A Brush of Wings (30 page)

Marcus doubted Mary Catherine would actually wake up. She looked completely drugged. Still, he pulled up a chair and again glanced at the nurse—just to make sure he wasn’t sitting too close.

“You’re fine.” The nurse came up beside him. She took Mary Catherine’s temperature and wrote down a few of the numbers from her monitors. “I’d expect her to wake up soon.”

The nurse stepped out and Marcus leaned closer. She looked so small, her face beautiful even with her breathing tube and heart monitors attached to every visible part of her body. “Mary Catherine. I’m here.” He spoke through the mask and waited, watching her. She showed no signs of life. He hung his head, his hands trembling.
God, she looks awful. Please . . . give me a sign that she’s getting better.
If only he could fast-forward the days until she could sit up and look into his eyes again.

He looked up and tried again. “Your new heart is working great.” He didn’t touch her. “God is healing you.”

At first she didn’t seem to hear him. But then, gradually, she began to move her eyes. And finally she blinked them open.

She was clearly medicated, her movements slow. But she looked right at him. The breathing tube prevented her from talking, but that didn’t matter. She didn’t need to speak. Marcus could read her eyes without a single word.

She was alive and she loved him.

Nothing else mattered.

23

S
AMI LOOKED OVER THE DISPLAY
of fresh-sliced meat and cheese and the berries she and Tyler had washed and arranged on Marcus’s kitchen counter. The whipped cream was freshly beaten and the slivered cinnamon almonds were roasting in the oven.

Everything was just the way Mary Catherine would like it.

After twelve days in the hospital, she’d come home earlier than anyone expected. Her doctor was thrilled at her progress. A week recuperating at home and now she was already able to leave the house.

Today was her first outing.

Marcus was picking up Mary Catherine and her parents at the apartment and taking her out for a surprise. The surprise, of course, was right here at his house. Mary Catherine was going to be shocked to see everyone who was here. Sami and Tyler, Ollie and Rhonda Wayne, and even Lexy. The girl had been staying with the Wayne family since Mary Catherine came home from the hospital. Just to make room for Mr. and Mrs. Clark.

And seeing all of them wasn’t the only surprise ahead.

There was another surprise coming tonight at dinner—one Mary Catherine knew nothing about.

Sami could hardly wait.

The whipped cream—organic and grass-fed—had just a pinch of real vanilla and no sugar whatsoever. Sami scooped the fluffy cream into a pretty bowl and set a spoon beside it. She caught a quick lick from the mixing bowl. Like most of God’s foods, it didn’t need sugar. It was sweet all by itself.

Dr. Cohen agreed with Mary Catherine’s high-fat, low-carb diet. New research showed that transplant patients—like most people—were better off avoiding most carbohydrates. Fuel the body with healthy fat, the doctor had told Mary Catherine. Ketosis would provide a better environment for healing.

Sami was proud of her friend. Mary Catherine had been following Dr. Cohen’s orders perfectly, and her body had developed no infections. Of course, Mary Catherine already ate a low-carb diet to control type 2 diabetes, but now she was more intentional. Refined and empty carbohydrates caused inflammation, illness, and disease.

Since she wanted to live, Mary Catherine needed to stay away from all of that.

“Rhonda, can you please get the almonds out of the oven?”

Across the room, Rhonda had been working with Lexy, arranging fresh flowers in a pretty vase at the middle of Marcus’s kitchen table. “I’m on it.” Rhonda ran to the oven and used the mitts to take out the tray of almonds. “They smell great!”

Tyler and Coach Wayne were outside washing down the table and chairs on Marcus’s deck. The two of them walked in and grinned at the spread. Tyler gave them a thumbs-up. “Looks like we’re ready for an engagement party!”

Marcus had built-in ceiling speakers in most of the main rooms, so Coach Wayne logged on to his kitchen computer and created a playlist with Francesca Battistelli, Matthew West, Colton Dixon, Newsboys, and Kyle Kupecky. All favorites of Mary Catherine’s.

