Chapter 10
TEN
Lauren
The next thing I'm fully aware of is Max's arms around me, hauling me out of the spring. Then everyone talking at once while I shiver.
“That spring is exactly seventy-two degrees year-round,” Tate declares.
Then someone's jacket is around my shoulders. Then the SUV pulls up. Meanwhile, I’m laugh-crying because my ankle hurts so dang bad.
I'm about to point out that this is entirely my own fault for attempting to navigate wet limestone in the dark while trying to reach a man. I refrain, because nobody needs to hear that right now, least of all me.
That's how good of a friend I am to myself.
I’m in the back of someone’s enormous SUV. Damien is driving, Kate’s in the front seat, Max is next to me, and one of the other brothers is wedged into the back third row of seats. The fact that my injury is now a Hastings team effort is mortifying.
“If I can't move my foot or ankle, does that mean it's broken?” I ask.
Everyone in the car answers simultaneously: “Yes.”
“Crap,” I mutter.
Don't think about Costa Rica. Don't think about Costa Rica. Just don't think about what will happen if you can't go to Costa Rica...
Modern medicine puts pig livers in human beings. And I once read an article about how specialists put a tiny camera in a tooth and implanted it into an eye. Surely someone will be able to fix my ankle. Even if I have to find the best orthopedic specialist in Florida.
Cypress Grove is small, and we're at the hospital in less than ten minutes. Damien screeches up to the emergency room, and before I can touch the door handle, Max is already there.
“I've got you. Don't even think about moving.”
He scoops me up with careful hands. “Hold on tight, okay?”
By now I feel like I might pass out from the pain, and it's impossible to hide the tears streaming down my face.
“No more medication,” I say in a fuzzy voice, looking from Kate to Max, who are sitting on either side of my hospital bed. “I don't like how it makes me feel. I've read enough about those pills to be cautious.”
Kate smooths my hair. “It was only one. The doctor said you can switch to ibuprofen tomorrow but she’s giving you a prescription just in case.”
“Or you could take the pain pills and actually feel better and be able to function,” Max says, his tone taking on a dry, almost professorial quality. “We won’t let you get addicted.”
Kate looks up and shoots him a look. My head tilts to the side and I don’t bother correcting it.
I feel a little drunk, probably from the medicine or maybe the adrenaline rush.
My eyes land on Tate, who’s in a chair, scrolling his phone with the peaceful air of a man who has decided none of this is his circus.
Damien has gone in search of the vending machines because everyone except me apparently has the munchies.
We've been here for hours. Or it feels that way. At least I'm pain free and have changed out of the wet clothes, because Tate appeared at some point with soft gym shorts and a black sweatshirt, plus dry clothes for Max as well.
Kate points to the sweatshirt I’m wearing. “What does that say? Dog Dad?”
I look down and a giggle slips out.
Tate looks up from his phone. He shrugs. “I got it at the shelter when I adopted Steve.”
There's a long conversation about Steve's diet and weight loss progress and whether salmon kibble causes gas, and I lean back into the hospital pillow. Somehow I doze off around the point where Damien mentions the words “spectacular” and “odor” in the same sentence. I’m suddenly so tired.
The next thing I know, everyone's talking about my doctor, and I feel like I'm floating slightly above my own body.
I'm also in some time-space warp where Max won't let go of my hand. I squeeze his fingers. He returns the squeeze, and I smile.
“Thank God for Dr. Dos Santos,” Kate murmurs.
“She's wonderful,” someone else says.
“And beautiful,” Remy adds.
Kate and the Hastings crew all seem to know Dr. Sara Dos Santos well. She'd gone to school with Max and greeted him like an old friend when she bustled into the ER shortly after our arrival. Remy had immediately started flirting with her. That much I remember clearly.
That led to the pain medication, the X-rays, and the MRI. Then the dog conversation.
Now all we need is the formal diagnosis. I know my ankle is a mess. How much of a mess is the only question, and one I'm deliberately not speculating about.
