into the main dining room. A gray-haired woman wrung her hands, standing over a still form on the floor.

  James dropped to his knees beside the man. “What happened?” he asked, fingers already searching the man’s neck for a pulse.

  “I…I don’t know. One minute he was fine, the next minute, he winced, rubbed his arm and fell over. Oh, help him, please!”

  “Somebody call 911!” James yelled at the other diners and staff who had already gathered. “Tell them we’ve got a cardiac arrest.” Recertified in CPR every year like clockwork, his training kicked in automatically.

  He was vaguely aware of Rachel’s attempts to comfort the distraught woman, but soon everything slipped away from him as he focused on the task at hand. Sweat beaded across his forehead and the back of his neck as he alternated fifteen compressions with two puffs of air.

  The muscles in his lower back strained in protest.

  Eternity passed—in counts of fifteen—before the paramedics arrived and took over.

  James dragged an arm across his forehead, then lurched to his feet, moving out of the way as more equipment was hauled in: stretcher, oxygen tank, defibrillator…

  Chaos changed to order as one paramedic issued commands to other members of the first-aid squad.

  James circumvented the group to get to Rachel and the man’s wife, who was now openly sobbing. An ashen-faced Rachel patted the woman on the shoulder as they both watched the rescue efforts.

  “Rachel…”

  Both women looked up at him. Rachel’s eyes flooded with relief. “James. This is Rosemary.”

  “Oh, thank you, thank you for helping my poor Henry.” The woman grabbed his hands and squeezed them.

  “Clear!” a paramedic yelled.

  The command echoed through James’s head, and he shut out the images of the cardiac unit at Children’s Hospital.

  Rosemary turned her head toward her husband just as they used the defibrillator on him. She flinched as Henry’s body twitched. “Oh! What are they doing to him?”

  “They’re doing their best to get his heart going again.” James draped his arm around her shoulders and gently turned her around. “Why don’t we get you a seat over here, out of the way of the traffic?”

  “But I want to stay with Henry!”

  “You can help the rescue workers the most by staying over here.” James assisted the woman to a seat, and a squad member quickly appeared to ask questions about Henry.

  “I’ve got a pulse!” a paramedic proclaimed.

  A cheer went up around the restaurant, and Rosemary turned teary eyes at James. She offered him a wavering smile and nodded her head in response to another question from the paramedics.

  As the adrenaline rush faded, James’s knees turned rubbery, much like the woman’s smile. He stumbled to a nearby empty table and sank down into a chair, propping his elbows and covering his face with his hands. He breathed deeply, filling his lungs to capacity; he held the air in for a moment, then exhaled slowly.

  It could have been Molly.

  He wrestled the thought into submission by reminding himself that despite the fact he had taken the CPR training in case, God forbid, his daughter had needed it, he’d never actually used it before tonight.

  Molly was fine, and in the capable—and also CPR-trained—hands of his friends.

  Her new heart was healthy and strong.

  Everything was fine.

 
; A warm hand closed around his left shoulder, its mate on the right. “She’s fine.”

  “I know. But thanks.” He grabbed Rachel’s fingers. “How did you know what I was thinking?”

  She leaned forward. “I figured there was a reason you knew CPR so well, and I figured you’d be thinking about her, that’s all. No psychic powers needed.”

  James rose from the chair, still clutching her hand. “Good. You’re amazing enough without adding special powers to the mix.”

  He led her back to Rosemary’s side. The woman twisted the strap of her purse around her fingers as they loaded her husband onto the gurney. “Do you think he’ll be all right?” she asked him.

  “The heart is an amazing thing, Rosemary. It’s a lot tougher than most of us realize.” Thank God for that.

  They followed the stretcher and paramedics out to the waiting ambulance. One EMT put his hand out when Rosemary tried to climb into the back with her husband. “I’m sorry, ma’am, but we’ve got two EMTs on board. There’s not enough room for you.”

  “What?” She twisted the bag’s handle tighter around her hand. “But…but how am I supposed to get to the hospital? I can’t drive now!”

