Only Her Heart

by Lyn Cote

The arrival at the hospital made him crazy. Medical personnel pushed him aside and relegated him and Annie to the hallway. He watched helplessly as his mom’s gurney was pushed from one location to another.

  “Jack, come here.” Annie took his arm, led him to a row of stiff plastic chairs and pushed him into one. She sat down beside him.

  He sprang up, unable to sit still. His gaze lingering in the direction his mother had been taken, he said, “I’ll call you a cab and send you home.”

  “No, I’ll stay. I told you I couldn’t just go home.”

  A tall distinguished-looking doctor—both familiar and unwelcome—hurried down the hall toward them. “Jack? Why is your mother here?”

  Irritation zigzagged through Jack. “You’re here? I didn’t know this was one of your hospitals.” He stared at his father and felt his jaw clench.

  “I was called in on another emergency consult.” His father studied him, but went on with emotion. “And I overheard, ‘Sandy Lasater.’ What happened?”

  Jack bristled, wanting to send his father away. He couldn’t forget the past sins that lay between them. But he only said, “She fell down the basement stairs.”

  “Is she in X-ray?”

  Jack nodded, pressing his lips together, holding back cutting words. Mom wouldn’t want him arguing with his father here. Or anywhere.

  His dad frowned. “I’ll go check on her.”

  Jack fumed in silence. What choice did he have? Maybe his father being a doctor would get his mother special attention. The thought galled Jack.

  His father glanced over at Annie. “This is...?”

  “I’m Annie, Dr. Lasater.” She rose and offered him her hand. “I recognized your voice from your call earlier this evening.”

  Dr. Lasater shook her hand. “Right, the call. I do need to discuss business with LIT. But now I’ll go see if I can help Sandy out.”

  The words grated on Jack. After all his father had done to hurt his mother, Jack wanted to snap, We don’t want your help. But he couldn’t. Mom just might need him. Dear Lord, help her. I’m powerless here.

  Chapter 2

  Much later, after Jack sent a reluctant Annie home in a taxi, he drove his mother home. As soon as he climbed out of his air-conditioned car, sweat beaded his forehead. The June night’s unusual heat and humidity hadn’t abated—not even after midnight—and it added to his aggravation. He hurried to the house and unlocked his mother’s back door. Then he returned to the passenger side of the car to help her out. “I still think they should have kept you overnight.”

  “I wasn’t injured badly enough to be hospitalized.” His mom turned on her seat and stiffly held her arms toward him. ”I just took...a fall. And you know...how I feel about...hospitals.”

  He didn’t like the way she inhaled so carefully, like every breath hurt her.

  “Two cracked ribs, a sprained right ankle and a chipped right kneecap—”

  “—isn’t serious enough for me to be kept overnight.”

  “I bet—” Jack assisted his slender mother to her feet and helped her prop herself against the open door “—if you were still Dr. Cliff Lasater’s wife, they’d have insisted you stay overnight.”

  “Jack, you shouldn’t be so bitter.” She waited while he got her crutches out of the back seat and then she positioned them under her arms. “Your father didn’t divorce me to hurt you.”

  Jack ignored her comment “I can carry you—”

  “I can walk with crutches. I’ll just take it slow.” She began to limp toward the back door, pausing after each step.

  Jack slammed the car door, hit the automatic lock on the key fob and hurried ahead to hold the door open for her.

  Inside, she insisted he let her “hop” up the three steps to the kitchen, holding on to the reinforced railing he’d put in two years ago. Then she limped through the kitchen to the front hall staircase and paused, panting.

  That’s enough. “Mom, it’s late. I’m carrying you up to your bedroom.”

  She turned to him. “All right,” she conceded in a pained, weakened voice, “but just this once. I have to be able to do this on my own—”

  “Don’t worry!” He couldn’t keep the frustration out of his tone. “Tomorrow I’ll insist you go jogging with me.”

  She chuckled and then froze as if that too pained her. “Jogging? Now—?” she forced out each word, one by one “—you’re...frightening...me.”

  He propped her crutches against the banister and then lifted her into his arms—a light burden. He climbed the worn stairs and deposited her on her bed. Then he hustled back down for her crutches.

