Chapter 2 #2
In the end, none of that mattered. They couldn’t go back and change what had happened. And God help him, he couldn’t forgive. He couldn’t forgive her for denying their child life. And he couldn’t forgive himself for making her feel like that was her only choice.
Stop. You can think later. Now, you have a patient to deal with.
When he shot a glance at the young woman, her eyes were closed, and her breathing was slow and regular. She’d fallen asleep while he chastised himself.
A single tear trembled on her cheek.
“Thank you!” Mia held her hand out the car window to accept the bag with Gus’s medication and tossed it on the empty seat beside her.
She couldn’t believe how long the drive-through line was today.
She’d waited nearly twenty minutes. But the moment she’d decided to back up and leave the line so she could go into the pharmacy and wait at the counter, someone had pulled into the drive-through behind her, blocking her exit.
Today wasn’t her day.
She sighed and began the fifteen-minute drive home. She should let Anne Marie know she was on her way. She hit the Call button. When the phone went to voicemail again, her stomach wound itself into a tight knot.
What if something had happened? Gus was so stubborn that Anne Marie sometimes forgot how fragile she had become.
She’d always been active. At eighty-two, she was beginning to slow down.
While her memory was still strong, her heart had eroded her health.
She was on a blood thinner and several other medications.
She needed a bypass surgery, but the doctors were hesitant since she’d become frail.
Mia didn’t want to think about life without Gus.
Her leg jiggled. Her foot tapped the gas. The speedometer inched up. The speed limit in town was thirty miles per hour. Thirty-one. Thirty-two. Thirty-three. Thirty-four. She didn’t dare go faster than that.
Not because she might get a ticket. Mia had no problem with getting a well-deserved ticket. But she couldn’t afford to lose the time it would take.
And she also wouldn’t be responsible for risking any life, hers or a stranger’s, through carelessness.
The light turned yellow. The car ahead of her screeched to a halt.
“Oh, come on! You could have made that!”
Her luck continued to sink. She hit every red light in town. When she was finally free of Main Street and the speed limit increased by fifteen miles, she hit the gas and floored it. She wouldn’t break any records, but she’d get home as soon as was humanly possible.
“Shannon would tell me to pray,” she muttered to herself, then grimaced. Jackson had taken her to church with him and his grandfather a couple of times. She’d been so hungry for love, and the idea of a loving God had appealed to her. Until they went too far and it all fell apart.
Yeah, she’d seen what faith looked like. Get someone pregnant, then abandon them. No thanks.
I should try Anne Marie one last time.
When no one answered, her hands curled around the steering wheel and tightened until her knuckles whitened.
Her street loomed before her. She braked at the stop sign, looked both ways, then rolled through the intersection and turned onto her street.
Blood pounded through her veins, sounding like thunder in her ears.
A group of boys was playing catch in the middle of the street. She rolled down her window when they didn’t move to let her through. Heat poured through the opening. Instantly, sweat slicked her skin, catching the dust floating in the air and holding it captive. Yuck.
“Hey, boys, I need to get through.”
The oldest boy grabbed the ball. “Sorry, Miss Turner.”
The four boys, ages ten through twelve, ran to the curb and waved as she drove by. Normally, Mia would have taken the time to stop and chat. Today, she had to get to Gus and make sure everything was all right.
Why hadn’t her cousin called her?
Mia pulled into her driveway. She shoved the gear shift to Park.
Turned off the ignition, then grabbed the bag with the medication and hopped from the vehicle.
She slammed the door and tore up the driveway toward the five steps leading to the front door.
She was halfway up the stairs when it hit her.
Anne Marie’s little four-door sedan wasn’t parked on the street.
Where was her cousin?
Images of Gus holding her heart ripped through her mind. Had they gone to the hospital? She ran up the rest of the steps and burst into the house.
“Gus?” she called out, eyes frantically searching for the familiar face.
The place was a wreck. Dirty dishes were on the table, a basket of clothes had tipped over on the floor, and a pizza box and several soda cans littered the floor in front of the sofa.
The house had been immaculate when Mia had left that morning.
“I’m here.” Gus’s voice wobbled in the next room.
She followed the weak voice into the kitchen.
Her eighty-two-year-old aunt leaned against the countertop as if her legs wouldn’t support her weight.
She had an apron tied around her waist and was washing dishes.
Her puff of steel-gray hair had been pulled away from her face by the reading glasses she wore like a headband for when she needed them.
Her lips were gray, and she gasped in each breath.
“Gus! You shouldn’t be doing this. Where is Anne Marie?” She hurried to Gus’s side and tucked her hand inside her aunt’s elbow, then guided the elderly woman to the table and settled her in a chair.
“Oh, she had some friends over, then they went out to catch a movie.” Gus waved an airy hand.
Mia stopped herself from rolling her eyes. Gus would do anything for her family. In the past, it had led to people taking advantage of her. Mia pursed her lips, suspicious. She went over to the tea canister where Gus kept her weekly grocery money and pulled on the lid. It came away with a soft pop.
Peering inside, she sighed. It was gone. “Gus! They took your money.”
“It’s all right, sweetie. She needed it. You can’t take it with you.” Gus sighed. “I’m tired, Mia. Be a dear. Help me to my chair.”
Biting down the acidic response that burned in her chest, Mia gently took Gus’s arm, wincing at how frail it felt, and walked her to the living room.
She helped her lower herself into her favorite recliner.
It would do no good to scold Gus and tell her not to let Anne Marie take her money. That was who she was.
It was up to Mia to protect her and look out for her.
“You stay here. I’ll get you dinner and your pills.”
Mia found some leftovers in the kitchen and heated them up. Then she gathered Gus’s medication and brought it to her. “Here you go. Careful. I think I put this lasagna in the microwave too long.”
“I’ll let it sit a bit.” Gus took her pills with the water Mia handed her. “Say, Mia, did you get to go on your run this morning?”
Mia shook her head. “It was raining this morning. I’ll do it tomorrow morning.”
“I just don’t want you to skip your running because of me.”
Touched, Mia kissed her aunt’s cheek. “I won’t. I’ll start running again once my school stuff is ready.”
The next two hours flew by. By the time Gus was ready to watch her nightly game shows, Mia’s shoulders and back ached. A slight headache pounded behind her eyes. The kitchen sparkled and the mess was gone, but what would happen tomorrow?
Her lips tightened. She needed a new plan. Because there was no way she’d leave Gus with Anne Marie again. Her cousin was twenty-six, just two years younger than Mia. But she’d shown that she couldn’t be trusted.
She wasn’t getting a second chance.
Well, Mia would handle her when she arrived home. Right now, she had other things to accomplish. She needed to get the money owed to her so she could finish her master’s and open her crisis pregnancy center.
Pulling out her laptop, she settled in to find the foundation so she could finally make the life she wanted for herself. No one would hand it to her. It was up to her.
Mia never backed away from a challenge.