Happy Hour (34 page)

“Sure,” Cassie replied sheepishly and handed it to her sister. She
whispered in her mom’s ear. “She turn into the Antichrist, or what?”

“Cassie,” Danielle warned.

Mark came in and motioned for Danielle to come out into the hall with
him. “What is it?” she asked.

“I’ve been conferring with Shannon’s doctor and since she’s not dilating,
we have to start talking about a c-section. Because her water broke already, we
only have a limited amount of time to get the baby out. Do you want one of us
to explain this to her or do you want to do it?”

“Maybe the both of us should talk to her. I know she feels comfortable
with you. She likes her doctor fine, but I think she really trusts you.”

“Let’s go talk with her.” He put an arm around her.

Danielle nodded.

Shannon wasn’t thrilled with the option but understood why they needed to
start considering and preparing for a c-section delivery. Mark told her they
could give it a couple of more hours. They could try giving her Pitocin to
bring on stronger contractions. Shannon agreed to give that a try. Two hours
later, when Shannon was in more pain than Danielle could bear, the doctors
stopped the Pitocin. There had been no change.

They made the decision right after midnight to go ahead with the
c-section. Danielle called Al to let him know. She was pleased that Cassie had
stayed. “It’s been a long night already, kid, you want to go home and get some
sleep?” Danielle asked her.

“No way. I’m here for the long haul, Mom.”

“We’ve got a few minutes. Let’s go grab a soda or coffee or something,
then.”

Cassie nodded, and Danielle took Shannon’s hand. “Hey, baby, we’re going
down to get a bite and a soda out of the vending machine. You okay?”

Shannon nodded, but didn’t look okay. Her eyes reflected the same fear
she’d shown when she’d gotten lost in the grocery store when she was five. “Hurry
up though,” she said.

“We will, sweetie.”

They walked down to the vending machine where they bought Cokes and a
couple of bags of chips. “It ain’t exactly nutritious, but it’ll do.”

“I lied,” Cassie blurted out.

“What do you mean, you lied?” Danielle asked.

“About sex.” She opened the soda and took a sip. “I told you that I had
sex with a lot of guys just because I knew it would drive you crazy.”

“Oh, Cass.”

“I’m sorry. I thought you were snooping in my room and so I got mad and I
told you that. I haven’t had sex with a bunch of guys. Only one guy. Jordan.”

“Oh.” Jordan had been Cassie’s first real boyfriend two years earlier.
They’d dated half of her sophomore year, but he broke her heart when he decided
to go to the prom with one of the cheerleaders. Then he’d gone off to college
in the fall and Danielle was pretty sure that Cassie hadn’t heard from him
again.

“I don’t even take the pill anymore. If you looked at the dates on them,
you’d have seen that.” She teared up. “I thought he broke up with me because I
was bad at it. It’s not like we did it very many times.”

Danielle pulled her into her arms and hugged her tight.  “Guys are
jerks.”

Cassie grunted a little laugh. “Mark seems nice.”

“He is nice. He’s really nice.”

Cassie pulled away and wiped her face. “You’re blushing, Mom. You really
like him.”

“I do.”

“Cool.”

They started walking back. The fluorescent lighting in the corridor
bounced off the stark floors. “Cass, you didn’t do anything wrong with Jordan.
He’s just a dumb guy. The best advice I can give you about guys and sex is that
it’s really complicated, and no matter how much you think you like or even love
a guy, when you throw sex into the mix, it gets even more complicated. On top
of that, it’s usually the girl who winds up the most hurt by it. Women don’t
just have sex to feel good physically, and I’m not saying that all guys do, but
at your age, that’s more the norm than not. But for girls, we tie in a lot of
emotion, and we think that having sex with a guy means love. To a lot of women,
especially young women, it means a man will love you back, if you sleep with
him. That’s why it’s good to wait. It’s good to wait until you’re old enough
and mature enough to understand the consequences on every level.”

Cassie nodded. “I know.”

“Good. I hope so. You’re too damn young, Cass. It’s too much for someone
your age. It really is.”

She nodded. “Mom, I’m miserable at Dad’s. Can I please come home?”

