Except it’s not the door that just made that noise.
It’s my heart.
Both the click and the thud.
Pushing all the madness and questions and emotions away, I close my eyes, settling in on the bed, my body drifting almost instantly. But just as the first glimpses of a dream hit the backs of my eyelids, my pager goes off. Not even ten seconds later, my phone rings.
With a weakened groan, I sit up slowly, my head spinning as a round of dizziness takes hold. “Yeah?” I answer blindly, not able to open my eyes just yet.
“Sorry, Dr. Hammond. Dr. Carter told us you were resting but your patient, Natalie Southers, is telling us she’s getting the urge to push. When I checked her, she’s at a ten and the baby’s engaged at a plus one station.”
Hesitantly, I open my eyes into the dimly lit room. No more spins. “I’ll be right there.”
I hang up and do a series of deep breathing exercises. Then I drag myself up and off the bed and back out into the hospital. Passing by the vending machine, I spot an energy shot and give it some thought. I don’t typically drink a lot of caffeine. Just one cup of regular coffee in the morning and maybe half a soda in the afternoon.
Too much caffeine has never agreed with me, but today I think I need the boost to make it through. I can sleep tonight. I’ll go home at seven and go straight to bed. I’ll sleep through the night and tomorrow morning I don’t have to get up early because I’m not working and then Carter and I have the show tomorrow night.
So, one little energy drink won’t do me any harm.
I haven’t had a seizure in years.
Mind made up, I grab the shot from the machine and down it all in one long gulp. Then I toss it in the trash and make my way to my patient’s room, ready to deliver a baby.
24
With Grace’s hand in mine, I help her out of the limousine beside the VIP entrance. I don’t even care if I’m playing the Fritz card. I want this to be a night Grace never forgets. A night of just her and just me and just us, not in my apartment hanging out, but a date. A real fucking date even if she’s pretending it’s not.
“What did you do, Carter Fritz?” she asks with a gleam to her eye and an incredulous shake to her head as she looks around us. The concert doesn’t start for another hour or so, but you’d never know it by the mass of cars and people already here tailgating.
I give her a wink, gripping her hand a little tighter. “Come on and I’ll show you.” I look to our driver, “We should be ready around midnight.”
“Very good, sir.”
And with that, I pull Grace along to the door, manned with security. Our family has a luxury box on the fifty-yard line at this stadium, and I could have used that for tonight—Kaplan and Luca will be up there with their dates and a few of their friends. But that’s not how I want my girl to watch one of her favorite bands perform. For a concert like this, you have to be in it, down on the floor, feeling the pulse of the audience and the thrum of the music.
“Carter,” she hisses and then squeals when she sees just what I’m up to. “Oh my God. You didn’t. Tell me you freaking didn’t!”
I turn back to her, wrapping my arms around her back, the late summer sun steadily heading west, casting a golden glow on everything it touches. “Sweetheart, sometimes it’s like you don’t even know me. Of course, I did. It didn’t even take much of a favor. Oh, and when you see Kaplan and Luca, just be nice and smile.”
I laugh at her stricken expression. “Kaplan and Luca are here? But… do they… they know you’re here with me?”
“Yes. I told them,” I explain, pulling out the VIP badges from the back pocket of my jeans, handing one to her.
“And they know we’re…”
I shrug up a shoulder. “I didn’t tell them the details. Just that you’re a big fan and would like to meet the band. They didn’t ask because I’m positive they already know or at least assume.”
“What about Oliver? Rina?”
“Not worried about Landon?” I quip as we reach the security guard and display our badges. He looks them over and opens the door for us, waving us through. Inside, we’re greeted by another guard and then ushered along the bowels of Gillette stadium toward what I’m assuming is a green room of sorts for the band.
“Carter?” She tugs on my hand, pulling me to a stop. “Does Oliver know we’re…”
“A couple?” I supply for her when she fails to come up with a definition for us.
“A couple?” Her eyes widen and she takes a step back, her fingers clutching to mine. Maybe I shouldn’t have thrown that word out there so fast?
“I was going to say sleeping together. I didn’t think… You know, we were…”
“What would you call us then?”
“I don’t know.” Her eyes blink in rapid succession, her free hand coming up to her mouth as she grapples with the implications of my question. “I was trying not to think about definitions of things. I was afraid of being… I didn’t want to get…”
“Okay. Let me start then since you’re having trouble.” I grasp her shoulder and slide us to the right, so we don’t take up the walkway that’s loaded with roadies trying to do their jobs. My eyes lock with hers. “I consider us a couple. To me, that means I’m not sleeping with anyone else. I’m not dating anyone else. I’m not looking at anyone else. It also means I have you in my bed or against the wall or in my office or any other place I can manage as often as I can. It doesn’t have to be serious, and it doesn’t have to be something that requires a whole lot of mental energy if you’d rather not go there yet. But for now, this is where I’m at and I’d like you to be there with me.”
“I’ve been lying to Oliver. And avoiding him.”
“I know.”
“I hate it. It breaks me in two.”
“I know.”
“What if I’m not ready for a full relationship yet?”
Rejection stings through my blood like a toxin, but it’s no less than what I was expecting from her. It’s why I never bothered or tried to have this conversation with her until now. Grace isn’t ready. Or maybe it’s just with me but I refuse to think on those terms. If it was just me, she wouldn’t be here at all. So we’ll go with not ready yet, since that’s the word she used and I’ll keep playing the system until she is.
“Then you’re not ready yet, but I’m still not sleeping or dating or looking at anyone else.”
She licks her lips nervously. “I’m not either.”
“Then we’re good. You good?” I check.
“I think so.”
“Then quit all your worrying and relax. Tonight is about fun.” I cup her face in my hand, drawing her back to me. “I know you feel that because Janet is suddenly gone that you have to pick up everything from her since she was a fellow third year, but there are other residents, Grace. It doesn’t have to be you that takes everything on.”
I tried to have this conversation with her earlier in the week and she wouldn’t hear of it. That is until her twenty-four-hour shift plus her regular shift after. I think that did her in. She fell asleep last night at eight—in her bed but we won’t go there now—and woke up at nine. She’s pushing herself like she has something to prove to everyone, including herself when she has nothing to prove to anyone.