by craziebabe45
"Kace," he pleaded.
"No, no, I see that you have other business to attend to," she said striding across the office and brushing past Lexi.
"It's really not like that," Lexi responded hurriedly.
Kace gave her a sad smile. "Of course not. It never is with Brandon," she said with a roll of her eyes.
"Kace," he growled grasping her elbow and yanking her towards him. She gasped as she was flung into his arms. He bent down and claimed her lips in a deep kiss. When he released her, the earlier anger in her eyes had dissipated. "I'll see you later."
"Yes. Later," she responded dreamily as she exited the office. He toed the door closed behind her and turned back to his desk.
Lexi sighed and followed him taking the unoccupied chair next to his desk. "Sorry."
"You can't call ahead of time like a normal person?" he grumbled leafing back through the papers he had been dealing with before Kace's interruption.
Lexi shrugged helplessly. "I didn't know you'd have…company."
"Assume away," he said waving a dismissive hand.
"Anyway, lunch?" she asked a bright smile crossing her face.
He sighed staring down at the stack of papers on his desk. "If I keep having lunch with you people are going to think you've put me in the friend zone," he murmured practically quoting a line out of Just Friends.
"You are in the friend zone," she said with a giggle. "You have been for a couple weeks and it's seemed to work out just fine. Anyway everyone knows that I'm living with Ramsey. You're the only one who seems not to care about that."
"I'm not the only one," he murmured. "Just the only one who will admit it." He glanced back up at her flirtatiously a smirk appearing on his lips.
Lexi shrugged again nonchalantly as if she had been through this conversation before…and she had. "Doesn't matter that you admit it. I'm still with Ramsey," she said certainly.
He set the papers aside, leaned back in his administrative chair, and stared at her. "And where is your man today?" he asked.
"He's working," she told him with a faint sigh at the end.
"Ahh," he murmured, "Too busy to take his girlfriend to lunch?"
"Stop goading me Brandon. He's not used to anyone being around. We had a long distance relationship for quite some time, and he can't just quit his job to have lunch with me every day. Since you work a 9to5, you have no trouble in being constantly available especially since you don't have a girlfriend."
"I would if you would let me take someone else to lunch," he spat back playfully.
"You know there's nowhere else you'd rather be," she said. "So come on. I want sushi today and it's your turn to pay."
"Fine," he grumbled only half frustrated by the situation.
The two had managed to develop quite a friendship just as Lexi had predicted that night out on Ramsey's balcony. Brandon, of course, never failed to shamelessly flirt and throw himself at Lexi, but she easily deflected his advances. They had an easy banter, and found that they had more in common than originally anticipated. When they both let their guards down, they found that they really enjoyed each other's company. He wasn't exactly a substitute for Chyna, for no one could really replace her best friend, but he was a nice change in the mean time.
Ramsey didn't approve of the relationship as he had made clear time and time again. But with Ramsey's continual absence, Lexi had to find a way to kill time outside of her job. He wasn't always around when she was at home, but the time they spent together was cherished by both. Lexi was certain that the decision to move in with him had been an accurate one at this point. Even though he was so busy, it was better to have the couple hours a week together then to have the distance to separate them.
Lexi paused in the doorway as her cell phone jingled in her purse. "Sorry," she mumbled fumbling with the latch on her purse. "Mom, hey, it's not the best time. I'm about to go to lunch," Lexi spoke quickly into her phone. The sobbing that penetrated through the receiver stopped Lexi in her tracks. "Mom, are you alright? Is everything alright? What happened? Calm down. Calm down. Tell me what happened," Lexi spoke urgently her heart beating out of her chest with fear. Panic gripped her and she latched onto Brandon as he approached. Upon seeing her stricken face, he ushered her back into his office.
"It's your father," her mother gasped through her tears.
"Dad?" Lexi moaned in terror. "What happened to dad?" Brandon rested his arm around her shoulder for support as her body seemed to be collapsing under the weight of the impending news.
