Survive and Conquer

by Andrew Grey

  Macy nodded, leaving the room. She returned a few minutes later with Rosie and Chase behind her. Rosie certainly seemed to have opened up to Chase, rattling on about God knows what, with Chase listening to every word.

  “Hey, buddy, are you going to be okay?” Chase asked, coming to stand near where Newton sat. Rosie set the backpack beside his chair and climbed onto Newton’s lap, settling in as though she had had enough excitement.

  “Yes,” Eric answered. “Needles suck, though.”

  Chase leaned closer and stage-whispered, “I don’t like them either, so you’re pretty brave.” He patted Eric’s shoulder and got a smile in return.

  “Do you need me to arrange a ride home for you?” Newton asked Chase. When he’d come to dinner, Chase most certainly hadn’t been expecting this kind of action.

  “I’m fine.” Chase smiled at Eric, who closed his eyes. The monitors told Newton that he was just sleeping and not losing consciousness, so he let him rest. These episodes took a great deal out of him.

  “Do you want to see if we can find a cafeteria where we can get something to drink?” Chase asked Rosie, who perked right up and took Chase’s hand. For a second, a jab of jealousy stabbed at Newton, but it died quickly, even though he wondered what it would be like to feel that hand in his. “We’ll be back in a few minutes,” Chase said as he and Rosie left the ER area.

  “Are you feeling any better?” Newton asked quietly when Eric opened his eyes.

  “Yes.” It was apparent that Eric was breathing much better, and his color was improving.

  Newton sat back, his heart rate returning to normal as the danger to Eric passed. The IV drip continued, and Newton tried not to stare at it. But with Eric now dozing and the room quiet, he had little to look at.

  “Daddy,” Rosie said as she came in the room, followed by Chase, who handed him a cup. “We brought this for you.”

  “Thank you,” Newton said to Chase and sipped from the cup. “He should be all right now.” Rosie climbed onto his lap.

  “How often does this happen?” Chase asked.

  “The last time was six months ago.” Newton smoothed the hair away from Eric’s forehead. He needed to get him a haircut. “He has POTS—postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome—and is one of the youngest people ever diagnosed with it.” Newton took Eric’s hand. “It’s been two years since diagnosis, but we’ve been dealing with it for longer. They tell us that it might be getting worse right now because of the prepuberty hormones and things. But they’re guessing, since most of the people who have this syndrome are women.” He was dreading Eric’s teenage years because of the sheer unpredictability. Newton set his cup on the stand next to the bed and held Rosie’s and Eric’s hands.

  “Isn’t that a disease where people get dizzy when they stand?” Chase asked.

  “No. It’s a syndrome with a collection of symptoms that can vary. Eric has it worse than most, who just get dizzy when they stand. The doctors have been reluctant to put him on medication because they don’t know what it will do to someone so young. We’ve been holding off as much as we can. He was having them every three months or so—this was six, so it’s working in our favor, at least for now.” This was so much for a young kid to go through.

  Rosie curled against his chest, and the room grew quiet. Newton wasn’t up to talking, and once the IV was finished, they discussed running a second, but it seemed it wasn’t necessary. Eric was stable, and giving him too many fluids only brought him additional issues later.

  “We’re going to let him rest and keep him for a little while longer before we let him go,” Jerry explained, and even coaxed a smile from Eric when he promised he’d remove the needle soon.

  THERE WAS another hour at the hospital and then the drive home to get through. Newton had both kids in bed, with Eric’s upper body propped up slightly on pillows. He watched him for a few seconds and then left the room. It was going to be a night of little sleep as he got up every hour or so just to make sure Eric was okay. Half closing the door so he could hear if Eric was in distress, he returned downstairs to where Chase waited on the sofa.

  “I know this was more than you bargained for.” He didn’t sit down, because he wasn’t likely to get back up. “Would you like something to drink? I have a bottle of juice, water, a few diet sodas I hid from the kids….”

  “Soda would be great. That’s all I usually like to drink when I’m driving.”

  Chase had a point. Newton grabbed both sodas out of the back of the drawer in the refrigerator, took them to the living room, and handed one to Chase. Then he sat down with a sigh. “I appreciate you going tonight. Rosie really likes you.”

  “She’s pretty special,” Chase said. “Both of your kids are.” He opened the can and sipped.

  “Yeah. They’re the center of my life.” Newton closed his eyes. So much for so long had been near chaos. “Eric crossed my path when he was in foster care—they both did. Eric had breathing issues as a baby, and his allergy profile is off the charts. You won’t find nuts of any kind anywhere in this house, or coconut—none of that. When I first got him, he wheezed and coughed a lot. But with the help of doctors, we eliminated a lot of his allergens from the house, including the fact that the home where he was living had a cat and he’s allergic to those too.” He drank some of the soda and set the can on the table. “No one wanted to adopt him and take on all the issues he had.”

  Chase smiled to his incredible eyes. “And you took one look at him and that was the end of it.”

  “Pretty much. I knew he was going to be a challenge, but we eliminated the allergens from the environment and his diet, made sure we limited sweets and spicy food, and added sodium because it helps regulate and retain fluids and actually helps prevent attacks. At least we think so.” Newton sighed. “And Rosie… she wound me around her little finger with ease.”

