Holly Hearts Headlines (Holly Hearts Hollywood Book 2) (24 page)

Sarah, the nurse practitioner, is still trying to act calm and like she knows what she’s doing, but you can totally tell she’s terrified. She told me earlier that she works in one of those twenty-four hour clinics in a pharmacy and all she does is swab the back of people’s throats to test for strep. So, I’m working very hard to not act like I’m freaking out. Allison needs one person to be calm right now. But inside my mind I am DEFINITELY
FREAKING
OUT. I mean there’s a woman in LABOR
ON
THE
PLANE. We are thousands and thousands of feet in the middle of the air. Do you know how many complications arise in pregnancy? TOO
MANY
.

This woman is holding my hand, looking for comfort, and I don’t know what to do for her! I’ve never even had
sex
. We have nothing in common at all.

Later, 5:55pm—On the plane

Allison just had a huge contraction and I’ve decided that I’m never having sex. I can’t risk it. I’m moving to a convent.

Later, 7:15pm—On the plane

Okay, I have to stop thinking negative thoughts because I think those thoughts are starting to effect other people around me. I must have given off negative vibes that Allison absorbed because the labor has taken a turn for the worst. She’s having this baby fast. Like, super fast. Scary fast. Sarah just took a peek “under the hood” and her face went white.

“What, what is it?” Allison demanded. Her back was propped up against a bunch of carry-on bags. An older lady, I think she said her name was Myrtle, was fanning her with a
SkyMall
catalogue.

“Nothing, nothing at all,” Sarah said in a wavering voice that meant something was definitely wrong. “Hold on for one second,” she said as she clamored over to me. For some reason, even though I’m only seventeen and am not related to her at all, everyone seems to think I’m in some place of authority and must be consulted on everything.

“What is it?” I whispered. Myrtle started to sing a warbled version of
Blackbird,
the Beatles song, to distract Allison.

“I think it’s a breech birth.”

“A what?”

“It means the baby is coming out the wrong way. It should be coming out head first. It’s coming out feet first.”

I didn’t know there was a wrong way to emerge from a vagina, but apparently there is, and it is very dangerous.

“What are you going to do?” I asked Sarah.

“I’ve read about breech births and I know what you’re
supposed
to do, but I don’t have any experience at all,” Sarah said quietly. Her face went absolutely ashen.

“What are you supposed to do?”

“I’m supposed to stick my hand …
up there
and turn the baby around,” Sarah said in a voice that was obviously mortified beyond belief. Now, I’m not in the medical profession, but I imagine that if I
were
in the medical field I would have to not be the squeamish or embarrassed type. It occurred to me then that Sarah might be in the wrong occupation.

“You’re just going to have to do it, Sarah,” I said to her in my best motivational speech voice. “Allison needs you and her baby needs you too.”

Sarah nodded. “You’re right.”

Sarah is explaining the situation to Allison as I write this. She sent a flight attendant off to find something to substitute as a rubber glove. Maybe this is why I ended up on this flight. I’m not the kind of person who believes that everything happens for a reason, I haven’t lived a long enough life to see that proven yet, but maybe there
is
a reason I’m here. I couldn’t get a flight to Florida and I happened to not have a passport. I got assigned to this seat on this connecting flight. Maybe it was all so I could sit here and hold Allison’s hand and talk some sense into Sarah.

Oh, I got to go. The flight attendant is coming back with a plastic bag and some duct tape.

Later, 9:00pm—Baggage Claim at LAX

Allison gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. Her name is Delta, after the airline on which she was born. I won’t traumatize you with all of the gory (and I mean
very gory
) details of the birth, but the most important thing is that both mother and child are safe and healthy. Of course, once we landed in LAX we all had to wait an extra-long amount of time to get off the plane because medics had to come and wheel Allison and baby out of the airport and get them to a hospital.

As they strapped Allison into a gurney, she reached out and grabbed my hand.

