An Unexpected Father

by Marie Ferrarella

  Brady knew that he needed something to cling to, no matter how thin. “It doesn’t?”

  She realized what he was asking her—and why. Harper rose to the occasion. “No, I’ve known one kid to come down with the flu while his sibling, sleeping only a few feet away, didn’t even get so much as a cough or a sore throat, much less come down with anything more serious.”

  Brady appreciated her effort. It hit him that he came from a large family. He had grown up surrounded by siblings. “How did I miss all this growing up?” he upbraided himself.

  “Don’t beat yourself up,” Harper told him. “Kids are usually self-centered and don’t really pay attention to anything around them. It’s normal,” she assured Brady. “And another thing you might not be aware of, a lot of kids run a temperature in the morning, then it’s gone in the afternoon, only to reappear in the evening. It’s all part of a pattern. For the most part, kids are really resilient.” Harper’s eyes met his as he came to a red light and turned around to look at her. “It’s going to be okay,” she promised Brady.

  Toby suddenly stirred, moaned and then opened his eyes. Harper looked at the boy more closely. She could see that his eyes were watery.

  “Harper,” Toby said in a raspy voice that made it sound as if he was on the verge of crying. “I don’t feel so good.”

  “We’re taking you home, honey. You’re going to be okay,” she told the twin firmly. Harper twisted around in her seat so that she could hold the boy’s hand.

  It felt hot, just like the rest of him.

  “Drive a little faster, Brady,” she told him in a calm voice that belied the concern she was feeling.

  * * *

  “I’ll take him up to his room,” Harper volunteered when Brady pulled up in his driveway. “You bring up Tyler.”

  “Maybe they should be in separate rooms,” Brady suggested. He felt totally at a loss as to how to handle any of this.

  “I think that’s kind of like closing the barn door after the horse got out,” she replied. “They’re always together so Tyler has been exposed already. If he’s going to get sick, he will,” she told Brady as she carried Toby to the front door.

  Holding Tyler against his shoulder with one hand, Brady quickly unlocked the front door for her with the other.

  “I already checked out Tyler,” she told Brady, “and he doesn’t feel warm to me.”

  Walking into the house, she carried Toby up the stairs and into his room. She set him on the bed, then very carefully took off his clothes and put him into his pajamas. The boy slept through most of it, waking up for a moment only to fall back asleep.

  Brady stood back, looking really concerned. “Maybe we should take him to the hospital,” he said as he changed Tyler into his pajamas.

  “It’s probably just a cold or maybe the flu,” she told Brady. “I’ll go get the thermometer so we can see what we’re up against.”

  Because Toby had fallen asleep, Harper took the boy’s temperature under his armpit. She adjusted her reading because of the thermometer’s location.

  Despite how hot his head felt, Toby’s temperature wasn’t registering all that high.

  But Brady still didn’t feel better about the situation. “I can’t stand to see him like this,” he told Harper as he looked down at Toby. The twin looked incredibly small and vulnerable to him. “Look, I know you usually go home at the end of the day, but would you mind staying, you know, the night?”

  Damn, he sounded like some awkward teenager, Brady thought, annoyed with himself. He decided to level with her and confessed, “I’m really out of my element here. I’ll pay you overtime,” he quickly offered.

  “You don’t have to pay me overtime,” she told him, waving the suggestion away. This was not about the money. It never had been. “I’ll be happy to stay with Toby.”

  “You will?” Brady looked visibly relieved. He needed someone here who knew what they were doing. “You have no idea how grateful I am.”

  Harper smiled at him. “Oh, I think I can guess. Why don’t you go to bed and get some sleep?” she suggested, then told him, “I’ll stay in here with the boys.”

  Brady looked around the room as if he hadn’t seen it before. “But there’s no bed for you,” he pointed out.

