Save Me (7 page)

Chapter Fifteen

“Sure you’re not thirsty?” Rose asked Melly, sitting at the edge of her hospital bed, when they were alone. She felt devastated that Amanda had been given last rites, but she masked it for Melly, who was waking up, having napped only briefly.

“No.”

“No water?”

“I drank some.” Melly touched the oxygen tube under her nostrils with her fingernail, polished pink, now chipping. “Did Ms. Canton go home?”

“Yes. She told me to say good-bye. Mr. Rodriguez came to meet you, but you were asleep, so I didn’t wake you.”

“Maybe because she’s sick. That’s why she wasn’t in school.” Melly let go of the oxygen tube. “Do you have my DS?”

“No. It’s in the bag I left in Leo’s car, with the book. Sorry. I don’t have my laptop either.”

“It’s okay. I miss my friends on Club Penguin. We always talk on Saturday morning.”

“I know.” Rose limited Melly’s time on Club Penguin, a safe chat site for children, though for a kid self-conscious about her looks, the site was a godsend.

“Can we watch TV? Cartoons are on.”

“No, let’s not.” Rose didn’t want to take a chance that any newsbreak or screen crawl could update the school fire, especially the fatalities.

“So what can we do?”

“I can run down to the gift shop and see if they have any magazines, and we can read together.”

Melly brightened. “Do they have
Teen People
? It’s my friend’s favorite magazine.”

“Which friend?”

“A girl on Club Penguin. She likes all those magazines. She likes Harry Potter, too, but she only read
Chamber of Secrets.
”

“Okay, I’ll go get the magazine.” Rose rolled the night table out of the way and stood up, just as the door opened. It was Leo, and he had John asleep on his shoulder, in his yellow onesie and a white receiving blanket. Oddly, Leo looked dressed for work, in the white oxford shirt, tan Dockers, and penny loafers of the American lawyer on a Saturday.

“Hey, boys! Let me see my Johnnie Angel.” Rose got up and took the sleeping baby, who filled her arms. John was big for his age, making a nice warm bundle, and he resettled his head on her shoulder. She was happy to see him, even if it wasn’t the greatest idea to bring a sick baby to a hospital. She stroked John’s tiny back in the soft blanket, cuddling him, and given what was happening with Amanda, she felt vaguely more comforted than comforting.

“Hey, girls!” Leo dropped the diaper bag on the chair by the door and went over to Melly. “How’s my melba toast?”

“Leo!” Melly knelt in bed and threw open her arms, and Leo gathered her up in a bear hug, ending with his trademark grunt.

“I’m so happy to see you, kiddo.”

“Leo, I have oxygen.”

“Great.” Leo laughed. “I love oxygen.”

Rose watched them, counting herself lucky that Melly loved her stepfather so much, whether she called him Daddy or not. Her family was finally complete, even if it wasn’t exactly the way she’d planned it, and she felt a deep stab of guilt over her own happiness, when she knew that upstairs the scene would be one of profound grief. She went over and impulsively kissed Leo on the cheek, catching a whiff of his spicy aftershave, also unusual for a Saturday. “Why do you smell so nice?”

“Because I’m a sexy beast?” Leo smiled crookedly, but Rose saw a flicker of regret behind his eyes.

“You’re not going in, are you?”

“I have to, babe.” Leo’s brown eyes met hers, his emotions now plain. “I’m going to trial, in
Granger Securities.
I’m so sorry, honey, but it can’t be helped. We were number ten in the trial pool, but everything settled and we’re up on Monday. I got the call an hour ago, from the law clerk.”

“On a Saturday, they call?”

“Yep. It happens. Judges can’t afford down time in their dockets.”

“But what about John? They won’t let him stay here tonight, and if they find out he’s sick, they’ll throw me out.”

“I couldn’t get a sitter.” Leo shook his head. “Babe, believe me, if I could avoid this, I would, but I can’t. My hands are tied. You know how big this case is.”

“I know.” Rose did, it was true. He’d been talking about
Granger Securities
for three years. “But what about Jamie, couldn’t she sit?”

“No, she’s busy. I even called the backup sitter, and she has exams. I told her she can study at our house, but she said no. Plus I asked the neighbor, Mrs. Burton. She’s going out, and I don’t know anybody else. I’m out of options.”

“What about the sitter from the old neighborhood. Sandy?”

“No answer.” Leo shrugged. “I’d take him with me to the office, but I have witnesses flying in from Denver, and it’s all hands on deck. I have to work all weekend, and next week will be sheer hell.”

“Oh, Jeez.” Rose was getting that Peter and Paul feeling again, torn between the two children. She didn’t want to go home with John and leave Melly alone in the hospital. “On the bright side, he’s cooler. Is his fever gone?”

