The Unblocked Collection (56 page)

Seconds passed before her eyes finally softened. “I believe that.”

“Then you have to believe I didn’t withhold this to intentionally hurt you because that couldn’t be further from the truth. I would never want to hurt you, baby. I care so much about you…” I stopped as her phone vibrated on the counter.

“Is that mine?” she asked, looking toward the kitchen.

“Yes, it’s yours.” I checked the time; it was almost midnight. “It’s a little late for a business call, isn’t it?”

“I don’t think it’s business.”

She ran to the counter and answered it. “Hello?” She turned to face me. “Yes, this is Frankie.” The color slowly started to drain from her cheeks, and her eyes filled. “Oh my God.” I rushed over, wrapping my arms around her waist to pull her closer. “Yes. Okay.” Her entire body was shaking. I squeezed tighter, holding her against my chest, trying to make her still. “Okay. Thank you. Bye.” The phone dropped from her hand and her head seemed to follow it.

“Frankie.” I leaned back so I could see her face. It was the only way I would know how to fix this. “Look at me.”

She gradually lifted her head, tears streaming down both cheeks. Her bottom lip quivered. Her chest rose and fell, unable to catch her breath. I cupped her face and moved in as close as I could get her. “Tell me.”

“It’s Anna.” Tears dripped over my fingers. Her lids squeezed shut and she shook her head as though she didn’t believe the thoughts inside it. “She’s in the hospital.”

“Is she okay?”

“I don’t think so.” Her voice was so fucking pained. “The nurse said when she was admitted, she was in a crippling amount of pain. The doctor is trying to manage it and make her as comfortable as possible.” I could feel her trembling in my hands. “She’s in the ICU, Derek, in critical condition.”

“Do they know what’s causing it?”

She nodded, and I felt her unravel even more. “Cancer.” It was the same thing that took her mother. I pulled her against me, wrapping my arms around her head and tucking my face into her neck. “I didn’t know…she didn’t tell me. It doesn’t sound good, Derek. Not good at all. I need her. I can’t lose her. I can’t…”

Her purse was on the counter right next to me. I tossed it over my shoulder and gently led her toward the elevator. While we rode down each floor, I kept her pressed against my side, my arm curved around her body so I could bear most of her weight. I angled my face so my beard rested on her forehead, allowing her to feel something familiar, to know I was there with her.

That level of pain she was feeling, I knew it too well. Every stab that continuously gutted her over and over…I could still feel the sharpness of that long fucking knife. I wanted to take it away, every tear, every unbearable ache, and hold it inside me so she wouldn’t have to feel it.

I wanted to heal my pink ivory.

“Where are we going?” she asked as we walked out of the lobby door. She shivered even though the air wasn’t cool.

“I’m taking you to the hospital, you need to be with Anna.” She began to cry even harder, my words obviously making the situation more real.

As I lifted her onto the passenger seat of my Suburban, I saw the hardness of her nipples, the bouncing of those perfect tits. She was braless and I hadn’t grabbed anything for her to cover up.

She grabbed my collar as I turned, stopping me from closing the door. “Don’t leave me.” Her voice was so small.

“I’m just going to the trunk. I think I have a flannel back there that you can wear. I’m not leaving you.”

She looked down at her chest and back up at me, her eyes telling me she barely registered what little she had on. “But Anna is.” She was curled in so tightly, her body was lost in the seat.

“You don’t know that, Frankie.”

“She’s like a mother to me…” Those gunmetal eyes were so wide and lost. “The only mother I’ve ever really had.”

“We’re going to get through this, baby.”

FRANKIE

“I’M SORRY,”
the nurse said, shutting off the tablet and hugging it against her chest, “but it’s way past visiting hours. I can’t let you in.”

We’d made it as far as the door outside the intensive care unit and she was stopping us from going any farther. This was the second time I’d asked her to let me inside and the second time she’d refused. I’d run out of kindness and patience…and words. All I had were thoughts of losing Anna, images of her lying on one of those wide beds, her frail body barely taking up half of it.

I needed to be with her, and I knew she needed me.

“The woman in that room is her family,” Derek said. His voice startled me as this was the first time he’d spoken since we’d gotten on this floor. “There’s no way she’s going to wait until the morning to see her. She needs to be with her now.”

“Sir, please—”

“Your policy can’t possibly keep family away in situations like this,” he added. “If you’re unwilling to cooperate, I’ll need to consult my lawyer to see what she says about it…”

As I squeezed his hand, I felt the nurse’s eyes on me. I returned her cold stare. I had nothing to add to what Derek had said. It felt like everything inside me had been sucked out. There were only tears left, and those I wasn’t able to stop.

“You cannot make a sound once you’re inside,” she said. “And you can’t stay all night. Just a little while—”

“Go,” Derek said, interrupting her and gently pushing me toward the door. “I’ll wait for you out here.”

I tried to ask him why he wasn’t coming with me…my mouth opened, but no words came out. He nodded his head, confirming again that he’d wait, and I moved through the door.

The latch clicked into place and locked behind me as the noise inside the unit hit me. Beeping. There was so much of it, all at different intervals and volumes. All I could smell was rubbing alcohol, bleach, and antiseptic. It was so pungent it burned my nose. Each room was divided by panes of glass; closed curtains gave the patients privacy from their neighbors. The front of the bays were completely open to make the beds easily viewable. Names and codes were written in marker on the front glass. I didn’t bother to look at them. I looked for her face, for her eyes; I searched for the warmth I felt whenever I was near her.

I reached the fourth room and felt no warmth at all. In fact, it felt like an air conditioning vent had opened inches above my head. A chill ran through my body as I looked at her face and arms—the only parts of her that weren’t covered.

