Hip Check (New York Blades) (27 page)

“Which brings us back to the fact that I’m a big girl and I can take care of myself.”

Her father heaved a deep sigh. “All right, all right, I get it. I just . . .” He shook his head sadly.

Michelle stood. “You just what?”

“I’m just disappointed with you, okay? Now that the shock’s worn off, I’m disappointed.”

“Disappointed,” Michelle repeated blankly. She licked her lips. “That’s a little harsh, isn’t it?”

“I don’t know. Is it?”

Her pain began recombining itself with anger. “Creating a loving, safe home for a little girl who’s been through a huge trauma is the work of someone you’d call a ‘disappointment’? Interesting. I’m just glad Nell has someone to help her navigate all this, Dad. I didn’t. I’m sorry you feel disappointed in me, but I’m not going to apologize for the way things have evolved.”

Her father pushed himself up off the couch. “I should take off.”

“That sounds like a good idea.” She forced herself toward the kitchen. “Let me at least make up some leftovers for you.”

“No, no, don’t worry, I’m fine,” he called after her.

“Okay. If you say so.”

Michelle changed tact and walked toward the front hall, her dad following suit. She felt like they were in the concluding moments of some depressing Arthur Miller play as she helped her father put on his coat. There was such sadness here, but there was also an overwhelming sense of impotent rage, at least on her part.

“Have you got everything?” she checked.

“Yep. All good.” There was an awkward pause as Michelle opened the apartment door. “Thanks for having me for Christmas, kiddo. Thank Esa, too.”

“Of course.”

“When do the three of you get back from London? Friday?”

“Yeah. Around seven.”

“You’ll call me when you get back?”

“No, Dad, you’ll never hear from me again.” Being a wiseass helped ease some of the pressure in her chest.

Her father leaned in for a quick hug. “Love you, ’chelle.”

“Love you, too, Dad,” she managed. She started walking with him out into the hall but he told her she didn’t have to, he was fine, he was capable of going down to the street and hailing a cab himself. Michelle took the hint, read the subtext.
Love you, ’chelle, but I really don’t like you right now.
No, worse than that.
I’m disappointed in you.

He’d never said that to her before. It hurt more than she could have imagined. She felt a white hissing behind her eyes as tears tried to push themselves free, but she refused to cry. She hadn’t done anything wrong.

40

“We’ve been here
for an hour and a half. If I were a betting woman, I’d say we’re not going to get out of here for at least another two hours.”

Michelle heard Esa’s groan as they followed Nell to another carefully staged grouping of plush, stuffed animals. They were on the ground floor of Hamleys, London’s largest toy store. When Michelle had read that it was two hundred and fifty years old, with seven floors, she thought: who would want to miss that? The answer was: no one. It was mobbed. Every family in London, tourist or native, seemed to be here, and together they’d melded into one chattering, heaving mass of slowly dissipating goodwill. The smart, sane reaction would have been to turn around at once and leave at the sight of wall-to-wall kids and their parents. But Esa had made the mistake of telling Nell, long before they hit the store, that she could have any stuffed animal she liked; Nell wasn’t going anywhere. It was insane to be buying Nell another present—they’d celebrated Christmas two days ago—but Michelle understood the impulse: they were having dinner with Esa’s parents tonight. Esa was simply letting her pick out a reward ahead of time.

Her phone vibrated in the pocket of her jeans. She let the call go to voice mail; she didn’t want to be one of those obnoxious people who talked on their phone no matter where, no matter what. But then it rang again. When she pulled the phone from her pocket and saw who the caller was, she knew she had to take it.

* * *

“Just take a
slow, deep breath, okay?”

Michelle knew Esa was trying to be helpful, but she didn’t want to take a slow, deep breath. She wanted to wail in fear at the top of her lungs that her father was going to die, and it was going to happen when she was in a plane somewhere over the Atlantic Ocean.

Still, she did as he asked, more for Nell’s sake than anything else. Her poor girl looked petrified.

“Better?”

Michelle nodded.

They were in Michelle’s hotel room, waiting for a car to pick her up to take her back to Heathrow. Nell sat frozen in place at the room’s ornate desk, never taking her eyes off Michelle, watching, waiting. “C’mere.” Michelle pat the empty space beside her on the bed. It looked for a minute as if Nell wasn’t going to move—or worse,
couldn’t
—but then she clambered up beside Michelle, who put her arm around her.

“I know you’re worried about my dad,” said Michelle with a slight quaver in her voice. “And I am, too. But he’s gonna be okay.” She knew Nell, so she braced herself for what was coming.

