Authors: Gina Ardito
~~~~
Adara would pluck herself bald to be anywhere else but in
this room right now. Avoiding Tyler’s intense gaze, so like his uncle’s, she
toyed with the digital alarm clock on the bedside table. But Tyler would not be
denied.
“Well?” his impatient little voice piped up. “Are you?”
Quick, Adara, play for time
.
“Am I what?”
“Going to marry Uncle Shane.”
“What makes you ask that?”
“I’m not a baby, Adara,” he told her with all the
self-confidence of a typical five-year-old. “I’ll be six in December.”
“Oh, well, that
does
make a difference, doesn’t it?”
“Uh-huh. And Uncle Shane likes you a lot. I can tell.”
From your mouth to God’s ears.
“Yeah? How can you
tell?”
“Because he brought you with us on vacation.”
“Oh.” The hope she’d dared to encourage popped like an
overblown soap bubble. “But I told you, he only brought me along because I like
Prufrock so much.”
“Do you like my Uncle Shane?”
She sank down on the edge of the bed and pushed a stray hair
from the child’s puckered forehead. “Of course. I like him very much. But we’re
friends, Tyler, nothing more.”
“If you don’t marry Uncle Shane, will you marry me when I
grow up?”
Oh, this child had a way of stealing pieces of her heart,
splinter by splinter. “I’ll tell you what. When you grow up, look for me.
Chances are, I’ll still be available.”
Wrapping his skinny arms around her neck, he whispered in
her ear, “You remind me of my mommy.”
Shocked, she pulled back to stare at him. “I do?”
“Uh-huh. She was pretty like you, but with dark hair. Like
Uncle Shane’s.” His warm breath skittered across the nape of her neck. “And she
smelled nice like you, too. Can I tell you a secret?”
“Sure, sweetie. What?”
He tugged at the sheet covering his skinny body. “When I was
little, I used to listen to Mommy and Daddy fight. Sometimes, when Daddy got
really mad, Mommy would come into my room and lock the door. She’d cry herself
to sleep on the floor right by my bed. I used to pretend I was asleep so she
wouldn’t worry, but I always stayed awake. I had to protect Mommy until Daddy
either fell asleep or went away. Uncle Shane and Dr. Stein say that Daddy
couldn’t help it when he hit Mommy. They say he was sick. You know what I don’t
understand?”
Adara’s breathing grew labored around the block of tears
clogging her throat, but she managed to rasp out, “What?”
“If Daddy was sick, how come he didn’t go to the doctor?
Whenever I got sick, Mommy always took me to the doctor. And Uncle Shane takes
me to the doctor all the time now, even when I feel fine. Sometimes I don’t
like to go. You know that stick they push into your throat? I hate that. It
always makes me choke. But then the doctor gives me medicine, and I get better.
Do you think if Daddy went to the doctor, he could have got medicine to make
him better?”
“I-I don’t know, honey. Maybe.”
He sighed and snuggled closer to her, resting his towhead on
her breast. “I wish Mommy was still alive. I miss her.”
“I’m sure you do,” she said, running a hand over his
shoulder.
“But when I’m with you, I don’t miss her as much. I love
you, Adara. I wish you could stay with us forever.”
Raw emotion overwhelmed her. Shivers racked her limbs while
the enormity of his words stole a huge chunk of her heart. “No one can promise
forever,” she said through brimming tears. “But I’ll stay with you for as long
as I can. And even when I’m gone, I’ll still love you, Tyler.”
~~~~
Tyler fell asleep a few minutes later, but Adara remained in
the darkened room to regain her sensitive equilibrium. After drying her eyes
and silencing her shudders, she rose from the bed, kissed his cheek, and left,
closing the door behind her. For a long moment, she stood in the hallway, too
stunned to move, waiting for some semblance of normalcy to return to her
posture.
“Adara?” Pauline’s concerned voice reached through the
darkness. “Are you all right, my dear?”
Incapable of speech after her emotional roller coaster with
Tyler, she nodded. Somehow, Pauline sensed the lie. She approached Adara,
wrapping a supportive arm around her overburdened shoulders. “Come, sit down,
sweetheart. You look as if you’ve just survived a hurricane. Poor thing, I know
how exhausting Tyler can be, especially at bedtime. Shane,” she called out,
“get her a glass of water.”
