Chapter Seven
Derek’s car crunches over the gravel in the medical complex parking lot, tires finding a spot between a minivan with soccer ball stickers and a sedan that’s seen better days.
The engine ticks as it cools, and through the windshield, I can see the building that holds my answers—a beige brick structure that looks more like an office park than a place where people find out if their hearts are trying to kill them.
I’ve been clutching the yellow sticky note Mom gave me this morning for the entire twenty-minute drive, my sweaty palm making the edges curl. The small square of paper feels heavier than it should, like it’s made of lead instead of cheap office supplies.
He shifts into park but doesn’t turn off the engine right away. “You’ve been holding that thing like it’s going to explode.”
“Maybe it will.” I stare down at the folded note, Mom’s careful handwriting visible through the thin paper. “What if it’s worse than I thought? Like something she didn’t tell me on Saturday?”
“I doubt it.” His voice is gentle, but there’s steel underneath—the same tone he uses when he’s trying to talk me through a difficult play at soccer practice. “You want to read it now, or wait until you’re in there?”
The air conditioning hums between us, and I can hear my heartbeat in my ears. Funny how awareness of your heart makes you notice every skip, every racing beat that you normally wouldn’t think twice about.
“Now,” I say, though my hands don’t move. “I should read it now.”
He reaches over and covers my hands with his, warm and steady. “I’m right here.”
I unfold the sticky note with shaking fingers. Mom’s cramped handwriting fills the small space, bullet points in black ink that look clinical and impersonal:
Heart failure - grandfather, multiple bypasses Heart failure - uncle, triple bypass age 45 Arrhythmia - grandmother
At the bottom, in different ink, blue instead of black, like she added it as an afterthought, Jeremy - tricuspid regurgitation, mild.
The words swim in front of my eyes. Heart failure. Multiple bypasses. Triple bypass at forty-five. The casual way she’s written it, like a grocery list, makes my chest tighten.
“Jesus,” Derek breathes, reading over my shoulder. “That’s…a lot.”
“A lot?” I laugh, but there’s no humor in it. “My grandfather had his chest cracked open multiple times. His brother needed major heart surgery before he was fifty. And my grandmother had arrhythmia, which is probably exactly what I have.” My voice cracks on the last word.
“Hey.” His hand finds my chin, turns my face toward him. “Look at me. Your dad’s condition is listed as mild. Mild, Liv. That means it’s manageable.”
“For now. What about in ten years? What about when I’m forty-five like his uncle?” The sticky note trembles in my grip. “What if I need surgery? What if I can’t play soccer anymore? What if,”
“Stop.” His voice cuts through my spiraling thoughts. “You don’t know any of that yet. That’s what this appointment is for—to find out what’s actually going on, not to assume the worst.”
I stare at the note again, “She wrote this like it’s nothing. Like ‘pick up milk’ and ‘Jeremy’s family has a history of heart failure.’”
“Maybe that’s how she copes. By making it clinical.”
“Or maybe she still doesn’t understand how big this is.” I fold the note carefully and slip it into my jeans pocket. “Either way, I need to know what I’m walking into.”
“You want me to come in with you?”
The offer is tempting.
“I think I should handle this part myself,” I say. “But will you wait for me in the lobby?”
“Of course. I brought a book and everything.” He pulls a worn paperback from his backpack. The Great Gatsby.
Through the windshield, I can see other patients walking into the building—an elderly man with a walker, a middle-aged woman clutching her purse like a lifeline, a teenager about my age walking beside what must be her mother.
“You know what’s weird?” I say. “All this time, I thought not knowing about my dad’s side was the worst thing. Like I was missing some crucial piece of myself.”
“And now?”
“Now I kind of wish I could go back to not knowing. When it was just blank spaces on medical forms, I could pretend it didn’t matter. Now…” I touch my pocket where the note sits. “Now I know exactly what I might be facing.”
He reaches over and squeezes my hand. “Whatever the doctor says, we’ll figure it out. You don’t have to handle this alone.”
“Okay,” I say, more to myself than to him. “I can do this.”
We get out of the car, and the afternoon heat hits us immediately.
I can already feel my hair frizzing. The parking lot shimmers in the sun, and the medical building looms ahead like a beige brick fortress.
