The Rescue Doc's Christmas Miracle

by Amalie Berlin

  But when had she gotten better?

  Dropping the empty bottle on the table, he picked up the album again and flipped the page.

  Eight. Birthday in a pool. Water wings on her arms and Mom behind her, holding her for safety. Scrawny little body.

  Nine. On the back of a pony with Dad holding her.

  Ten. In a wheelchair.

  No smiles. No smiles anymore. Never smiles. It was like looking at the embodiment of suffering. Her family loved her and the weaker she got the closer they held her, but her eyes were just dead. None of that Penny spark shone there.

  He put the birthday album back down and reached for the other. He’d spent a half hour watching her deteriorate. He needed to see some progress.

  But that’s not what it showed. The first fifteen or so sheets of images showed progression, not progress. Small, fragile, but trying so hard to do what the therapists told her. Tears. So many tears.

  God, this wasn’t any better.

  He skipped chunks he simply couldn’t bear to see, and didn’t stop turning pages until he saw a twelve-or thirteen-year-old Penny in a safety harness, gripping parallel bars and walking. Supported, but walking. And smiling. With no fresh redness on her face, just a lingering pink shadow of it around her eyes, those brilliant, shining, hope-filled blue eyes.

  Progression became progress. She worked the bars, bearing more weight in every picture as her cheeks and arms filled out.

  She used weight machines, and her legs grew thicker, took on definition. Grew strong.

  Braces became crutches, became a cane, became nothing. And her smile, God, her smile...

  My whole life, my thinking was always, “Can you do this?” And for so long the answer was always no. When the answer finally started becoming yes, I just always did it.

  He picked up the first album and flipped to those teenaged birthday parties.

  Thirteen. Go-karts.

  Fourteen. Horseback riding without someone holding her.

  Fifteen. He couldn’t tell what was going on, just that there were girls and boys in bathing suits, running amok in the surf at the beach, and probably some kind of wet sand fight? There was sand flinging, which wasn’t entirely safe without protective eyewear...

  Sixteen. Dancing with friends and live music in the background. Who knew where...?

  Always outside. So happy. So alive.

  They’d had to hold her up, and then it became holding her back from all the things she wanted to do, and she’d pushed back against it. She hadn’t sought out dangerous things because of some kind of desire for an adrenaline high, she’d wanted to do things that celebrated that freedom she’d fought so hard for. And to help others who were hurting. She understood suffering.

  He didn’t want to be someone who held her back. He wanted to celebrate with her, to see that sparkle in her eyes.

  The sparkle that hadn’t been there last night.

  She’d gotten used to fighting for her freedom, and he’d gotten used to protecting himself. It couched all his decisions—that need to be safe.

  Until that night...

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  PENNY CHECKED THE GPS as she turned down the drive where it told her, into trees, somewhere on the outskirts of Gabriel’s hometown in New Jersey.

  She hadn’t heard from him the day he’d left, hadn’t seen him that morning. She’d promised to stay out of his way and she had.

  But she had heard the moment he’d gone, and even if she hadn’t heard the door closing, she still would’ve known. A whole night awake fantasizing that he’d find her albums and change his mind had made her even more hypersensitive to his presence than usual. The moment he’d stepped out, all the hope had left her, had left with him.

  Then she’d cried.

  The next day had passed the same way—not knowing if he’d found them, if they’d made any difference. If he’d cared. If he even still wanted to be part of their child’s life or if she’d ruined that too.

  By the time his text had come late last night—We need to talk—along with some coordinates and a time, her hopes had fallen too far to even speculate about his thoughts.

  On the drive, she’d conjured two options: meet his parents because he did still want the baby. Or meet at a lawyer’s office because he did still want the baby, as in sole custody.

  The long, private drive said parents. Which was good. She’d take it—she’d take whatever she could get.

  Through the thick line of trees running along the drive she saw a field of white, and then color. Red and white checks like a massive gingham picnic blanket.

  And then the trees opened out and she saw a big gingham hot-air balloon.

  Her heart stuttered.

  She sped up to get to the end of the road, wherever the heck it was, and around the bend came to a parking area before a massive red horse barn. Gabriel was there, leaning against the front fender of his car, arms crossed, knit cap and coat to warm him in the frosty but bright, sunny day.

  She parked right beside him and got out, going a bit snow blind with the early afternoon rays bouncing off the snow. Snatching her glasses, she put them on and closed the car door.

  The hot-air balloon could just be there by some coincidence. Maybe. She was afraid to get her hopes up or even to look at him, though the glasses made it a little easier as she could hide it if she got weepy again.

  He didn’t say anything but she could feel him watching as she pulled her gloves on and went to lean on his car beside him.

  “Is that balloon for you?”

  “Yes.”

  “I thought they only flew them when it was warm?”

  “They usually do,” he said softly, “but I begged.”

  Pregnancy-safe adventure. They’d even talked about this as a possibility. Oh, her hopes, they were climbing.

  “It’s not dangerous?”

  “It’s cold. People don’t do it because it’s very cold.” His arms uncrossed and he slid one down her arm to take her gloved hand in his own. “Want to try it?”

