Chapter 18 #2
I called Eric to stay at the store for the afternoon and stayed by Betsy’s side in the emergency department.
She was going to need surgery and bed rest. She was being admitted into the main hospital, and since I wasn’t family I had to wait in the general waiting area.
I used the time to plot how we—Eric and I—could manage the store over these next weeks.
An imposing figure stopped in front of me where I was sitting in the waiting room.
I looked up to find Carl. Gruff as ever.
“You can go now,” he snarked.
“Excuse me?”
“I’m here now. You can go,” he responded.
I looked to either side of me, wondering if everyone was hearing this or just me. There was no one else in the room.
“Well. I’m here for my friend and boss, Betsy. And I don’t plan on leaving anytime soon. They’re prepping her for surgery,” I said. “What business is it of yours anyway?”
“I’m her brother. Her emergency contact,” he deadpanned. “You’re not.”
“You’re ‘Dumpy’?” The hospital registration clerk had contacted Betsy’s brother after we arrived, but with all the confusion I didn’t realize who exactly that was. Betsy referred to him as “Dumpy,” and sure enough he was listed that way in her phone.
“Don’t call me that,” he said with a warning look. The nickname was obviously earned.
“Do you even want to know what happened?” I asked incredulously.
This guy was beyond grumpy. His disdain for me seemed to consume him.
At least I think it was his disdain for me—and only me—since everyone else in town kept telling me how Carl “isn’t that bad.
” He was the worst, as far as I could tell.
“She fell and got hurt. That ’bout sum it up?” he asked.
“Excuse me. Hey, Ali. Betsy is asking about you,” Rosalie, a nurse, I had already bonded with during the ED experience, said.
She had a practiced inside voice—delicate and calm.
I’d already learned of her on-again, off-again with the father of her three-year-old and her struggles with her traditional Filipino parents navigating this modern arrangement, so there was a level of familiarity and sisterhood there.
“You can see her for a few moments before we wheel her back for surgery. She’s very loopy, though. That sedative they gave her to keep her calm before setting her wrist in the ED is in full effect. She’s a hoot!” she said.
“She isn’t family. She shouldn’t be allowed back there,” Carl said, pointing a thumb back toward me.
The nurse paused and nodded. “And you are?”
“Betsy’s older brother, Carl Kettering. Betsy’s emergency contact.”
“I see. You made it,” she said. We made eye contact and exchanged a smile.
Betsy had gotten on a roll with funny stories about “Dumpy” after the pain meds started to set in.
Based on her cute stories of her older brother, I thought I would get to meet a sweet older man who, while protective of those he loved, was endearing and huggable.
Instead, Carl showed up with all the warmth of a snow shovel to the face and the subtlety of a bulldozer to a flower bed—especially, it seemed, when it came to me.
“Betsy asked for her specifically,” Rosalie replied with a bit more edge to her voice. “You can approve her to go back with you since it’s what your sister requested.”
I liked how Rosalie stood up to Carl. It was like she sensed Carl was an overstimulated dog who momentarily forgot his training. She stood steady and calm and waited for him to settle himself down. Interesting approach and one I maybe needed to incorporate.
“Fine. Fine,” Carl grumbled.
We walked into Betsy’s room. She was supine in a hospital bed, wearing a hideous gown in a sickly shade of blue-gray, an IV already pressed into her arm. Her face, which was normally tense even when smiling, was slack. Drug-fueled serenity and peace.
“Oooh, you’re still here!” She sounded like she was on her third glass of rosé—light and airy. A tilt to her tone as if she was leaning on every word to stay upright.
“Thank you, beautiful Ali. For getting me here and for taking care of me. You’re a doll. And those handsome EMTs! Did you hand-select them? What was the ab minimum?”
I loved intoxicated Betsy.
“Dumpy! You’re here too? Aw. I’m touched.” She pressed her hands to her chest. “You do not, however, meet any kind of ab-muscle minimum.” She tapped Carl’s protruding belly. I couldn’t help but snicker. Carl looked embarrassed and stood up a little taller, sucking in his midsection.
