Following Doctor's Orders

by Caro Carson

  Brooke got to her feet, wrapped Zoe in one of his dark navy towels, and handed him his daughter. “Here you go. One completely adorable tax deduction, squeaky clean.”

  Later, when it was just the two of them, she’d been sitting on his bed, brushing her hair before bed.

  He wanted to try again, when no little girl would join them on the porch steps. He sat behind her and took the brush out of her hand, ready to take over a task that always struck him as sensual with Brooke, and tried to think how to open the conversation about children that they needed to have.

  She turned toward him first. “What if I gave up my apartment?”

  He was stunned at the abrupt question. “You want to live with me?”

  “I kind of already am. I was at my apartment today, and I realized it’s really just an expensive closet now.”

  She turned back around, and he began stroking her hair, choosing his words with care. “Charisse’s parents are certain that she and this Tony guy don’t want primary custody of Zoe. Maybe your place is a safety net. If you get rid of it, it would be harder for you to move out if you changed your mind. Are you sure living with Zoe isn’t going to become too much?”

  He ought to be thrilled to have Brooke here full-time, but it didn’t sit right with him. It was a commitment of one sort, but it wasn’t marriage.

  It’s rent.

  “Zoe is so sweet, it’s been much easier than I’d thought. You’d have to let me pay some bills here when I don’t have any more there. We could work on that bathroom together.”

  They turned the lights out. The sheets were smooth and cool, her body warm and pliant. She molded herself to his side.

  “Whose bed should we keep?” she asked. “I like your couch better than mine. I don’t think my table will fit in your kitchen.”

  “We’ll have a lot of decisions to make, I guess.” He looked forward to it, or he would, when he got used to the idea. It was everything he wanted—but it wasn’t. Still, he must have been making too much of a big deal over a few days of distance. If she wasn’t afraid to let go of her apartment, if she was willing to live with a small child, then the sky was the limit. He wanted to marry her. He’d find a way to pay for an engagement ring, and then he’d find the right time to ask her.

  When you find the woman you understand and who understands you back, you don’t let anything stand in your way.

  As he kissed her, he thought it was time to stop waiting for the perfect time. She was obviously not as fragile as he’d thought when it came to Zoe. He’d buy that ring right away, and then he’d tell her that he wanted more than a roommate. He wanted forever.

  She broke off the kiss and touched him in the dark, running her fingers through his hair to settle on the nape of his neck, a motion he’d come to love in the weeks of their love.

  “This is going to work out so well,” she said softly. “When we have to work at the same time, the hospital day care center will take Zoe if we’re cohabitating.”

  Zach pulled back as if she’d slapped him. Alarms went off—real alarms, from the two-way radio he was required to keep on standby for Texas Rescue.

  He and Brooke both slept with their phones on during flash flood season, because they could be called in for emergency shifts. For Texas Rescue, a two-way radio connected Zach to the crew of the chopper.

  Cursing, he silenced the alarm as Brooke reached for her phone.

  “Looks like I’m on standby tomorrow.” Her face was illuminated by the phone screen.

  “Flash flood warnings are back on,” Zach said, reading the two lines of green text on his handheld radio.

  They returned their devices to their end tables and settled into their pillows once more. Those updates had been sent at exactly midnight, an automated procedure. He and Brooke were too experienced in these drills to be alarmed.

  Zoe was not experienced at all. She came trembling into the bedroom, barefoot in her pink ruffles, and climbed onto the mattress that was almost too tall for her to scale. Zach cursed again, silently this time, for forgetting the alarm would wake her. That alarm was designed to wake the hardest sleeping adult around. Even he found it too jarring. Maybe he could keep it partially muffled in the future, wrapped in a towel.

  Without trying to tuck Zoe back into her new bed, Brooke settled her onto her pillow and put her arm around her. Zach wasn’t sure it was a good precedent to set, but knowing tomorrow had the potential to be a taxing day, sleep was more important than having a parenting discussion with Brooke now.