  “So neither of them is biologically yours?” Chase asked.

  “No. I haven’t had a partner in….” He rolled his eyes. “A very long time. I have my work, and since I adopted the kids, they have my energy.” They gave love without expecting something else in return. Newton was under no illusions; he knew what his life was, and he had his feet planted firmly on the ground. There was the work he loved, and Rosie with her needs, and Eric with his. The love those two children gave him was more than he ever thought possible. “Rosie’s adoption was finalized a year ago. Do you have kids?”

  Chase shook his head. “I guess I’m too busy. I want to be a partner in my firm, so I work way too much and I’m too danged career-focused. I had a boyfriend in college, but that crashed and burned in spectacular fashion. Since then….” He shrugged, and Newton nodded. He understood. “Sometimes it’s just easier to work on other things. Like anyone is really going to want to see me after eight o’clock at night and then have me up at six and out the door by seven.”

  He’s gay. For some reason a flutter raced through Newton and sent his belly into little butterfly wings of excitement. Of course it didn’t mean anything, and he had enough in his life at the moment without getting involved with anyone. He’d told himself many times that his life was full enough. But lately those reassurances hadn’t rung as true as they once had, especially when the kids had been younger. “Yeah, well, there are no off hours with being a parent.” The room grew still, and he listened for any sound from upstairs, but all remained quiet.

  “Well, maybe you could take a little time off to go to dinner?” Chase asked.

  Newton stilled, wondering if he’d heard properly. “You’re asking me out?” he asked, almost pulling on his ears to make sure they were working properly.

  “Why not? You must need a little time for yourself every once in a while, and I sure as hell could use a chance to go out with someone who isn’t a colleague or a client.” Chase finished his soda.

  “Sure. We can try to do that.” Newton could attempt to find someone to watch the kids for a few hours. Newton tried to think of the last time he had been ou
t with anyone for any reason. “But I don’t get it. Why you’d want to go out with me?” He had plenty of baggage, more than just two amazing kids.

  Chase chuckled as he walked to the door. “You’re tenacious, Newton. I haven’t met anyone in a long time who would take me on the way you did at the courthouse the other day. I told you no, and you didn’t give up and pled your case anyway.” Chase pulled open the door. “I’ll call you tomorrow, and we can set up an evening for dinner.” He paused. “And just so you know, don’t expect me to cook like you did tonight. Not unless you want to end up in the hospital for a very different reason. My cooking is lethal.” Chase said goodbye and left the house, closing the door behind him.

  Newton locked it and made sure Chase was gone before turning off the outside lights and then heading up to bed. He was inordinately pleased that he was going to be seeing Chase again, and it put a smile on his lips that lasted until he fell to sleep.

  Chapter 2

  CHASE SAT at his polished desk in his office and hung up the phone yet again. He had made dozens of calls that morning, and he was waiting for the return of a final one. The stack of documents for him to review kept getting taller, and he made inroads as he waited, marking some for his associates and paralegals to handle.

  “Why are you so danged happy?” his assistant, William, asked after knocking and then coming in. “It’s been one hell of a day. The partners are all meeting as though there is some crisis brewing.”

  There was, but it had nothing to do with Chase, thank God. One of the firm’s high-profile corporate suits had hit a major snag, and that meant that the huge payoff they had been anticipating probably wasn’t going to materialize. Not that Chase would see any of that anyway, because he wasn’t a partner. But he’d predicted exactly what would happen, and when he’d taken it to Milton Howard, the senior partner, Milton had listened to him and gone ahead anyway.

  Chase pulled a sealed, dated envelope out of his desk, held it in the air with a smile, and then put it back. “They have their problems, and we have ours.” He turned his attention to the paperwork once again, handing an organized file to William. “This is for Anne. My notes are inside—the same for these for Denton. Tell them both to go ahead and get the paperwork ready to file. I want these wrapped up this week.”

  “Is there anything else?” William asked as he held the files. “Like why you’re smiling?” He turned and closed the door. “Okay. You’ve been grinning like you just won the lotto and don’t need this pressure cooker any longer. What gives?” He leaned over the desk. “Did you find another place to work? Will you take me with you?” William was sometimes overly dramatic, but only with Chase, and it could put a smile on his face even on the toughest days.

  “No. I’m not leaving, but if I were, I would definitely take you with me,” Chase said. There was no way he could do this job without William’s efficiency or his daily dose of sunshine. “Now, stop digging for information and get back to work.” He raised his eyebrows, and William just smiled.

  “I can take a hint.” William pulled open the door.

  “About as well as I can dance ballet,” Chase retorted.

  William nearly dropped the file folders. Chase was a notoriously bad dancer. At the firm Christmas party last year, Gwen Howard, the wife of the senior partner, had insisted he dance with her. It lasted about two minutes and ended with her hobbling off the dance floor and Milton telling her that he’d warned her.

  “Good one,” William said through his chuckles. “I hear Milton’s wife is able to walk normally now.” He closed the door behind him before Chase could throw something at him.