  “Thank you, Jack.” Sighing cautiously, she motioned him to rest the crutches on a chair beside her bed. “Now I’ll be able to manage. You go home and get some sleep.”

  He’d already thought ahead to this moment. “I’ll spend the night in my old room—”

  “Jack—”

  “It’s late, and it will give me more time to sleep,” he alibied with a straight face.

  His mom shook her head at him. “All right. I’m too tired to argue with you. And you’re always welcome here anyway.”

  He looked around her small bedroom. He couldn’t stop himself. “I wish you’d let me help you buy something newer—a ranch-style with everything on one level and larger—”

  “Not that again,” she scolded. “I like this house. I love this neighborhood where I know everyone and—”

  “—and it has a corner store and a rapid transit station within walking distance,” he recited the litany of reasons she’d given over the years for not moving.

  “Exactly. If I’d wanted to move, I would have. I didn’t and I don’t.”

  “But those basement steps—”

  “Don’t fuss over me!” Irritation finally leaked into her tone. “Go get some sleep. I’ll be fine. This isn’t my first time using crutches.” In spite of her brave words, she was wilting visibly. She drew in a shallow breath. “I know what I’m doing.”

  Sorry he’d provoked this outburst, he held up both hands in surrender. “Okay, good night, Mom.” He bent and kissed her cheek.

  She patted his. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

  “Okay.” He made himself walk across the hall to his old bedroom. The air-conditioning at the hospital had been much more effective than his mom’s old unit. Breathing in the stuffy air of the unused bedroom, he switched on a box fan on the floor. Then he flung back the navy-blue comforter on the twin bed he’d slept on in high school. Kicking off his shoes and shrugging out of his knit shirt and slacks, he flopped down on the bed.

  His body ached. But it wasn’t waiting at the hospital on uncomfortable plastic chairs that had knotted his neck muscles. What’s going on? I don’t see my father for how long? And then in one evening, he calls and I run into him at the hospital? Jack turned over onto his stomach. Seeing his dad stirred up thoughts he rarely allowed to intrude—like his dad’s trophy wife, a very young red-haired trophy wife. Or rather, ex-trophy wife.

  Feelings buzzed around inside him like angry bees. He closed his eyes, concentrating on the soothing whir of the fan and its cooling breeze drifting over him. But his mind refused to be lulled to sleep.

  “I need to discuss business with LIT”—that’s what his father had said.

  “Well, I’m not the only game in town, Dad,” Jack grumbled sideways into his pillow. “You’re not going to draw me into your life again with this lame ploy.”

  Once again, an image of his father driving out of the hospital parking lot in his new Mercedes came to mind. It isn’t fair, Lord. Mom should have what she needs. He has so much and she has so little. It isn’t fair. But Jack would make up the difference. His mother would never want for anything if he could help it—and fortunately, he could.

  At the chrome red and white kitchen table around ten o’clock the next morning, Annie sipped her dad’s strong morning coffee. She was wearing faded cutoffs and a tattered white T-shirt—her painting clothes. The o
utfit suited her grumpy and “at odds” mood. Her dad, Mike Petrov—lean and wiry with salt-and-pepper hair—was similarly dressed in a spattered khaki work shirt and jeans. He looked relaxed, but why was he eyeing her so strangely?

  “You shouldn’t have let me sleep in,” Annie complained, while swallowing a self-incriminating yawn. “I wanted to get this painting started early so we’re done before the afternoon heat.”

  “You didn’t get in until long after midnight,” her dad explained in his easygoing voice, ignoring her crankiness.

  These words stated so calmly alerted Annie. “Okay. What do you want to know, Dad?”

  He grinned at her. “Why did you stay so late at the hospital with your boss? You could have come home.”

  Annie sipped her coffee, hiding her mouth behind her cup. Jack was the last person she wanted to talk about. She pictured Jack waiting with her for a taxi at the curb in front of the hospital. Jack was a maddening mix of unexpected solicitude and vague neglect. Annie took a bite of buttery blackberry-jammed toast

  “So, what’s going on with you and Mr. Brain Lasater?”

