Christmas Miracle: A Family (6 page)

“Really?” he said, still covered.

“Really. No one meant it to happen, and we know you didn’t start it.”

“That’s why he doesn’t want me,” he said.

“Who?”

“My first dad…Donnie.”

“Because of a fire?”

He didn’t say anything, but she saw the blanket bob up and down and took that for a yes.

“Did you start a fire at your house?”

“He said so, but I didn’t do it.”

“What kind of fire?”

“In his chair. He was sleeping and it just caught on fire.”

“In Donnie’s chair,” she said, just to be sure.

The blankets bobbed up and down again.

“And Donnie said you started the fire in his chair?”

“Said it was my fault ’cause I didn’t get it. I was supposed to get it when he went to sleep, and I forgot.”

“What, Tyler? What were you suppose to get?”

“His cigarette,” he said, snuffling. “I always had to get his cigarette.”

Fallon drew in a furious breath, trying to keep her voice calm for Tyler’s sake. “So he’d go to sleep while he was smoking and it was your job to take the lit cigarette from him when he did?”

“Uh-huh.”

Fallon’s phone rang before she could respond. She glanced at the number. It was Emoline Putters, getting impatient, she guessed. “Look, Tyler, we know the fire up at the lodge wasn’t your fault. Nobody’s blaming you.” While she truly wanted to comfort Tyler over what Donnie had done to him, and tell him that it wasn’t his fault, that Donnie shouldn’t have done that, it wasn’t her place. Like
Edith had said, everybody needed a mother sometimes, but she wasn’t Tyler’s mother, and she had to remember that. Had to remember that the mothering instinct she felt toward him was because he was her son’s brother.
But Tyler was not hers
. He belonged to James, and this was something James would have to deal with. “Look, I’ll be back in a while, Tyler, and maybe you can show me how to play that game.”

He poked his head out from under the covers. “I’ll beat you,” he warned.

She smiled. “I’m sure you will.”

On her way back to the ER, she thought about the many ways she’d like to throttle that Donnie character, and every which way seemed too kind. A man like that deserved…

“From the look on your face, I’d say you’re about to tie someone up with surgical tape,” James said. He was bandaging the hands of the cook who’d tried dousing the grease fire with water. Not a good move. The fire had leapt from the pan. Luckily, the cook had managed to jump back far enough that his injuries weren’t serious.

She went to the sink to scrub her hands. “Surgical tape’s too good. I want something that’ll hurt more coming off.”

“Not for me, I hope,” he teased.

“For Donnie.”

“Donnie? As in…?”

“The man who
isn’t
Tyler’s father! Tyler thinks he’ll be accused of starting the fire at the lodge,” she said, trying to keep her temper in check, even though she was so angry she was almost shaking.

“I don’t understand.”

“I mentioned that we had to take care of people from the fire and he said he didn’t start it. Because of the way
he reacted, I asked him if he’d ever started a fire at his house, and he said his dad accused him of it. It seems one of Tyler’s
chores
was to pull a burning cigarette from Donnie’s lips if Donnie dozed off. Apparently once Tyler didn’t do it and Donnie’s chair caught on fire.”

“Damn,” James muttered, as he rolled gauze over the fleshy part of the cook’s palm.

“I hated to leave him but we’ve got several people coming in at the same time and…”

“I understand,” James said, through gritted teeth.

“He’s fine, James. For now, he’s fine.”

“Plucking lit cigarette butts from the lips of his stepfather… A mother who allows that…” He looked up at the ceiling, clearly trying to grapple with his emotions. “Nothing about him is fine, Fallon. The kind of life he has to live with his mother… The thing is, I should be there to help him, right now when he’s afraid he’ll be accused of starting the fire. But I’m not there, like I wasn’t there when
you
needed me.”

She stiffened. “Don’t turn this into something about me! I told you I understood, James. Tyler needed you then, and you had to be with him.
He
needed you, and I was fine. And I’m pretty sure Tyler understands why you’re not there now,” she said, even though she knew James was right. Tyler needed his father…his real father. Right now. “Once Eric gets back, maybe you can go to him.”

