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Authors: Michelle Stimpson

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BOOK: Someone to Watch Over Me
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I decided to put the suffering out of my head for a moment. The Advil had taken the edge off the pain, so I carefully reached onto the floor and pulled my laptop bag onto the bed. The sweet challenge of work carried me into a trance that dulled the pain for a while.
I tapped on the mouse to wake my computer and then resumed toggling between the open programs on my computer desktop, making sure my client's newsletter matched the updated blog content precisely. Next to update their social media networks with useful information about the company's new products.
With reviewing several press releases still on my agenda, I really didn't want to stop working. But the pain in my midsection returned with new vigor, biting into my concentration. I powered down my computer for the night and made my way back to the restroom for another bout with bile and a double dose of Advil. If the pain wasn't any better by tomorrow, I'd have to miss work so I could visit the doctor.
Kevin rolled in a little after eleven to assess me again. He slipped a hand beneath the comforter and rubbed my backside. “You all right now?”
“No,” I groaned.
He nibbled on my ear, a sure indication of his intentions. “Mind if I make you feel better?”
“That won't help.”
“Marvin Gaye says sexual healing is the best thing for you.”
“Marvin Gaye never felt this bad. Besides, I might have germs.”
Kevin tried again, lapping my neck with his tongue. “I don't care. I miss you.”
Now he doesn't care about the germs.
His hand moved around to my stomach, warranting a stern rejection. “Kevin, I cannot do this tonight. Move your hand.”
He jumped up from the bed. “Fine. Fine. I understand. I'll be on the couch.”
Chapter 2
“M
aybe it's because you haven't eaten anything,” my secretary speculated when I told her I felt like I'd been kicked by a horse. “You tried crackers?”
“Yes, but they wouldn't stay down,” I confessed. Jacquelyn had never seen me so miserable—in fact, no one had ever seen me so miserable because I'd never
been
so miserable in my whole life. I hurt so bad I was close to crying, which is the only reason I decided not to hang around the office another hour before my eleven o'clock semiappointment with Dr. Lightfoot.
His receptionist had assured me, “You may have to wait a bit when you get here, but we'll try to work you in as soon as possible.”
I figured if they were going to work me in some way, I might be able to get the ball rolling sooner if I got there earlier. I grabbed my laptop bag and purse, and stopped by Preston's office on my way out the door. By this point, I was nearly doubled over in pain.
“Tori, can I get someone to take you to the doctor?” he asked. “You really don't look well.”
Truth be told, I would have preferred a ride. I'd even considered calling Kevin, but if he came home, he probably wouldn't be able to reschedule his flight and make it to Chicago in time for his next presentation. Still, the logistics of having a coworker take me—leaving my car in the parking lot, getting someone else to pick me up when this was all over—was too much to ask. Plus there was always the possibility I might barf upside someone else's door panel before they could pull over, like I'd contaminated my car only three hours earlier.
“No, I'll make it. I've got my unfinished work here in my bag, in case I don't get to come back this afternoon.” I raised the black leather satchel for him to see.
To my surprise, he didn't seem impressed. Then again, who could really tell with those glasses?
“Well, let us know if you need a day off or something.”
I frowned and shook my head. “Oh, no. I'll be back at my desk tomorrow for sure. There's way too much work to be done.”
Now it was Preston's turn to frown. “Take care, Tori.” “Okay. See you tomorrow.”
I treaded lightly down the hallway, stabilizing my midsection. Movements were the enemy. Movements and food. Even liquids were suspect.
The beauty-queen wave would have to do as I floated down the hallway saying good-bye to the few coworkers who happened to be looking up from their screens as I passed by. Our gray cubicle partitions definitely prevented outside distractions.
Once down the elevator (which nearly did me in), through the parking lot, and sitting in my shiny red Cadillac SRX mini-SUV with the lovely lingering aroma of throw up, I carefully snapped my seat belt and took off for Dr. Lightfoot's office. My only saving grace was the weather. February in Houston is still quite cold, thus the odor from this morning's puke hadn't been baked in yet. The detail shop would have to work me in, too.
Why are there so many lights?
I was down to one hand driving now. The other was practically glued to my midsection, attempting to protect myself from this invading pain. The act itself was impractical because the pain came from inside me, but I couldn't help myself.
