Huckleberry Hearts (32 page)

The thought of Zach's suffering didn't make her feel better at all. Surely he must have known that.

Cassie smiled through her tears. Zach wasn't one to be serious for long. It was one of the many reasons she loved him.

It was a good thing she was already sitting down or she might have fallen on her face. She clutched the letter to her breast. She loved him.

Mammi watched her and sported a wide grin.

“How long have you had this letter?” Cassie said breathlessly.

“A week or two.”

A week or two? Zach had suffered through a week or two, not knowing how she truly felt? “Why didn't you give it to me sooner?” she asked, with a tinge of scolding in her voice.

Mammi shrugged, still with that persistent twinkle in her eye. “You were mad. I was afraid you'd rip it up.”

“All this time wasted. Mammi, how could you?”

Mammi giggled. “Now, Cassie. I've had a lot of experience with this sort of thing. You have to trust that your mammi knows what she's doing.”

She had to get to Zach as soon as possible. She wouldn't let him go on grieving for one more minute. She loved him. He was her Sir Galahad, her Darth Vader, and her Da Vinci.

She jumped to her feet and ran down the hall to her old bedroom. “Are my Englisch clothes still here?” she called over her shoulder.

“Jah. I had a feeling you'd be back.”

Cassie closed the door to her room and found a pair of jeans and a T-shirt. Not her most stunning outfit, but she didn't care. She had to see Zach immediately. She took the kapp off her head and pulled the bobby pins from her hair, letting it tumble to her shoulders.

She took off the plain green dress and apron, stockings and black shoes, and pulled on her jeans, T-shirt, and boots. Zach liked the boots.

Even though she was in a hurry, she pulled the mascara tube from the top drawer and chastised herself for not buying a cheap mirror when she had the chance. It was almost impossible to get her mascara right using Mammi's microscopic hand mirror.

After taking one last, hopeless look at herself, she found her cell phone at the bottom of her sock drawer, turned it on—yeah! It still worked—and sprinted out of her bedroom, saying a prayer of thanksgiving that she hadn't sold her car yet. It was parked in its usual spot in front of Mammi and Dawdi's house with a For Sale sign in the window. Thank the Lord, it was old enough that nobody had wanted to buy it.

“Mammi,” she panted, “remember when I gave you my car keys for safekeeping?”

Mammi stood with her hand out and an eager smile on her face. Cassie's keys, complete with Sir Galahad key ring, dangled from Mammi's fingers. Cassie snatched up her keys and gave Mammi a big hug. “Denki, Mammi. Wish me luck.”

“I don't believe in luck.”

Cassie raced out of the house and jumped into The Beast. The ignition made a mournful, sickly sound as if it were hibernating and didn't want to be disturbed. “Come on, honey,” she coaxed, patting the dashboard and giving it a little gas. She tried three, four, five times, then pounded her head against the steering wheel and groaned. It had been sitting idle for nearly five weeks. What had she expected?

She had no choice. She dialed Zach's cell number. She had to tell him she loved him. Now. No answer. Growling in frustration, she sent him a short text before jumping out of the car and going back into the house. “Mammi, the car won't start.”

Mammi raised her eyebrows. “Is the knitted steering wheel cover on? That might warm it up.”

“Yes, but it won't help.”

Mammi never seemed ruffled about anything, even though Cassie was about as ruffled as she could get. “You'll have to take the buggy.”

Titus, with Dawdi and Norman in tow, burst into the house as if he were late for a very important meeting. He looked at Mammi doubtfully, probably wishing for that stopwatch.

Mammi propped her hands on her hips. “Titus, you're five minutes early. All of you go back outside and count to three hundred slowly.”

A thundercloud parked directly over Norman's head as he looked at Cassie's very un-Amish outfit. “What's this?”

Cassie didn't want to waste one second trying to reason with her brother. “Norman, I'm not going to be baptized.”

He narrowed his eyes. “That's foolishness. Do you want to break Mamm's heart all over again? Change into some decent clothes this minute.”

Guilt felt like a shard of glass in her heart. Norman was right. If she left a second time, Mamm would be crushed, Elmer Lee would be disappointed, and Norman would be angry. She didn't want a confrontation with Norman, but she didn't have time to be meek. Nor did she have time to placate him. She loved Zach. She had to see him immediately.

