A Chance of a Lifetime (23 page)

“How's your pain on a scale of one to ten?” Samantha asked.

Lucy's fingers fluttered over the middle of her chest. “About a six. Maybe a five?”

“It's a six. Lucy's a minimizer,” Marti said from across the room. “She hates to put anyone out.”

“We women tend to do that, don't we?” Samantha fastened the straps across Lucy's legs, then glanced at all of them before settling her gaze on Joe. “We're going to take her to St. Anthony's. As soon as we get her loaded into the ambulance, we'll give her some nitro, which should help with the pain.”

If
it was a heart attack. Joe remembered the tiny pills Grandpa Cadore had never been without. If it wasn't a heart attack, the medication wouldn't do more than maybe cause a headache. And since the paramedics with their EKG thought the nitro would help…

God help them, it
was
real.

Fear spread through him.

Before the paramedics could roll her away, Lucy shoved her phone at him. “Call my mom when you have something to tell her.”

He wrapped his fingers around the phone and her hand. “I will.”

“Don't scare her, okay?”

He forced a grin. “I won't,” he assured her, while thinking that no matter how gently he broke the news, Robbie Cutler would have a heart attack herself. Lucy was her only daughter, her baby.

The paramedics took Lucy away then, and Patricia hugged Joe close. As far as comfort went, it was the next best thing to being held by his mother. He had an absurd desire to hide his face against her shoulder and cry, something he hadn't done since he was fourteen at Grandpa Cadore's funeral.

“She'll be all right,” Patricia murmured.

“Yeah.” The word was little more than a croak. Straightening, still gripping the phone, he ran the back of his hand across his eyes. “I, uh…I have to…”

“I know. Do you have a key?” she asked.

He fumbled in his pocket for his keys, singling out the one to the shop's back door.

“Marti, why don't you give him a ride to the hospital?” Carly's voice was as calm as always. “Patricia and I will lock up and meet you there. Once we know she's okay, then we'll come back here and take care of everything so she won't find a mess next time she's in.”

“Great idea.” Marti pushed Joe toward the door, and he let her, moving on autopilot. With every step, Carly's words echoed in his head:
Once we know she's okay…

She
was
okay. Would be. Had to be. Because he'd waited a hell of a long time to be more than just friends with her, and now that they had finally gotten to that point, he needed sixty years or so to show her just how much he loved her.

Dear God,
he prayed,
please let her be okay.

S
aturday had been a good day, Calvin reflected as he stood at the sink in his mother's kitchen. The table had been full for dinner: him, his parents, Gran and Diez, Bennie and Mama. The food had been great, the company easy to take, and Bennie had offered to let him walk her home with a sly smile and a look that made him feel weak inside, but in a good way. An alive-and-aware-of-a-beautiful-woman-he'd-loved-for-more-than-half-his-life way.

Darkness had settled, coming early on the cold day. His breath had frosted in the air when he'd walked the few yards from his car to the house, reminding him of months in the desert heat. A uniform, boots, and gear could get damn near unbearable when the sun relentlessly baked everything caught in its glare, and he'd often gone to sleep dreaming of winter, cold, snow, days when the simplest exertion wouldn't drench him in sweat. Of course, desert winters could get bitterly cold. Then the blistering summers sounded pretty damn good.

He'd dreamed of so much those years he was gone. Peace. Safety. Life. The comfort of knowing no one was trying to kill him. Not having to kill anyone himself. No more loss, no more sorrow, no more horror at the things people were capable of. The things he was capable of.

Ducking his head, he pressed the heels of his palms to his eyes and sighed. He was proud of his country. He was proud of his service. He just couldn't reconcile the person he had been with the person he'd become. He'd had a strong upbringing, parents who loved him, religious values, moral values, faith in all the right people and things. He should have survived better. He shouldn't have broken the way he had. He shouldn't have—

“You forget how to turn on the water?”

Bennie's teasing voice startled him, causing his hands to fall to his sides, making him spin to face her. His reaction, in turn, startled her. It showed briefly in her eyes, in the fading of her smile before she fixed it back in place. He exhaled deeply and fixed a smile of his own. “I was just thinking.”

“Life is too short to think too hard.” She nudged him aside, turned on the faucet, and slid a glass underneath the flow. “Gran is the only person I know who doesn't like bottled water. Says it doesn't taste like water. Water's not supposed to
have
a taste.”

Calvin inhaled the lingering aromas—dinner, the lemon cleaner Elizabeth used on the counters, coffee, and Bennie—and a little of that peace he'd just been yearning for settled over him. He didn't know what fragrance she wore, couldn't recognize any of the individual components that went into it. He just knew it smelled clean and a little sweet and a little spicy and a whole lot appealing. It was the scent he would like to fall asleep to, wake up to, the scent he would associate with good things the rest of his life.

