Stealing Second: Sam's Story: Book 4 in the Clarksonville Series (22 page)

Sam reached up, but Lisa grabbed her wrist gently. “Don’t touch.”

“You’re right. Sorry.” Sam nodded. “I think my cell phone knocked me for a wallop.”

“Were you driving?” Marlee asked quietly as they continued their trek up the stairs.

Sam shook her head and relayed the story as they went. She glossed over her panic about not being able to wake up Helene.

Once situated in the much smaller but somehow cozy waiting room on the second floor, Sam’s mother joined them briefly, and then went to the nurses’ station to inquire about Helene. With Sam’s mother away, Lisa placed her hand over Sam’s. A nurse walked by, and Lisa pulled her hand away. Sam sighed in frustration. She hated being so far in the closet that her own girlfriend couldn’t give her comfort.

Lisa took a closer look at the stitches. “That doctor did a great job. Nice and even.”

“I hope you won’t have a scar,” Marlee said.

“I don’t care about that,” Sam said. And she didn’t. All she cared about was Helene.

“Did you lose consciousness?” Susie asked

“Nah, I remember every scary detail.” Sam felt a rush of tears as she relived the accident. She hid her face in her hands.

Lisa put her arm around Sam and held her close. Sam let her. She didn’t care if her mother or those nurses saw them. She needed her friends. She needed Lisa. Lisa rubbed Sam’s back until Sam got herself back under control.

When Sam pulled her hands away from her face, she had to laugh because Marlee was holding a box of tissues inches from her face. “Thanks.” She took a tissue and blew her nose. She took another and wiped at her eyes, careful not to touch the new stitches. “You guys are the best.”

Lisa’s hand was still on her back. Sam sat forward and Lisa seemed to take the hint and pulled away.

“You know what?” Sam said to Lisa.

“What?”

“That might have been you.”

“Where? What do you mean?”

“Those paramedics. That might have been you driving the ambulance or checking to make sure I was okay, or...“ Tears choked her throat closed for a moment as she thought about the firemen pulling Helene out of the car. “I’ll never forgive myself if something happens to her.”

Lisa’s hand was on her back again. “You can’t blame yourself. It was an accident.”

“If my stupid passport didn’t need to be renewed, this never would have happened.”

Susie put a calm and reassuring hand solidly on her shoulder. Marlee held the tissues out with a steady hand. Sam snagged a couple more, grateful for her amazing friends.

“Thanks, you guys.” Sam dabbed at her nose. She looked at Lisa, into those familiar light brown eyes that always melted her. Sam had built a pretty tough outer shell over the years, learning not to need anyone, but she understood something at that moment. She needed Helene. She also needed the love and comfort that Lisa gave her and the love of her friends. She watched her mother talking quietly with one of the nurses and realized with a start that she needed her parents, too.

Helene Frances Bouchard

“LOVE YOU.” HELENE squeezed Sam’s hand. Her eyes were closed.

“I love you, too, Helene.” Sam tried to keep the emotion out of her voice, but found it difficult. “You have to be better in two weeks, you know. Our favorite hockey team needs you.” Helene didn’t respond. She must have fallen asleep again. Sam gently kissed Helene’s hand and sat down in the quasi-comfortable chair that had become her second home in Helene’s spacious hospital room.

Sam blinked back tears and smiled at the long windowsill filled with flowers from Susie and Marlee, Lisa and her family, Sam’s parents, Rolando and his wife, Mrs. Worthington, Mrs. Tardelli, and lots of other people. Sam, of course, trumped them all by having six bouquets sent. She breathed in the flowery fragrance, grateful Helene had so many fans.

The night before, Sam hadn’t wanted to leave Helene alone in the hospital when visiting hours ended, especially since Helene had woken up, and they had talked for a few minutes. Helene hadn’t remembered a thing about the accident, and seemed more concerned about Sam’s stitches than her own concussion. Typical of Helene, but this time Sam was going to play the role of nanny and take care of her.

She had been prepared to defy the visiting hours rule and camp out all night in Helene’s room, but the doctor and night nurse insisted Helene would rest better without Sam’s nervous energy in the room. Sam’s parents had long gone home. They’d left about an hour after Helene was situated in the private room on the ultra-quiet third floor. Lisa, Marlee, and Susie had stayed longer, but eventually they, too, had to go home. Susie drove Marlee and Lisa back to Clarksonville, and then came all the way back to East Valley. She stopped back at the hospital to make sure Sam was all right. Susie had even been willing to stand vigil all night with Sam but ended up driving her home a little after nine p.m.