Cassie squared her shoulders and stood toe-to-toe with her brother. “Norman, I'm not going to be baptized. I'm not going to wear the kapp again, even when I'm visiting you and the family.”

“You won't be allowed in my house,” Norman said.

“That is your choice, not mine.”

Norman stood as rigid as a maple tree. “You will go to hell.”

“God is my judge, not you. I will take my salvation up with Him.” She turned to Titus. “My car won't start, and I need to get to the hospital immediately to see Dr. Reynolds. I've got to tell him I love him. Will you help me hitch the buggy?”

Titus lifted his chin and flung his toothpick out the open door. “I'd never let a broken car stand in the way of true love.”

Chapter Twenty-Nine

He was jogging around an empty, maze-like building trying to find a way out. Elmer Lee suddenly materialized, punched him in the nose, and handed him a cookie. Then Cassie, who always appeared in his dreams dressed in white, floated down the hall and came to a stop in front of him. “I love you, Zach,” she said.

Before Zach could respond, Elmer Lee took her hand and they walked out of the window together. He tried to follow them, but instead of floating like they did, he fell and the ground rushed at him before he jerked awake and sat up in his bed.

He looked at his alarm clock. Three minutes before noon. He'd only been asleep for three hours.

He realized what had woken him up when he heard three sharp raps on his door. Didn't anybody use the phone anymore?

Okay, that wasn't fair to whoever was on the other side of that door. He'd turned his phone off so he could get some sleep. Apparently, a long nap was not meant to be.

Not that he slept all that well when he could catch a few hours. All his dreams were of Cassie, and he often woke up mid-dream with grief and regret clawing at his chest.

He stepped into the pants he'd taken off three hours ago and shuffled out of his room to the front door. If it was important enough to come over, it was important enough to answer the door. Unless of course it was Blair, and she'd better not be within a hundred miles of Shawano.

He'd better make sure, just in case. “Who is it?”

“It's Jamie.”

Zach quickly slid the dead bolt and opened the door. Jamie could wake him whenever she wanted, especially today. She looked horrible. Her hair was half-in, half-out of her ponytail, and her eyes had that look that told him a migraine was starting. She strode into the room as if she knew exactly where she was going and then paced as if she had no idea where she was.

“Is everything okay?”

“Zach, I've been trying to call you.”

“My phone was off,” he said, reaching into his pocket and turning it on so he didn't miss anything important. It looked as if he already had.

“They called me from the hospital because they couldn't reach you. There's been a terrible accident.”

Zach smoothed his fingers through his hair. “Do they need an extra doctor? What happened?”

“Cassie's been hurt.”

 

 

Zach might as well have been lost in one of his nightmares. He couldn't breathe, he couldn't speak, and nothing made sense no matter how hard he tried to concentrate.

He stumbled into the emergency room and stood in the waiting area as if expecting instructions about what to do next. The room was empty. Not even an attendant sat behind the admitting window. A TV hummed quietly in the background, playing the noon news for an invisible audience. Zach had never noticed how dark and antiseptic the emergency waiting area looked with its fake potted plants and rack of golfing magazines.

Where was Cassie? Jamie had said the accident was serious. Was Cassie in surgery? Had she already been released? Was she dead?

A tremor traveled through his body, and his hands shook violently. She couldn't be dead.
Dear Heavenly Father, don't let her be dead.

He stood in the middle of the room, disoriented and paralyzed by fear. Why had everyone disappeared?

Brian Mills, a county EMT, came out of the door that led to the emergency room. A bandage stretched around his left hand, but it didn't look like a serious injury. He stopped short when he saw Zach and frowned in deep concern. Zach must have looked pretty bad. “Hey, Dr. Reynolds, are you okay?”

Zach planted a hand on Brian's shoulder. “Brian, they brought an Amish girl in here about an hour ago. Was that you?”

“The one in the buggy?”

“Yeah.”

Brian nodded gravely. “Some guy was texting and ran into her not three blocks from here. That buggy was so smashed up, it was like pulling her out from underneath a pile of wood shavings.” He held up his injured hand. “I got a splinter the size of a pencil.”