“What were you thinking about?” Bennie asked quietly.

Talking was good, his therapists said. Remembering was good. The more a person hid from painful or traumatic memories, the more power those memories held. In both individual sessions and group therapy, reliving experiences was a big step forward. Though it had been impossible in the beginning—he'd sat through entire sessions without saying a word to the psychologist or therapist—he was learning.

To talk to them, at least. To other soldiers who had been there. Who were getting better themselves. But talking to family and friends—with Bennie at the top of that list—still seemed impossible. And she needed to know, sooner rather than later. There was something serious between them, and before it went too far, she needed to know that the Army considered him a psychiatric casualty of war, that he considered himself…whatever he was.

He took a breath, filling his lungs with determination, but someone was watching over him because her cell rang at that exact moment. She rarely answered calls when she was busy with someone in face-to-face interaction, but she glanced at the screen, her forehead knitted in a frown, and she raised the phone to her ear.

Calvin couldn't hear the other voice, but whatever she had to say, it drained the life from Bennie's face. Her hands went nerveless, and the glass of water she'd gotten for Gran slid to the floor with a thud, splashing water across the floor and up the bottom cabinets. “Oh, sweet Jesus,” she whispered. “I'll be right there.”

“Bennie, what's wrong?” he asked, reaching for her, but her fluttering hands evaded his as she looked anxiously around the room.

“I've got to—I've got to go.” She hurried to the hall closet, opened the door, and stared inside a few seconds before looking at him. “My coat. Where did I put my coat? And my purse? My keys?”

“Your coat's in the living room, and your keys, I imagine, are in your pocket. You didn't bring your purse.” Worried, he followed her into the front room, where Gran gave them a critical look.

“See, I told you that thud was too loud for clothes hitting the floor,” she said, elbowing Mama while Elizabeth clapped her hands over Diez's ears. “Mom!” she scolded.

“What's wrong?” Justice asked.

Bennie snatched her coat from the rack in the corner nearest the door, shrugged into it, and anxiously patted the pockets. “Therese called and said paramedics had taken Lucy to St. Tony's. They think she had a heart attack.” Her gaze met Calvin's. “I can't find my keys!”

He reached past her for his own coat. “I'll take you. Mom and Dad can find them later. Oh, and there's water spilled in the kitchen.”

“Don't worry,” Justice said. “We'll take care of everything. Lucy…is she the pretty little round one that cooks like an angel?”

Calvin nodded as he guided Bennie to the door.

“Aw, poor thing. We'll pray for her right now.” Mama lowered her head and began her prayer in a strong, sure voice.

Diez slid noiselessly to his feet and passed Calvin, murmuring, “I'll clean up the water.”

“Thanks.”

Despite her shorter legs, Bennie beat Calvin to the car, hugging her jacket to her, shifting restlessly as she waited for him to unlock the doors. “I can't believe…She's been exercising and losing weight and eating healthier…” The instant he opened the passenger door, she slid in and fastened the seat belt. He was a few seconds slower, but within another few seconds, they were on the street and heading toward the hospital.

“She's just the sweetest thing,” Bennie went on. “We all love her to death—” Her eyes widened, and her face crumpled. “I didn't mean that, Lord. We all have our qualities. Patricia's the mothering type, Therese is the serene one, Jessy's the bold one, Marti's the cool one, Ilena's the happy one, Fia's the one who needs the mothering.” A smile nervously crossed her face. “I'm the mouthy one. I don't know why—and you don't need to explain it.”

Calvin reached across the seat and took her hand tightly in his. Some of her tension seeped into his fingers, as if holding on to him made things easier. He hoped so.

It took just minutes to reach St. Anthony's, to follow the winding drive to the bright red and white Emergency Room sign, and find a parking space. Bennie was out of the car before he'd turned the engine off. He jogged a few yards to catch up with her.

He hated ERs. Especially hated them on busy weekend nights. The beginning of the end of his Army career had started in a civilian ER in Tacoma very much like this: check-in desks, a sign directing the way to triage rooms, another leading to locked doors and the treatment rooms behind them, televisions turned to competing channels, and people everywhere. Every age, every race, all with some complaint, real or imagined. Though the evening was still young, there were already the victims of bar brawls. There were parents using the emergency room for routine sick call for their kids, addicts concocting stories of nonexistent injuries to get painkillers, and people with genuine emergencies.

There was also a group who'd claimed one corner of the waiting room for themselves, the margarita girls, some of them sitting quietly, others pacing. Bennie headed straight for them, and everyone enveloped her in a group hug. Calvin stood back awkwardly until he saw Dane Clark on the periphery of their staked-out area. He joined him, hands shoved in his coat pockets, still cold despite the crowd in the room. “She gonna be okay?”

