Christopher and Jaime (Pianos and Promises #1)

by Jennifer Peel

  “How about I take you to the park and we get popsicles?” Ruth was a saint.

  “Thank you.” I placed the hand of my daughter in hers. I whispered ever so quietly in her ear, “Chris has been in an accident. I don’t have any details.” I stepped back to see her wide eyes. “I’ll call later.”

  “Bye, Mommy.” She sounded like she had lost every friend in the world.

  It was exactly how I felt. Not only was I divorcing my husband, but I was losing my best friend in the deal.

  “Bye, baby doll. Be good for Grandma.”

  She nodded her head and Ruth picked her right up. She was still a tiny little thing, petite like her mother, but she looked more like Chris with the same startling blue eyes. I had wanted all of our kids to inherit those eyes. Stop thinking about it, Jaime. It is never happening.

  With Allie taken care of, I sped toward downtown on I-65. I wished I knew what kind of accident it was. Was he in his car? He still walked to work most days, so that seemed unlikely. Maybe he had gone to an appointment, but he was at Saint Thomas, so I was assuming it was downtown. My mind was going to darker and darker places, like workplace violence, or a drive-by shooting. Maybe he was stabbed. The thought made me ill. While I drove, my mind drifted back to the last time we were at that hospital.

  We had only been married for a couple of months, but I had never been so sick in my life. I was diagnosed with a kidney infection that earned me my first and only hospital stay so they could pump me full of antibiotics intravenously. Chris was so worried; he never left my side. I could still feel the way he held my hand and kissed my forehead repeatedly. His work fell by the wayside while he nursed me back to health even after we got home. I could still hear the words he whispered as I lay in our bed in his arms. He thought I was asleep and lightly ran his fingers down my arm. “How is it that I feel worse when you’re sick than if I was? You’re my life.” Those words warmed me. I knew then more than ever I had made the right decision marrying him. It had proven to me that when it came down to it, he could come through and put me first.

  The construction delays downtown made traffic insane in the middle of the day and it brought me back to the depressing present. My mind began to race again. Maybe a crane fell on him? I couldn’t think like that. He was going to be okay. He had to be, for Allie.

  There was hardly a seat available in the emergency room waiting area when I arrived. Sickness hung in the air. It added more to the uncomfortable feelings going through me. I steadied myself at the door. I took a deep breath and pushed my way forward to the information desk. An uninterested woman sat there, her eyes daring me to need something. She could get over herself. I needed to see my husband, I meant Chris. I had to know he was all right.

  The older woman with the bad dye job looked up from the People magazine she was reading. “Can I help you?”

  “I hope so. I received a call from this hospital informing me that my husband, Christopher McKay, was here and that he had been in some sort of accident. I would like to see him.”

  She took her time typing some information, one key at a time, into her computer. This was no time for poor work ethic. I tapped my fingers against the counter.

  She pulled her glasses down and looked up at me. “Take a seat and someone will be out to speak to you.”

  “Can you please tell me how he is?”

  “Take a seat, ma’am.”

  Hold it together. Don’t become one of those people who lash out. “I hope you never have to be on this side of the coin.” I didn’t bother to look at her reaction. I walked off and found a seat near the back of the room. I sank into the chair, clasped my hands, and bent over to silently pray. Please don’t let him die. Allie needs him. And I . . . I still love him. I knew we could never be together, but I would always love him. I couldn’t imagine my world without him in it.

  I sat there for almost an hour, checking in at the information desk every fifteen minutes. I kept getting the same answer that someone would be out to talk to me. My nerves were shot. If I didn’t get answers soon, I was going to become a patient myself when I fainted in this germ-filled room.

  While I waited impatiently all I could think of was Chris—my Chris, not the Chris I was divorcing. I had a million memories of him, but for some reason my mind settled on another time I had been frightened.