"Honey, he had a heart attack," she cried out. She hiccupped a couple times into the phone a sure sign, Lexi knew, of an onset of hyperventilation.
Lexi felt a tear run down her cheek and then another one followed. She couldn't stop them from tumbling relentlessly out of her eyes. "Is he okay?" she could barely get out.
Another round of sobbing came through the line. "I don't know. I don't know. I just…don't know."
"Where is he? Did you call an ambulance?" Lexi asked taking the side of the parental figure and demanding the details.
"He went into the city for some consulting work," she sobbed. "He had been complaining that his shoulder and chest hurt, but we just didn't think anything of it. He always has chest pains. Luckily someone was around when he collapsed. They picked up the call and told me they were calling 911." She paused for another round of fitful tears. Lexi had never quite heard her mother in such a state. "They took him to Grady. It'll take me too long to get there, but I'm on my way. Please go and tell me he's alright. Tell me I haven't lost my George."
"I'm on my way now mom. I love you. I'll call you from the hospital," Lexi told her before hanging up.
"Do you need me to go with you?" Brandon asked having heard everything through the line.
"No," Lexi said swiping at her face. "I just…I can drive."
"Are you sure?" he asked grasping both of her shoulders in his hands and staring deep in her tear streaked face. She nodded helplessly. He pulled her into a brief comforting hug. "Call me if you need anything," he told her. She nodded again and then quickly left his office.
She pulled her phone back out as soon as she was out of the elevator. Her first instinct was to call Ramsey. She knew he was busy working, but she needed to speak with him. Hopefully he would be available. Sometimes when he got so into work, he completely forgot all else including to check his phone. She pressed the speed dial number for his phone, listened to it ring four times before going to voicemail.
Lexi cursed loudly as she entered the parking garage and beelined for her car. She wanted to talk to Chyna. She was reassuring and always helped Lexi through these problems. Unfortunately she was halfway across the world at a photo shoot in Milan, and the international reception was terrible. Lexi rarely got to talk with her, and never when she was the one who called.
She peeled out of the garage and zipped towards the interstate. She scrambled for who she could call. She needed to speak to someone…to have someone reassure her. She needed a voice of reason in her panic. Brandon was nice. She could have let him come with her, but they had been friends for less than a month. This wasn't exactly a place for her to allow him to get involved. She needed someone else…someone who really knew her.
Lexi knew she had lost her sanity in this instance when her fingers numbly dialed the next number. "Lexi?" Jack asked answering the phone on the first ring. She couldn't help it. She sobbed into the phone just as her mother had when Lexi had answered.
"Lexi? Are you alright? Are you hurt? What happened?" he asked quickly his chest pounding as he listened to her tears.
"Jack. Oh Jack," she cried barreling around cars on the interstate. "My dad had a heart attack."
"What?" he gasped. "Is everything alright?"
"I don't know. I'm on my way to Grady right now to find out," she told him.
"Look Lexi, he's going to be fine. Grady has some of the best doctors in the world," he told her reassuringly. "He is in good hands there."
"I know," she
blubbered, "but it's my daddy."
"I know Lex," he said lapsing into old habits easily, "but you have to be positive. You don't know all the details. Things will work out."
"How? How do you know?"
"I don't, I'm afraid, but I just have a feeling," he told her.
"Promise?" she begged.
He paused a second before answering. "Yes I do."
"Thanks Jack," she breathed into the phone. "That means a lot," she said sniffling and holding back another round of tears.
"Do you need me to come down there?" he asked hesitantly unsure if that was his place or not.
"No," she answered quickly. "Thank you. I don't want to take you away…"
"Right," he responded.
"I just needed to talk to someone…someone who knows me," she said quietly.
Jack took another exaggerated pause before responding. "Well I know you Lex."
"I know Jack," she whispered.
"If you need me to come to the hospital just give me a call ok?"
"Okay," she mumbled.
"Everything will be fine," he repeated for reassurance.
"Thanks."
"Are you almost there?" he asked not wanting to get off the phone in her time of need until she had safely at the hospital.