“Thanks so much for being there for me,” she said. “And please don’t think of yourself as a failure. You’re much more valuable than you think.”

Maybe she’s right. I might not have gotten the farm back, but it doesn’t mean that I’m a worthless human being, right? I’m going to have a hundred more failures in my life and hopefully a hundred successes as well. I have so much life to live, who knows what could happen?

Then again, Allison did just give birth to an eight pound baby without any medication so she could’ve been totally out of it and hallucinating that I was someone of worth like Elizabeth Warren or Jennifer Lawrence.

Later, 11:30pm—Home

I have never had such an emotionally daunting day in my life. I’ve experienced so many emotions in the last fifteen hours that I’m pretty sure I’m going to swear off of emotions forever and just be like Doctor Spock in
Star Trek.

When the taxi dropped me off outside the house, I felt the strangest mixture of relief and dread. Firstly, I was relieved to just be back home. I guess I’m now officially calling Los Angeles home. While I miss Meredith and Amanda, I don’t want to go back to Iowa. This is where I belong now and this is where I’m building my life.

The feeling of dread was obviously coming from my fears of telling my family that I didn’t get the farm back. I walked up the front steps, each foot felt like it weighed a hundred pounds, and I unlocked the front door and stepped inside.

It was chaos. Everyone was awake, even though it was late. Even my grandparents were up. You have to understand, my grandparents have been going to bed at eight o’clock sharp every night for as long as I can remember. As far as I know, if they stay up past that they turn into gremlins or democrats or something.

“Holly!” Ivy shouted when I walked in. “The fashion show was amazing!” She squealed. “I totally stole the show and now everyone wants to join the club next year! I’m going to be the most popular girl in school.”

“That’s great, Ivy.” I looked around at the chaos. “What’s going on?”

Grandma and Grandpa were shuffling back and forth from their bedroom with piles of clothes in their frail arms. “Oh,” Ivy said, “they’re packing their bags to go home, of course!”

The icy pit in my stomach suddenly grew three times larger. There was nowhere for them to go back to. I had failed, and now I had to tell them as they shoved the remainder of their lives into their vintage Samsonite suitcases. I put down my own bags and walked over to the kitchen.

“Grandma, Grandpa?” I said cautiously. “I have something to tell you.” I swallowed the elephant sized lump in my throat, and then immediately started choking on my own spit because there, in my kitchen at nearly midnight, was Grayson.

“Grayson,” I said when I finally could catch a breath, “what are you doing here?”

Mom suddenly had her arms around me in her anaconda-like grip. “Oh, Holly, it is so wonderful,” she gushed.

“What’s wonderful?” I asked.

Mom released me and Grayson walked up, a big bright smile on his face. He held out a piece of paper to me cryptically, and I took it.

“What is this?”

“Read it,” Grayson said with an even bigger smile.

I looked down at the paper and my head began to spin. Have you ever looked at something, and even though your eyes are telling your brain the correct information, your brain is somehow trying to figure out all of the reasons why it’s a mistake? I could be staring at a purple horse, I could be
riding
the purple horse for heaven’s sake, and my brain will still say, “This isn’t logical, this can’t be happening, horses aren’t purple.”

So when I looked at the paper Grayson handed me and saw that it was the deed to my grandparent’s farm I could not wrap my head around the concept.

“How did you get this?” I mumbled. My tongue suddenly felt heavy and like it was covered in fur.

“I bid at the auction and I won,” he said. “Well, I wasn’t there physically, I was a phone buyer.”

“YOU
WERE
THE
PHONE
BUYER?” I screeched. I’ve never actually screamed or shouted at someone like this before, I didn’t even know that my vocal cords were capable of such a noise, but there I was in my kitchen screeching at my boyfriend like an angry bird.

Grayson was understandably startled. “Yes?” he said cautiously.

I rubbed my temple. “Grayson, I was at that auction.
I
was trying to get the farm back and I was so upset because I lost to an anonymous buyer.” I smacked him on his arm. “Why didn’t you tell me that you were going to be there?”