  Brooke had her arm on Zoe, so Zach put his arm on Brooke, and he fell asleep hoping for the best.

  Hours later, in the gray of a stormy dawn, he woke to the kick of a diminutive foot in his stomach. His daughter—would he ever get used to those words?—was sound asleep, blond curls on Brooke’s pillow. He touched one, amazed anew at the miracle that was his child.

  And then the sleep of fog was burned away in a flash. Brooke had done it again, as she had on the steps, as she had in the kitchen. She’d replaced herself with a child.

  Enough. The middle of the night was as good as any time to find out for once and for all why he was losing Brooke.

  Chapter Eighteen

  The nightmare left her so lonely.

  Brooke woke, knowing she was only halfway done with the misery. First, the nightmare had to be endured from beginning to end. She would be smiled at. Treasured. Then all that would be taken away in a flash, and although she knew it was hopeless, she would beg for the love to stay.

  Now that she was awake, she had to recover. It was just a dream. Take a breath. Nothing bad has happened.

  Except it had. Her heart had been broken. The emotions were real and fresh and sharp.

  She rolled onto her back in the new twin bed. Zoe’s night-light cast five-pointed stars on the ceiling. Her pillow smelled like baby shampoo. Everything that Zoe touched was transformed into something charming, something innocent. The magic of her childish world touched everyone lucky enough to be in her circle.

  This was the magic that Brooke’s father had decided not to even try to live without. Eighteen years ago today, he’d decided there was no reason to stay if his little girl was gone. Brooke had not had enough magic left by the age of twelve to keep him.

  The sky outside was more black than gray. The rain was steady, the kind that could last all day. That meant flash floods were possible all over the city of Austin. Roadways would become impassable in a matter of minutes as dry creek beds suddenly filled to overflowing. She wouldn’t be able to visit the cemetery where her father’s ashes were interred.

  The relief made her cry.

  She was so tired of being brave. So tired of doing the right thing. She just wanted to go back in time. Not eighteen years—no, no, no. She just wanted to go back two weeks or so. She wanted to laugh with Zach and have crazy good sex and enjoy the world. Delicious food, delicious music, delicious man. That had been magic for her.

  She wanted Zach.

  The bedroom door suddenly opened and Zach stepped into the light, stars splashed across his chest and arms and half his face. He didn’t look loving and magical. He looked furious.

  “What are you doing in here?” he demanded in a tone that was angry despite its quiet volume.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered, feeling like a child who’d been caught doing something bad.

  That was ridiculous. She wasn’t hurting his daughter’s bedroom. She sat up and pushed the blankets off. The little motion stirred the air and she realized her cheeks were wet. Real tears. She put her hands to her cheeks.

  “Brooke.” Her name seemed to have been ripped from his star-covered chest. He crossed the small room and joined her on the bed, scooping her against that chest in one motion. “A nightmare. Is that why you left our bed, so you wouldn’t wake me with your tears
? Darlin’, don’t you know I never want you to cry alone?”

  She couldn’t do it. The dream was too recent. She couldn’t play it off as if she wasn’t devastated. She couldn’t pretend she didn’t want to completely succumb to every horrible emotion in her heart.

  She cried. Oh, how she cried, and Zach kept her cheek pressed to his heart, strong arms holding her as she sobbed, warm hand soothing her hair.

  When she was spent, she wiped her face on a corner of the soft sheets and looked out the window rather than at Zach. The rain was relentless.

  “Did you get called in?” she asked. “Is that why you’re up?”

  “I came to find you. You keep leaving whenever Zoe’s around. You have to be honest with me. Zoe is stirring up all your emotions about your sister, isn’t she?”

  “No, it’s not Zoe. If anything, she’s reminded me of everything good about Chelsea. It makes me feel...content, knowing that the world still has lovely, magical little girls. Innocence isn’t gone, after all. It’s right here.”