“Yes, but I packed the Tylenol and amoxicillin, just in case. Also I fed the dog and left the dog door open.”

“Leo, Leo!” Melly called from the bed. “Ms. Canton gave me a Hermione wand!”

“Lemme see.”

“I forget the incantation to make water come out, though. Oh, wait.
Aguamenti!
” Melly grabbed the wand and waved it around, and Leo ducked.

“Cool. Let me try. I don’t speak Harry Potter.” He took the wand and waved it in the air. “Bibbity, bobbity, boo! What’s the spell for a babysitter?”

Melly frowned. “Leo, Mom says I can’t watch
iCarly.
”

“She said that? She’s such a meanie.” Leo turned to Rose, waving the wand. “Let’s make her change her mind. Presto!”

“No TV.” Rose flared her eyes meaningfully, but Leo scoffed.

“Come on, she won’t see anything bad on Nick.”

“What’s anything bad?” Melly asked, and Leo caught himself, cringing.

“Nothing.”

“Step outside with me, will you, Merlin?” Rose went to the door with John, then turned to Melly. “Honey, stay in bed. We’re going into the hall a minute, to talk.”

“Later, tater!” Leo kissed Melly and gave her back the wand, and Rose led him outside to the window well, dreading the task at hand. Her heart felt so heavy, and she leaned against the ledge, with the air conditioning cold on her back.

“Leo, there’s terrible news about Amanda. They gave her last rites. She may already be—” Rose still couldn’t finish the sentence, and from the expression on Leo’s face, she didn’t have to. His forehead collapsed into folds, and he winced.

“Aw, no.” He wrapped his arms around her and John, holding them close and rubbing her back. “That’s terrible, so terrible. That poor kid.”

“I know. I just feel so awful for her, and for Eileen. I wish we could do something.”

“We can’t.”

“You sure?”

“Of course.” Leo released her, squinting against the sunlight. “There’s nothing we can do.”

“Just to tell them we’re thinking of them.”

“You’d make yourself feel better, but not them. You’re the last person they want to hear from right now.”

Rose felt stung, if only because it was true.

“Plus anything you say can look like an admission of guilt, later.” Leo frowned. “Let it go. Can you let it go?”

Rose had been here before. She could never let anything go. She didn’t even know what letting go meant.

“Listen.” Leo rubbed her arms, and John stirred, but stayed asleep. “I got a bunch of calls from reporters today, and there are messages at work, too. We have to be smart about this. I realize that this trial comes at the worst time, but it’s out of my control.”

“Can’t you get an extension from the judge? You have a child in the hospital.”

“Melly’s coming home tomorrow, right?”

“Yes, around noon.”

“Then no.” Leo gave her a quick kiss on the cheek. “Look, I have to leave. Tonight, take John and go home.”

“I don’t have a car.”

“Yes, you do. I parked yours out front.”

“Thanks. How did you do that?”

“By cab. Listen, Melly will be fine tonight. I put her new book in the diaper bag, plus the DS. You can call her every hour. I’ll call if I can, too.”

“Leo, no.” Rose felt so confused. Her head thundered. “I can’t go home and leave her alone. She just went through a major trauma.”

“Then go home until one of the sitters frees up, and maybe you can come back.”

“I don’t want to leave her alone. She could have died. Amanda is dying. This is real, and it matters.” Rose felt herself get worked up. She flashed on the teddy bears in the ambulance. “These kids are real, not packages you can drop off. They live and they die.”

Leo blinked. “I know that.”

“Melly’s always accommodating John. It’s never the other way around.”

Leo frowned in confusion. “That’s because he’s the baby.”

“Or is it because he’s
your
baby?”

“What?” Leo’s lips parted. “Are you crazy?”

Mommy!

Rose blinked. Maybe she was. She felt it, a little. She was responsible for a child’s death. She couldn’t take anything back. She couldn’t replay anything. It was too late to make a different decision. Time wasn’t her friend, it had never been. It didn’t care about children, life, or death. It just ticked ahead, moving on, ever forward, always later.

“Ro, it’s not a choice between Melly and John, or between Melly and Amanda. You’re all over the place. Hang on to yourself.” Leo touched her arm, and John shifted, his nose bubbling. “I love both kids the same, you know that. Right now, the only family that matters is ours. Not theirs, ours. You, me, Melly, and John. Even Googie. That’s the family that means everything to me.”

“Is that why you’re going to work?”

“
What?
”

“You heard me.” Rose knew she was wrong, even as the words escaped her lips. She was digging herself a hole and she didn’t know why, but she couldn’t stop herself, either.