  “Going on?” Suddenly, her recurring daydream of Jack sweeping her into his arms flitted through her unruly mind. She felt her cheeks warm. “Nothing’s going on.” She pleated the soft, well-worn cotton tablecloth between her fingers. Thanks to Jack, nothing is going on, and apparently nothing ever will.

  Childish footsteps pounded down the back staircase of the two-flat. The back door flew open, banging the wall behind it. Annie flinched, then smiled.

  Her twin four-year-old nephews—Austin and Andy—threw themselves at her. “Aunt Annie! Aunt Annie! We get to help you and Grampa paint this morning!”

  “What?” Though glad of the interruption, Annie held her coffee mug high above their boisterous hugs. Then she turned a quizzical expression to her dad sitting across from her. “Nobody told me.”

  Her dad shrugged. “Don’t look at me.”

  “I hope you won’t mind.” Melissa, Annie’s younger sister, petite and dark-haired just like Annie, stood apart from them in the kitchen door. “Troy has to work today at the jobsite and I need to take care of...some things.”

  Melissa sounded funny, as if she were covering up for something. Annie scrutinized her sister. Did these “things” have anything to do with the raised voices over the past few weeks and doors slamming upstairs very late last night? Annie swallowed that question, recalling the first law of living near relatives—don’t pry.

  Melissa avoided Annie’s eyes. “I won’t be gone long.” Then she glanced at her sister.

  Annie stilled at the defiant look in Melissa’s eyes. “But—”

  “Gotta go!” Melissa backed toward the door. “I can’t change plans now.” She paused at the door and then came back. She hugged each of her blond, blue-eyed sons, miniatures of their father, and kissed them. “Be good until Mommy comes back, okay?”

  “Okay!” the boys chorused.

  Then Melissa escaped out the door.

  Annie and her dad exchanged glances. Hers asked, What’s with Melissa, and how are we going to paint a room with the help of two four-year-old boys?

  His unspoken reply: I don’t have a clue. I guess we’ll manage.

  “Okay, boys,” her dad said, “let’s strip you down to your briefs. We’re moving everything out of cousin Patience’s room so we can paint it for her before she comes home next week.” Her dad yanked off the boys’ shirts and shorts, tossing them on a kitchen chair.

  In Spider-Man briefs, the twins danced around them, chanting, “Will we really get to paint? Huh? Really? Huh?”

  Annie nodded. Still, the defiant expression on her sister’s face kept coming back to her. God, speak to Melissa today. Make her aware of how blessed she is with a loving husband and two adorable boys. Please!

  Around ten on Saturday, the morning after the rush to the hospital, Jack rolled over, yawning. Then he was awake, looking up at the ceiling in his old room at Mom’s and then over at the bedside clock. He sat up and rubbed his face with his hands. Before he could give in to temptation and roll back over to sleep, he stood up and pulled on his slacks.

  “Mom!” he called as he opened his door and looked across the hall.

  His mom’s bed was already neatly made. She was not in her room.

  “Mom!” He shuffled down the stairs at a fast clip. “You should have got me up! You shouldn’t have gone downstairs by yourself. What if you’d fallen?”

  At the bottom of the staircase, he listened for her. He heard nothing. “Mom!” He headed toward the kitchen. She wouldn’t go back down those basement steps again, would she? Worry picked up his pace.

  After passing through the kitchen, he flipped on the light switch in the basement stairwell and listened for movement below. Then he heard his mom’s voice—outside. She shouldn’t be hopping up and down, in and out.

  Jack jerked open the back door and leaned out. The heat from the asphalt drive wafted up into his face. The large round thermometer on the garage already read ninety-two degrees Fahrenheit. At the fence on the other side of the driveway, His mom was talking to her next-door neighbor.

  “Mom?”

  Leaning on her crutches, Sandy turned back. “Finally woke up?”

  “Hey!” Mr. Pulaski, the grizzled retired police sergeant who lived next door, greeted him. “How’re ya doin’, Jack? Invented anything lately?”