  Zach brushed his fingers over her cheek. “Then why the tears? Weren’t you dreaming about your sister again?”

  “No.” Her words were a whisper. Her throat hurt with the truth. “I was having nightmares about you.”

  He was silent.

  “It was your love that suddenly disappeared. I think it’s because you’re a father now. You have more than one person to care for.”

  “Brooke. Please, Brooke. If you don’t believe anything I ever say or any promise I ever make, believe this—Zoe cannot replace you in my heart. It doesn’t matter how much I love Zoe, I love you, too. I need you. I want to see your face every day.”

  The sweetness of his words was soothing, but the nightmare was still so fresh. “You know, my father loved all of us. My mom, my sister, me. As long as we were all together, he could love us all. But once we were parted, he said he had to choose. Mom and I were here. Chelsea was in heaven. He couldn’t be with all of us anymore. He chose Chelsea.”

  Miserable, she pulled her knees up to her chest and hugged herself. “That’s how he explained it in the note he left behind.”

  Zach nodded, one sharp nod of understanding. He stood to pace in the small room, stars moving across his body as he took two steps away and then turned back to her.

  “You think I would choose my little girl over you, because your father chose his little girl over you. That’s why you’ve been stepping away every time Zoe is near. You assume I’d rather hug her than you. You assume I’d rather sit next to her than you. You’re wrong. I haven’t chosen between you two. I never will.”

  You never know what you’ll do until you’re in that situation yourself...

  “I know his note was wrong. He wasn’t really choosing between me and Chelsea. Thank God for medical school. The classes we took on biochemistry of the brain, the pharma classes on how and why antidepressants work, they helped me see my dad’s death in a whole new light. I know why he really took his life. Losing Chelsea triggered a profound medical depression, something beyond even the huge grief that is considered normal after the death of a child. He killed himself because he was mentally ill.”

  “Eighteen years ago? Today was the day, wasn’t it? I lost track of time.”

  She nodded and kept her arms firmly around her knees. It was a long time ago, and yet she could so easily remember being in this position as a preteen, hugging bony knees that didn’t quite fit her body yet.

  “When did you start medical school? Eight years ago?”

  “Nine.”

  “Nine years out of eighteen. The first nine years, you believed your father’s note. You really thought you lost him because Chelsea was more precious than you.”

  Her tears started fresh. There was no reason for them. Just because Zach understood her so well? That ought to make her happy, not sad.

  “You are in my heart, Brooke. So is Zoe. That is where you both will stay, always. Even if the worst should happen, I’ll never be without either one of you.”

  “Zach, that is beautiful.”

  “I want you to remember it, if you ever start to think your father’s note was true.”

  “Once I’m fully awake, I can put it in perspective. I know he was sick. But those first few minutes in the dark, it’s different.”

  “Then from now on, I’ll carry Zoe back to her own bed when she comes into our room. You need to sleep with me. When you have a nightmare, you turn to me. Wake me up if I haven’t heard you dreaming. The first thing I’ll tell you is that I refuse to ever make a choice between you and Zoe. I’ll tell you a hundred times that you are too precious to leave.”

  The two-way radio alarm sounded in the next room.

  Texas Rescue was asking him to leave right now.

  * * *

  Brooke knew she’d been saved by the bell, or in this case, the alarm.

  Zach understood her almost too well. He’d so accurately guessed that a rational knowledge of mental illness didn’t easily wipe out nine years of believing an irrational man’s final words. It was only a matter of time before Zach figured out that her new mission in life was to make sure nothing bad ever happened to Zoe.

  There was no reason to believe that he would handle grief as self-destructively as her father had, but she intended to keep Zoe so safe, she’d never find out. If she was a little irrational in achieving her goal—for example, sitting Zoe next to Zach on the porch steps so that he’d catch her before she could fall again—well, it wasn’t hurting anyone.

