by Anne Fraser
He owed her one. This was his fault. If he had any decency at all he’d tell her it was over and let her get on with her life.
Liz ducked behind the nurses’ station and grabbed a stack of papers without looking to see what they were.
“Liz?”
She didn’t meet Kelly’s eyes.
“Is something wrong?”
She couldn’t answer.
“Liz?” Her friend’s concern heightened her voice.
“Nothing’s wrong. I’m just tired.” And I want to throw up.
How could the man she’d loved for months act as if she was an inconvenience he wished would go away?
“I don’t believe you,” Kelly said, her hands on her hips and a determined gleam in her voice. “Tell me what’s wrong.”
Could a relationship as wonderful as what she and Adam had shared end just like that? With no warning, no arguments, nothing to make her suspect he had been unhappy? Had she been so caught up in Gramps’s illness that she’d missed Adam becoming unhappy with their relationship?
She hiccuped, fighting tears. She couldn’t cry. Not at work. She had patients to tend to.
“Liz, look at me right now,” Kelly ordered. “You were in Mr Keele’s room? Did he remind you of Gramps?”
Liz met Kelly’s concerned expression, and proceeded to spring a leak. Two leaks. Leaks that flowed freely down her cheeks, and Kelly hugged her.
“Oh, honey, I’m so sorry. I know how much you miss him.”
Another hiccup escaped her mouth. This one carried a half-hysterical edge. Her friend thought she was mourning the loss of her grandfather. In reality she mourned the loss of her best friend and lover, Adam.
“Adam and I are breaking up.”
Kelly looked startled. As if Liz’s words were the last thing she’d expected to hear. “I know you’ve been concerned lately, but every couple has arguments. Adam loves you. It’ll all work out. You’ll see.”
But they hadn’t argued. She hiccupped again. “He’s never said he loves me.”
Kelly paused, clearly taken aback by that admission. “Some things don’t have to be said with words for them to be true. I’ve seen how he looks at you. Take it from me, he’s crazy about you.”
Liz didn’t comment, just swiped at unwanted tears.
“He’s probably having a bad day and took it out on you,” Kelly comforted, giving Liz another quick hug.
“A bad month is more like it.” Wiping her palms over her scrub top, Liz pulled herself together. She was stronger than this.
She really had to get her act together. If not internally, she could at least put on a cheery front for her coworkers and patients. They deserved a smiling face and positive attitude. She smiled at her friend, counting her blessings that she had a friend like Kelly in her life. “I’m sorry for blubbering all over you like this.”
“No biggie.” Kelly gave her a quick hug. “I’m surprised you’ve held up as well as you have, with your grandfather having been sick so long, and then the long hours you’re working, and now Adam. Why are you pulling so many extra hours? When’s the last time you had a day off?”
“I’ve got next Monday and Tuesday off.”
“Until HR calls begging you to fill in for whoever isn’t coming to work that day.” Kelly gave her a knowing look. “Say no for once. Take those days and rest. After you catch up on your sleep things will look brighter.”
Liz nodded slowly.
Nausea constricted her throat and, not wanting to alarm Kelly any more than her friend already was, Liz gave her a hug, excused herself, and went to the ladies’ room to throw up.
CHAPTER SIX
“HI, MRS PROBST,” Adam said, glancing toward the woman sitting on the exam table. He didn’t personally know the hospital volunteer, but he’d seen her around the building from time to time.
He’d ask why she was there, but he knew.
Talk of May’s tumor could be heard throughout the hospital. He felt partially responsible as she’d originally been scheduled to see him on the day after Gramps had died. When he’d shuffled his schedule to go for the MRI and spinal tap, May had unfortunately been bumped a second time. He hadn’t blamed her when he’d heard she’d rescheduled with a different surgeon. Although he wouldn’t have chosen the particular one she’d opted to see.
“Dr Cline, this is my husband, John.” The woman introduced the man who sat in the chair pushed against the wall. Worry lines furrowed deep above his bushy salt-and-pepper brows.