"Yes, I'm pulling in now," she told him as she directed her car into the first available parking space.
"Call me to let me know what happens alright Lex?" he said. "I want to know that I'm right…that I held up my promise."
"Sure Jack," she said sadly as she hung up the phone. She couldn't even consider how ironic his statement was. She raced into the Emergency Room lobby and to the woman behind the desk.
"Name," she said dryly not looking up from her clipboard.
"My father had a heart attack. I need to see him," Lexi gasped out.
"Name?" she asked turning to her computer flippantly.
"George. George Walsh. My name is Lexi. I'm his daughter," she breathed out as fast as possible.
"Yes. Mr. Walsh is up the stairs and down the hall. Room number 205," the woman told her just barely glancing at her over her horn-rimmed glasses.
"Thank you," Lexi said before darting down the hall. She skidded around the corner at near break neck speed and took the stairs two at a time. She slowed as she approached the much busier hallway. She took a light jog as she followed the line of numbers down to the one she had been assigned.
Lexi pushed open the door to her father's hospital room and stepped in. "Daddy?" she whispered into the sunlit room tears streaming down her face again.
Her father's eyes fluttered open briefly in recognition before closing again. His breathing was labored and he looked as if he had just run a marathon. His skin was almost a green color and he was soaked through with sweat even though the hospital room was frigid. Despite this, a faint smile appeared at the edges of his lips upon her entrance. "Hey….ba…by," he breathed out before falling silent again, the effort to speak taking too much out of him.
"Hey," she cooed rushing to his bedside, planting a soft kiss on his forehead, and falling back softly into the waiting bedside chair. "You don't look too good old man," she said jokingly. It took everything she could to chuckle softly. She could tell it was straining him to pull up the corners of his mouth, but that didn't stop him.
Lexi pulled out her phone and quickly sent a text to her mother to let her know that her husband was still alive. She didn't want to leave his side long enough to make the phone call. She knew her mother was likely still in hysterics and the thought of being out of the room for long enough to deal with that seemed too much to grasp right now.
A nurse scrambled in the doorway and Lexi snapped her head around at the disruption to the quiet of the room. The only thing that had been constant was the deep wheezing breaths her father was taking and the slow beeps emitted from the machine next to his bedside. The woman stopped in her tracks when she saw Lexi sitting in the previously unoccupied chair. "Well hello dear," she said a bit too brightly for the circumstances.
"Hi," Lexi squeaked out. "Is he going to be okay?"
"Oh he is going to be just fine. The doctors will come in and explain everything to you shortly. You're his daughter I presume?" she asked waddling over to her father's bedside. Lexi nodded mutely as she watched the nurse begin to fiddle with the IV stuck into his hand. For some reason Lexi hadn't even realized it was there. "Well I'm just going to monitor the ECG until the doctor arrives."
A short while later her mother bustled into the room. Her face was still covered in tears and at the sight of her husband hooked up to machines, she fell into another round of hysterics. Lexi stood and allowed her to take the seat at his side that she had occupied. She watched her mother reach out tentatively and grasp his hand in her own. She stayed there staring at the love of her life, the man she had spent the last thirty years with, the man she had had three children with. Lexi wondered if she would ever be as happy as them one day.
Just then the doctor walked through the door. Lexi turned around to face the door as the small brunette entered her nose buried in his chart. "Well let's see what we have here," she began. "George Walsh. Age forty-nine. Heart attack. Overall I'd say you are rather lucky under the circumstances, Mr. Walsh." Finally she looked up at her patient.
Lexi released a short gasp at the recognition between the two. "Parker?"
The doctor looked between Lexi and the patient she had just been addressing and back. She was clearly thrown off that her personal life had somehow managed to wiggle into her work environment. "Lexi?"
"You two know each other?" Lexi's mother asked glancing back and forth between her daughter and the doctor who she realized looked just like Lexi. Lexi and Parker both nodded. "But…you look so much alike," she said wistfully.
"We've heard that before," Parker answered returning to her paperwork quickly.