My hand instinctively goes to my chest, feeling the steady thrum of my heartbeat—the heart that might carry my grandfather’s weakness, my uncle’s need for surgery, my grandmother’s irregular rhythms.
He walks beside me across the asphalt, close enough that our arms brush with each step. I stand on my tiptoes and kiss him, quick and soft. “Thank you,” I whisper against his lips. “For everything.”
The automatic doors slide open as we approach, revealing a lobby that smells like hand sanitizer and a soft hint of Lavendar. I pause at the threshold, my hand finding the sticky note in my pocket one more time.
Behind me, Derek settles onto a bench with his book, already prepared to wait as long as it takes.
The waiting room is exactly what you’d expect from a cardiology office—beige walls, motivational posters about heart health, and patients who look like they’d rather be anywhere else.
A woman about my mom’s age flips through a magazine without reading it, her leg bouncing with nervous energy.
An elderly man stares at the fish tank in the corner, where three goldfish swim lazy circles around a plastic treasure chest.
I check in with the receptionist, a woman with kind eyes and scrubs covered in tiny hearts. She hands me a clipboard thick with forms, and I settle into a chair that’s probably supposed to be calming but instead makes me feel small.
The forms are the usual nightmare of family medical history, but now I actually have answers for the paternal side.
I pull out the sticky note and carefully transcribe my mom’s cramped handwriting into the appropriate boxes.
Heart failure. Multiple bypasses. Triple bypass at forty-five.
Each entry feels like I’m signing my own cardiac death warrant.
“Olivia Kline?”
A nurse in navy scrubs appears beside me, clipboard in hand. She’s probably in her forties, with graying hair pulled back in a practical ponytail and the kind of efficiency that comes from seeing dozens of patients every day.
“That’s me.”
“Follow me.” She says.
I stand and do so. Past the door that separates the lobby and the back, there’s a small narrow hallway with a bunch of pretty watercolor floral paintings across the wall.
“We will be going into room twelve.”
I nod and walk straight into that room.
“First time seeing Dr. Kasey?” she asks, glancing at my chart.
“Yeah. My regular doctor referred me because of some symptoms I’ve been having.”
“What kind of symptoms?”
“Racing heart, getting dizzy when I stand up too fast, shortness of breath,” The list sounds scarier when I say it out loud, especially with Jeremy’s family history fresh in my mind.
She nods, making notes. “Any family history of heart problems?”
“Yeah.” I touch my pocket where the sticky note sits. “Just found out about my dad’s side. It’s… extensive.”
“We’ll make sure Dr. Kasey has all that information.” She opens the door to exam room three, a small space with the usual examination table, blood pressure cuff, and motivational posters about the importance of exercise. “Go ahead and have a seat on the table. I need to get your vitals first.”
The paper crinkles under me as I sit down, the same sound that’s been following me through medical appointments my whole life. But this time feels different. This time, I’m not just going through the motions. I’m actually scared of what they might find.
The blood pressure cuff squeezes my arm, tighter and tighter until I think it might cut off circulation entirely. The numbers that appear on the screen make the nurse frown slightly.
“One forty over ninety,” she murmurs, making a note. “That’s elevated for someone your age.”
“Is that bad?”
“Dr. Kasey will discuss it with you. Let’s check your heart rate.” She clips the pulse oximeter to my finger, and I watch the numbers jump around on the small screen. “Ninety-eight beats per minute. A bit high for resting.”
Everything’s high. Everything’s wrong. I think about Jeremy’s uncle, who needed a triple bypass at forty-five, and wonder if this is how it started for him with elevated blood pressure at eighteen, racing heart, the slow march toward surgery.
“Any medications you’re currently taking?” the nurse asks.
“No. That’s it.”
“Caffeine intake?”
“Maybe one coffee a day? Sometimes none.” I’m grasping for explanations that don’t involve genetic cardiac time bombs. “I’ve been stressed lately. Family stuff.”
She nods sympathetically. “Stress can definitely affect your heart rate and blood pressure. Dr. Kasey will want to rule out any underlying conditions, though, especially with your family history.”
After she leaves, I sit alone in the exam room, studying the poster on the wall that shows a cross-section of a human heart.
It’s surprisingly complex—four chambers, multiple valves, arteries branching off like the roots of a tree.
All those moving parts that have to work perfectly for years and years, never taking a break, never getting to rest.
A knock on the door interrupts my cardiac anatomy lesson.