Adam shook the man’s hand.
“You have to know why I’m here,” May continued, her bright eyes meeting Adam’s. “I’ve not kept my problems secret from the hospital staff.”
“I was sorry to hear about the tumor, Mrs Probst. And sorry that your appointments with me had to be rescheduled and you were forced to go elsewhere.” Adam opened her file, reviewed Dr Mills’s surgical notes. Inoperable.
He hated that the evidence pointed toward his having to concur with Dr Mills.
“John and I felt time was of the essence and a week seemed an eternity to wait to find out what was going on inside me.”
Adam understood well. Too well. He’d started a three-times-a-week injection yesterday morning that would hopefully slow the progression of his MS, would hopefully stop this exacerbation, prevent new ones from occurring. Waiting to see how he’d respond required patience he wasn’t sure he possessed.
“We got a second opinion in Jackson. Actually, a third opinion as well from that surgeon’s colleague,” her husband interjected. “They won’t operate due to May not being strong enough to tolerate surgery.” The man’s bleak eyes glanced toward his wife. “That’s not acceptable to us.”
May handed Adam a stack of papers. “These are the office notes from the specialists I saw. Apparently the risk of me dying on the operating table is too high. Both said that at the rate the tumor is growing, I should live another six months, possibly longer.”
“Which they say is preferable to her dying now on the operating table,” her husband added, giving a pained glance toward his wife.
“Life just to say one is alive is no life at all.” May lifted pain-filled eyes to Adam’s. “I throw up everything I eat. I’ve lost thirty pounds in the past two months. I can’t sleep, can’t do anything because of the way I hurt.”
Her husband scooted forward on his seat, took his wife’s hand in his and gave a reassuring squeeze. “I love my wife, hate the thought of losing her any sooner than I have to, but she can’t go on like this.”
“Faced with the option of knowing each day is only going to bring more sickness, that I’m waiting to die, that my family is having to watch me die day after day.” Tears filled her eyes, but her head remained high. Her husband lifted her hand to his lips and placed a kiss on her fingers. They exchanged a look of understanding, love, compassion for what the other felt. “Well, like I said,” May continued, “that’s no life at all.”
A cold sweat covered Adam. He knew where this was leading, knew if he put her on the operating table she’d likely die there. No one wanted to operate on the tumor because they may as well write May’s obituary. What doctor wanted to be responsible for that?
But if there was a chance to be cured of his MS, wouldn’t he take any risk to have that cure? To have that hope for the future?
“Even if there’s only a slight chance of me surviving, I’m willing to face those odds. I’d rather die fighting than go on like this, having to see my family watch me suffer, having to suffer this horrible pain.” May and her husband both turned expectant eyes toward Adam. “We’re here to ask you to please cut this tumor out.”
* * *
Liz didn’t see or talk to Adam for the next week.
As always, the hospital was understaffed and she’d been able to pull extra shifts. Her next paycheck should make a good dent in Gramps’s medical bills.
The nursing director had called early that morning to ask if she’d come in, but when they’d been on the
phone the night before, Kelly had threatened her with bodily harm if she didn’t take the day off.
Which left her with time on her hands.
First, she cleaned the living room. Then she scrubbed the kitchen until the old ceramic utilities sparkled. Despite brief overly emotional thoughts of stomping the rose bushes to smithereens, she’d trimmed, fertilized, and treated them for insects. All that, and it wasn’t even two PM yet.
Perhaps she should eat. She should eat. But almost everything she put in her stomach came back up so she’d fallen into nibbling on toast or crackers.
She wasn’t underweight, but the lack of sleep, hours of crying, and another few dropped pounds left her face looking haunted.
She was haunted. Haunted by all the knowing looks her colleagues shot her at work. She’d not breathed a word to anyone except Kelly, but Adam had asked for her not to care for his patients. No one said anything, of course, but they all knew. Word traveled fast.
Unable to keep going over what she’d already spent hours and hours trying to figure out to no avail, Liz headed to the bathroom. She’d give it a good going over as she had the kitchen.