  She nodded, smiling even as she felt sneaky tears trying to leak out and had to dip her free hand up to swipe under her glasses before he saw them. “Even if you planned on chucking me out of the basket at ten thousand feet.”

  “You know better than that,” he said softly, but let go of her hand and rounded to the trunk of his car. He soon returned with the largest parka she’d ever seen, and a thick, wooly beanie too. He pulled the hat onto her head, mashing her hair down, and she didn’t care at all.

  Standing so close and not touching him when her arms ached to wrap around him took strength of will she’d have doubted she possessed, but this felt like something that had to happen at his pace. The man liked to take his time in things...

  “You only brought one big coat? That’s not going to fit either of us.” She tilted her head back so he could adjust her hat, and closed her eyes against the blinding afternoon sun.

  “Trust me, I have a plan,” he said, then, with her eyes to the sun, face lifted, she felt the brush of something cold and firm on her lips. It took a second, but she identified it.

  Lip balm.

  He did have a plan. Keep her warm, protect her lips from the wind. She smiled.

  “Perfect. That makes it easier,” he said, and finished. Then, before she could open her eyes, he pressed his lips to her newly moisturized mouth.

  It was probably supposed to be a sweet little smooch, but the second she felt his warm lips against hers, her restraint evaporated. All the hurt of the past—Lord, she’d lost count how many days, it felt like years—evaporated with it.

  This time, when her arms whipped around his shoulders, his came around her too, and he didn’t kiss her back in the way of a man suffering her touch or indifferent to it. He angl
ed his head, held her tighter, kissed deeper, until it was clumsy and wet, teeth, tongues, tears, and skewed sunglasses.

  “This isn’t the plan, baby.” He panted more than spoke, his lips brushing hers with every syllable. Then lifted his head and pulled the glove off one hand so he could wipe the tears on her cheeks. “These will freeze up there.”

  She sniffed, then laughed a little and eased her hands back down. “I think I need more lip balm...”

  He presented the tube, winked, and while she reapplied it, he put on the massive parka.

  “Doors locked?”

  She stuck the balm into her pocket, pulled out her key fob, and locked the door. With the keys stashed again, and her hands back in gloves, he put his arm around her waist and led, their steps crunching across the snowy field.

  Two people waited at the balloon—the captain she could identify because he climbed into the basket, and a man at the moorings to knock off the anchor ropes when they were ready.

  She didn’t know how high they were going to go, but they couldn’t reach her hopes and the burst of joy that had her just a little terrified she was getting too far ahead of herself.

  The prospect of how much colder she knew it would be even a few hundred feet off the ground should probably factor into that fear, but it didn’t. Gabriel would always try to keep her and the baby safe, and he was too sensible to go up for any other reason but to show her something. He loved her. He had to.

  “Think you have room in there for me to huddle in? I’m not sure my wool coat is going to be warm enough. Also, I’m hoping to force you to hug me for a long stretch of time. It’s my clever plan that I’m telling you like the villain at the end of a movie when they think they have the hero in the right place and...” She stopped, chuckling at herself. “Those thoughts started out from a much funnier place than they became as I kept explaining.”

  “They didn’t have any parkas in your size, so I got the big one to share. It was my plan all along. My improvised romantic plan when they didn’t have your size.”

  She smiled then and stepped in front of him, pressed her back to his front, and clamped her arms at her sides to keep them out of the way.

  “Sleeves.”

  “Really?” She looked at the sleeves and then back at him. “Are you going to have one and me the other?”

  “We could do that, but you’ll probably be warmer if my arm is there too. The sleeves are big.”

  Penny wasn’t about to put up a fuss about anything. She eyed the sleeves to make sure they were roomy enough, then just shrugged and went with it. It’d be better if her coat were off so she could actually feel him without the layers between them, but maybe that would come later. He had said romantic.

  When it was done, and only her fingertips poked out of the wrists, making her hands utterly useless, he stiffly zipped them in. He was right, it was warm, and nice with him behind her, around her. To smell him, even among all this new-coat smell. Made the hard days blur about the edges.

  Below, the land fell away as they rose. Gabriel lifted their arms together so he could pull up the hood, then rested his chin on her shoulder so they were both protected from the wind.

  “How did you set this up so fast? Or did you do it when we talked about it?”

  “I did it yesterday. Their schedule was totally open,” he said, and then added in a softer voice, “It was easier to arrange than the mental stuff.”

  “The not wanting to be anywhere near me bit?”

  “That wasn’t it. It was more being afraid to be with you.” His mouth stayed at her ear, making it easy to hear over the wind. “Actually, that’s not it. You kept saying I didn’t trust you, and you were right. After Nila left, I always held part of myself back, and when I realized what you and the baby mean to me, I was in some broken pattern of trying to protect you both, or trying to protect myself. You humbled me. I know what it took for you to show me those albums, the albums that almost killed me.”

  She closed her eyes and let those words wash over her. Then turned her head toward him so the crosswinds wouldn’t eat her words. “It was easier than you think, when it became necessary. If you were going to leave me, I wanted you to leave the real me. I should’ve let you see them before.”