“Bets, I’m your emergency contact. Of course I came,” Carl said.
“Dumpy . . . Dumpy. Come here. You need to hear this.” She waved him closer to her face.
He stepped in and leaned down. She grabbed the back of his neck and yanked him toward her.
“You need to stop acting like an ass toward Ali.” I think she was intending to whisper, but it came out more like spit through clenched teeth.
“We don’t need to talk about this now,” Carl said, trying to wiggle out of her grip. She, however, wasn’t letting up.
“Look at me. You need to give her a chance.” She released his neck, and Carl stepped out of her reach. He looked back toward me. It was silent other than the automatic blood pressure cuff inflating.
“Betsy, I’ll be here when you get out of surgery. We’ll have to figure out how to manage the store with you on bed rest for—I think the doc said six weeks,” Carl said.
“I can help,” I chimed in. “I can run things with Eric and keep it going. Betsy and I already talked about it.”
“This isn’t about you,” Carl snapped. “We all know we can’t rely on you. And she doesn’t know what she’s saying right now,” he bitterly spat as if a bug flew into his mouth and he needed to expel it from being stuck on the roof of his mouth. My head jerked back like I’d been slapped in the face.
“Oh, Dumpy, settle down. We’ll be fine. She knows what she’s doing. She isn’t the spoiled brat you thought. Libby would be proud of her,” Betsy said in my defense.
I realized Carl may be her emergency contact, but he had very little influence over the autocratic Betsy Kettering.
“Okay, Miss Betsy, it’s time. Are you ready to get yourself a new hip?” It was Rosalie entering the room to wheel Betsy back to the OR.
“Oh, Rosie!” Betsy said, not quite getting her name correct. “Yes, let’s get it done, eh? Thank you, Ali. You’re such a doll.” Betsy reached out for my hand. “I love you, dear.”
My heart melted a little. I think I loved her too.
“Dumps. Take her number so you can send her updates,” Betsy ordered. Carl resisted.
“I don’t think so,” he said.
“Carl! Get your head out of your ass or go pound sand!” Betsy shouted with her finger pointing at him like he was a child. I startled at the way her voice increased in volume and speed. Sharp and deep. An unmistakable Fuck right off.
Carl sighed in frustration but reached in his pocket for his phone. “Put your number in my phone and I will text you an update,” he said, rolling his eyes.
“You can leave now,” Carl said as we made our way back to the waiting area.
“I, um . . . Sure. I rode in the ambulance with Betsy. I have no way at the moment to get back to Lakeside.” I didn’t love that I had to admit that to Carl, but it was the truth and maybe he had a suggestion.
“Of course you don’t.” He huffed. “Don’t you have any friends you can call? Or a driver you can summon? I’m sure you’ll figure it out.” Then he walked away.
I sat in the front lobby of the regional medical center in Holly Bend—which was several towns outside of Lakeside.
It was the nearest full-service hospital with an orthopedic wing.
But still probably not the easiest place to call on a rideshare or taxi and definitely not one to drive me the hour or so south to Lakeside.
Which would also cost me a small fortune, which I did not have.
A familiar feeling started to creep in. It was hard to identify but something I’d felt many times in my life.
It shouldn’t have hurt as much as it did.
I had just gotten Betsy to safety, and she was well taken care of.
I should feel relief for my friend and boss, but my heart felt two sizes too heavy from loneliness and—I gulped down the next feeling like a bitter pill—dismissal.
Carl. He served up the reminder every time.
I was so sick of this pattern. One I’d thought was changing for me here in Lakeside.
A pattern of a transactional kind of love. The kind where I had to prove my worth or earn it by fixing everyone’s problems. It felt like duty disguised as love sometimes. I felt it with my parents—especially my dad.
I plopped down in a cushioned chair facing the revolving door that swept newcomers in on one side and shooed them back out on the other—swift and indifferent.
My tote bag settled on the floor next to me.
I let my head fall into my hands. I just needed a few moments to despair.
I would allow myself to feel it for these few moments, then I would dust myself off and face the challenge like I did every other time as Alison Fucking Bennet.
“Hey, wildflower, need a ride?”