Leo’s eyes widened, a bewildered brown, the hue of earth itself. He shut his mouth, pursing his lips, and she could see he didn’t want to say anything he would regret. Without another word, he turned on his heel and strode back to the hospital room, where she knew he would put on a happy face and give Melly a good-bye kiss.

Rose remained frozen in the sunlight, and when Leo emerged from Melly’s room, she didn’t apologize or try to stop him.

She let him walk down the hall.

Away.

Chapter Sixteen

Rose began walking and rocking John, who was fussy and unhappy. He’d slept most of the afternoon, but his second dose of Tylenol was wearing off and he must’ve been hungry. She replaced his pacifier and sang him “Oh Susanna,” her go-to song, but it wasn’t working. She didn’t know what had happened to Amanda, and she felt cut off from the world, tense, and out of sorts.

John wailed, and Melly looked up from her
Beedle the Bard
book. “Mom, what does he want?”

“I don’t know. His ear must hurt.”

“Why don’t we tell the doctor?”

“They’re all busy, and he’s not their patient.”

“Why not?”

“That’s not how it works.

“‘Oh, don’t you cry for me.’” Rose sang and swayed, but John kept crying. She walked him to the window, but he wouldn’t be distracted by mere trees and a setting sun. She had to quiet him before the nurses got wise to their pajama party. She paced back to the bed. “Melly?”

“Yes?” She looked up from the book, pressing her oxygen tube dutifully into place.

“I’m going to go downstairs and get us some more food. I’ll be right back, okay?”

“Okay.”

“If you need anything, you can always ask the nurse.” Rose picked up her purse and slung it over her shoulder, then grabbed the remote control and tucked it under John. She wiped his nose with her sleeve, then slipped out of the room. An older nurse and a young intern looked up from behind their counter, and Rose flashed them a smile. “We’re going down for some food, and my daughter Melly will be alone. Can you keep an eye on her?”

“Sure,” the nurse answered. “Take the stairs, it’s quicker. The cafeteria is to the right, at the bottom, first floor.”

“Thanks.”

John cried, and the intern winced at the sound. “No lung trouble on him, eh?”

Rose faked a laugh and wished parenthood on him, then headed down the hall toward the stairs. Visitors and orderlies turned as she passed, and when she went through the stairwell door, John quieted abruptly, at the change in scenery. He sighed a baby sigh, his chest heaving, and he looked around in wobbly wonderment. The tip of his nose was red, his cheeks pink and chubby, and his curly brown hair damp where he had sweated. His brown eyes shone with tears, but were round and lively, like Leo’s.

Is it because he’s your baby?

“There you go, honey bun.” She rubbed his back between his tiny shoulder blades, and his sleeper felt warm and nubby under her palm. “It’s all right, honey. Everything’s all right.”

John smiled at her, and Rose felt her heart fill with love. She gave him a kiss, then climbed down the stairs, cradling him close to her chest. She adored John, and she adored Leo, and she felt terrible about what she’d said about him favoring the baby. It was a terrible thing to say, and it wasn’t even true. She must have been crazy.

Mommy!

She stopped on the stairwell, slid her BlackBerry from her pocket, and thumbed her way to the phone function. She didn’t think she’d screw up any cardiac monitors if she called from here, but there was only one bar left on the screen. She thumbed her way to the text function, texted I’M SORRY LOVE U, and hit SEND. But the text didn’t transmit, either because of the low battery or poor reception.

She hit the first floor, opened the door, and entered the bright, glistening lobby. It was an uncrowded, sleepy Saturday night, and for that she was grateful. She passed a sign for the cafeteria and followed it past bronze plaques that listed major donors and corporate sponsors, knowing she was getting closer to the cafeteria by the comforting aromas of grilled cheese and tomato soup. She kept going, and the hallway wound around to an institutional cafeteria signed THE GROTTO, where papier-mâché salamis and ersatz wheels of provolone hung above a stainless steel lineup of trays and silverware. She grabbed a red plastic tray and got in line behind a man and a woman, sliding the tray along with one hand and holding John with the other, giving him a kiss on the cheek.

“Let’s see what they have, huh? Hot dog, grilled cheese, mac and cheese.” Rose talked to John all the time, like the narrator of their everyday life. She didn’t know why she did it, but she’d done it with Melly, and she knew he understood the gist. Science didn’t give babies enough credit, and every mother knew it.

“Johnnie, look at all this good stuff.” Rose eyed the hot sandwiches wrapped in aluminum foil and picked two grilled-cheese sandwiches for them, hoping to find something easier on the throat for Melly. John started pumping his fists happily, which he did when he was hungry, and it caught the attention of a female cafeteria worker, whose nametag read DORIS.