  Jack swallowed the lecture about being more careful that he’d intended to give his mother. Instead, he waved at Mr. Pulaski, who had no sons or grandsons and who had come to all of Jack’s high school football games. “Nothing special.”

  “Jack, I’ll come in and make you some breakfast.” Using her crutches, Sandy began slowly limping toward Jack.

  “I told yer ma she should do her laundry at the Laundromat. Then she wouldn’t have to go down those stairs. They ain’t safe for a lady who’s got the arthritis so bad. If it weren’t for this bum leg, I’d take it for her.”

  “I’m with you a hundred percent. And don’t worry. I’ll take care of it.” Jack ushered his mother inside and closed the door behind them. “Mom—”

  “Now, don’t fuss, Jack. I’m a little sore this morning, but my pain pills are doing their job, okay?”

  He tamped down the string of cautions he had prepared. She won’t listen to me anyway. “If you say so. Now sit down while I get myself some breakfast.”

  She lowered herself with care into one of the kitchen chairs at the round oak table.

  From the cupboard, Jack got a box of cereal, and from the fridge, a half gallon of milk, and he set them both down on the table. “Mom, I was thinking. Why don’t you move into my apartment until you’re off crutches?”

  “No, I want to be in my own home.”

  “But Mom, with the only bath upstairs, you have to go up and down stairs all day—”

  “I’m staying right here.”

  “Mom, why not take it easy for just a day or—”

  “No, dear, I’m fine right here.”

  He frowned. “You don’t make this easy.”

  There was a knock at the back door. It opened before either of them could answer it “Sandy? It’s me, Cliff.”

  His dad had nerve. Jack nearly growled, Go ahead, just walk right in like you still own it, Doctor.

  Sandy shook her head at Jack. “Come on in, Cliff.”

  He hated the way people always catered to his dad, the doctor. Watching his dad out of the corner of his eye, Jack kept busy pouring cereal into his bowl and adding milk and sugar.

  Cliff walked into the kitchen. From his dad’s crisp tan chinos and blue knit short-sleeved shirt, Jack surmised that he was on his way to play golf.

  “I can’t stay long, Sandy. I’m on my way to the links. I just wanted to see how you were doing this morning.”

  Jack kept his focus on his breakfast.

  “I’m a little more achy than usual, Cliff,” his mom replied. “But I’m going to be okay. I’m sure
Jack will hover over me for the rest of the weekend.”

  Jack felt his father’s attention on him. Warm in the face, he refused to look up.

  “I was hoping you’d be here, Son. I really need to make a date to talk with you about business—stat.” So, that’s why you came here. Maybe you think Mom will pressure me for you? Jack glanced up. “My partner, Tom, who negotiates all our deals, is gone on a two-week vacation. I’ll have him get back to you when he returns.”

  His dad frowned. “This can’t wait that long.”

  Jack shrugged.

  “Jack,” his mom coaxed.

  “Okay,” Jack said to placate her, “call me again Monday morning.”

  “Great. I’ve got to go.” His dad glanced at the gold Rolex on his wrist. “I’m golfing at the club today with two city aldermen and the chief surgeon from Northwestern Hospital. Sandy, call me if your condition worsens, okay?”

  “Okay. ’Bye, Cliff.” She waved.

  The door closed and he was gone.

  Jack sucked in acid words, his usual reaction to his dad. Two city aldermen and a chief surgeon—we are impressed, Dad. Jack chewed his crunchy wheat cereal as though chewing out his dad. Pretense. All show. And this visit was all about what his dad needed, not his mother’s condition.

  His mother cocked her head toward him. “What’s this about Cliff wanting LIT to do a job for him?”

  He didn’t answer her.

  “Your father’s money spends just like any other,” Sandy said with a rueful smile.

  Jack didn’t reply.

  “Jack, your father and I have been divorced for years now. I’ve forgiven him. Why haven’t you? It’s time you made peace with him and went on with your life.”

  “I am going on with my life. There’s nothing wrong with my life.”

  His mom shook her head. “Son, holding in anger will only make you miserable. ‘Forgive us as we forgive others,’ remember? You go with me to church but is anything about God’s love and forgiveness to us and we to others penetrating that brilliant mind of yours?”