I open my eyes when Dr. Dos Santos bustles in with a sheaf of papers and what appear to be X-rays. She gives Remy a quick smile. She’s bright-eyed and efficient, and I wonder if they've ever dated. Remy seems like a person who has dated everyone in town. Thank goodness Kate didn’t fall for him.
Thank goodness I didn’t fall for him. “Blergh,” I say randomly out loud, and a few people pat my good leg.
“Well, Lauren, you certainly had a fall.” She flicks a switch and a lighted panel on the wall illuminates. With quick, practiced movements she clips two X-rays to the top.
“You have a medial malleolus fracture.” She gestures with a pen on the X-ray.
I wince. “That bone isn't supposed to be in two pieces, is it?”
“No, it isn't. It's a little early to know whether you'll need surgery, and I'd suggest you see an orthopedic surgeon next week. I’ll give you a referral.”
“Surgery?” Only it comes out sounding like smurgerfy.
She nods. “You're young and have good bone density. It may heal on its own, but you need a specialist's opinion. I can refer you, or Max may know someone.” She glances at him with a smile. “Lord knows you boys broke enough bones growing up.”
Max, Damien, Tate, and Remy all chuckle. Kate snorts.
I scowl at all of them.
“But I have a trip coming up.” I squint at the X-ray. “Costa Rica. I was going to do a sunrise yoga session in the rainforest canopy. And zip-lining.” My throat tightens with panic. “Some yoga, too.”
The doctor clicks her pen three times. “I think zip-lining should come off the agenda for the near future.”
Can I reschedule the Costa Rica trip? Valentina had been so generous with the invitation, and there are probably a hundred other influencers lined up behind me...
“What if I'm really careful? Can I still travel? I'll be mobile, right? I can walk?” I imagine myself hobbling through a luxury eco-retreat on crutches and feel the urge to weep.
“I'm not the orthopedic surgeon, but I can tell you this: you need to stay off that ankle for at least six weeks.”
“Six weeks?” My voice comes out approximately three octaves higher than usual. “I'm supposed to walk down the aisle in Kate's wedding. And I have the trip of a lifetime booked.”
Dr. Dos Santos nods and scribbles something on my chart. “When's the wedding?”
“Three days,” I mutter. “And the trip is two weeks from now.”
Two weeks from now I'm supposed to be in Costa Rica photographing dawn mist over a rainforest canopy. Maybe I could still do it in a cast? I imagine asking a howler monkey to sign it and almost laugh despite myself.
The doctor looks up and beams past me. “Someone getting married?”
“We are.” Damien slides an arm around Kate, who looks like she might burst with happiness. Damien presses a kiss to her temple and Tate whispers, “aww.”
“Congratulations.” She grins, then glances at Remy.
“I’m still looking for a date if you're free, Doc,” Remy says, beaming and puffing out his chest a little.
“Maybe it’s not the moment for that,” she says. And yet, the tops of her cheekbones turn a little pink.
I look around the room with wobbly indignation. “I'm the patient here,” I announce, and Dr. Dos Santos snaps back to professional mode with admirable speed.
Max rubs my arm and tries not to smile.
“You'll recover well, Lauren,” the doctor says. “You can use crutches or a knee scooter to get around until you see the specialist. The cast will keep everything held in place. I'll write a prescription for pain medication—”
“Ibuprofen is fine,” I say firmly. “I've read too much about those pills to be comfortable with them. I'd rather just manage.”
She gives me an appraising look. “That's your call. Just don't try to tough it out completely — undertreated pain slows healing. Ibuprofen on a proper schedule, not just when it's unbearable. Pain meds for tonight and tomorrow, at the least.”
“Deal.”
“And no alcohol this weekend.”
“That’s probably not a bad thing.” I glance at the cast on my ankle and feel the specific misery of someone whose carefully constructed plans have just been rearranged by a piece of Florida limestone. “What exactly is a knee scooter?”
The explanation, when it comes, does not improve my evening, because it looks like the maid of honor at Kate’s wedding will be rolling, not walking, down the aisle.
With Max Hastings at her side.