Tyler grabbed a broom from the pantry and swept the kitchen. Marcus’s housekeeper came once a week, but she’d been on vacation and the house needed sprucing up. Especially because Marcus was spending all his days with Mary Catherine and her parents.

Sami smiled as she thought of how involved Marcus was in Mary Catherine’s recovery. Her parents planned to stay another week, and the two of them had been available around the clock. But Marcus was there to help her move from the hospital to the apartment, and he bought groceries whenever she ran out.

Once every hour as long as she was awake, Mary Catherine needed to get up and walk—something she loved. And always it was Marcus leading her around the apartment, making sure she was steady—especially when she tried to push herself a little too hard.

“All we need is lemon water.” Sami found two pitchers from one of the cupboards and Rhonda pulled a lemon from the refrigerator. Colton Dixon’s “Through All of It” was playing over the speakers. Tyler finished sweeping, put the broom away, and came up behind Sami at the sink.

“This song says it all.” Tyler slipped his arms around Sami’s waist. “It’s my anthem.”

“Mmmm.” She turned around and put her hands on his shoulders. He was right. The lyrics were perfect. “ ‘I have won . . . I have lost . . .’ ” Singing wasn’t her gift, but with him she wasn’t afraid to miss a note.

“ ‘I got it right sometimes, and sometimes I did not.’ ” Tyler sang the next line and then their voices joined together. He chuckled. “We make a good team.”

“We do.”

“I second that.” Coach Wayne chuckled. “No doubt.”

Rhonda smiled as she sliced the lemon. “Definitely a great team.”

Lexy came into the kitchen and grabbed a few paper towels. “Relationship goals.” She paused, and her smile fell off a little. “You two and Marcus and Mary Catherine. That’s what I want one day. A long time from now.”

Sami shifted to Tyler’s side, her arm around his waist, his arm around her shoulders. She reached for Lexy’s hand and gave it a gentle squeeze. “Remember what we talked about?”

“Yes.” Lexy’s eyes warmed up again. “ ‘Seek first His kingdom and His righteousness . . .’ ”

Tyler looked straight at Sami. “ ‘And all these things will be given to you.’ ”

“Yes.” Sami smiled at him. “Exactly.”

Lexy used paper towels to wipe up the water drops from the fresh flowers. “There. The table looks perfect.”

“Everything does.” Tyler raised his fist in the air. “Home run!”

Ten minutes later Sami heard a key in the front door, then the voices of Marcus and Mary Catherine and her parents. It took just a few seconds for them to reach the back of the house, where the party was set up.

As soon as they were in view, Sami and Tyler, the Waynes, and Lexy all shouted, “Surprise!”

Sami watched Mary Catherine stop, hands flying to her mouth. “What’s this?” She looked at Marcus and her parents, and then back to the group. “I had no idea!” Mary Catherine seemed genuinely surprised. “This is amazing! Thank you! Y’all are the best!”

Lexy ran to Mary Catherine first. Then each of them took turns giving her a hug. Sami held Mary Catherine tight.

Mary Catherine blinked back tears. “You had this all planned?”

Sami laughed. “We did. You’re engaged . . . and you’re healthy. Two great reasons to celebrate!”

Marcus put his arm around Mary Catherine and kissed her cheek. “Your parents were in on it, too.”

“Oh, yeah?” Mary Catherine grinned at her mom and dad. “Now you’re keeping things from
me,
is that it?”

Everyone laughed.

Sami had only dreamed the surprise would go this well. She watched Mary Catherine lean against Marcus and whisper, “Really, though. This is the best surprise ever.”

“Everything’s ready.” Sami reached for Tyler’s hand on one side and Lexy’s on the other. “Let’s pray.”

They formed a circle near the food and this time Lexy spoke up. “Can I say it?”

“Absolutely.” Mary Catherine looked like she was proud of the girl.

Sami’s heart swelled within her. Lexy’s bond with Mary Catherine was as strong as ever.

Lexy closed her eyes. “Father, thank You for the food. Thank You for Mary Catherine being healthy enough to join us today. And thank You for this family. We love You, amen.”

