Chapter 7

Rachel pushed the button for the ground level and let out a weary sigh when the elevator doors closed. Visiting hours were over and it was now time to brave the waiting horde. Thankful to be alone, she slumped to the side – taking weight off her right leg – and rested her head against the wall. She could feel her ankle throb beneath the stiff brace. It certainly wasn’t anything compared to what Terrance was likely going through with his leg, but with the way it was hurting, she was glad the ICU was a couple floors directly above the hospital’s main entrance. And that there was complimentary valet parking.

Her thoughts drifted back to Terrance. He was dozing when she left – something he’d been doing off and on for a couple days now. But that leg. It had her worried. It was why he hadn’t been shifted to a regular room yet. True, he’d shown considerable improvement since the accident. The other injuries were all healing nicely, but that leg – not so much. She herself was torn. She desperately wanted him moved so Hailey could finally visit him but she also knew he was getting the most attentive care he could get right where he was.

What Rachel found most odd was that she was both grateful and annoyed she had no say in that decision. Still, she treasured her time with him. It ran the gamut – from watching him sleep, to talking about just about anything under the sun, to sitting quietly and watching a movie together. And those eyes of his! She even got to shave him today and she struggled doing it just because he would watch her with those incredible blue eyes.

Her mind was still adrift, thinking of Terrance, when the elevator doors opened. Standing back up, she winced as she put weight on the not-so-minor of a sprained ankle. Stepping out, she could see the information desk ahead of her and beyond that, the main doors. Awaiting her outside of those, she could also see, was a sizable array of media people – all the way from television news crews, likely from Honolulu, to the basest of paparazzi. It was nightly news time, after all.

“Could you have the valet bring my car around?” she asked the older woman at the desk, handing her the ticket. Normally, the thing to do would be to go to the valet station outside the main doors but that was no longer feasible, what with the feeding frenzy out there.

“Absolutely, Ms Vargas,” the woman replied, taking the ticket and calling the valet directly.

Minutes later, she saw her Lexus pull up.

“Wish me luck,” she murmured to the information attendant.

The woman gave her a sympathetic look and nodded. “Take care out there.”

With a heavy sigh, Rachel turned and steeled herself for the inevitable confrontation. For some strange reason, the song about putting one foot in front of the other from that old Christmas cartoon came to mind and she found herself wanting to giggle. At the very least, it lightened her mood and gave her an idea. With a shake of her head, she did just as the song suggested and headed off for the rental car.

There are just so many times that you can watch the same edition of SportsCenter. The restless patient laid his head back on his pillow with a sigh, his right thumb repeatedly pressing down on the channel select button. He watched with growing disinterest as the screen flitted from one show to another. He was desperate for a distraction. With a loud groan, he gave up the search and held the button down until the TV turned off.

“I’m so bored.”

“Well,” shot back his night nurse, Leilani, who had just walked in, “you wouldn’t be if you hadn’t been stupid enough to run in front of a bus.”

Rance liked her. This was his second night with Leilani and he had to admit, she was a character. About his age, she was a little heavier set but pretty and very proud of her Hawaiian heritage. With a quick wit and a sharp tongue, she could go toe to toe with anyone and give as good as she got.

“It was a truck ... and you’re right, but I thought I could beat it,” he admitted with more of a grimace than a grin.

“Hey! What did I tell you about that whole macho, manly crap?” Setting the dressing supplies on the counter by the sink, she turned and approached his bed. “What are you at?”

“About a six, maybe a seven,” he conceded sheepishly.

“Where?”

“The usual – my leg, mostly.”

“You push the button? Hey, don’t give me that look,” she challenged when he rolled his eyes at her. “You’re the idiot who didn’t tell me he was in pain. Wanted to be ‘Mister Tough Guy’!” she mocked, shaking her head. “You’re as bad as my husband.”

With key in hand, she flipped open the housing for the morphine pump. Rance watched as she tapped the keypad, shortening the interval between doses, and relocked the case. “Okay, go ahead and push it now,” she told him as she jotted down a few notes on a pad she kept in one of her pockets. “Let me know how that does. If you still need more, I’ll talk with your doctor. Now, let’s get those dressings changed on that leg and see how it’s doing.”