  “Rosemary, it’s okay.” James gently removed the woman’s purse from her fingers. He nodded to the paramedic, who slammed the door of the ambulance. Sirens wailing, it charged out of the parking lot. James turned back to the trembling woman. “Where’s your car? I’ll drive you to the hospital and stay with you until your family arrives, okay?”

  Tears filled the woman’s eyes. “Bless you! What a darling man you are. The keys are in my bag.”

  “Good.” James turned to Rachel. “You follow us, okay?”

  “To…to the h-hospital?”

  “That is where they’re taking Henry.” James accepted the keys from Rosemary. “I’ll see you there.”

  “O-okay, sure.”

  He knew what it was like to be alone in a hospital while you waited for news from a cardiologist about someone you loved. And he didn’t want this woman to go through it that way.

  It wasn’t until he was driving the old Buick down the road that he realized Rachel hadn’t looked very enthusiastic about the idea. But Rosemary’s sobbing didn’t leave him time to think about it.

  RACHEL’S HEART FELT HEAVY in her chest as she pulled into the parking lot of the county hospital. James, already out of Rosemary’s car and standing in the circle of illumination from a streetlight, waved and pointed to the building, then escorted the older woman into the emergency entrance.

  Rachel cruised the lot, evaluating and discarding various empty spaces—too close, too far, sandwiched between battered cars, too narrow. If she was lucky, she could play find-a-parking-space until James got Rosemary settled.

  But after ten minutes she tired of the game and slipped the convertible into a slot facing the building. Her clammy fingers beat an erratic rhythm on the steering wheel, tempo increasing, then abruptly stopping.

  She jumped from the car and slammed the door. Her hands curled into tight fists, fingernails digging into her palms. “You can do this. You ate lasagna tonight. You can do this. Lace those boots tighter and carry on, soldier.”

  Stiff-legged, she marched through three rows of cars, over the curb and onto the grass, then finally the sidewalk. She paused beneath a droopy maple tree to study the squat, four-story building across the road.

  Lights gleamed in various windows—probably patients’ rooms. In some of those rooms, people celebrated new life. In others…

  Rachel shoved away the thought and the image of Daniel’s tiny form in a room similar to those in the building before her. She summoned a picture of James’s face instead. He’d called her amazing—and brave.

  “Think pleasant thoughts.” She started across the road.

  Chocolate…James…sex…sex with James and chocolate.

  A nervous giggle bubbled out of her. Where had that picture come from?

  Better. Definitely better.

  She found herself outside the emergency entrance. Squaring her shoulders, she jumped when the automatic doors swung open, then strode through them.

  About three steps inside, the scent of antiseptic and cleaning fluids attacked her nose. Her stomach heaved, threatening to return the lasagna. The harsh glare of the fluorescent lights made her blink rapidly.

  The nurse at the reception desk scribbled information from a man cradling his towel-wrapped hand in his lap. Murmurs of low voices echoed through the hallway. Rachel swallowed hard and moved toward the waiting area.

  Blue plastic chairs—hard-looking, not meant to be inviting. Small tables cluttered with magazines sporting tattered covers and pamphlets about various diseases. In the corner of the room, a television blared CNN—more crime, more disease, more bad news.

  Rachel scanned the small, somber clusters of people, searching for James, but didn’t see him.

  The automatic doors opened again, and chaos swept into the ER. Several paramedics, voices tense, rushed a gurney down the hallway. “MVA” was one phrase Rachel caught as she pressed against the wall. “Severe head trauma” was another.

  Severe head trauma.

  The gurney and its cloud of people vanished around the corner. At the far end of the corridor, she saw the form she’d been looking for. James.

  Severe head trauma.

  A loud roar filled her ears. In her mind, she could hear those same words from a different doctor— severe head trauma. And later he’d said “Brain dead.”

  Her legs trembled as other voices invaded, a stranger, a soft-spoken woman. “We’d like to talk to you about organ donation.” Roman: “I think we should, Rachel.” Her father: “It makes sense, Rae.”