Her words spoke straight to Sami’s heart. They were a family, indeed. Bloodlines and titles weren’t the only way people became a family. Faith could do that, too. The fact that Lexy felt so much a part of them even after the life she’d been living . . . well, that was a miracle, too.

As much as Mary Catherine’s recovery.

They ate on the back patio, where the sun was still warm even on this late October evening. It wouldn’t get chilly until after the sun went down in an hour or so. Marcus and Mary Catherine and her parents sat across from Sami, Tyler, the Waynes, and Lexy. The setting was serene and beautiful—exactly what Mary Catherine seemed to need.

Sami noticed today even more than yesterday how much better Mary Catherine’s complexion looked. Her cheeks were pink again, her eyes bright and full of life. The mechanical heart was working brilliantly from everything her doctors had told her. Seeing her so alive was the answer they had all prayed for.

Over dinner Lexy talked about the baby. “I don’t know about other moms, but my morning sickness is all day.” She rolled up a slice of turkey and a piece of cheese and dipped it into mustard. “This is the only thing that doesn’t make me feel sick.” She’d been off the streets for a month and definitely the way she talked now was different. Less slang, more communicative. Four weeks ago, Sami had wondered about her decision to take the girl in. It was Lexy’s only option, of course. The only way to keep her from having an abortion.

But it had turned out to be so much more than that.

“Have you heard from your mom since you saw her a few weeks ago?” Marcus directed the question to Lexy.

“A few times.” Lexy looked at Sami and then Mary Catherine before turning back to Marcus. “She’s still trying to arrange something with her brother in Texas. She wants him to take me in after the baby.”

“So far Lexy’s uncle hasn’t contacted her mother. So that’s not a strong possibility at this point.” Rhonda Wayne put her arm around Lexy and gave her a brief hug. “We’ve got her, though. Until God shows her what’s next.”

Whatever the future held for Lexy, none of them were willing to resign her to a life on the streets. She needed this change—that much was obvious. Sami smiled now as Lexy talked about learning how to cook, and loving the Bible. She really was like an entirely new person, with her past fading a little more every day.

Not only that, but Sami thought Lexy looked younger. Maybe because her eyes were softer, her voice kinder. She had no one to be tough around, nothing to prove. She wondered whether Lexy struggled to forget her life on the streets. Sometimes she seemed to slip into a quieter mood and Sami would find her staring out the window.

“I think about Ramon,” she’d told Sami and Rhonda a few days ago at the Waynes’ house. “He did love me.” She looked at Sami, confusion darkening her eyes. “Don’t you think?”

And again Sami had to remind the girl exactly how Ramon had treated her. The bruises and verbal abuse, the threats that he’d kill her. And the way he hadn’t respected her.

Lexy had nodded, looking distant. “You’re right. I just . . . I wonder, that’s all.”

Other times, Rhonda had confided that Lexy would wake up in the middle of the night screaming. The first time it happened, Rhonda had been certain someone had broken into the house. Coach Wayne had grabbed a baseball bat and run toward the screaming. But Lexy was alone, tossing and turning, rolling about in the bed. “No!” She’d screamed again. “I don’t want to die!”

Gently the Waynes had woken her up and helped her to a sitting position on the edge of the bed. “You were screaming, honey. What were you dreaming about?”

Sami felt sick about the story. Lexy had been out of breath, shaking, her forehead sweaty. She told the Waynes that in her dream Ramon was going to kill her. Sometimes she worried that he might know where to find her.

It had taken the Waynes an hour to calm the girl down. Sami was glad for Lexy’s fear of Ramon. Maybe it would keep her from finding a way back to her old life on the days when she was tempted.

The meal was winding down, and Sami looked at Tyler. The two of them exchanged a knowing smile. “Time?” she whispered.

“Definitely.” Tyler reached under the table and took her hand in his. “This is going to be fun.”

Mary Catherine had been in a conversation with Lexy and Marcus and her parents, but now she turned and gave Sami a questioning look. “What’s the whispering about?”

Sami looked at Marcus and Tyler, and then at the other faces around the table. All of them were silent for a moment. Mary Catherine looked at each of them and then back to Marcus. “Someone please tell me what’s happening.”