Sam took another look at Helene in the bed. The early afternoon sunlight had crept up to the bottom of the bed making the room feel peaceful and cozy. Sam wished she could say Helene looked peaceful, but she didn’t. The pain medication the nurse had given Helene must not be working yet. The nurse told Sam that Helene’s body was recovering from the sloshing her brain had gotten in the accident.

Sam pulled out her phone and scrolled through the happy pictures of her and Helene at the lake house. She blew out a sigh and said a silent prayer to a God she hadn’t talked to in a long time.

A quiet knock on the door made Sam’s heart soar. The door opened and Lisa, Susie, and Marlee walked in.

“How’s Helene today?” Lisa asked in a whisper. She flew over to Sam and gave her a quick hello kiss. She wrapped her in a snuggly hug.

“The doctor said she’s going to sleep a lot while she recovers,” Sam whispered back.

Lisa let go of Sam and reached for the medical chart tucked in a box on the end of the bed. She scanned the entries.

Susie gave Sam a quick hug and asked in a quiet voice, “How long does she have to stay here?”

“The CAT scan showed there wasn’t any bleeding on her brain or anything like that,” Sam said.

“Thank God for that, eh?” Lisa blew out a sigh and stashed the chart back in the box.

“She has a severe concussion and needs rest, so they’re going to play it by ear. Three or four days at least.” Sam gestured for her friends to sit in the chairs Susie and Marlee had snagged from the hallway the night before. “Lisa, you should go to medical school. You love this stuff.”

“Medical school?” Lisa got a faraway look on her face as if she’d never thought of it. ”That’s going to be expensive, but I guess I could get a student loan or a scholarship or something.”

“Yeah, and your bio-dad gave your mom enough money to take a big chunk out of your undergrad costs.”

Marlee gave Sam the envelope she had been holding. “It’s a get well card for Helene from me and my mom.”

“Thanks, Marlee. That’s sweet.” Sam put the unopened card on the table next to Helene’s bed.

“Oh, geez,” Lisa said, “I forgot the cards in the van. The three musketeers made a whole bunch of get well cards for you and Helene before we went to church this morning.”

“We’ll go get them,” Susie said. “C’mon, Marlee, let’s give the lovebirds some alone time.”

Sam felt her cheeks get warm. It wasn’t like she and Lisa were going to get down and dirty right there in Helene’s hospital room, but it was kind of nice to have Lisa all to herself for a while.

“How ‘bout I call the three musketeers later? Let them know I’m okay.”

Lisa’s loving smile made Sam get warm all over. She pulled her chair closer. “You’re so nice to think of them. See? When you do stuff like that, it makes me want to marry you.”

“Ahh,” Sam said, “do you know that we can legally get married right now?”

“Right now? How? We’re both underage.”

“I looked it up. We’d need written permission from both sets of parents, though.”

Lisa laughed. “And you’d be able to get that real easy, eh?”

Sam rolled her eyes. “Not in this lifetime.”

“What’s the age we don’t need our parents’ permission?”

“Eighteen.”

Lisa nodded slowly as if scheming. “Guess we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”

“Do you want to cross that bridge with me?” Sam asked shyly.

Lisa stood up and pulled Sam out of the chair. She swallowed Sam in her arms and seared her with a steamy kiss. When she let go, Sam was delightfully dizzy. She stumbled backward and sat down hard.

Lisa shot Sam a suggestive look. “Does that answer your question?”

“I’ll say.” Sam nodded slowly and fanned herself. Sam snuck a peek at Helene. She was still sleeping soundly, but this time her face looked more relaxed. The pain meds were probably kicking in big time. “For now we’ll have to make do with celebrating our four month anniversary.”

“On Wednesday.”

Sam nodded. “I’ll pick you up after play practice, okay?”

“Dinner at D’Amico’s?”

“Maybe.” Sam had actually reserved a table at
Le Grande Bistro
, a high end restaurant in Southbridge, but wanted to surprise Lisa.

“Did you ever look up the answer to that other question we had?” Lisa sat back down.

“What other—“

“You know.” Lisa blushed. “When you turn eighteen, and I’m still sixteen. Will you be in trouble if we, you know?“

“Oh, that question.” Sam leaned closer and said in low tones, “Yes, we will be in trouble then because we’re in trouble right now. Well, I am anyway.”

