Medicated, followed up with a cardiologist by the end of the week. She was being admitted overnight for observation. She was going to be fine. The word fine had never in Marcus' life felt so specific and so earned. He called Elena from the parking lot at 11:45 while Darnell stayed with their mother.
She answered on the second ring. "Tell me," she said. Arrhythmia, he said. Not a heart attack. They're keeping her overnight.
She needs to see a cardiologist, but she's stable and she's annoyed about the hospital gown, which means she's herself, he heard Elena exhale. "Thank God," she said quietly, like it was meant for herself as much as for him. "I'm sorry about tonight," Marcus said. I know it wasn't "Marcus, stop apologizing for things that aren't your fault. I had a plan for tonight.
It wasn't supposed to end with you putting my daughter to bed while I sat in an ER. Life doesn't ask about your plans, Elena said. That's not a criticism. That's just the truth. A pause.
Tonight was good before the call and then after the call. It was still good. Different but good. "How do you figure that? " he asked. Because you called Darnell back, she said.
Because you made your mother get her coat. Because you've been in that waiting room for 2 hours taking care of your family. And that is exactly the man you told me you were trying to be. A pause. I got to see it, Marcus.
That's not nothing. That's actually everything. Marcus leaned against the side of his truck in the hospital parking lot under the Cedar Falls night sky and felt something in his chest that was too big for the parking lot and probably too big for any room he'd been in recently. "Zoe okay? " he said. Because he needed to say something manageable.
"She woke up once about an hour ago. Elena said asked where you were. I told her you were with grandma and you'd be back. She said okay and went back to sleep. She trusts you completely, Marcus.
That kid trusts you without reservation. "She's the one person in my life I haven't let down," he said. "That's not true," Elena said. "You haven't let me down either. Not this time.
He closed his eyes for a moment. I'll be there by 1:00, he said. Don't wait up. I'll be on your couch, she said. Drive carefully.
He went back inside, sat with his mother until she was settled into her room. Until the nurses had done what nurses do, and the monitors were doing what monitors do, and Patricia Reed was lying in her hospital bed with the resigned dignity of a woman accepting temporary defeat by an institution she has never trusted. Go home, she told him. Both of you, "I'm not going anywhere. " I'll be back in the morning, Marcus said. "Bring me real coffee," she said.
Not that hospital, I know. Mama and Marcus. She reached out and took his hand. "Call that girl tomorrow in the daylight when things are calm. Tell her I want to meet her properly.
She squeezed his hand. Anybody who stays in a stranger's apartment all night with two little girls while the man she's seeing sits in an emergency room, that's somebody worth knowing. "She's not—" Marcus stopped. We're not officially Marcus Darnell Reed, said with the particular authority of a woman who has been reading her children accurately for 35 years. "Don't talk to me about officially. " He kissed her forehead.
Let Darnell drive him back to his car, drove home on route 9. The apartment was quiet when he walked in at 12:50. The lights in the living room were on low. Elena was on the couch with a throw blanket over her legs and a book open in her lap, his copy of The McBride. He noticed.
And she was not asleep. She looked up when the door opened. Helena said, "Good," Marcus said. Settled. Annoyed herself.
He set his keys on the hook. Stood in his own hallway looking at Elena Brooks on his couch with his book in her hands and two sleeping girls in his apartment and the specific weight of a very long night pressing down on his shoulders. "Sit down," Elena said. She moved her feet to make room. He sat on the other end of the couch, took off his shoes, leaned his head back against the cushion.
"You should have gone home," he said. "It's almost 1:00. Kesha's asleep, and I didn't want to wake her. " Elena said, "I'll take her home in the morning, Elena. " Marcus, she looked at him directly. ""I wanted to be here when you got back. "" "That's the honest answer. I wanted to be here. " He looked at her across the couch. She was looking back at him with the particular steadiness she had not performing calm actually calm the kind of calm that comes from a person who has decided something and is at peace with the decision.
I've been thinking she said about what you said at dinner about arriving somewhere. "I remember," he said. "I think you were right," she said.. And I think I've been so afraid of arriving somewhere wrong again that I've been treating every possible destination like a threat. She set the book down.
I don't want to do that anymore. "Okay," he said., "I'm not saying I'm ready for everything. " She said, "I'm saying I'm ready for the next part. Whatever the next part is, I want to find out what it is instead of staying in the part where I'm deciding whether to find out. " Marcus looked at her for a long moment. My mother wants to meet you, he said. Elena blinked, then smiled.
You told your mother about me? She heard from Ranata, he said. The information infrastructure in this family is staggering. What did she say? She said, anybody who stays in a stranger's apartment all night with two little girls, while the man she's seeing sits in an emergency room is worth knowing.
Elena was quiet for a moment. Man she's seeing, she said carefully. Her words he said I told her were not officially Marcus. Yeah. She was looking at him with something that was not qu question and not quite a statement.