Page 102 of Seasons of Love
“Leave it with me.”
Darius takes us into a room.
“How old is she?”
“Nine months. She’s just started eating solids but still takes formula,” I say.
“Eating well?”
“Yeah, she likes her food. Drinks some water too.”
Sara’s been a healthy baby, and we’ve never had to come to the emergency room before. I really hope this isn’t something serious. The thought is too painful, so I push it out of my head.
Darius removes Sara’s clothes until she’s in only her diaper and starts checking her over while having an adult conversation with her about how hard it is to find cheap vegetables these days and how criminal it is that they still haven’t invented a bubble gum-flavored twinkie.
She seems completely fascinated by his deep voice, and I feel calmer now that she doesn’t look so distressed.
He turns to me. “Her lungs are clear. It looks like it might be an ear infection. I’m going to give her an antibiotic and connect her to an IV to give her some fluids for dehydration.”
His voice seems to have the same magical effect on me because all I can do is stare at him. He looks familiar, but I can’t place him, and I know for sure I’ve never met him before.
“Will she be okay?” I ask.
“I’m sure she will. She wouldn’t be doing her job right if she didn’t give you a few white hairs before she’s one. I’m still going to take a blood sample and send it for analysis to make sure the cause of the fever is just the ear infection and nothing else. It could take a couple of hours for the results to come through.”
I nod. “Thank you so much for helping us.”
He puts his stethoscope around his neck and smiles. “I love my job, and it’s not a hardship when the patients are this adorable.” He tickles Sara’s tummy, starting another one of their conversations as he connects the IV line.
“See ya later, alligator.” He says when he's finished, and then turns to me again. “I’ll be back in a while to check on her fever, okay? If you need anything, just press that buzzer on the wall.”
He leaves us, and a moment later, Florrie comes in with the receptionist.
I explain what the nurse did, and we finally take a moment to breathe.
“She was fine all evening. When I put her to bed, she didn’t even complain,” Florrie says. “Then she suddenly started crying, so I checked on her, and she was burning. I tried to get her temperature down with the Tylenol and a wet cloth, but it wasn’t working.”
“Thank you, Florrie. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
She gives me a hug, and we wait. I hate seeing my baby girl with the needle attached to her tiny hand, even though I know it’s making her better. Sara’s fever goes down and her bloodwork comes back clear, so Darius is happy to send us home a few hours later.
By the time I get to bed, I’m so exhausted that I put Sara’s baby monitor on the loudest setting to make sure I can hear her if she wakes up again.
I look at a photo of my mom that was taken when she and my dad got married. She looks happy and carefree. Like she has her whole life ahead of her.
“I miss you, Mom. Keep an eye on her for me. She’s all I have left. Love you.”
6
ELLIS
I don’t know what possessed me to say yes to meeting up with a couple of my students’ parents for Thursday night drinks at The Academy a couple months ago. I knew it had bad idea written all over it.
Okay, so after Harrison and Fletcher helped me with the school’s Spring Fair, we kinda became friends. When I say friends, it’s more that they decided I need to be taken under a wing as a single gay newbie in town.
No amount of insisting that I spent plenty of summers in Stillwater convinced them I wasn’t much of a newbie. And it didn’t help that my sister—God rest her soul when I eventually kill her—sided with them.
Apparently, I need to have a social life.