I began to doubt whether I could step out of my car if I ever made it to Dr. Lightfoot's office. Agony elicited little animal noises from deep within me. Now, I was thankful for the stoplights. They gave me a chance to catch my breath, refocus myself and gain my wits again. I promise you, the road to this office was turning into that long, ever-extending hallway in
The Shining.
I think I had maybe two more intersections to go when I decided there was no way I could make it in. I should have taken Preston up on his offer because, at the moment, tears blurred my vision. “Oh my God!” I finally cried out, followed by a long string: “Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.” And I wasn't just saying His name jokingly, either. I felt as though I was, maybe, ten minutes from meeting the Big Man Himself if this pain didn't cease.
Then came this sudden, unquestionable realization that I needed to make a quick right into the hospital's emergency room, which was directly across the street from the physicians' offices. I knew I couldn't sit in Dr. Lightfoot's office and wait to be seen after someone with a mere stuffy nose. I needed someone to see me stat.
A gloriously close spot opened up just as I was pulling into the emergency room parking lot. Couldn't have asked for better without being in an ambulance. I swerved between the white lines and parked, waiting for a moment of diminished pain. No such luck. No reprieve in sight.
I opened the car door and found footing on the nice, steady concrete. Now to push myself up and out of the car. I rolled down the window to get a good grip on the door's frame with my right hand. I'd just grabbed hold of the headrest with my left and was attempting to tilt forward when this band of torture wrapped itself around to my right side and dictated in no uncertain terms:
you ain't goin' nowhere, Tori!
Yes, Pain has a voice. He sounds like Freddy Krueger and he minces no words. The excruciating fire in my stomach had spread.
“Help!” I whimpered desperately. “Help me!”
The lot was completely void of all human life. Eyeing the building's glass windows, I saw why no one inside the building had noticed me. The shades were pulled down to block out the high sun. Only the patrons' legs were visible.
But wait!
A little girl. On the floor. I waved my hand and finally managed to lock gazes with her. She gave me a snaggletoothed smile that, at that moment, was the sweetest vision I'd ever beheld.
I motioned for her to touch the nearest grown-up and get me some help—or at least I thought that's what I'd motioned. In restrospect, I'm sure I must have looked like I was doing the chicken dance.
The little girl turned away from me and continued playing with some toy on the ground. But a second or two later, she gave me her attention again. This time, I mouthed the word “help” and folded my hands in a pleading gesture.
She laughed, apparently amused. This little girl was not
even
trying to help me. I had to go mean-church-usher on her. I'd never been so glad that 90 percent of communication is body language. Through gritted teeth and flared nostrils, I ordered her with words I'm sure she couldn't hear, “Get your momma! Get your momma!” I wagged my finger angrily toward her. “Get her now!”
The child's face wrinkled with fear and she tapped her mother's leg, then pointed back at me. Seconds later, the bottom of the blinds lifted and a woman's face peeked out at me.
“Help me!”
Nurses came scrambling out with a wheelchair. Thankfully, they had the wherewithal to secure my car and grab my purse. I was transported straight to an examination room. They asked me a ton of questions that I couldn't answer because I was in such agony I couldn't even think straight anymore. Their faces blurred by tears, their words overshadowed by my wailing. I just wanted them to knock me out and do whatever they had to do.
“Who can we notify for you?”
I cried, “Nobody! I came by myself!”
“Have you taken any drugs, Miss Henderson?”
“No!”
“Is there a possibility that you could be pregnant?”
Home-training aside, I managed to say, “No, no, no to everything, all right? Just help me!”
After covering every possible topic—including my insurance—and prolonging my pain to the full extent legally allowable, a doctor finally entered the room. She asked me two questions about my symptoms, had me lie flat on my back, and pressed one area on my stomach that made me want to slap the judge.
I didn't have to tell her she'd hit the spot.
“Looks like it's your appendix. We'll have to operate right away.” She glanced at my chart again and ordered the nurses to prepare me for surgery.
“Miss Henderson,” the pesky nurse drilled me again, “we have to notify someone before we can proceed. Don't you have
anyone
we can call? Grandparents? Cousins?”
Surgery?
I shook my head violently as, now, a fresh batch of tears spewed from my eyes. These, however, came from a different well.
I don't want to die.
“How about coworkers or a friend or a boyfriend?”
“He won't answer—he's on a flight.”
“It doesn't matter. We can leave a message. We just have to let someone know you're going under sedation. It's the law.”