Lexi forgot how shy Parker could be in uncomfortable situations. "This is my father," she stated even though the fact was now obvious. "Sorry I'll just…uh wait outside. I just need some air. I'll be back in a minute mom." Lexi rushed past Parker and out into the hallway. She took a deep intake of the stale hospital air. She was sure that she was overreacting, but being in the same room with her at such an emotional time had just felt wrong. She needed to leave. She needed to get out of there.
A seat had been placed outside of one of the rooms and she slumped into it. All she wanted to do was shut her brain off. She closed her eyes and pressed her palms to her temples in an attempt to stop the pounding in her skull. A tear fell from her eye as the pressure from the last couple hours seemed to settle on her body. She just wanted to go home, cuddle up with some double chocolate ice cream, and cry herself to sleep. She had almost lost her father today. It wasn't a feeling she was soon to forget.
Lexi looked up when her father's hospital door opened again and Parker exited. Instead of turning away, Parker walked down to where Lexi was sitting, crying. "Hey let's go get some coffee," she said her voice lowering comfortingly.
Lexi wiped at both of her cheeks and stood slowly. "Don't you have to get back to work?" Lexi asked though she was extremely grateful for the offer.
Parker shrugged. "I'm in need of a break. They can still run without me for awhile."
"Sure," Lexi said following her down the hall and into the coffee shop. "I didn't know you worked for the ER." She ordered a large black coffee. The caffeine was exactly what she needed right now.
"They just have me in the ER when other doctors call out. I'm usually in surgery," she told her. Parker ordered a small coffee and doused cream and sugar in it as soon as it was pushed across the counter. The two found a vacant table and slid into their seats. "Sorry about your dad," she spoke softly.
"Me too," Lexi murmured.
"I think he's going to be okay now though. Your mom will keep a close watch on him and I prescribed some blood thinners," she told her reassuringly. "He'll only have to be in the ICU for a day or two."
&nbs
p; "Thanks," Lexi said forgetting she was talking to a woman that she had so many reservations against. "I really…just thanks for everything you did."
Parker blushed at the words. "It's my job," she said dismissively.
"Yes well it's admirable. I mean I'm just a blood sucking lawyer," Lexi said with a chortle at the end that she really wasn't feeling.
"I'm sure you do good too," Parker responded quickly.
Lexi shrugged noncommittally. She wasn't sure what to say. Instead she just took another long sip of her coffee and let the caffeine fight her ailments. If someone had told her a few days ago that she would be having coffee with Parker or that her father was going to have a heart attack, she wouldn't have believed them. But here she was at the hospital and both things were true.
"Lexi?" Parker asked hesitantly looking down into her coffee cup. "Can I be honest with you?"
Lexi looked up from her own coffee and stared at Parker speculatively. She wasn't sure she wanted to have this conversation…whatever it was. "About what?"
Parker bit down on her bottom lip. She released a long sigh before meeting Lexi's gaze. "About Ramsey," she said barely louder than a whisper.
Lexi's stomach dropped. Here it was. Everything she had been waiting for. Everything she had suspected. She had known all along deep down that there was more to the story. She had always wanted to believe what Ramsey had told her about his relationship with Parker, but the story had never settled right with her. She wasn't sure what it was about it. Maybe it was the way that Jessie had talked about them the first time Lexi had met Parker over spring break. Maybe it was the looks that they so easily passed between them. Maybe it was just jealousy after everything she had dealt with in her life. But whatever it was, she was about to find out.
Lexi gulped hard. "What about Ramsey?" she asked her hands shaking.
"I just…I…Lexi you have to know I don't like to lie. It's not in me to lie," she said seemingly trembling with the weight of what she was trying to say. "I didn't want to hold back everything from you." Lexi felt a numbness fall over her. Lies. Hidden information. None of this could be good. "I don't really talk about what happened, but I just didn't think it was fair for you not to know. I can tell that ya'll are getting serious, and I…" she faltered pushing her hand up through her hair before continuing, "well, I would want to know if the roles were reversed."