Maybe turned out to be a fantasy when seven patients rolled through the door, one after the other. Not only had Eric come in with them, so had Neil. “Fallon,” Eric called, from down the hall. “I’ll need you in room three. Get me an oxygen set-up and an IV.”

“Fallon,” Neil yelled, from the other end of the hall, “get respiratory therapy in here, stat.”

“Fallon, we need bandages down here in exam two,
and can you check the vitals on the patient in exam one…he claims he has high blood pressure, and I’m afraid the stress of all this might be too much for him.” That from Gabby.

And so went the next two hours, with Fallon running from place to place, being all things to everyone. In a spare moment James watched her. Simply leaned against the hall wall for ten seconds and observed—his first time ever to see what she did so well—and it took only a moment to understand why everybody in the hospital praised her so highly. Fallon was amazing. Absolutely everybody here on every medical level depended on Fallon to do, well, pretty much everything. And she did, without ever missing a beat. She responded to the doctors, took time to comfort the patients, directed the volunteers and nursing staff. Yes, she was truly amazing. And if he hadn’t fallen in love with her all those months ago, he’d have fallen head over heels in love tonight.

Damn, he wanted to make things right with her. He wasn’t sure how, wasn’t even sure what, but there had to be a way. But he had to make things right for Tyler, too. And that thought overwhelmed him. Fallon…Tyler… How was he going to do it? How was he going to be everything both of them needed?

“I think you’re good to go see Tyler,” she said as she rushed by him. “No more burns coming in, and word from the scene is that there are no more casualties. So I’d say now is as good a time as any to get out of here.”

He reached out and caught her arm. Stopped her and, surprisingly, she didn’t yank away from him, as he’d expected her to do. In fact, she looked grateful for the momentary break. “You need to slow down,” he said.

“I will.”

“Now. You look…exhausted.”

“And I feel exhausted, but it’s almost over. All the serious injuries have been treated, and as soon as we get the barrage of minor injures taken care of, I’m going to take a break.”

“How about I go check on Tyler for a minute then come back and take over Triage for you while you go put your feet up for a while? It’s showing on you, Fallon. It’s been months since you’ve worked this hard physically, and I’m worried.”

“I appreciate that. And you’re right. I
am
out of shape.”

“Then for once you’ll listen to someone else?”

Stubborn was what Edith had called her. She wore that with some amount of pride but sometimes it did get in the way. “I’ll listen. But just this once, and don’t get used to it.”

James chuckled. “You do have your red-headed ways, don’t you? I think one of the first things I liked about you was that stubborn streak. At least, some of it.”

“I prefer to think of it as independent, not stubborn.”

He chuckled again. “Like I said…” This was the old Fallon, and it was so nice to have her back. Even if only for a moment. “Look, let me get out of your way, go see Tyler. Then I’ll be right back. OK? You’re not going to go back on your word, are you?”

“No. Unless someone needs me.”

No one needs you like I do
, he thought. Then he spun away before he said the words aloud. But Fallon reached out, grabbed hold of his hand, and pulled him back to her.

“I know it’s not the way you want it to be between us, James. And I know this is hard on you. But someday you’ll realize that what we’re doing now is the way it has to be. And in the meantime…” She stood on tiptoe and
brushed a light kiss on his cheek. “Thank you. Thank you for caring about me, thank you for helping me and, most of all thank you for letting me be part of Tyler’s life. He’s an amazing little boy. So go. If he’s awake, tell him I’m anxious for my first lesson.”

“Lesson?”

“Video game. He’s going to teach me how to play.”

“Are we talking about
my
Tyler? The little boy who breaks things?
That’s
the Tyler who offered to teach you how to play?”

“One and the same. We had a talk earlier, have a little bet going that he’ll beat me.”

James blinked hard. “Amazing. I can’t even get him to talk to me, and here he’s offering to play games with you? How’d you do that, Fallon?” He was surprised and, admittedly, a little hurt at the same time. Tyler wanting to teach Fallon was a good thing, but it would have been nice if Tyler had made the same offer to him. Of course, Fallon was Fallon, and everybody responded to her that way. He had. So why should Tyler be the exception?

She tossed James a sassy wink. “I’ll never tell.” This time she was the one who spun away from him.