Rance could feel the additional morphine kick in right away, as the pain faded into the background. He also noticed his head started getting fuzzy, as Leilani tried to engage him in conversation while she worked.

“You know, you’re the talk of the hospital right now,” she teased, giving him a sideways glance.

Choosing not to bite, he just gave her a blank look.

“Oh, so that’s how you’re going to play it,” she snickered. “Fine, be that way. I’ll just have to come up with my own stories about your visiting harem of supermodels then. Maybe get an exclusive with one of those reporters camped outside the entrance.”

“A harem?” Rance sputtered weakly, his vision starting to go a bit cross-eyed. “Oh, please.”

“So, you’re saying you don’t have feelings for any of them?” Seeing her patient blink slowly a few times and struggle to answer, she just smiled. “Uh huh, that’s what I thought. Well, just so you know, a couple of them have feelings for you, too, tough guy.”

“Probably just overly sympathetic,” he conjectured sleepily. “Or maybe it’s pity.”

Leilani let out a dismissive snort. “That might be true with that Aussie chick,” she agreed, “but not Rachel.”

Not hearing a response, she glanced back at him only to see he’d drifted off to sleep. After redressing his leg, the nurse adjusted his bed back a bit more and then stopped to softly pat his cheek. “Nope, hero boy, if I’m right, it’s far more than sympathy – a lot more.” With that, she headed back out to her station.

Rachel was comfortably resting on the couch, with a novel in hand and her bum ankle elevated on an ottoman, when she heard the bang of a door and the stomping of unhappy feet on the hardwood floor. Glancing to the right, she watched as a four and a half foot blur dashed past the open archway, headed for the stairs. She smiled to herself and went back to reading. There was no one upstairs.

Chloe, Zoe and Hannah were still off at the calendar shoot – something about some sunset shots on the southwest side of the island. Nina, for her part, was out engaging in what she liked to call “retail therapy”, which meant either gifts for her nieces and nephews, shoes, or – far more likely – both. Rounding out the missing adults were the elder Marzanos, who had left young Anthony at the Bed & Breakfast and were off on some much needed alone time.

Other than Elaine and Michael, the owners of the complex, who were around somewhere, Rachel was it for adult supervision – and the last she’d checked, which had been roughly ten minutes earlier, the two youngsters were playing a board game together on the back porch. Evidently, that had now changed – which was not a surprise, considering how increasingly moody Hailey was getting. Drawing on her long dormant babysitting skills, she decided to let them come to her.

She did not have to wait long.

A minute or so later, the previous blur rematerialized in the archway. Her expression was one of irritation and frustration. The child didn’t say anything, though.

Rachel merely patted the cushion next to her with her hand.

Hailey did something somewhere in between a nod and shrug before following the lone adult’s suggestion. Moments later, she was on the couch and leaning against her left shoulder. Rachel leaned over and kissed her on the top of her head.

“Boys are stupid.”

Rachel chuckled. “They can be,” she agreed, before returning to her book. She pretended to read before slowly turning to the next page.

“What are you reading?”

“The Hobbit.”

“Why?”

“Your father was teasing me for not having read it. So I’m reading it.”

“Oh. Do you like it?”

“I don’t know. Nina picked the book up for me today and I just started a little bit ago. Have you ever read it?”

Hailey shook her head no. “But Daddy liked it?”

“He said it was one of his favorite books as a boy.”

“Oh. What’s it about?”

“A small man by the name of Bilbo who goes on an adventure with a bunch of dwarves.”

“Is it scary?”

“I’m not sure. It appears to have a dragon in it somewhere,” she replied, showing the girl the picture of a dragon on the paperback cover. “So it might be.”

The child didn’t say anything but seemed to look at the cover with significant interest.

“Would you like me to read it out loud to you?”

“From the beginning?”

Rachel nodded, which elicited a smile and a nod from Hailey. With that established, she turned back to the very first page and began to read.

“In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.”

Before long, a shadow appeared in the archway. The reader didn’t pause her reading but did gesture ever so slightly with her head toward the cushion on her right side. Anthony took the hint and soon all three were caught up in a great adventure, if only for a little while.