  “No, but there is a recliner,” she said. It had been the first thing to catch her eye when she had initially seen the room. “Don’t worry. I’ll make do,” Harper assured him. “Now go to bed. He’ll probably wake up tomorrow morning with energy to spare.”

  He looked at the boy’s tiny face, concern evident on his own. “I hope you’re right,” he told her.

  “I’ll remind you that you said that,” she promised with a smile. “Now go, get some rest.”

  “Okay.”

  Exhausted and drained, Brady left the room, convinced he wasn’t going to get a wink of sleep.

  He was asleep a second after his head hit the pillow.

  * * *

  Brady woke up with a start.

  It was morning.

  How did that happen? he upbraided himself. Somehow, he had slept straight through the night. That hardly ever happened anymore. At least, not in the last six months.

  Awake now, thoughts of Toby flooded his brain. Guilt was less than half a beat behind.

  Looking down at himself, Brady realized that he had fallen asleep in his clothes. Since he had, there was no need to get dressed. He even had on his shoes.

  Brady quickly made his way to the twins’ room.

  He found Harper there and she was already awake, looking uncommonly fresh, especially given the situation.

  That only succeeded in making him feel twice as guilty as he already did.

  Moving as quietly as possible, Brady came up behind Harper and asked her, “How is he?”

  “Well, he still has a fever,” she told him, not wanting to hide anything from Brady. “But the good news is Tyler seems fine. When Toby wakes up, I’m going to give him a sponge bath, try to lower his temperature.”

  “The hospital—”

  “Will still be there if we decide to take him as another option later. But at the moment, I don’t think there’s a reason to panic. I’ll make him drink a lot of liquids. I’ll watch him and if his fever goes up or he gets worse, we can take him in then. But in my experience, that’s a last resort.”

  He didn’t know if he was up to this waiting game. “Why don’t we just take him in now?” Brady wanted to know.

  “Because we might not have to,” Harper explained. “And I don’t think you want to teach him to panic at the first sign that he might be coming down with something,” she added.

  “But—”

  “You want to raise these boys to learn how to take things in stride,” Harper advised, then asked, “Don’t you?”

  She was making sense, Brady thought, nodding his head. “You’re right,” he agreed, then looked down at Toby. “I guess this whole thing just made me lose my head.”

  She laughed softly and gave his hand a quick, warm squeeze. “Face it. You’re a first-time parent and you got into the game late. Reacting the way you did is just a sign that you care,” Harper told him. “And in case that fact managed to escape you, that’s a good thing.”

  He blew out a long breath. Becoming the twins’ guardian had made for a rough six months, but to date this was by far the roughest thing he had gone through. “I’d go to pieces if you weren’t here, you know that, don’t you?” he asked Harper.

  To his surprise, she shook her head. “No, you’d get on the phone to one of your married cousins or siblings and you’d ask for their advice,” she contradicted. “And then you’d get through this.”

  He wasn’t buying it. She was an important part in his being able to handle this. “Don’t sell yourself short. If you weren’t here, I’d be a complete basket case by now,” he told Harper.
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  “No, you wouldn’t be,” she insisted. “But instead of arguing with me, why don’t you go down and make us some breakfast?” Harper suggested.

  He laughed at the idea. She had to know better, he thought. In case she didn’t, he asked her, “I take it you have your heart set on coming down with a case of ptomaine poisoning.”

  Harper smiled, taking him at his word. “That bad, huh?”

  “Well, I can open a cereal box,” Brady responded. “And the refrigerator to take out a carton of milk, but not much else.”

  She shook her head, totally amazed at his inability to do something she considered to be so simple. Scrambling eggs. But then, she had been the one to do the shopping, she recalled. Prior to her first trip to the grocery store, there hadn’t been all that much in the refrigerator, she reminded herself.

  “You stay with the boys. I’ll go and grab a quick shower,” she told him, beginning to leave the room.

  “Um, Harper?”

  She turned around and looked at Brady. He looked utterly lost again, she thought. “What do I do if he wakes up?”