As it turned out, Tyler was sound asleep when James finally got back to his room. So he stayed but a moment, pulled the covers up over him, gave him a light kiss on the forehead then returned to Fallon. When he found her, she was carrying a stack of IV set-ups to the central supply area. He took them from her then she was off to take a break. Like a whirlwind, James thought. Damn, he loved that whirlwind.

“You OK?” James asked.

She was studying the choices of soft drinks in the vending machine, trying to decide between the orange and
the strawberry. She’d been standing and staring blankly at them for the past several minutes, almost too numb to think. “I’m fine. Just ready to call it a night and go home. Everybody has been seen, we’ve transported a few people to Salt Lake City, most of the volunteers have left. So, after a sugar boost from one of these cans, I’m out of here.”

“And your friend Edith?”

“Good. Giving me hell for being so stubborn. But good. I’m going to make arrangements to send her to her sister in Florida for a few weeks. Edith needs some warm weather and sunshine, I think. She asked me to come along and be her private duty nurse.” An intriguing idea, and a tempting one. But she’d had to turn it down because, well…she wasn’t sure. Somehow she just couldn’t bring herself to leave White Elk. Funny thing was, just a few days ago she’d have probably jumped at the chance to get away for a while. Now she couldn’t. “All expenses paid. Beachfront cottage. Amazing restaurants. A dream come true.”

“And?”

“And I turned it down. Arranged for Jessica Walthers to go in my place. She’s a retired nurse, widowed. I thought the warm weather would do her some good.”

“It wouldn’t do you any good?” James asked, the corners of his mouth turning up.

Fallon looked away. “I have a job now.”

“But Gabby’s not in a big hurry. Besides, most of what you’re doing to get her hospital set up could probably be done from a warm, sunny beach in Florida.”

“I don’t fly any more. Edith is going to fly.”

“Take a train and meet her there. I’ll bet it would be a nice, relaxing ride across country.”

“So how’s Tyler?” she asked, turning back to the drinks machine, trying to change the subject, trying to ignore what James was hoping to get her to admit—that she was
staying because of him, because of Tyler. “Last time I looked in on him he was busy playing his game. Doing really well with it, too. He taught me a couple of things, then turned around and beat me. And had the audacity to laugh at me.”

“I’ve never seen him laugh.”

“I’m sorry, James. I never…”

“Don’t be sorry. It’s good he’s comfortable with you. God knows, he’s not with me. But if it’s not me, I’m glad it’s you, Fallon. I trust you with my son.”

His words were like a sharp knife through her heart. Words that were meant well and turned into bitter, deep pain. “I, um…I want to go home,” she said. “Get some sleep.” Get away from James. Get away from the reminders.

“Then I’ll drive you. And if you don’t want me there, I’ll come back and sleep in one of the on-call rooms…won’t even try and persuade you to let me stay.”

“I can drive myself.”

“You’re exhausted.”

That, she was. And this was an argument she wasn’t going to win because she was in no condition to drive.

“How about this? I’ll take you home, and when we get there you can decide what you want to do with me? Fair enough?”

“I’m not going to send you away. But…”

“But you’re still not easy with the decision of having me stay there…not when Tyler’s not there.”

“Maybe a little. But he’ll be there in a day or so. And I want him to be comfortable, to be settled. And with Christmas coming…”

He shushed her with a finger to her lips. “One day at a time, Fallon. And on this day I’m taking you home to
sleep. When you wake up, we’ll decide what happens from there. OK?”

She nodded her agreement. He was so easy to give in to. And that was the problem. She wanted to give in. With James, she always wanted to give in.

Fallon slept the whole way home and, to be honest, she didn’t remember getting out of the car and walking into her house. Surely, the brisk winter wind or the falling snow would have woken her up, but her first recollection when she finally opened her eyes was of her sofa. She was under the patchwork quilt she kept on the back of it, all comfy and safe. She was still tired, and a little achy from over-exertion. Most of all, though, she was really wishing the morning light wasn’t peeking in through the living-room curtains because she wasn’t ready to start the day.

“I didn’t look when I undressed you,” James said.

He handed her a mug of coffee, but she refused it. Instead, she peeked under the covers to find, much to her relief, that she was still dressed. No snow boots, no socks, but otherwise decent.