She got the tub, toilet, and sink as spotless as was humanly possible then decided to clean the small closet. She’d not done much in the way of going through Gramps’s things and today was as good as any for getting rid of his toiletries.
She tossed away item after item. When she pulled out a ceramic mug with a shaving brush inside, she sat on the floor and bawled. Memories of, as a child, watching Gramps slather cream onto his strong, cleft chin with the brush and then shave racked her body with grief.
Lord, how she missed him.
Just as she missed the man who’d left her as surely as Gramps had.
Knowing she was preparing for a full-blown pity-party if she sat on the floor a second longer, she reached for a plastic bin of her personal toiletries so she could wipe the shelf down.
When her eyes landed on what the box held she realized what else she’d been missing for…three months.
Liz couldn’t believe she was pregnant.
She’d bought two pregnancy kits and both had shown positive. Still, she couldn’t believe it. To believe it meant acknowledging that she was pregnant by a man who no longer wanted to be a part of her life.
Personally, she’d decided he’d lost his mind. How else could one explain him going from the perfect lover and companion to his cold-hearted treatment? He hadn’t even had the decency to break things off. After a year-long relationship he’d just gone to avoiding her.
Her eyes closed.
Now they were no more and his baby grew inside her.
Adam may not have been willing to love her, but he’d given her something precious. His child.
For the first time in what seemed like for ever, Liz smiled as light-heartedness filled her heart.
“Did you and Adam work things out?” Kelly asked the next morning from behind the nurses’ station where they stood talking during a short lull. They’d both taken notes at shift change, been busy with patients, but Liz had caught her friend staring curiously at her several times.
She shook her head, took a sip of the vitamin-packed drink she’d purchased from a vending machine minutes before, and continued with the chart notation she was working on. “I haven’t seen Adam since that day here at the hospital.”
“You were humming,” Kelly accused, leaning against the desk Liz sat at.
That got Liz’s attention. Humming? Not lullabies, she hoped since she’d not told a soul of her news. Although she’d used the two home kits and both had showed positive, she wanted her pregnancy confirmed by a gynecologist before she told anyone.
Plus, she’d tell Adam first.
Despite everything, he deserved to hear the news that he was going to be a father before anyone else.
She’d had brief thoughts of packing her things and leaving Robertsville, leaving behind the memories and making a fresh start for herself and the baby without him ever being the wiser that they’d made a baby. But the thoughts had been brief.
Ever the fool, her heart belonged to him and deceiving him so cruelly as to hide their child wasn’t something she could do.
And although she should be upset that she was having a baby with a man who’d essentially pushed her out of his life without a word of explanation, she wasn’t.
She hadn’t thought about having a baby any time soon, had even been on birth control, but she must have missed one at some point when Gramps had been having a bad night. Although she had always thought of motherhood as something far off in her future, the idea of having a baby to love, a child to fill the house with laughter, made her giddy with how blessed she was.
Adam had unknowingly given her what she’d needed. Someone to love and be loved by. Not just someone, their baby.
Would they have a son or a daughter?
She didn’t care. Just so long as their baby was healthy.
“Liz? You’re doing it again,” Kelly interrupted her thoughts.
“Doing what?”
“Smiling. Humming.” She arched a brow in question, her gaze narrowed. “It’s good to have you back, but what’s happened?”
Liz shook her head. “Nothing.”
“Don’t tell me that. Something’s up.” Kelly eyed her suspiciously. “Have you met someone new?”
“No.” She wanted to tell Kelly her news, but she had to tell Adam first. But she wouldn’t be lying to say someone new had entered her life. Someone had. Adam’s baby. Kelly had been so worried the past few weeks. She smiled conspiratorially at her friend. “You might say someone’s come into my life.”
“Oh, Liz!” Kelly exclaimed, looking both shocked and pleased while she hugged her. “This is wonderful news. I’m so relieved. I worried you wouldn’t get over Adam. I know how much you cared about him.”