  She didn’t understand his problem. “Same thing you’ve been doing when he wakes up.”

  “But he’s sick now,” Brady protested.

  She still didn’t understand. “Hasn’t he ever been sick before?” Harper asked incredulously.

  “Not really. He had a slight cold once, but that didn’t slow him down. But now...” His voice trailed off as he looked at the boy. Suddenly, Toby looked almost terribly lost in his bed.

  Brady couldn’t remember ever feeling so helpless in his entire life.

  “If he wakes up, you take hold of his hand and tell him that everything’s going to be all right.” She looked at him with sympathy. She imagined this had to be hard on Brady. “Really sell it,” she advised, then asked, “Anything else?”

  “No,” Brady answered. He was up to this, he told himself. Everything was going to be all right.

  “Be back soon,” Harper promised.

  * * *

  She wasn’t gone five minutes when Toby moaned and opened his eyes. Brady’s first instinct was to call for Harper.

  Instead, he made his way over to Toby. “How are you feeling, soldier?” he asked the lethargic-looking little boy.

  Huge puppy-dog eyes looked up at him. “Terrible,” he complained.

  “Well, you’ll be back to your old self before you know it,” Brady promised, trying to sound as positive as possible.

  Tyler was up and he crawled up next to him as he asked, worried, “He’s not going to die, is he?”

  “No, he’s not going to die, Tyler,” he told the boy. “Whatever made you ask something like that?”

  “You looked so worried,” Tyler answered. “I thought that maybe...maybe...” He sniffled. “Well, you know.”

  Yes, he knew, Brady thought. The boy had let his imagination get the better of him. “Don’t worry, Ty.” He hugged the boy to him. “Toby will be back to his old self very soon.”

  Tyler rolled that over in his head. “Can it not be too soon?” he asked.

  “Why would you say that?” he wanted to know.

  Tyler tugged on the bottom of Brady’s sweatshirt, beckoning him to bend down to his level. “He’s nicer this way. Doesn’t call me any funny names or anything,” he whispered.

  “Well, when your brother gets better, we’ll have a talk with him about that,” Brady promised. That seemed to placate Tyler. “All right, boys, what would you like for breakfast?” he asked, doing his best to pretend everything was going as usual.

  Toby, who looked as if he was slipping in and out of consciousness, stared up at Brady. He shook his head. “I’m not hungry.”

  “Now there’s a first,” he said, trying to lighten the mood because Tyler looked apprehensive as he stared at his brother. Toby had always been an eating machine.

  “Maybe we should take him to the hospital,” Brady murmured, feeling uneasy about the situation. What if he got really bad?

  “Hospital?” Tyler cried, his voice going up. The word hospital made him think of his parents. His grandmother had told him that his parents had been taken to the hospital and had died there. The facts had gotten muddled, but the effect remained. “Is he going to die?” the little boy cried, his eyes welling up immediately.

  “No, he’s not going to die,” Brady said firmly, trying to reassure Tyler. “I’m just a little worried, but we’re not going to the hospital yet. Let’s wait a little and see if your brother can get better on his own,” he told Tyler.

  He fervently hoped he wasn’t being too lax. By the same token, he didn’t want Tyler to panic.

  Brady looked toward the door, willing Harper to come back and take over. She had a way of making everything seem as if it was going to be all right.

  He never needed to be reassured more than he did right at this moment.

  Chapter Fifteen

  All things considered, Toby’s fever cleared up rather quickly. But it was obvious to Harper that the little boy wasn’t back to his normal self. Whatever he had come down with was lingering in his system. The mischievous glint was gone from his eyes and his behavior was entirely subdued.

  That was when she put in a call to the recently built Rambling Rose Pediatric Center and asked to speak to the boys’ pediatrician, Wayne Patterson. She wanted to be sure she wasn’t being too laid-back about the whole thing. The doctor himself came on the phone. He listened quietly to her narrative, then said something that put her mind at ease, indicating that he was on top of the situation.