Dane shrugged. “Don't know yet. They did confirm that it was a heart attack. Joe's been texting stuff to Marti—he's the only one they've let go back there. He's the football coach, her neighbor, and I guess her new boyfriend.” He glanced over as the hug broke up. “Dalton's over at Ilena's house, taking care of her baby. She didn't want to expose John to all these sick people.”

Calvin imagined the big cowboy, who looked like he could wrestle a steer to the ground one-handed, cuddling with the fat little dark-eyed baby he'd seen Bennie with last Monday. It seemed an even stranger picture than himself cuddling the boy.

“You want to get some coffee?” Dane asked. “I imagine we're going to be awhile.”

“Sure.” Calvin told Bennie where he was headed, and she nodded, pointing toward the sign down the hall that read “Cafeteria.”

Dane walked with a slight limp as if his leg hurt, and Calvin figured it probably did. He'd had more friends than he wanted to count who'd lost hands or arms, feet or legs, to the enemy's improvised explosives. They'd been shipped back to the United States to receive treatment usually at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, the 5C program at Naval Medical Center San Diego, or the Center for the Intrepid at Brooke Army Medical Center. Visits with them had been rare, only when he'd been back in the States and close enough for the trip to their treatment facility.

Sometimes back in Washington, when Calvin had been really down, he'd wished he had a real, physical injury that he could point to and say,
This is why I'm having a tough time.
There was no place he could single out on his uninjured body and say those words and get the same nonjudgmental response.

But Calvin could learn to cope with his issues. He was doing desensitization therapy to take away the impact of the bad memories, learning to avoid his triggers and to control his responses. He could be close to normal again. The doctors and therapists had confidence to spare when his was lacking.

But Dane couldn't grow back his leg.

It was too early for the hospital staff to be taking their dinner breaks, so the cafeteria was relatively empty. They got large coffees in paper cups and sat at a small table near the exit.

“You known Justin long?” Dane asked.

“Just since I came here the end of October.”

“He's a good kid. Had some tough breaks.” He smiled wryly. “I guess we've all had some, haven't we?”

“Some tougher than others.” He didn't need to look in the direction of Dane's missing leg. It was understood.

“How many rotations did you do?”

“Four.”

“Me, too. If I never set foot in that part of the world again, I'll be happy.”

Calvin echoed his words. “Me, too.”

After a moment's silence, Dane leaned back and stretched out his left leg on the empty chair between them, rubbing a spot about halfway down his thigh. “I had a hell of a time dealing with losing my leg. Maybe it wouldn't have been so bad if it had happened all at once, but only my foot was blown off in the blast. Then I got an infection, and they took it to the knee, and then I got another infection, and they had to go above the knee. It was spread out over nearly a year, so every time I was starting to accept what was gone, they removed more.”

He rubbed the stubble on his jaw. “When I first came here, I kept it covered all the time. I wouldn't tell anyone what had happened, not even Carly. Believe me, it's hard to have much of a relationship when you can't take your clothes off in front of your girlfriend. She almost dumped me over it. Not because I'd lost my leg, but because I hadn't trusted her enough to tell her. There's a time and a place for secrets, but she let me know that with your girl isn't it.”

Calvin's gaze was steady and flat. “Did Justin tell you I'm a patient at the WTU?”

“Nope. He wouldn't do that. But I spent a lot of years in combat and watching my buddies die and then, after the blast, feeling like I was less than I used to be. I recognize scared when I see it.” He waited a beat, then asked, “PTSD?”

It took effort for Calvin to release some of the pressure he held on his coffee cup so it wouldn't explode in his hand.
Talking is good. Get used to the bad memories, and they lose their power. The more you talk, the easier it becomes.
Hadn't he thought just this evening that he had to tell Bennie the truth? Practice always helped when saying something hard. Dane could be his practice, couldn't he?

But it was hard, damn it. His muscles knotted, his stomach turning queasy. Nodding took as much effort as running five miles with a pack, as much courage as racing into gunfire to pull a wounded buddy back.

His gaze locked on the coffee swirling from the vibrations of his grip on the cup. “Bennie and her husband, J'Myel—they were my best friends forever. He and I enlisted together, shipped over together. Things went wrong between us, and by the end of my second tour, I was having some problems coping with…stuff.”

Dane nodded. It was one of the good points of confiding in someone with the same experiences. He didn't ask what Calvin meant by
stuff
because his definition was pretty much the same as Calvin's.

Calvin took a slow, controlled breath. The tumbling in his gut was easing, not enough yet to trust that he could keep the coffee down if he drank any, and a vein in his temple throbbed with a matching throb behind his eyes. “On the third tour, J'Myel died. A lot of people died. I couldn't sleep, had nightmares. It changed from day to day whether I was afraid I would get killed or afraid I wouldn't. I made it through that deployment, and one more, but by then, I was in a pretty dark place.”