  Chase answered his phone and got back to work, but even the call from a ridiculous attorney, who had no case but was still trying to wheedle some sort of deal, wasn’t going to put him off his day.

  He worked quietly for another hour until the call he was waiting for was returned. He sighed and smiled because he loved it when things came together this easily. Chase messaged Newton about dinner just to make sure that they were still on. He received an immediate answer that the sitter had confirmed, and Newton asked if he wanted to meet at the restaurant. Chase answered that he’d pick Newton up at six, then made another call, this one almost equally good news.

  “Angela, it’s Chase Matthews,” he said. “I was able to speak with the attorney for your in-laws, and it seems they’ve had a change of heart.” He smiled.

  “Really?” she asked. “That doesn’t sound like them.”

  No. It probably didn’t. “They changed their tune once they saw all my requests for discovery about their finances, tax returns, investments, and medical histories. After all, they raised a convicted abuser. What if there’s something in the family medical or mental health history that led to that? I also asked for school records of both of them, and I told them we would be talking to friends and colleagues to determine the kind of parents they were. They raised a thoughtless, selfish ass once—what if they do it again?” He was already smirking. “It seems they weren’t as keen to have someone looking into their past and all the things they might have done.” Chase was just getting started. “I also informed him that if they should lose, and that was highly likely, it was also almost a certainty that they would never see their granddaughters again.”

  Angela swallowed. “I would never do that.”

  “I know, but they don’t. Anyway, his parents have decided they are no longer going to be a party to the divorce, and it seems the other matters are going to be dropped as well.” Chase knew how to handle people like them—bury them in requests and threaten equally invasive counter motions. “They thought that this would be easy and that they could scare you into getting what they wanted. When that didn’t work, they folded like a house of cards. My suggestion is to do nothing until they call you. And then say that they can visit their granddaughters, but only with supervision and under controlled circumstances. Be nice but firm, and we’ll see what their next move is, if any.” He was pretty pleased up to this point.

  “Oh God, that’s….” She heaved a huge sigh through the line. “I can’t tell you what a relief it is. They used to be nice, but as soon as Reggie was arrested and then convicted, everything was my fault. I wasn’t a good enough wife and I didn’t look after him…. It was like he was the abuser, but I was the one at fault for it.”

  “I see that all the time.” And he had experienced it firsthand. Chase had a pretty good idea what those kids were going through. It had been part of why he’d taken the case in the first place, even though he wasn’t going to tell anyone that. There was no way he would let his adversaries have anything on him that they thought they could use. He had to remain strong, even when people told him stories that came way too close to home. “His parents are afraid of how his conviction will make them look, and if someone else is at fault, then Reggie can still be their little baby.” Chase understood the psychology and had been able to use it against them, by threatening exactly what they had been afraid of. It was part of being a good attorney.

  “I have to get the girls from the bus, but thank you so much for all your help.” Angela sniffed, and Chase knew he’d done a good thing by helping her. It hadn’t taken nearly as much time as he’d expected, at least so far… and he had really helped someone.

  “I will still file for an order to prevent the girls from being taken to visit their father until they are of age to make that decision for themselves. That will give you legal backing to tell them that they can’t try to take them to the prison, and it will help reinforce the fact that you’re in charge, not them.”

  “Good.” He could almost hear the worry slipping from her voice. “Thank you again.”

  “I’ll be in touch when I know more.” Chase ended the call and finished things up for the day.

  He was getting ready to leave a little after five when Milton knocked on his door and came inside. He never went visiting, almost always calling people to his office. Chase groaned inwardly and wished he’d lef
t five minutes earlier. It figured, the one night he had needed to get out of the office at a decent hour.

  “Are you leaving?” Milton made a point of checking his watch.

  “Yes. I have a dinner appointment, and I haven’t left the office before seven in weeks, so I thought I’d kind of earned it.” Chase wasn’t going to be cowed the way most people would. He brought a great deal of revenue to the firm, and they all knew it.

  “I understand you took on another pro bono case,” Milton said flatly.

  “Yes. It took me just a few hours. I have things well in hand, and it looks like I was able to intimidate the other side into capitulation. A few more hours to get a court order to restrict prison visitation for the abused children, and it should be over.”

  “That’s good.” Milton tapped the door frame. “Just remember that the partners will be meeting in a few months to review potential associates for partnership.” The part left unsaid revolved around the fact that pro bono work wasn’t going to add to his billable hours and, therefore, wasn’t going to be taken into partnership consideration. “I have a new case for you… a big one.”

  “In family law?” Chase asked. There were high-profile divorces and things like that, but often family issues were handled quietly in the courts.

  “Yes. This is a high-profile case with the potential to be explosive. Since you’re on your way out, have your assistant contact Renee and book some time for tomorrow so we can discuss it.” Milton leaned a little farther into the office. “This could be a case that helps define the firm, and could very well propel your career to new heights.” He smiled and exited the office, leaving Chase on pins and needles. Still, he had places to be, and this new case would be waiting for him in the morning. One thing was for sure: if it was related to family law, no one else in the firm was going to touch it.

  Chase packed up his things, locked his desk drawers, and left his office, putting out the trash and locking it as well.