“But what if he isn’t?” she asked, her eyes filling with tears.

“If he isn’t,” Michelle answered, pausing to compose herself, “we’ll worry about it then. But right now, we have to believe he’s going to be okay.”

Nell burrowed close to Michelle, wrapping her arms around her waist, resting her head against her chest. “I don’t see why we can’t all go back to New York. I don’t see why Uncle Esa and I have to stay.”

“I don’t, either,” said Esa. Nell’s head shot up, eyes full of hope. “Sorry, Nell,” he apologized glumly. “Dumb joke.”

Michelle felt guilty; she knew the last thing he wanted to do was have dinner with his folks tonight without her there. But neither of them had a choice: he couldn’t leave, and she sure as hell couldn’t stay. Her father had suffered a heart attack. It was even possible he was being prepped right now for his surgery. Triple bypass. Michelle was overcome with images of him: smoking cigarettes and cigars, eating cookies, and all those endless trays of goddamn lasagna they made down at the firehouse.
Goddamnit
.

“Michelle?”

She looked down at Nell, her image clear and bright, then wavy, then finally blurry as she realized she’d started to cry. “Oh.” Michelle swiped at her eyes. “Sorry, sweetie.”

“You’re afraid he’s going to die,” Nell whispered. “I know you are.”

“I’m not afraid he’s going to die, Nell,” Michelle lied calmly. “I just wish I was there right now.”

“Me, too.”

Michelle hugged her tighter. “Plus, I have
crazy brain
right now. My brain is bouncing all over the place.”

“Maybe Zak can make you feel better.”

Michelle smiled. “Maybe.”

“I’ll go get him.”

Nell scrambled off the bed to fetch the oversized, stuffed polar bear she’d chosen at Hamley’s, leaving Michelle and Esa alone for a moment.

“God, I wish I was going to be there to see you get that thing through customs,” Michelle sniffled.

“We’ll ship it ahead. I really think we should go back with you. Nell’s not going to care about a thing, now that you’re not here.”

“That’s not true. She was really looking forward to seeing Leslie.”

“I dunno . . .”

“You just want to avoid seeing your parents,” Michelle accused playfully.

“That’s not true!”

“Yes, it is!”

“No, it
isn’t
.”

Michelle closed her eyes as the mattress dipped from the weight of Esa sitting beside her. “I want to go back because I want to be there with you,” he said softly, taking her in his arms.

Michelle buried her face in his neck, and began to cry. “I’m so afraid he’s going to die, Esa.”

“I know.” He began rocking her gently. “But he’s a tough old bastard, eh? You’ve said so yourself.”

“Yeah, but sometimes it’s hard not to jump immediately to the worst thing, you know?”

“Because of your mom?”

“I hadn’t even thought of that, but it makes sense.” She swiped away a tear with the back of her palm. “He’s never taken care of himself.” She lifted her head, meeting Esa’s eyes. “You don’t want to know how many firefighters die of heart attacks, both on the job and after they’ve retired,” she said bitterly. “They all think they’re goddamn immortal.” She rested her head on Esa’s shoulder. “Christ, I can’t believe I have to sit through a six hour plane flight before even getting a cab to get to the hospital.”

“Are you sure you don’t want us to come back with you? My parents can see Nell at Easter. This is more important.”

“I’ll be fine.” She lifted her head again, studying Esa’s face. She and her brother used to play a game where they’d stare at each other for ten seconds, then start drawing furiously. The one who drew the best picture from memory was the winner, and the winner was nearly always Michelle, because she had an eye for detail. Were she to draw Esa right now, she’d sketch his blue eyes, and razor sharp cheekbones, but she’d also sketch the tiny, nearly invisible freckle touching the top left of his lip. She’d draw the small white scar across the bridge of his nose that made her think of pince-nez, and she’d draw the slight droop of his right eyelid, which happened when he was tired. But most of all, she’d try to capture the way he was gazing at her: with a passionate intensity that wasn’t in the least bit sexual. He’s in love with me, she realized.

She broke eye contact, shaking her head with a small smile. Too much all at once.

“Michelle? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” she repeated. Out of nowhere, tears threatened again, and she laughed. “Actually, I’m a mess. One minute I want to cry my eyes out, the next I could just laugh . . . I think I’ve finally lost it, Esa.”

“It’s a reaction to stress.”