  Two hours after Zach was called in for Texas Rescue One, Brooke was called into the ER. She was bringing Zoe with her to stay in the hospital day care center. The ER was not yet swamped, but when bad weather was expected to cause injuries in the population, the hospital called in the staff before roads became impassable. Not knowing how long she’d be at work, she wore scrubs and sneakers instead of her usual skirt, and packed a set of pajamas in a tote bag for Zoe.

  She was still driving toward the outskirts of Austin when she hit the first intersection that was under a few inches of flowing water. It was so tempting to drive through, but the motto Turn Around, Don’t Drown was well known in Central Texas. Any amount of flowing water on a road was considered to be dangerous.

  She debated a second longer. Who was she kidding? She had Zoe with her; she wasn’t taking any chances with safety. Although cars around her drove through the intersection, Brooke turned around.

  The relentless rain made finding an alternate route all the more challenging. Twice more, Brooke was stopped and turned around. The police were requiring it now at several points.

  “My, my. It certainly is raining cats and dogs.”

  Zoe’s perfectly enunciated line must have been one of her grandmother’s sayings. It sounded adorable from such a tiny girl. The comedic relief was appreciated as Brooke continued to work her way north, trying to find a way to go around the flooding to get to the hospital.

  “Oopsie. That car felled down.”

  Brooke crept slowly around a car that had spun out into a gulley. Rushing water was nearly as high as its hood. Police were already on the scene, so Brooke kept going.

  At last, she came to a new road that had been built to run alongside a creek bed, rather than crossing it. Brooke joined the line of slow-moving cars who were taking advantage of the clear road. The new construction narrowed to a single lane after a mile. Traffic went from a crawl to a stop.

  Brooke craned her neck to see how far ahead the cars were stopped. Then she checked her rearview mirror to see how many were behind her.

  She double-checked the mirror.

  A brown wave of churning water was coming up the road, knocking cars crookedly out of its path. It was relentless, looking just like the footage of the tsunami that had made the world news a few years ago. It was fast. And Broo
ke’s car was a sitting duck.

  She turned back around and pressed the back of her head to the headrest to prevent whiplash. “Hang on, Zoe. There’s going to be a bump. Put your head back, like I’m doing.”

  The impact sent them forward a couple of feet, and then the water rushed past them. They’d been on a road. Now they were in a river, her car like a boulder scattered among so many other boulders.

  “You’re doing great, Zoe. Good girl.”

  “What is the water for?” Her voice sounded a little panicky and completely bewildered.

  Brooke tried to set the right tone. “It’s from all the rain. It will go away again. We just have to wait. It may be a while, but we’re safe in the car.”

  Please let us be safe. Please don’t let me be the one who harmed Zoe.

  Waters receded as quickly as they rose in flash floods. Sometimes. On the other hand, the evening news often showed roads that had flooded under and stayed that way.

  The seams of the doors were watertight. So far. She’d had no choice but to take the hit. Now she had no choice but to wait it out. She adjusted the rearview mirror so she could see Zoe.

  A second push, gentler than the first, nudged them farther along. A car behind them bumped into them, the heavy vehicle moving in slow motion in the speeding water.

  Brooke’s car began to move.

  It was a strange feeling, like being levitated. They floated a few feet and came to a stop, but the reprieve was short-lived. The muddy water lifted them once more. They bumped other cars on their way, traveling on water that reached halfway up the trees that marked where the side of the road had been.

  She had no control. She had a preschooler completely entrusted to her care, and she had no control in a raging river of muddy water.

  Her front bumper hit the tree and stuck. For a moment, she was grateful for the stability, until she realized the back half of the car was sinking.

  “Zoe!” She took off her seat belt and scrambled over the center console to reach Zoe’s car seat. She released the straps and pulled Zoe into the front with her. The car was still dry, but the back end was sinking lower and lower into the water. She could see churning waves inching up the trunk lid toward the rear window. The back door started leaking, water trickling in steadily. It was only a matter of time now. Did she have five minutes? Ten?