  She hadn’t wanted it. Couldn’t face the thought of them cutting into her baby. She wanted to gather him into her arms despite all the tubes and wires and kiss the boo-boos away. The doctors were wrong. They had to be wrong.

  But both her father and Roman thought donation was the right thing to do—that it could save others even though their darling, the light of their lives, was gone.

  Daniel.

  They’d left her alone with him for a while. She snuggled down next to him on the hard, uncomfortable bed; fixed his ash-blond hair so the bandage on the side of his head wasn’t as noticeable, ran her fingertips over his cheeks. He looked so peaceful, her baby, an angel in waiting just like the country music song said. She knew she needed to say goodbye and give him permission to fly.

  It had been so hard to get past the fact that—if you didn’t count the tubes and such—he looked as if he’d wake up from his nap any minute, throw his arms around her neck and kiss her. Then ask her if she wanted to play cars with him.

  Her father’s voice had been gruffer than ever before, thick with his own emotion when he’d leaned over the bed and informed her it was time to go.

  Daniel. Four-and-a-half years old. Goal in life: to go to kindergarten on the big yellow school bus like the kids his mom taught.

  He hadn’t made it.

  Tears leaked from the corners of her eyes, tears she hadn’t dared shed that day in her father’s presence. They slid down her face, collecting under her chin, on her throat.

  Her heart hammered against her breastbone. Her breath came in quick gasps, overloading her with the smells of the hospital despite a rapidly clogging nose: the cleaners, the disinfectants. Death. Blackness obscured the edges of her sight, creating a tunnel-vision effect. Far off in the distance, James turned and looked at her, then he, too, faded into darkness.

  “Rachel!” James nearly knocked Don over as he dashed down the corridor. “Rachel!” he repeated, then watched as she slid the rest of the way down the wall and crumpled into a heap at its base.

  He dropped to his knees on the hard floor and gathered her into his arms, reassured by the pulse beneath his fingers on her tear-dampened throat. “Rachel? Come on, get back here.”

  “How much you want to bet this is her first time in a hospital si
nce she lost her son?” Don asked, bending over them both.

  “Dammit, I never even thought about that.” James slapped her cheeks. “Come on, Rachel. I need smelling salts here!”

  “I didn’t picture her as a fainter. I thought she was dealing with all of it better than this.”

  James glared up at him. “She’s doing great. Tonight she overcame a conditioned aversion relating to her son’s death. Jeez, give her a break. Weren’t you the one who told me to stand back and hope she popped? Well, she popped, all right.” He turned his attention back to the woman in his arms. “Rachel? Come on, sweetheart, wake up.”

  A nurse in pink scrubs knelt next to him and waved an ammonia capsule under Rachel’s nose.

  She inhaled sharply and turned her head away. The persistent nurse followed her with the smelling salts.

  Rachel moaned, her eyes fluttering open. Then she began to cough. “No. Get it away.”

  “Bring that wheelchair over here.” An orderly promptly obeyed the nurse, wheeling the chair beside Rachel.

  “No. Let me out of here. Gotta get out.” Rachel shoved at the nurse’s hands.

  “Easy, Rachel, everything’s all right. Relax and let us get you in this chair. You can lie down for a few minutes and you’ll feel much better.”

  She struggled to sit up. “No. You don’t understand. I can’t stay here. Not a minute longer.” Her hand swung out and gave the wheelchair a shove that sent it wobbling a few feet down the hall. The orderly ambled after it.

  Rachel struggled to her feet and made for the doorway.

  James sighed and leaned back against the wall. The nurse shook her head and stalked off, no doubt to find a patient who better appreciated her.

  Don made a sympathetic clucking sound. He held out a large hand to James. “Let me help you.”

  “You want to help?” James accepted his hand and rose to his feet.

  Don nodded.

  “Is your support group over?”

  “Yeah, we wrapped about twenty minutes ago.”

  “Good. Then I need you to stay with Rosemary, the woman we brought to the hospital, until her son gets here. Should be about an hour or so.”