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Lacy couldn’t remember feeling so nervous before. Not during any of her theater auditions or college exams. Not on her first date with Kurtis or the night on the pier when she thought Raphael was going to propose to her.
Sandy pulled Lacy’s car into the parking lot of Sacred Heart Hospital. “Take all the time you need, sweetie. I’ll just take a walk and give my legs a good stretch.”
Lacy nodded. At least Anchorage was smart enough to spray for mosquitoes, so the bugs weren’t that unbearable.
Her legs were weak as she took one tentative step after another into the main entrance of Sacred Heart. Her stomach quivered as if her body was afraid she’d be admitted again, operated on, and sent home with meds that turned her brain to fuzz but only took a slight edge off her pain. She knew Raphael’s room number but had to ask the volunteer receptionist how to get there.
“That’s in C Tower. Third floor. You can take the stairs or the elevator,” the elderly man told her.
She would definitely take the elevator.
When she got to his hallway, her gait slowed even more. The incision site from her surgery throbbed. She took in a deep breath. She could do this.
Whatever you choose, I’m giving you my full support. That was easy for Sandy to say — Sandy, who had made her decision decades earlier. Lacy thought about her mom, torn between a safe man her family loved and a boyfriend who promised adventure. Passion. Danger. She had never imagined Sandy with anyone but Carl. She had turned down the safe man.
Should Lacy? Kurtis was so compassionate. He would understand. She had known Raphael for so many years. Had waited for him for so long. She had never gotten over the pain of losing him, and now that he was back in her life, how could she turn away from him? Especially now, when he faced such a long road to recovery? How could she desert him when he needed her to nurse him? Encourage him?
They had been so great together, she and Raphael. They could look at the same painting and come away with entirely different impressions, but their differences gave them an hour’s worth of engaging conversation. They loved the same things — art, theater, Broadway, road trips. The only drives she and Kurtis took were to Anchorage to fill up on staples at Costco. The most danger she had ever experienced while dating him was traveling over the mountain pass at a conservative forty miles an hour.
But what was wrong with safe? That’s the question she had asked herself time and time again. She knew she was still functioning in crisis mode, her brain still reeling from the accident. At some point, she’d have to address what Raphael told her before they crashed. He had made some bad choices. Really bad choices. Choices that cost Lacy four years of her life. How could she be sure he wouldn’t repeat the same mistakes again? What if they got married and he did something similar? What if they had a child?
She pictured Kurtis’s daughter, so cuddly and headstrong. Lacy would do anything to guard Madeline and only imagined the protective instinct would be stronger once she had a child of her own. How could she forgive herself if she and Raphael had a kid they weren’t able to keep safe?
Safe. That same word again. Offering so much comfort, especially after all that Lacy had been through. But so smothering at the same time. The bugs won’t bite you if you live in a plastic bubble, but does that count as really living?
She stopped outside Raphael’s door and checked the number three times. Was she ready for this? No. But she was here. Raphael was injured. He needed her. Every other decision could be put on hold until he recovered.
It was the only plan she had as she stepped into the room, but it would have to be enough.