  It had been our junior year and Southern fall weather struck while we were at school. Normally we were let out early when tornadoes were predicted, but this storm seemed to come out of nowhere and we were stuck at school. While I loved a good storm, I was terrified of tornadoes. It was against the rules to leave your assigned area, but Chris pushed his way against the crowd of students sitting in the hall bracing for the worst to find me. He knew how much I feared tornadoes. I sat there shaking and wishing for Chris and his hand to hold. When I heard him say, “Jaimes,” my heart immediately calmed. I looked up to find him grinning before he sat down next to me on the hard tile floor. He didn’t say another word, he just took up my hand with both of his and held it securely. I rested my head on his shoulder and we weathered the storm together. I had never thought there would be anything that could tear us apart.

  Breathe, breathe, breathe.

  Finally, someone did come to talk to me, but it filled me with a fear more paralyzing than any tornado. I saw the unhelpful clerk point a police officer my way.

  I can’t. I can’t breathe.

  The tall lanky officer looked grim as he approached.

  Please, no.

  “Mrs. McKay?”

  I think I nodded.

  He knelt in front of me. That was good, in case I fell over. At least he would be there to cushion the fall.

  He got right to business. “Your husband was struck by a car late this morning as he was walking across Broadway.”

  I gasped and covered my mouth with my hand.

  “He was lucky it was a smaller vehicle, and the driver did apply her brakes before impact.”

  “He’s still alive, right?”

  “Yes, ma’am, but his head hit the asphalt. He was conscious when the ambulance brought him in, but there were injuries.” He handed me his card. “We will need to get his statement when he’s able to provide one.”

  I took the card and glanced at it. The officer’s name was Wes Johnston.

  “Witnesses say your husband was in the crosswalk and the driver was distracted talking on the phone. We don’t believe alcohol or drugs were involved.”

  I nodded numbly to acknowledge him, but all I wanted was to see for myself that Chris was alive.

  “Feel free to call if you need anything. I wish your husband a speedy recovery.”

  “Thank you.” I looked down at the trembling card in my hand. At least I knew he was still alive, but what were the extent of his injuries?

  The clock on the wall became my point of focus. Each second that ticked by only fueled my desire to see Chris. For those minutes, I forgot we were at odds, or that he was making my life more difficult by halting the divorce proceedings. I couldn’t understand his reasoning in slowing it down—he didn’t fight for us when he had the chance, so why bother now?

  Then the guilt crept in. During our conversation last night I had said some things in pure, unadulterated anger. He had made an innocent comment of, “I didn’t know that’s what you needed, working late never bothered Bianca.” I unleashed my fury by saying, “Maybe that’s because she was out sleeping with her colleagues.”

  Silence was his reply.

  I had ambushed him with Bianca’s affair. I only said it to hurt him; I wanted him to feel a fraction of how much he had hurt me. I wasn’t an angry person, or even a spiteful one, but I felt like Bianca had loomed over our marriage, and hearing her name made me snap.

  “Jaime McKay,” a nurse called.

  I shook my head to clear my thoughts and rushed to the nurses’ station. “I’m Jaime McKay.”

  The kind male nurse smiled at me. “Follow me.”

  Finally.r />
  “Your husband has been moved to ICU. A doctor is there . . .”

  I stopped dead in my tracks. “ICU?”

  His look was grave. “Yes, ma’am. His doctor can explain more when we get there.”

  I placed my hand on the wall for support while I steadied my breathing.

  The nurse hesitated, but he placed his hand on my arm. “Your husband is in good hands.”

  I found the strength to move forward. He took us to the fifth floor. The elevator ride had me feeling like I was going to lose my lunch.He was alive, I kept reminding myself.

  I had to sign in at the nurses’ station, as well as answer questions regarding my health before I was allowed back. It seemed like everything was going in slow motion. I only wanted to see Christopher.

  I was met by Dr. Edward Little before I made it to his room. He held out his hand. “Mrs. McKay?”

  “Yes.” I took his outstretched hand.

  “Your husband sustained a significant blow to the head when he was hit by that car. We had to place him in a medically induced coma . . .”

  Suddenly there was no air to breathe.

  “That sounds worse than it is.” He tried to comfort me.