I looked up, shocked by the sound of his voice. It was Jake.
“Wh-what are you doing here?” I stuttered, yanking my head from my hands and swiping beneath my eyes, realizing I hadn’t looked at myself in a mirror in a while.
“I heard about what happened and thought maybe you’d need a ride back,” he said.
“I do. Need a ride. Thank you,” I said, exhaling for the first time since my interaction with Carl, the pressure in my shoulders easing up.
“I would’ve been here sooner, but when Eric called, I had to finish with my patient. You ready?” He lifted my tote bag from the floor beside me like none of this was a burden on him in the least.
I stepped toward him and wrapped my arms around his midsection, taking the hug I so desperately needed.
I breathed in his fresh cedar scent. Maybe from the soap he used.
Maybe from the hamster shavings of his patient.
I think I caught him off guard at first, but then he settled into wrapping his arms around me and resting his chin on the top of my head.
I listened to the sound of his heartbeat.
We were quiet. It was full of rightness—the kind of embrace that didn’t ask for anything, but gave everything.
After what felt like a long, restful nap but was probably less than a minute, I relaxed the squeeze I had on Jake and pulled my face away from his chest to look up at him. “Thank you for coming. For knowing.” My voice was croaky, weighted with emotion.
“I’ve got you,” he said. He caressed the top of my arm and then put my tote bag over his shoulder. He reached down for my hand and quietly led me out the door and to his truck.
I kept looking at Jake at the wheel and quickly turning my face away before he could catch me staring. It worked a few times, but then I turned my head a fourth time and he met me there. We exchanged smiles.
“You called me wildflower back there.”
“I did. Should I not?” he asked.
I shrugged. “I don’t mind. I guess it’s cute.”
“I’ll consult Misha for a better nickname.”
“You do that, Dr. Love Paws,” I said, referencing Misha’s favorite nickname for Jake. “Why didn’t you warn me that Carl and Betsy are siblings?”
“You didn’t know? Was he the reason you were sitting . . . um . . . alone when I got there?”
I nodded. “He hates me!” I said dramatically. “And I have no idea why. I get that I came here and had a ridiculous amount of luggage, but come on. Is that reason enough to loathe a person forever?”
“No, it’s not,” he said with a laugh. “I love Carl and all, but fuck him.”
“What?”
“You heard me. He doesn’t get to treat you like that.”
“Thank you,” I said with such meaning. Jake looked at me again and nodded. “I don’t think you mean it. And I don’t think I want you to. But it’s exactly what I needed to hear.”
Time passed. The music in the car was low. No streaming from a phone in this old truck, but whatever radio station this was nailed the tone, tempo, mood.
Jake. The music. All perfectly in sync with what I needed right now.
This man . . . He just knew. Just showed up.
“Hey, what would you have done if I had already left for Lakeside? When you got to Holly Bend, I mean?”
He shrugged. “I’d have checked in with Carl about Betsy, offered up some help if needed. Then probably turned around. Headed back to Lakeside. But I’m glad that I did catch you.”
And catch me he did. It felt like I was in a free fall of emotion sitting in that lobby and then like a ripcord had been pulled and a parachute deployed, providing me a soft landing in Jake’s wonderfully strong arms. But not rescued.
This didn’t feel like I was helpless and he was my knight in shining armor.
No. This was not that. It was something completely different, but I was having trouble identifying exactly what it was.
Even though I didn’t want them, warning bells were creeping in.
I knew from experience the crash of disappointment if I allowed myself to trust this feeling. Like striking concrete on a cold day. All that reliability and veracity—it was bound to wane. Bound to wear off. And smack—I’d be back to cold and alone once again.
I didn’t want to believe that anymore. So I ignored the warning bells and tried something different.
“Thank you for having my back. For showing up.” My voice was low. Soft. Timid.
“Always.” He emphasized each syllable of the word and placed his hand in the middle of the bench seat. Open palm. An invitation to meet him halfway if I wanted. And I did. I let my hand nestle into his. Maybe I didn’t fully trust any of this to last, but it was here for me right now. So I dove in.