“Kevin Walker.” Then I gave her his number and someone whisked me off for surgery. “And call my job for me, okay?”
“We'll do that later.”
The last thing I remember was a woman saying, “I'm gonna stick this needle in your arm and you'll be on your way to la-la land.”
I remember thinking, “Lady, you can stick a needle in my
eye
if it'll get me out of this misery.”
Chapter 3
U
nfamiliar surroundings caused a brief panic as I returned to a state of consciousness. An IV in my arm, sterile whiteness all around me.
“Miss Henderson?” a soft voice called.
My voice way obstructed, I instinctively reached for my throat and felt plastic tubing.
“No. Wait just a second—I'll take it out.” A red-haired nurse with extremely fair skin stood over me now. Her presence brought everything into focus. The first thing I realized was the absence of excruciating pain that had taken over my entire being earlier in the day, replaced by only a tenderness in the area.
In one sweeping motion, the nurse extracted the cylinder from my mouth. Like ripping tape off someone's skin, there was no use in belaboring the action. A few coughs later, I managed to eke out a request for water.
The nurse obliged me only a sip, saying I shouldn't eat or drink anything until the anesthesia wore off. “Don't want you to lose whatever you put down.”
Please. After all I'd been through, I was a professional vomiter.
The next thing I remember with clarity is eating Jell-O, trying to convince myself that it was okay to eat again. The surgery was over, but I still needed to satisfy my psyche. One bite. Wait a minute. Another bite. Wait. Before the next bite, I examined the Jell-O. My taste buds must have been asleep still because I wasn't able to taste much. I had to rely on texture. Gelatin made with real sugar was thicker than Jell-O made with artificial sweetener. My fork sliced through the shiny red goop easily. Splenda.
I'm pretty sure I slept like a baby for most of my two-day hospital stay. There was little to occupy me except an occasional visit from the doctor or a nurse. I could have kicked myself for leaving my laptop in the car. The outside temperature was cool enough to prevent damage to my equipment, but the workload would certainly swell with neglect. If only I'd had someone I knew come by, I could give them my keys and ask them to go get my bag.
Kevin called once, between meetings, to check on me. “How are you feeling?”
“Much better.” I powered my bed to an upright position. “How's it going in Chicago?”
“Sweet. I think that pharmaceutical company I told you about is going to award us the account. It's huge. Seriously—huge.”
“That's good.” I wish I could say I listened to him go on and on about the deal, his residuals from it, and how his team would probably win the contest if they got this one, which meant a trip to Saint Lucia for us both, but as exciting as all that was, something else caught my attention. Actually, it was the
lack
of something that struck me. I didn't have any flowers. Not one balloon, not one card. Nothing.
Voices from the hallway spilled into my room, and I watched for a moment to see who they belonged to. First appeared a woman about my age with her hair pulled behind a white cloth headband. She wore a full-length halter dress and flip-flops. The child, probably her son, hopped from tile to tile as he traveled alongside her. She told him to stop it; hospitals were no place for leaping. Slowly, a man came into view pushing an IV cart. The patient. They were a family, I figured. The mom and son had come to visit the father. A few more elderly family members trailed the man. Maybe his parents. They talked about whether or not the man would still be able to travel to “D-I-S-N-E-Y land,” the grandmother spelled out, presumably so the child wouldn't understand the topic.
As I watched this family's snapshot, the absence of flowers, cards, and balloons seemed minor, to belie my saddest realization. No one had come to see me.
I broke into Kevin's impending-sales-victory train with a question. “Do you think we're ever going to be a family?”
He stuttered, “Wh-what?”
“A family.” I spelled it out for him: “Me, you, kids, your parents.”
“Tori, we've already talked about this.”
I sighed. “I know, I know. It's just that I'm sitting here in this hospital all alone and—”
“You're having a fleeting maternal episode, babe. Don't get down about it, all right? You'll be up on your feet in a few days. This moment will pass,” he assured me. “I gotta go. I'll call you when I get a chance.” He hung up before I could even say good-bye.
My eyes began to sting and lumps jumbled in my throat.
I'm having a fleeting episode?
A moment of wanting someone to care enough to check on me? This ain't no Twix commercial, this is life. I didn't want a moment of being cared about—I wanted someone to care about me every day. For a lifetime.