  Tiny amounts of air returned. I took a shallow breath.

  “We placed him in a coma to help reduce the swelling in his brain. The metabolism of his brain was altered due to the injury. What we are trying to do is reduce the amount of energy the affected areas need so that they will heal and the swelling will go down. We administered a well-known drug called Propofol; it’s used every day in surgery. It’s safe and he has been responding well to it. His EEG patterns are looking good.”

  “How long will he have to be like that?”

  “Typically two to three days. We will monitor him closely.”

  “Any other injuries?”

  He smiled. “He’s lucky he didn’t break any bones, but he has a serious case of road rash, a dislocated shoulder and he’s going to feel like . . . well, like a car hit him when he wakes up. We couldn’t find any other internal or external injuries, but like I said, we will keep a close eye on him.”

  “Can I see him?”

  “Of course, and as primary caregiver, you can stay as long as you’d like.”

  I followed him to room three. The door was an automatic sliding door and it slid open when we approached.

  I heard the monitors before I saw him behind the curtain. Nothing prepared me to see Chris looking so fragile. He was hooked up to all sorts of machines, everything from a ventilator to a heartrate monitor and a blood pressure machine. His face was consumed by medical gadgetry. I cautiously approached him and took up his hand.

  “You can speak to him; many patients in his state report being able to hear loved ones.”

  I wasn’t his loved one, but I nodded. I didn’t want to say anything in front of the doctor. I was doing my best to take this all in. To take in the injured body of the strongest person I’d ever known. He had always seemed invincible, but in that moment, I could barely recognize the man who had been a constant presence for most of my life, even during these last couple months of our separation.

  The doctor left me alone with my soon to be ex-husband.

  I took the chair by his bedside. He was motionless, but the machines assured me he was alive, a fact I was thankful for. I took his hand back and placed it against my cheek. It felt cool, not like the warm hand I had missed.

  “Please don’t leave us.”

  Chapter Two

  I stared at him for hours, only moving to call Ruth and my family to let them know what was going on. Eating and drinking weren’t even on my radar. Bree offered to pick up Allie and keep her for the night. I knew Chris wasn’t going to wake up, but for reasons unbeknownst to me, I couldn’t leave him. I loved him despite all that we had been through.

  During the late evening, my vigil was interrupted by perhaps the happiest person I had ever met, Hope, an ICU nurse. Her name fit her to a T.

  “I’m here to check his vitals.”

  I nodded.

  She looked across the bed at me as she took his pulse. “Are you Jaime?”

  “Yes.” I was surprised she knew my name.

  Her eyes brightened as her smile grew. “I happened to be in the emergency room when they brought your husband in.”

  “How do you know he’s my husband?”

  “Besides the fact you are mesmerized by him, he kept calling for you when they brought him in. He said he needed to tell you how sorry he was. He begged the EMT to call you. We tried, but he was having a hard time remembering your number.”

  My eyes widened.

  “No need to worry, his head took quite the beating, but it should go back to working properly.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Nothing is ever for sure.”

  “You don’t have to tell me.” I looked back at Christopher. The last two years I never knew where I stood with him. I had wanted to feel assured of his love, but we never got there. And now we never would.

  “I can tell that he loves you and, Allie, is it?”

  “Allie’s our daughter.”

  “He repeated several times, ‘If anything happens to me, tell Jaime and Allie I love them.’”

  “Did you hear him right?” I shouldn’t have asked. It wasn’t fair to bring this sweet, unsuspecting nurse into our drama, but Chris never said he loved me. He would always say things like, “We love each other.” But never once, “I love you.” I looked up at a confused Hope.

  “There was no mistaking it.”

  “We’re getting divorced.” My mouth had a mind of its own, but admitting it helped me deal with it.

  “That would explain his agitated state, besides getting hit by a car.”

  Agitated was a good word to describe him lately. I thought he would be relieved that I filed for divorce, but no. He only shut himself off further. It was like he was holding something in, and I thought several times over the past weeks that he wanted to tell me something, but he always fell silent. Our conversation by phone last night was the most we had talked in weeks, but I did my best to shut him right back up with my callousness.