She wanted to decline, but her body refused to accede to her
brain’s demands. To lean against another human being, allowing someone else’s
strength to sustain her, even for a moment, proved a temptation too strong to
bear. Comfort and understanding flowed from Pauline’s steady embrace, seeping
into her tired pores, revitalizing her.
With this added encouragement, she found the energy to move
forward, into the light. As she approached the dining room, Shane pulled out a
chair and placed a tall glass on the table. Before sitting, she downed the
water in three gulps. The cool liquid sluiced over her ragged throat, easing
the sting of her swallowed tears.
“Is everything all right, Adara?” Pauline asked, pulling up
a chair beside her.
She nodded, wondering how much, if any, of her conversation
to share with these two adults. Surely, they would have Tyler’s best interests
at heart. Yet, something held her back. Tyler had said it was a secret. Did she
have the right to break that confidence? For now, she decided the answer was,
“no.”
Perhaps, in the future, if Tyler gave her permission, she
might advise Shane of their discussion in full detail. But not now. Still, the
Griffins looked at her strangely, expectantly. She needed some sort of
explanation to appease their curiosity. So she settled for half-truth at the
moment. “Tyler told me he loved me,” she said, her voice softened by affection
and surprise.
Pauline’s face lit up with excitement. “He did? Oh, Shane,
did you hear that?”
“I heard. What else did you two talk about?”
Adara shrugged. “Not much.”
“You were in there an awfully long time for ‘not much,’” he
grumbled.
“You know Tyler,” she said, avoiding his piercing blue gaze.
“He can spend hours talking about Prufrock.”
“He usually does,” Pauline interjected with a grin. “I can’t
imagine what he’ll do when he sees his idol in person.”
Only when the subject changed to tomorrow’s activities did
Adara relax. She relaxed so much, in fact, that she never sensed the exact
moment Tyler crawled into her bed that night. But in the morning, there he lay,
snuggled up beside her, a dreamy smile upon his peaceful face.
Chapter Twenty-Six
For the next three days, life took on a sameness for Adara.
To all outward appearances, they probably looked no different than any other
family on vacation in KidLand. Inwardly, however, deep in her scarred heart,
old wounds, long painful and bleeding, began to heal. Day by day, minute by
minute, the adorable and affectionate Tyler charmed his way into the space left
empty by her father’s abandonment. Amazing how such a tiny child could fill
such large shoes.
In KidLand each day, Adara took snapshots of the Griffins
hugging Prufrock, Salome, and all the Wasteoids. Lunch routinely consisted of
tacos in Prufrock’s Playa, while they ate dinner at the usual tourist style
restaurants. By their third evening, the pace had taken its toll.
Too exhausted to sit in another burger joint, Tyler
requested a pizza delivered to their suite, but fell asleep on the couch before
it arrived.
“Should we wake him?” Adara asked, touching the boy’s
shoulder tentatively.
“Let him sleep,” Shane advised. “The poor kid’s beat. If he
wakes up, we can always reheat a slice for him. But something tells me he’s
down for the night.”
Collapsing beside the sleeping boy, Pauline released an
exhausted sigh. “How about tomorrow we take a break from the park?”
“Good idea,” Adara replied. “We can hit the swimming pool
here on the grounds in the morning then maybe rent bikes after lunch.”
Shane shrugged. “You’ll get no argument from me. I’ve pretty
much OD’d on Prufrock at this stage of the game.”
“I think we all have.” Pauline brushed the hair from Tyler’s
closed eyes. “Even his number one fan has had enough.” She frowned then and
leaned closer to touch her lips to the child’s forehead. “Shane? Tyler’s got a
fever.”
Shane was across the room like a bullet shot from a gun.
“How high is it?” He knelt by the couch, staring at Tyler’s flushed cheeks with
concern.
“A guestimate? He’s pretty hot. Without a thermometer, I’d
say about 103 or so.”
Unfamiliar with childhood illnesses and their symptoms,
Adara squelched the panicky shiver running across her shoulder blades. “Should
we be worried?”
“Not yet,” Shane replied, rising. “Kids sometimes run fevers
as a way of heading off something more serious. And Tyler has a tendency to get
ear and throat infections. He just got over strep last week. At least, we
thought he was over it. This might be a recurrence. I’ll take a walk to that
grocery store on the grounds and pick up some ibuprofen. With any luck at all,
he’ll sleep through the night and be fine by tomorrow morning.”