I rushed to her side, taking her delicate hand gently in my own. Her eyes were closed, her cheeks sunken. Her face was ashen. “Anna,” I whispered. I didn’t want to wake her, but I wanted her to know I was there.

“Is that my doll?” she whispered back. Her eyes slowly opened, bloodshot, with a hazy film coating them.

This wasn’t happening…it couldn’t be. I wanted to be strong—for her, for me, for any bit of hope that might remain. But her lips were so dry and cracked, and her breathing was so shallow. There were machines behind her that cried out continuously, and an IV in her hand, and wires snaking out from beneath the blanket.

“What happened, Anna?”

She turned her head, resting her cheek on the pillow. It looked like she didn’t have the energy to hold it straight. “Pancreatic cancer, doll. I got the diagnosis a few months ago.”

Pancreatic cancer? And she’d known…for
months
?

I was doing everything I could to keep the wine in my stomach. I knew what that diagnosis meant, how small the recovery rate was. One of the residents in my building had received the same diagnosis a few years ago. He’d undergone surgery and still only lasted a few years.

That wouldn’t be my Anna. She’d fight. She’d beat it. She had to.

I pulled the chair as close as I could get it so I didn’t have to reach for her. “I wish you would have told me.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t,” she said weakly. “But I didn’t want you to constantly worry and stop your life because I’m sick. I don’t like to be hovered over, and I know that’s what you would have done.”

She was right; that’s what I would have done—stopped my life to dote on her. If she was sick, I was sick. But I didn’t get that option.

“What are they doing for you?” I glanced at the IV stand, reading the words that had been printed on each of the bags. “Are they making you better?”

“They’re making me comfortable.”

“What about surgery?”

“I’m not a candidate.”

I could tell it took so much out of her to answer, but I wasn’t going to stop my frantic questioning. I had to get to the bottom of this. I had to solve it. I had to. “What about chemo? Alternative treatments? There must be clinical trials going on that we can get you into.”

She moved her other hand so it rested on top of mine. I looked at her skin, the way it wrinkled over her veins, the age spots that freckled it. “They were hoping the chemo would help with the pain,” she said. “And it did for a little while…but my body couldn’t handle it, so they had to stop. There’s no more treatment.”

No more…

Had I seen this coming and ignored the signs? She’d been thin for as long as I could remember, but definitely not this thin. She’d never had a huge appetite, but she’d stopped nibbling on the sweets I brought her after only a few bites. She’d complained of stiffness in her joints and muscle pain, so I’d had the treadmill delivered to her apartment. She’d been pushier lately when it came to stating her opinion. She’d always been one to give it, but never quite like now, and never as persuasive as she had been about Derek.

Why hadn’t I recognized her sickness?

“Are you in pain now?” The names of the drugs on the IV bags told me they were trying to manage it, but I could see in her eyes the effect it was having on her physically.

“No, doll. They’re taking it all away.”

Taking it all away.
I didn’t like the sound of that. I knew in the end it wasn’t just her pain that would be taken away.

My Anna.

My chest tightened. It felt like it was going to crack down the middle.

My Anna…

“What can I do for you, love?” I rested my cheek against her hand. Her skin was cold and so soft and smelled of alcohol—not the cherry blossoms I was so accustomed to. “How can I make you feel better?”

“You being here is enough.”

“There must be something more.” I felt so helpless, so useless.

“Well…there’s a box in the back of my closet.” She stopped to take a breath and struggled to fill her lungs. “It has your name written on it. I’d like you to get it.”

I lifted my face from her hand. “Right now?”

“No, doll. After I’m gone.”

A rush of panic washed over my chest and got caught in the back of my throat. I couldn’t hear that word…not from her.

“What are you saying, Anna?”

I could see the life slowly leaving her eyes. Every cell in my body seized in sorrow.

Hands gripped my shoulders, and I jumped and gasped. I knew the strength, the touch. Derek’s embrace was exactly what I needed at that moment. But all I could focus on was Anna’s cold hand in mine, and the cold knowledge of the life that was draining from her.

“Baby, I’m here,” he said from behind me. He wrapped his arms around my neck, and his beard brushed against my cheek.

Was this really happening or was I imagining this moment? Derek and Anna finally meeting…in the hospital. Where she was dying of cancer.

Derek placed his hand on ours. He brought the warmth that was missing from this room. “Anna,” he said. “You’re even more beautiful in person than in the pictures at Frankie’s condo.”

“Derek…finally.” There was a weak smile on her face as she spoke his name. “You’re what I wished for. What I’ve wanted for her.”

I watched the two of them, their eyes taking each other in, knowing it was a moment I didn’t want to miss.

“Frankie loves you so much,” he said.

I tasted the salt on my lips.

“And I love her,” Anna told him.

They were talking as though I weren’t in the room, as though I was just going to stand up in a few minutes and leave Anna alone in here. I wasn’t going anywhere. Derek needed to know that.

“Tell them I’m staying,” I said.

Anna’s thumb curled around my fingers. She brushed the pad back and forth over my skin. “You can’t stay here tonight, doll. I need my sleep, and you need yours. Go home and come back in the morning.”

I shook my head. “No, Anna…”

She raised her hand for Derek to take. It looked so tiny in his large palm. “Take care of her.”

“I will.”

“Love her and listen to her. Let her be Frankie.”

“I promise,” he answered.

Her thumb pressed against my skin. Even a gesture that small took so much out of her. Her lids were getting heavier, her breath slowing. “I’m so proud of you, and I love you so much. Love you like you’re my own daughter, Frankie Jordan.”

“I am,” I whispered.

“Yes. You are.”

I tried to breathe, but I couldn’t. “I have so much I need to say, Anna.”

“We’ve never needed words, doll. I feel it. I always have.”

“But…” I could barely see her through the haze of tears that wouldn’t cease.