Lisa’s eyes grew wide. “Why?”

“You’re not seventeen yet. It turns out that we’ll be legal once you turn seventeen.”

“Even though at seventeen I’ll still be underage?”

Sam nodded. “The website I went to said anybody under seventeen years old is incapable of giving consent to, you know, have, uh, intimate relations.” Sam blushed at the last two whispered words.

“Oh, I’m more than capable of consenting.” Lisa waggled her eyebrows.

“Believe me, I know.”

The door opened wide, and Susie and Marlee rushed back in. Marlee held up the plastic grocery bag filled with crayon-drawn get well cards from Lisa’s brother and sisters and handed it to Sam.

“Thanks, you guys.” Sam took the bag.

“Look at your cards later,” Susie said. “Move your chair over here. Marlee and I found something quite interesting in the lobby.” She held up a pamphlet.

Sam couldn’t believe what she was seeing. “STDs and You? Why do you have that?”

“Just get over here,” Susie hissed through gritted teeth.

Sam shook her head, but did as bidden. “What is so exciting about STDs?”

“Shuddup. I’m giving you guys a quiz.”

Sam rolled her eyes dramatically and then snuck a peek back at Helene who was still sleeping soundly. “Okay, but we can’t wake up Helene.”

“
Sí, claro, gringa
. So, I assume you guys took Health in ninth grade, like me and Sam did, right?”

Lisa and Marlee nodded.

“Let’s see how good your memories are. Name some STDs.”

“Syphilis,” Marlee said with a snap of her fingers.

“Yes.”

“Gonorrhea,” Lisa offered.

“Good. What else?”

The room was stock still. The only sounds that could be heard were the quiet noises of the medical staff moving in the hallway outside Helene’s room.

“See,” Susie said, “it’s not an easy quiz.”

“Wait, now,” Sam said, “I remember something weird about warts, you know, down there.”

“Oh, yeah,” Marlee said. “Can you imagine how awkward that would be?”

“Uh, how about herpes?” Lisa said.

“Bingo!” Susie said. “But there are a couple of biggies you haven’t said yet.”

After a few moments of wracking their brains, Susie let them off the hook. “HIV is an STD.”

“Yeah, I guess it would be,” Sam said. “Any exchange of bodily fluids, right?”

“Right. Hepatitis B, too.” Susie added. “
Aay
,
mierda
. Check this out. It says one in every five Americans has an STD.”

Marlee’s jaw dropped open. “One in five?”

Susie nodded. “Twenty percent.”

“Oh, man. There are five people in this room right now. That means one of us could have an STD. Holy crap.”

Sam’s eyes grew wide. “Wait a sec. Are we counted in that one in five? Do lesbians have the same risk?” She whispered the word lesbians, still not comfortable saying the word out loud. “I thought we were immune to that stuff.”

“I think we’re at risk with any kind of exchange of bodily fluids,” Susie said, “but I really don’t know. And if your school is like ours, they only talked about hetero sex. Am I right?”

Sam and Lisa added their nods to Marlee’s.

“They do their best to scare us into abstinence in ninth grade,” Marlee said, “but, seriously, what STDs do we have to worry about?” Marlee asked the question before Sam could.

Susie shrugged. “I have no idea. Sam, give me that fancy phone of yours, and I’ll look it up.”

“No way,” Sam said. “You’re not looking that up with my phone. What if my parents saw it?”

“True that.” Susie nodded.

“I use the school computers in the library for that kind of research.” Sam winked at Lisa.

“Check this out, you guys.” Marlee grabbed the pamphlet from Susie’s hand. “It says here you can lower your chance of getting STDs by using a latex male condom or, get this, a female condom.”

“
Aay
, a female condom?” Susie asked. “You made that up.”

“I did not. See?” Marlee pointed to the pamphlet.

“I’ve never heard of a female condom. Have you guys?” Susie asked.

Sam and Lisa shook their heads. “Get back to us after you do your research, Sus,” Sam said.

“Why me?”

“’Cuz you’re the one who brought that stupid thing in here,” Sam said.

“Okay, whatever. I’ll use a computer at the college, because my mother will have a heart attack if she finds out I’m researching anything about sex.”

“Can I read my get well cards now?” Sam stood up.

“
Sí, claro
, class dismissed.” Susie grinned.