“What a cute little guy!” Doris walked over with a tray of wrapped hamburgers, flat and silvery as flying saucers. “Is he a good baby?”

“The best. Easy as pie.” Rose thought of the cafeteria workers killed in the explosion, then shooed it away. She plucked a French fry from the bag and offered one to John, who closed his little fingers around it and throttled it before it got to his mouth, where he stuffed it in, sideways. “Yummy, huh?”

“He loves my cooking.” Doris smiled.

“He sure does.” Rose went down the line, looking for pizza. The man in front of her skipped ahead to the coffee station, and she closed up behind an older woman with a short, steel-gray ponytail, who was squinting at the vats of soup, the deep lines in her face illuminated by the under-counter lights.

“Excuse me, can you read that, dear?” the older woman asked, frowning at Rose. “I forgot my reading glasses. Does that say ‘vegetable’?”

“Yes, it’s vegetarian vegetable.”

“Thank you.” The woman smiled, her hooded eyes lighting up when she saw John. “Goodness, a baby! How I miss those days! She’s adorable.”

“Thanks.” Rose didn’t bother to correct her, and Doris tried to get the older woman’s attention.

“Ma’am, did you want some soup?”

“Yes, please, just one. Vegetable. Small.”

“And you want the burgers, too. All eight?”

“Yes, I’ve got to feed a lot of people.”

“Good for you,” Rose said, trying to leave. The heat lamps shone blood-red onto pizza slices in cardboard triangles, and next to that were glass shelves of cherry Jell-O and chocolate pudding, which she slid onto her tray for Melly.

“They sent me down for the food. I’m the one who pays, naturally. I’m always the one who pays.” The older woman chuckled, and Rose took three bottles of water from a well of chipped ice.

“That’s nice of you,” she said, to be polite.

“My grand-niece is in a bad way,” the older woman said to Doris, who was putting the hamburgers in a large paper bag. “She got hurt real bad, in that fire at the school.”

Rose froze. The woman had to be talking about Amanda. It was a coincidence, but not that strange. Reesburgh Memorial was a small hospital in a small town. It meant that Amanda was still alive. Her heart leapt, and she wanted to hear more. She handed John another French fry to keep him quiet, eavesdropping.

“Sorry for your trouble.” Doris pitched ketchup packets into the bag. “I saw that fire on the news. They broke in right in the middle of my stories.”

Rose kept her head down. She wanted information, but she didn’t want to be recognized.

The older woman was saying, “The doctors thought she was going to pass this morning, but she proved ’em all wrong. It’s a rollercoaster, up and down, down and up, day and night.”

“I’m so sorry.” Doris frowned. “I’ll say a prayer.”

“Thank you. We drove across the state from Pittsburgh, when we heard. They won’t let us in to see her, for more than fifteen minutes every hour.”

“Rules are rules.” Doris handed the bag to the cashier, then turned to Rose. “Would you like to go first, miss? You have the baby, and this lady has a large dinner order.”

“Yes, thanks, I should hurry.” Rose went ahead to the cashier, keeping her head down, but she could still overhear the conversation.

“I believe in the power of prayer,” the older woman was saying. “I pray every day. Ever since my husband passed, it brings me peace and tranquility. You ask me, the rest of my family could use some good old-fashioned religion. My nephew, he’s a lawyer, and he’s just plain angry all the time. He’s up there now, ranting and raving. Hard to believe he was raised a Christian.”

“I hear that.” Doris put a floppy packet of napkins in the bag.

“He wants to sue the school and everybody in sight. He says, ‘Heads will roll!’”

Oh no.
Rose got her wallet from her purse, but the cashier was taking forever, pecking the register keys. Another cafeteria worker, a tattooed teenager, came over and helped the older woman. Rose kept her head down, and the cashier stuffed the food in a bag, firing lids for the Jell-O and pudding, while the machine came up with a total.

“That’ll be $18.36,” the cashier said finally.

“Keep the change.” Rose left a twenty, grabbed the food bag, and hurried from the cafeteria. She hit the hallway, her thoughts racing. She wanted to call Leo and tell him that he’d been right. People were lawyering up. Amanda’s family, the school district, and God knows who else.

She took her phone from her pocket, juggling John, purse, remote control, and food bag. She glanced at the screen but it was still a single bar, so she headed for the hospital entrance, figuring she’d get better reception outside. But when she looked up through the glass doors, she stopped in her tracks.

Reporters mobbed the walkway, drinking sodas and smoking, their videocameras and microphones at rest. She turned on her heel and hustled back to the stairs.