She wouldn’t get over Adam. Not really. But she would go on and she would have happiness. Knowing about the precious gift inside her removed any doubt that she’d have a bright future.
“I discovered there’s room in my heart to love someone besides just Adam Cline, that’s all.”
Which meant the hell Adam had been through for the past few weeks had all been worth it.
Liz was moving on.
Quicker than he’d expected. Quick enough that a sharp sting burned his chest. Just his pride hurting, he was sure. The fact his vision held a hazy green, well, that was the after-effects of too many hours in the OR, worry over Liz, worry over his MS, worry over what he was going to do about May Probst, and not enough shut-eye. Not jealousy.
Adam swallowed the lump in his throat at the thought of anyone kissing Liz’s lips other than him.
“Dr Cline,” a patient’s wife said from behind him, causing the two oblivious-to-his-presence nurses to jerk toward him. “I’m so glad to see you,” the woman continued, unaware of the shock emanating from Liz and Kelly at being overheard. “Herbert’s bled through his bandage, and we really weren’t expecting that much blood after his hernia repair. I was coming to find his nurse so she could check him, but since you’re here, you should.”
Herbert, bandage, blood, he mentally noted, but his eyes didn’t leave Liz’s pink cheeks. She was blushing. Blushing.
Her face held guilt.
Blushing cheeks, guilty expression.
Little more than a week ago he’d been in her bed. What had she done since then that would make her react this way?
The sting in his chest intensified, painting his whole world a deep green. A very jealous shade of green.
He should be happy Liz was moving on with her life. Wasn’t that what he wanted? For her to find happiness? To find someone who could give her all the things she deserved?
Herbert’s wife cleared her throat. “Dr Cline?”
“I’ll be by his room in a few minutes to check him, Mrs Donahue. If you’ll wait there?”
The woman glanced from Adam to where he stared at the two nurses. Obviously curious,
but polite enough not to ask, she nodded. “Thank you, Dr Cline. I’ll be in Herb’s room.”
Willing his eyes away from Liz, Adam pinned Kelly with his glare. “Are you taking care of Herbert Donahue?”
“Angel is,” Kelly said, not backing down an inch from her protective stance next to Liz. “But I can check him, if you like. Or do you want me to page Angel?”
He could feel Liz’s silky gaze on his features and without meaning to he met her eyes head on.
“Yes.” He didn’t look away, didn’t indicate that he’d answered Kelly’s question, just waited.
“Anything else?” Kelly asked, humor in her voice. Humor that indicated she knew he’d overheard Liz and she knew his secret. He was burning alive inside.
“That’ll be all. Thanks.” He spun to go to Herbert’s room before he made a complete idiot of himself by asking who Liz had been spending her time with.
After all, just because he refused to burden her with a life sentence, that didn’t mean just any replacement would do. Liz deserved someone wonderful. Someone who could appreciate her finer qualities. Someone who would rub her aching calves after she’d pulled an extra-long shift. Someone who knew she adored home-made banana pudding from the mom and pop diner they’d occasionally snuck away to. Someone who understood how she’d felt about Gramps.
He was all those things, of course, but he didn’t qualify to be Liz’s man. Not with his ticking time bomb health.
“I can’t believe he didn’t even say hello to you,” Kelly complained behind his back, having to know he could hear.
“It’s OK,” Liz replied in a calm voice that hinted she was warning her friend to stay out of it.
“Maybe he needs an antidepressant,” Kelly persisted.
“Adam isn’t depressed.”
He wasn’t so sure about that. At the moment, the thought of Liz with another man left him darned depressed.
Moments later, Liz took off toward the nearest exit—which happened to be the front hospital entrance. She could barely catch her breath. Adam had looked upset. Not only that, but she wasn’t the only one who’d lost weight. Although the changes were subtle she’d seen the difference in his jaw line, his cheeks, in the way his clothes hung on his body. The question was, why would Adam be losing weight if freedom was what he wanted?