Danielle stopped and looked at her. “Do you think you can respect me and
my rules? Because, honey, I can’t have you home if you plan to continue talking
to me the way you do and walking all over me. I love you, but I can’t have it.”

“I understand. Can you give me another chance? I promise not to blow it.”

“The babies getting to you, huh?”

“You have no idea. But it’s not so much them, even. It’s Stacey. For a
long time I thought she was so cool and hip, but she’s a nag. She nags Dad
every second he’s around and then she nags me. I don’t have a clue what Dad was
thinking.”

Danielle simply agreed. “We better get back to your sister.”

Shannon was prepped, and then Danielle prepped. Cassie waited in the
waiting room, and a few minutes later, the anesthesiologist, Shannon’s doctor
,
and Mark came in. Mark explained the procedure to them both again
.

“Mom?”

“Yes, babe?”

Shannon stretched out her free arm and wiggled her hand. Danielle took it
and stroked her hair. “I’m proud of you. I am so, so proud of you,” she said,
and she meant it. Maybe having this baby would not have been her choice for
Shannon, but her daughter had convictions and she’d stuck by them, allowing her
faith to lead the way.

She smiled at her.

“Incision has been made,” Mark reported.

Danielle didn’t want to see the cut on her child. Standing at her head
and holding her hand was the best place for her. A few minutes later, Shannon’s
doctor lifted out a seven-pound baby boy. He held him up. “Here he is.”

Mark looked at Danielle. “Do you want to cut the cord?”

“Yes.” Danielle did so, and then the baby was quickly examined and
wrapped up. Vitals were being taken on Shannon as the baby was handed to
Danielle.

He was truly beautiful. Not all red and purple like so many newborns. His
little eyes were closed tight, and Danielle smiled when a little squawk came
from him. She ran her finger over his perfect tiny feet and hands and she
instantly fell head over heels, totally in love.

“Can I see him?” Shannon asked.

“In a minute,” a nurse replied.

“Doc. I got a drop on the pressure here,” another nurse said.

Mark took a look.

“I feel dizzy,” Shannon muttered.

Beeps and whistles started going off, and orders were shouted at the
staff quickly.

“What’s going on? What’s going on?” Danielle asked.

A nurse took the baby and put him into the incubator. “Let’s get him to
the nursery.”

“What is happening?” Danielle demanded again, not able to keep the panic
out of her voice.

Mark looked up from where he stood over Shannon, working frantically on
her. “Danielle, go with the baby.”

“She’s coding!” the anesthesiologist said.

“Code blue, code blue, 121, code blue 121,” went out over the hospital
speakers.

Danielle was pushed out of the way as more hospital staff rifled into the
room, each of them doing something to help save her daughter’s life.

Alyssa stood over Ian’s hospital bed. It would be four weeks before the
actual transplant could take place. She’d be traveling back and forth between
L.A. and Napa during that time. She knew she was eating up a large chunk from
her grandmother’s inheritance, but she couldn’t think of a better way to use
it. She was staying at a residential hotel within walking distance of Cedar’s
Sinai and, for now, everything in her life besides seeing her son through this
was on hold.

His first chemo treatment had been administered that morning and despite
it, he seemed in good spirits.

“Thank you for being here with me,” he said.

 “I wouldn’t be anywhere else,” she replied.

“My mom was like that, too. I mean my other mom.”

“I know what you mean.” It was the first time that Ian had made an
acknowledgment that she was also his mother. “I bet you really miss her.
Everyone must miss her.” Alyssa thought about the copy of the photo of Louise
and Ian that she kept in her purse. She’d taken to looking at it daily and
saying a silent prayer of gratitude to the woman who’d raised Ian, and also
asking her to help heal him. She felt a kinship with this woman she’d never
known.          

“We do. My dad especially. He’s married to his work now, and us kids.”

“Do you have a favorite commercial he’s made over the years?” Alyssa had
learned from Charlie that he wrote commercial jingles and Darren produced
commercials. They owned their own lucrative business and were not only
brothers, but partners, too.

Ian smiled. “Yeah. I like the one where the kid is in the bathtub singing
‘Rubber Ducky.’ You know, the bubble bath commercial, but the kid can’t say
rubber ducky. Instead he says wubber yucky.”

