But how much will it cost? That’s what I wanted to know. It seemed small, petty to be quibbling about money when my mom’s life was on the line, but what else could I do? We knew people that had been financially wiped out by medical debt and now we were facing the same reality.
“So, the costs?” I croaked out.
The doctor frowned, compounding the feelings of shame. He shook his head, then sat back in his chair.
“You can talk to our financial department about that. If you’re happy to go ahead with the surgery, we can book your mother in tomorrow…”
Forms were presented and signed. Information pamphlets were pushed my way. Everything happened with a growing sense of unreality, which left me stumbling back to Mom’s bed.
“So are we getting out of here?” she asked, trying to sit up.
“No, I’ve found a way to make this work,” I replied and that was the moment when I understood my mother the best. She’d lied to me like that as a child, hoping to spare my feelings. Shouldering the fear, the guilt, the anger, Mom left me to skip along, oblivious. The least I could do was the same for her right now.
I just wasn’t sure how.
Sleeping in the chair beside Mom’s bed was not great, but the next day I went down to the cafeteria to grab a coffee and some breakfast. Mom was fasting in preparation for the surgery and I… I needed at least some caffeine to get me through the next stage. The biggest risk during an ablation was just after the surgery. They used this device that went through a major artery in your thigh to perform the surgery and so she would have to stay perfectly still afterwards until a clot formed. As I stood in line, all the confusing, horrifying details hit me as I tried to make sense of them.
“Next,” the cashier said, prompting me to step forward and put in my order.
The coffee tasted overly sweet and weak when I took my first sip. Australians seemed to like theirs brutally strong. I barely slept a wink the first night on the farm. Half of that was down to Bruce… Pausing in the hallway, I leant against the wall. Couldn’t think about the huntsman spider right now, nor his wrangler. So why did the sight of Troy sliding the paper behind the glass bowl fill my mind? It was the memory of me clutching my breasts thathad me smiling finally. Like the sun that just peeks through the cloudy sky, it was a little ray of light.
Then these words sent the sun into hiding again.
“Alex Miller.” What the hell was my ex doing back at the hospital and who was he talking to? Looking down the hall, I frowned. The guy Alex addressed was tall, broad shouldered.
All too familiar.
“No…” I hissed. “No.”
Alex sized the man up and obviously seemed a bit intimidated by the way he squared his shoulders. His fingers gripped the other man’s and he shook it sharply, then said this.
“I’m Mackenzie’s fiancé.”
Chapter 31
Troy
Standing there like a stunned mullet, I tried to process what I was hearing, but before I could reply, someone called my name.
That was the one thing I didn’t know I needed.
Spinning around, I caught the moment when Mackenzie’s eyes went wide, then she flung herself at me. All I could do was step forward to catch her. Wrapping her tight, I had her in my arms, and that meant I could take a full breath.
“Troy, what the hell are you doing here?” I pulled back, remembering what this dickhead, Alex, had said, but if Mackenzie was someone’s fiancé, she wouldn’t put both her hands on my cheeks, would she?
She definitely wouldn’t pull my head down into a kiss.
I took over seconds later, my mouth hungry for hers. Kissing her harder and harder, we were forced to pull apart just to breathe. The way she stared up at me had hope springing eternal.
“How…? When…?”
“A plane, obviously,” I said. “Charlie apparently filled out a US visa application the minute we got together and as soon as I found out you’d gone, I hopped on the next flight. Love…” I stroked her hair back, seeing how dark the skin under her eyes was. She was exhausted. “Is your mum OK?”
“No.” Her smile disappeared then and the pain in her eyes had me pulling her closer. “She has to have surgery, and it’s going to be heinously expensive. The finance lady said they’re probably going to have to put a lien on her home…” My thumb brushed the skin at the top of her cheek, because her eyes started to fill with tears. “But she needs the surgery or her heart might be damaged or she’ll have a heart attack.”
“So what’s the hold up?” I looked around with a frown, seeing the nurses and doctors in a whole new light. “Why haven’t they got your mum in surgery right now?” I remembered the ridiculous wait times when my mother first got her cancer diagnosis. “If there’s someone I need to see to put a rocket up their arse, just point me at ‘em.”
“Getting all grumpy for my mom?” She tried to smile, but it was a watery thing. “You don’t have to do that.” With a blink, she seemed to have some kind of realisation. “You didn’t have to fly all the way over here! The farm. The heat wave!”