  “You were protecting yourself. I get it. Neither of us were ready. If I’d looked then, I might not have seen it. Especially after having just looked at your Adventure album.”

  “Seen what?”

  “What really drives you.”

  She hadn’t really ever thought about her motivators aside from the excitement of doing stuff. “What do you think drives me?”

  “Life. You just want to experience what life has to offer. You don’t do things that people frequently die doing. You use safety equipment. You always buckle in when you fly. You don’t chase death. You chase experiences,” he explained, shaking his head. “Did you just want me to say it, or do you not really know this?”

  She shrugged He’d feel her shoulders creep up his chest, and no doubt saw her brows moving her knit cap.

  “You told me you need adventures. That was your word, so on some level you know your motives. You didn’t say you wanted thrills, stunts, or even fun. You said adventure.”

  “Yeah, okay. I guess that’s right.” She straightened and looked out over the sea, only realizing then that they were drifting out over the bay to the Atlantic. The gray winter water below still sparkled under the sun, and toward the northwest she could see the city skyline in the distance.

  “I want to have adventures with you. I don’t want to watch and worry. If you storm the gates of hell, I need to be storming them with you.”

  She smiled, and even her lip balm felt like it was stiffening from the cold, but she didn’t want to cut their time short. “I promise not to storm the gates of hell. Or exclude you.”

  “I promise to work every day not to hold back from you, even if you’re the one person in the world with the power to destroy me.”

  His words bounced around in her heart and she tried to turn to him, but her arms were stuffed in the sleeves and he’d wrapped their arms around her, which made it impossible. “I wouldn’t... I wouldn’t ever destroy you.”

  “I know. In my heart I know you would never do anything to hurt me, not on purpose. Logically, I know that it’s going to be a struggle, me wanting to hold back. But you have a way of breaking through those barriers. I need that.” He held her gaze as she twisted as best she could to look at him. “I need you. I asked you to marry me, and I told myself it was just for the well-being of the baby, but I need you. And I can give you however long you need, as long as you keep fighting for me too.”

  Her lower lip quivered and her throat had closed up again, so she nodded with as much vigor as she could manage tucked against him like that.

  “Do you know the best adventure for us?”

  She did. Oh, she did. But she needed to hear him say it, even if it would just be whispered in her ear.

  “A life together. Laughing, fighting, driving each other crazy, knocking over Christmas trees because we can’t stop touching long enough to lie down sensibly.” He said the words she’d been waiting for. “Never giving up on one another. Raising our kids. Going on vacations to...scuba dive in the Keys or...to Iceland for the Northern Lights...”

  It all sounded perfect, even before he said the thing that was sure to rip her guts out.

  “Doing with them all the things Penelope didn’t get to do.”

  Tears on her cheeks would freeze so she turned her head to him so he could see her cheeks. He was the one mostly in control of their hands right now.

  “None of that,” he said, reaching up to rub them away with his gloved hand, and then brought their arms together so he could cuff the left sleeve enough to expose her hand. Then took off her glove.

  Sh
e started to pull the shared-sleeve arm to her face to get to her cheeks, but he already had them bending down and in.

  “Pocket,” he said.

  She slipped her hand into the pocket, confused. Pockets were warm...

  Except this one had a small velvet box in it.

  “No balling my fist up for warmth with this thing in there,” she said, closing her fingers over the box, and they pulled it from the pocket in tandem.

  Gabriel stuffed her glove into the other pocket, then removed his own on the right, and stashed it too. Right hand his, left hand hers, he reached for the box. “Hold tight.”

  She nodded, and watched as he raised the lid. A glittering diamond winked at her from the black interior. “Man, I never thought I’d be excited to get an engagement ring, but if you don’t hurry up I’m gonna die.”

  She’d have to tell him later that she didn’t need a long engagement. He’d gone to such lengths to plan this, and he’d said even more than her heart had been aching to hear for what felt like years.

  He plucked the ring from the velvet perch and she flipped her hand over to flex her fingers out to receive it. And dropped the box right over the edge, into the sea.

  “Oh, no... Oh, no! You got it? You got it, right?” she babbled, until he showed it to her. “Hurry, before we drop it too! Hot-air balloons are dangerous if you’ve got butter fingers. Maybe we should step back from the edge of the basket.”

  In answer, he slipped the ring onto her finger.

  “You know, in my head, I was going to kiss the ring, it was going to be extremely romantic. But now I’m thinking gloves.”

  “Yes. Yes, gloves.” She laughed, and between the two of them wrestled her left glove on over the ring, and his right one back on.

  As soon as the maneuver was complete, Penny wiggled and turned, pulling her arms from the sleeves.

  “Pen?” Despite his confusion, he held still, didn’t try to stop her.

  She didn’t stop, even to explain, until she’d gotten her arms free and spun inside the oversized coat to get her arms around him.

  His smile was beautiful, and short-lived. She tugged on him and leaned up on her toes, mouth presented for kissing. That was all it took to convince him to kiss her again. Kiss for real. Kiss enough to make the balloon captain feel awkward, probably.