“I know,” Michelle agreed sadly, squeezing his hand. “I remember at my mom’s wake, going to use the ladies room at the funeral home. I opened the door, and there in the lounge area were three of my mom’s friends laughing so hard there were tears running down their faces. I remember feeling just
furious
: how dare they laugh when my mother was dead?

“Now I realize they were just trying to cope. You need to be able to let go in these types of situations or you lose your mind.”

“All the more reason for me and Nell to come back with you,” Esa insisted.

“Why’s that?”

Esa frowned. “Who’s going to help you cope? Your brother? The one who suddenly had to work on Christmas Day? C’mon, Michelle. I’m not stupid.”

“No, you’re not,” Michelle agreed. “And it’s starting to become inconvenient.”

Esa laughed, helping to lighten her mood. Light was where she wanted to try to keep it. That meant trying to steer off the topic of her brother.

“Where’s Zak?” Michelle called out to Nell. “My brain is getting pretty bouncy out here!”

“Coming!”

Nell appeared, her body almost obscured by the giant stuffed animal. She released him on the other side of the bed next to Michelle with a small pant. “He weighs a ton!”

“Well, he’s a polar bear,” Esa pointed out.

“A facsimile of one, you mean.” Nell manipulated one of the bear’s paws so it slowly stroked Michelle’s arm. “See, he’s trying to make you feel better. Is it helping?”

Michelle smiled. “It is. Thanks.”

“You can take him back to New York with you, if you’d like. Maybe your dad would like to have him in hospital with him!”

“I’m sure he’d love it, Nell, but I doubt the nurses would let him keep it. Hospital rooms are very small.”

“Oh.”

Zak’s paw continued stroking Michelle’s arm. “Can I visit your dad in hospital?” Nell asked very quietly.

“Of course,” Michelle whispered, eyes flooding. One look at Esa and the next thing she knew she was practically doubled over on the bed, laughing, or maybe it was crying, she couldn’t tell. Zak’s paw on her forearm stopped moving, and Nell’s eyes were big as twin planets. “It’s okay,” Michelle assured her, trying to get hold of herself after a series of false starts. “Don’t look so worried. Sometimes people laugh a lot when they have crazy brain and they’re worried, and then they feel silly about being worried and don’t know what to think. That’s what’s happening.”

Nell looked thoughtful. “If anything did happen to your dad, you’d still have me, and Uncle Esa.”

“That’s right,” Michelle agreed, feeling pain trying to punch its way out from deep inside her. “And Zak. But I’m pretty sure things are going to be fine.”

* * *

Michelle was more
wired than ever as she walked into New York Hospital Queens. Thanks to a nice tailwind, the flight from New York to London had taken five hours rather than six. She’d thought that perhaps her mind would stop racing on the flight home, but no such luck. Instead, she kept checking her phone, doing a blow-by-blow account in her head of what was probably going on with her dad: He’s probably being prepped for surgery now. He’s probably in surgery now. He should be out of surgery now, unless there were complications. She hated that she hadn’t been there to talk to the doctors before and after the surgery was done, but she was sure Jamie would fill her in, or if not him, then Uncle Micky. Jamie sounded like he didn’t know whether he was coming or going when he’d phoned her in London, which wasn’t surprising. Michelle was just glad her brother hadn’t been pulling a shift when her dad started having chest pains. If her father had been home on his own, he’d have dismissed it as a pulled muscle and lit a cigar. The thought of what might have happened made Michelle nauseous.

Jamie was waiting for her outside the Intensive Care Unit, flipping impatiently through a well-thumbed copy of
People
magazine. As soon as he spotted her, the magazine was carelessly tossed aside and he was on his feet.

She hugged her brother, but he was stiff in her arms, a sure sign he was distressed. “How’s he doing?”

“Good.”

“Where’s Uncle Micky?” It was seven, early evening. Michelle was surprised he wasn’t there.

“I told him we had some family stuff to discuss, so he took off.”

Michelle sat down in one of the chairs, bracing herself. “Family stuff.” That sounded ominous. Her first thought was morbid and melodramatic: her father was on life support. She pulled herself back to the brink of the rational: there’d been a complication that needed to be dealt with. He was seriously incapacitated.

“Can you at least tell me how the surgery went?”

Jamie rubbed absently at the two day’s worth of stubble on his chin. “Yeah, of course. He did good.”

“What exactly does that mean?”

“There were no complications, Michelle. If he’d ignored the chest pain, he’d probably be dead.”

“God,” Michelle whispered.

“So they did the triple bypass. Obviously he’s got to do a total lifestyle makeover: eating better, more exercise. He’s got to stop smoking the cigars.”