I blinked back the tears because crying, like vomiting, was not my forte. The last time I could remember crying, I mean shoulder-shaking, snot-flying crying, was when my mother told me
not
to cry. I was sixteen and had just delivered a stillborn baby boy.
A nurse brought him to me, swaddled in a white blanket with pink and blue stripes. She said she'd leave me alone with him for a while. To say good-bye.
His little body was perfectly formed, ten fingers and ten toes. He had my lips, his father's nose. If the doctors hadn't told me he was dead, I would have figured he was just sleeping. A guttural wail came from deep inside me as my tears fell onto my deceased son's forehead.
My mother sat beside me on the hospital bed and fingered through my hair. I wasn't expecting her to do that. She'd been so distant—both physically and emotionally—throughout my unexpected pregnancy, I'd forgotten she could actually show affection like most human mothers.
“It's going to be all right, Tori. Everything will work out for the best,” she whispered softly. Then she stroked my son's plump cheeks. “He has your lips,” she agreed with me.
I laughed slightly. “He kind of looks like Grandpa Henderson, doesn't he, Momma?”
She laughed, too. “Yes, he does look like my father—you're right. He's a handsome little thing.”
“You think Grandpa Henderson will recognize him and take care of him in heaven?”
“I'm sure he will, Tori,” my mother said as she pulled me and the baby into a hug.
Just then, Mr. James entered the room. My mother stiffened, then jumped up from the bed wiping her eyes with the back of her hands. She walked toward my stepfather and braced him, holding both his arms. Mr. James was short, stocky, and balding on top of his head. His mean black eyes peered from beneath hooded lids. How he'd managed to snag someone as beautiful as my mother was strictly business. She wanted financial stability, he wanted a trophy wife to complement his joke of a political career.
“Give her a minute with the baby, James.” My mother attempted to stand her ground with him.
“It's dead, Margie.”
I burst into tears again. Why did he always have to be such a jerk?
“No use in crying over spilled milk. What's done is done,” he snapped, and pushed past my mother to confront me directly. “I told you and your momma you weren't ready to handle a baby. Even God agreed with me.”
I secured the baby in the nook of my left arm, then used my right hand to bop Mr. James upside the head with the hardest thing I could get my hand on—the television remote control.
Mr. James cupped his eye with his hand and stammered, “Are you cr-crazy?”
My mother jumped in between us, as she'd always done. “Tori, stop this! You've lost your mind, hitting your stepfather.” No surprise there, either. She almost always took his side. “I'm going to call the nurse. Maybe they can give you a Valium. . . . James, go to the nurses' station and see if you can get an ice pack.”
My mother pushed the call button and seconds later, a nurse arrived to assist. I don't know why it didn't occur to me that the nurse would want me to relinquish the baby. But when she rolled that bassinet into the room, reality punched me.
“No! Don't take him!”
“Honey, give me the baby,” Mother demanded.
“I'm not ready,” I protested. “He's not ready. Aunt Dottie didn't get to see him.” I truly wanted my aunt, who had taken me in during the last five months of my pregnancy, to see him. But she was busy working at her store. It was the day before Thanksgiving. There was no way she could close shop on such an important day. She said she'd come and see me as soon as she closed and I knew she would. Aunt Dottie always kept her word.
“Tori, it's all over now,” Mother coldly surmised. Somehow, Mr. James always managed to turn my mother into a wicked witch when he was around.
Gently, the nurse and my mother pried my son from me for the last time. “Wait!” I tried to maintain physical contact with him, but they weren't listening. I'd learned no one listened to sixteen-year-old mothers, actually.
When the nurse placed the baby in the clear standard-issue bassinet and rolled him out of the room, I fell apart, sobbing uncontrollably and scrambling to get out of bed.
“Tori, stop this!” my mother ordered. “Stop this. It's over! Stop crying, stop crying this instant! You hear me? What's done is done. Crying won't change anything.”
She was right. Crying had never changed one single thing about my miserable life before. I had no reason to think things would change at that point. If anything, things had been worse with my mother and Mr. James since I'd gotten pregnant by one of the neighborhood thugs.
My mother had already decided we weren't having a funeral. Just a graveside service, which I'd already overheard my stepfather, Mr. James, tell hospital personnel “cost way too much money for a dead baby. Why can't they just dispose of it?”
He thought I was asleep. I wasn't.
BOOK: Someone to Watch Over Me
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