“I love that one, too.” They both started laughing and before long it
turned into belly laughter. When they’d stopped and Alyssa wiped the tears
away, she said, “I would think it’ll really help you out that your dad and
uncle are already in the business. With connections and everything.”

“Definitely. I’m super excited about school and writing. I can’t wait to
get back. I have to get rid of the crap in my body, but then I’m full speed
ahead.”

Alyssa inwardly hoped that would happen for him. He was bright, talented,
and so deserving. Why was it that someone like Ian had to be so sick? In the
past few weeks, she’d learned a lot about leukemia and bone marrow transplant.
The good news was that Ian seemed to be an excellent candidate because his
overall health was good and he was a strong young man, but there were also some
possible negatives that worried Alyssa, including the cancer coming back or the
donation not working.

“I’m writing a script now, you know.”

“You are?”

“It’s a comedy. A caper type. Kind of like
The Pink Panther
. Love
those movies.”

“With Peter Sellers
.
Yeah, me too. How funny. Those are great. I
would have thought you too young for those.”

“No way. My mom loved them, which meant we all had to love them.” He
laughed. “You and me have a lot in common. It’s that biology thing, I guess. I
wonder if I would have a lot in common with my biological dad.”

Alyssa didn’t say anything.

“I’m sorry. I know you don’t know where he is and what his life is all
about. It’s too bad you only knew his first name.”

Alyssa nodded. How could she tell him the truth? How could she not? He
had a right to know. Maybe he didn’t have to know the details around how he was
conceived? But James had no right to be in Ian’s life. None. Or was she being
selfish by not telling Ian? She’d already learned that secrets and skeletons
come back to haunt in due time. But shouldn’t Ian know that his sister was the
donor? And that in addition to her, he had five other biological siblings? She
needed to take a walk, clear her mind, but she didn’t want to alert him that
something was wrong.

“Do you like to paint?” she asked.

“No. I’m not much of an artist. Oh wait, I did do some impressive
finger-painting back in Kindergarten.” He laughed. “Why?”

“You know I’m into art and I have some paintings that I want you to see
when you get out of here.”

“What are they of?”

“You’ll have to wait and see.”

“Oh, you gonna be like that. Okay, then, you gonna have to wait to read
my script.”

“Deal.”

“What’s a deal?” Darren walked into the room. “Your dad will be by in a
bit. He says give him a call if you need anything. So, what’s a deal?” He
looked from Alyssa to Ian.

“Alyssa has some special paintings she’s going to show me when I get out
of here, but she won’t tell me what they’re of, so I told her she’ll have to
wait until then to read my script.”

“Sounds like a good deal to me.” Darren smiled at her. “How are you,
kid?”

“Kind of tired now. They give you some of those feel-good drugs along
with the chemo, so you don’t start puking right away.”

“Kid has a way with words. What you trying to tell us then, you too tired
for a visit?” Darren laughed.

“No way.”

Darren handed him a Target bag. “What’s this?” Darren shrugged.

“Oh, man, thanks.” Ian took out the set of
Bourne Identity
DVDs.
“I love these.”

“I know,” Darren replied. “That’s why I got ’em.”

“You the man.”

“I know. Want to watch one?”

Ian nodded and Darren walked over and put one of the DVDs into the
player. A few minutes later Matt Damon’s face flashed across the screen. They
all watched the opening scene. Alyssa glanced over from her chair and noticed
Ian closing his eyes. She walked over to Ian and placed a hand on his shoulder.
His eyes fluttered. “You want to rest?” she asked.

“Maybe.”

Darren stood. “We can come back later and finish watching this with you.
You should probably rest up for your dad’s visit. And I’m sure your brothers
and sisters will be by throughout the day.”

“Okay. I am kind of tired.”

Darren gave him a hug and Alyssa kissed him on the cheek. They left his
hospital room both with a sigh and unspoken emotion between them. “You hanging
around or would you like to go grab a bite to eat with me? I finished a big
account’s project this morning, so I’m thinking I can take the day off,” he
said. “Let him get some rest and we can drive up the coast for some lunch.”

She checked her watch and realized that she hadn’t eaten much that day
and it was already after one o’clock.