  “I’m sorry, I don’t know why I told you that. I’m not thinking straight. It’s been a long day.” A long year.

  “Don’t apologize, buttercup.”

  On my list of things I loved about living in the South, Southern terms of endearment was near the top. “Will he really be okay?”

  “Time will tell, but judging by his behavior when he was brought in, I would say he has incentive to make a full recovery. Maybe he needed a good knock in the head,” she teased.

  I felt myself smile. It seemed like forever since I had. “It couldn’t hurt.”

  “Why don’t I bring you a blanket and some food?”

  “You don’t need to do that.”

  She waved me off. “Looks like you have a long night ahead of you. I’ll see what I can get up here from the cafeteria.”

  I looked up into her smiling eyes. “Thank you,” I sighed.

  “Don’t mention it. By the way . . .” She pointed at a table near the television in the room. “That white box contains his belongings.”

  I followed her finger. I hadn’t noticed anything but Chris since I got there. “Again, thank you.”

  “I’ll be back in a bit. Holler if you need anything.”

  A heart transplant would be good. My broken one was killing me.

  As soon as she left, I got up and stretched a bit before I walked over to see what the box contained. I looked down at my long, bare legs. They were covered in goosebumps and I was thankful she thought to bring me a blanket. The room was cold and I was only wearing shorts and a tank top. I was probably a mess from unpacking earlier today. I approached the white cardboard box and peered inside. It looked like a Christopher box, right down to his designer suit that had seen better days. Looks like they had to cut it off him, and the asphalt did it no favors. The bloodstains raised my he
art rate. Under the tattered clothing lay his briefcase and shattered phone. I had no doubt he was talking on the stupid thing when he got hit. It was like an appendage to him, and a sore spot in our marriage. Even when he was home, he wasn’t always present. I pushed it to the back of my mind. All that mattered for the moment was that he recover.

  I lifted out his Italian leather briefcase. It was a little scuffed up, but not too worse for the wear. I brought it back with me and took up my seat next to him. I stared at the combination lock and wondered how to open it. He would never give me the code, instead he would playfully say, “If you ever want to get in, you’ll figure it out. Here’s a hint: it’s my favorite day.”

  I thought for a moment. Since he loved himself so much, I put in his birthday, 0405. Nothing. I tried Allie’s birthdate, 0131. Still no luck. With a sick heart, I punched in his anniversary date with Bianca. I was both relieved and frustrated it didn’t work. I tried to remember the day he graduated from Duke or landed his job, but I didn’t have exact dates, only months and years, so I tried those without success. After several minutes, and random tries, I punched in an unlikely day—our anniversary, 0516. To my astonishment, the case unlatched. I shook my head. How could that be his favorite day?

  The briefcase contents were what I would expect him to have, file folders of clients and contracts. In the small pockets were mints and a picture of Allie bug. I admired our cute girl sitting on her rocking horse. I was missing her tonight. She cried when I talked to her on the phone. Poor baby had been through so much lately. We did our best to shield her, but the effects of divorce are far reaching.

  I was about to close the case when something caught my eye. Under the files was his journal. It was a handsomely bound book Christopher wrote in every night. I pulled it out and ran my hand across the embossed cover, with his name in the corner. I remembered back to the night over fifteen years ago when his grandpa presented it to him on his eighteenth birthday. His grandparents had raised him since he was seven years old. Christopher’s dad was some high-ranking military official, but he died in a friendly fire accident in Iraq when Chris was Allie’s age. His mom never could move on from the loss of her husband, and right after his seventh birthday, she overdosed on sleeping pills. By the time I met Chris four years later, he hardly ever talked about them. To this day, it’s a rare occasion for him to bring them up. But Clive and Allison McKay were frequently mentioned. We both loved them. Clive, his grandfather, was his hero and mentor. Chris wanted to be just like him—successful and respected, a pillar of the community.