  “Sounds like Toby caught what’s been making the rounds lately,” Dr. Patterson told her. “You say that Toby’s fever only lasted for the day and that it’s gone now?”

  “Yes, but he doesn’t have any of his usual energy,” she told the doctor.

  “That’s normal, too,” the doctor confirmed. “Just keep him resting for as long as possible. Be sure to give him plenty of liquids and see that he eats well. No junk food,” Dr. Patterson specified. “This should run its course in a few days, tops. If it doesn’t, or he starts to regress, call my office immediately and bring him in. But between the two of us, I don’t think you have anything to worry about,” the doctor concluded.

  That was a relief, Harper thought. She had begun to think that she was being too blasé. “Thank you, Doctor.”

  “My pleasure, Ms. Radcliffe,” the pediatrician replied.

  Though heartened by the pediatrician’s prognosis, Harper still remained at the house for the duration of Toby’s confinement. Tyler, too, stayed with his brother, no doubt still concerned. For the most part, rather than video games, she had all of them playing simple board games that the twins had brought with them when they moved to Rambling Rose.

  When they grew tired of playing those, she read stories to them, holding Toby and Tyler captive by doing different voices for the various characters in the stories.

  Since she was there, keeping the twins occupied, this allowed Brady to continue working at the hotel. But he made a point of trying to keep his hours reasonable so he could get home before either of the twins was asleep. He felt it only fair to provide Harper with at least temporary relief since she had agreed to stay at his house.

  However, today Brady was unable to come home as early as he had the two previous days, although he did call to check on Toby’s condition. When he finally did get home, no one was downstairs in the family room or the living room.

  Growing apprehensive—had Toby gotten worse and been taken to the emergency room?—he went looking for her and the twins.

  Taking the stairs, he experienced a sense of relief when he heard what sounded like a rollicking story being played out.

  And then he heard the twins laughing.

  Both of them, he realized.

  That meant that Toby had to be getting better, he t
hought, pleased. He hadn’t heard Toby laugh since the boy had gotten sick.

  Brady took the rest of the stairs two at a time. From the sound of it, he expected to find Harper and the boys gathered around the small TV he had brought into the twins’ room.

  When he reached the bedroom doorway, Brady was surprised to discover that there was no television program or Blu-ray Disc being played. All the different voices he had heard were coming from one source.

  Harper.

  Fascinated, he stood just shy of the doorway, listening to the story she told for several minutes—until Tyler looked up and became aware of his presence.

  “Unca Brady, you’re home!” the boy cried, running up and then throwing his arms around Brady’s waist, hugging him as hard as he could.

  Surprised as well as pleased, Brady smiled down at the boy, giving Tyler a hug back.

  “It sure looks that way,” Brady said to the boy. One arm around Tyler’s shoulders, he guided the boy back to Toby’s bed. “So how are you two feeling?” he asked the twins.

  “Great!” Tyler cried with enthusiasm. He had never caught Toby’s flu.

  “I’m getting better all the time,” Toby proudly announced, then pouted, “But Harper won’t let me get out of bed to play.”

  “Harper’s a wise lady,” Brady told the boy solemnly. “If I were you, I’d listen to what she has to say.”

  It was obvious that Toby clearly thought he was missing out on something. But instead of arguing with Brady—or Harper—he just sighed dramatically, a clear sign to Brady that the boy still wasn’t operating at a hundred percent of his normal energy.

  Well, he’d take what he could get, Brady thought. He glanced toward Harper, thinking that the woman had to have supernatural powers. There was no other explanation for Toby’s behavior.

  Harper took advantage of the slight lull. “Have you eaten yet?” she asked Brady.

  He shook his head. “I came straight home so I could see these guys before you put them to bed,” he confessed, smiling at the twins again. “Work ran long today,” he said, explaining why he had arrived home later than he had the last few days.