Grayson blinked. “Well why didn’t you tell
me
that
you
were going to be there?”

“I was trying to surprise everyone!”

“And I was trying to surprise
you
,” Grayson said firmly.

We stopped talking and stared at each other for a moment before we started to laugh. Grayson swooped me up into a big hug and kissed me on the top of my head. “Are you surprised?” he whispered.

“Very,” I said.

We all sat around the living room for another fifteen minutes just chatting and laughing. Suffice it to say, my grandparents like Grayson a
lot
more now. After the stressful day I just had, it was really nice to come home to good news and a family that isn’t trying to kill each other.

I’ll be honest though, I have one small concern. And it is small; it’s so very small I’m not even sure if I should write about it. But, I’m not sure about this whole “Grayson saves the day” thing. It isn’t that I don’t appreciate what he did, but my trip to Iowa was about my own attempt to not only make up for being a terrible person to others, but to save the day on my own without help from others.

Instead, Grayson (unknowingly) directly interfered with my ability to do that and instead is now receiving all of the attention for being so wonderful and selfless. I don’t know if this is something I should mention to him or if I should just let it go. My mom always tells me to pick my battles, which is a grown up way of saying to know when to shut the hell up.

April 27
^th
, 8:00am—Home

Five minutes ago, my mom burst into my room, flung herself onto my bed, and shouted “DISNEYLAND” at the top of her lungs.

So I guess we’re going to Disneyland.

Later, 10:00am—Restroom at Disneyland

If you watched enough Disney movies in your lifetime then you’ve been indoctrinated with the concept that going to Disneyland is the most important thing you could ever do with your life. And you know what? IT
’
S
COMPLETELY
TRUE.

Disneyland is AMAZING. My senses are being completely overstimulated right now but I don’t even care. I’ve already had a churro AND a Dole whip and it isn’t even lunchtime yet. Do you know what the best part is? Grayson is here with me. I’m at Disneyland with my boyfriend! And yeah he’s wearing a baseball cap and a very fancy fake moustache so that no one recognizes him, but he’s here!

I saw Princess Belle earlier and I legitimately almost cried. Grayson saw me getting misty eyed and he was all like, “Are you crying?”

“No!” I said very aggressively in an attempt to compensate for the fact that I was actually crying over seeing an actress dressed like Princess Belle. “I just got some sugar from my churro in my eye.”

“Uh huh,” Grayson said in a tone that was meant to convey disbelief. I decided to “pick my battles” by not fighting with him anymore.

We all went on this ride earlier that was Buzz Lightyear themed. We rode around in little carts and shot at aliens. The bigger the alien the more points you got. Grayson and I are very competitive as it turns out. We rode this ride THREE
TIMES because neither one of us would accept defeat. Grayson beat me by a hundred points and I’m still mad about it.

I’m just so happy right now. My grandparents are currently on the plane back home to the farm that is theirs for the rest of their lives. My boyfriend is here with me and my family in Disneyland and everything is just great. Yesterday I thought my life was over. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

Later, 12:15pm—In line for Space Mountain

The line for Space Mountain is ridiculously long. Grayson and my mom are in a deep conversation about which season of
American Horror Story
is best (he says it is the first season and she says it was the second) and Ivy is flirting with a cute boy in front of us. So I’m stealing a little bit of time to write here.

It’s really hard to write while in line for a ride. There isn’t anywhere for me to put this journal down so my handwriting is really wobbly. Hopefully I’ll be able to read this clearly later.

I think that today might be the best day of my life. I don’t think I’m going to want to ever leave Disneyland. Maybe there’s a spare room in Cinderella’s castle I can move into. I’ve taken so many pictures on my phone. Before today, I didn’t have very many pictures of Grayson and me together. And sure, in all of the pictures today he’s wearing a fake moustache and a hat, but I can still tell it is him.