“And if not?”
“Let’s just think positively for now.”
“See if the store carries thermometers, too,” Pauline
suggested. “Let’s be certain about his temperature if we can.”
“I’ll be right back.” With a quick nod in their direction,
Shane scooped up the room key and left the suite.
“Poor little one,” Pauline said, lifting Tyler’s head into
her lap.
Helpless to do much at all, Adara paced the room, quickly wearing
a deep groove into the carpet with her worry. “Should I get him something to
make him more comfortable? A drink of water? A pillow?”
Pauline smiled, but the expression was solemn, not at all
the joyful grin Adara had grown accustomed to. “No, dear. We’ll have a tough
enough time waking him to get the ibuprofen into him. Trust me. The best thing
for him right now is sleep.”
“Does he get sick often?”
“It’s like Shane says. He has a tendency toward ear
infections. Seems like every time the boy gets a cold, some fluid settles in
his ear and won’t drain properly. That’s probably all it is now, too. It’s
inconvenient and a little uncomfortable for Tyler, but nothing we haven’t seen
before.”
Tyler groaned then, drawing both ladies’ attention.
“Easy, sweetie,” Pauline crooned. “Uncle Shane went to the
store to get you some medicine. What hurts you, baby? Your ear again?”
“My head,” he mumbled. “And my neck.”
“You mean your throat?”
“Un-unh. Not inside my mouth. It hurts outside.”
“Where outside? In the front or in the back?”
“In the back.”
“Tilt your chin, and let me see.”
“I can’t,” the child whined in a puny voice. “It hurts too
much to move my neck.”
Unbidden, words from a report Adara had read recently at
work popped into her head. “…The patient presents with a high fever, a general
feeling of malaise, and a stiff neck…”
The report’s image was foggy, but some strong sense of
urgency prodded her to recall the document and its final diagnosis. Why? What
did some stupid paperwork from the office have to do with Tyler?
Sirens screamed in her head. She needed to rouse her brain,
to bring that sleepy memory to the forefront of her consciousness. It was
vitally important that she do so. She didn’t know why, but she knew Tyler’s
life might depend on it.
In her frantic mind, she relived that last Wednesday at
Alliance Healthcorp. What cases had she worked on? Aside from the usual
diagnoses of pharyngitis, aka the dreaded sore throat, and upper respiratory
infections, she’d paid the anesthesia bill for Mrs. Jablonski’s C-section, and
approved testing for Mr. Fabiola’s possible sleep apnea.
But no, the record she tried to recall with such accuracy
differed from the normal humdrum claims-paying routine. At the time she’d paid
little attention to it. Now she wished she’d studied it like the Rosetta Stone.
How much could she recall? She knew the patient was a boy,
younger than Tyler, maybe two years old, tops. Too young to verbalize all his
symptoms, so a lot of it was guesswork on the parents’ part. The document was
some kind of physician’s report, but from what type of facility and for what
type of condition?
“…The patient presents…” Presents where? An emergency room,
most likely. Okay, so the report had to be a hospital admission summary.
As if confirming her suspicions, her brain focused on a
familiar green and white striped form with the usual chicken scratch
handwriting of a doctor bogged down in endless paperwork.
“…with a high fever, a general feeling of malaise, and a
stiff neck…”
It was the malaise that caught the admitting physician’s
attention. Reading the report that Wednesday afternoon, she’d marveled that
such a general symptom should have raised the ER doctor’s suspicions so
quickly.
Dammit, what illness had he suspected? Could she recall the
ICD-9 code the staff had written on the admitting diagnosis? If she could
remember those four or five digits, she just might recognize the corresponding
condition. Her brain flexed and bent into pretzel shapes. To no use.
Think, Adara, think. How about recalling more of the
document?
Squinting her eyes as if reading along, she concentrated all her
effort on the Tests Performed section. “…A spinal tap was ordered…”
A spinal tap, a spinal tap, a spinal tap. Why? What was the
doctor looking for? What had he found?
Dry ice crystallized her blood, and her mouth filled with
imaginary sand. Oh, God, she remembered now.
“We have to get him to a hospital,” she whispered, her eyes
never leaving the child’s pale complexion. “Immediately.”