Zach gripped Brian's shoulder tighter. “What about the girl?”

“Internal injuries. A sharp piece of wood missed her jugular by millimeters. They think she might have broken her back.”

Zach was going to throw up. His ears started ringing, and the room began to spin. Struggling for air, he clutched Brian's shoulder more tightly and doubled over.

“Hey, Doc,” Brian said, heightened alarm in his voice. “Hey, Doc. Sit down.” He practically shoved Zach into a chair and knelt next to him. “You okay?”

“What's the prognosis?”

“She's in surgery. Everything is going to be okay. Just calm down. You're going to be okay.”

No, he wasn't, not unless Cassie was okay. Paramedics were trained to reassure patients in dire circumstances. In no case were they to tell the patient how bad things really were. Brian's response only fanned Zach's panic.

He braced his elbows against his knees and took several deep breaths while scrubbing his fingers through his hair. He'd be worthless if he couldn't get control of his emotions. He had to find Cassie and learn how grim her condition really was. He had to keep his head.

“You okay, Doc?” Brian asked again.

Zach took several more breaths and nodded. “I'm okay. I need more information, though. I'm going up to the OR.”

“Well, maybe not till you're sure you won't pass out.”

Zach held up his hand. “Just give me a couple minutes.”

Brian gazed at him gravely. “A friend of yours?”

A friend? How about the girl he loved with every beat of his heart? How about his best reason for living? Even if she didn't ever love him back.

“Yeah. A friend.”

“Can I get you a drink of water, Doc? Or a cup of coffee?”

With elbows still resting on his knees, Zach rubbed up and down the side of his face. He was acting more like a patient than a doctor. Clenching his gut, he stood up. “I'll be okay. I'm going to head up to surgery and see what I can find out.”

“If you feel like you're going to faint, sit down.”

“I will.”

With renewed purpose and an oppressive sense of dread, Zach climbed the stairs to the second floor. A beehive of activity near the nurses' station told him immediately which operating room Cassie was in. Three nurses stood with their heads together conversing in hushed tones. They nearly snapped to attention when Zach approached.

“How is she?” he asked Marla. OR wasn't her area, but she was obviously as concerned as anyone about Cassie.

Marla pursed her lips. “I'm not sure. They've given her twenty units of blood, and they said something about a splenic rupture.”

The bile rose in Zach's throat.

Marla laid a hand on his arm. “But that's not for certain. I'm just hearing rumors.”

“What can I do? Do they need an extra set of hands?”

Marla pinned him with a stern gaze. “Not you, Doctor, and you know it. Dr. Parker and Dr. Desantos are in there. Plus Dr. Halstead. They're the best team we've got, and you need to sit down.”

Zach didn't exactly feel relieved, but he felt a little better. Dr. Halstead was a fine surgeon. If Cassie had any hope, it was in Dr. Halstead's capable hands.

He drifted into the waiting room, another one with boring magazines, and sat down. Every muscle in his body tensed like the string of a crossbow stretched to its breaking point. The only thing he could think of to do was pray, and that idea made him flinch. He was afraid he might lash out and say something to God he would regret later.

He pulled out his phone and looked at it for the first time since Jamie had come over. Three texts from the hospital, one from Jamie. One from . . . Cassie?

His heart leaped into his throat. She hadn't made contact with him for weeks.

He couldn't have been more stunned if a bolt of lightning had fried him to dust. Did this mean she wasn't going to join the Amish? Did she still love him? Was it some kind of sick joke from Norman or Elmer Lee?

It couldn't be a joke.

She'd read his letter.

His heart vibrated a thousand miles a minute. Groaning softly, he pressed his hand against his face. Was he going to lose her when they'd only just found each other again? He couldn't breathe. It hurt too bad.

Anna and Felty, plus Norman, Linda, Luke, and Cassie's mamm filed into the waiting room. Jamie followed close behind. Once she'd delivered the horrible message to Zach, she had gone to Bonduel to pick up Cassie's family and bring them to the hospital.

With tears in her eyes, Anna immediately reached out her arms for Zach. She pulled him into her embrace, and although she stood more than a foot shorter, Zach felt like a little boy in the comfort of his mother's arms. There was no solace like a grandmother's hug.

The tears that he hadn't allowed to flow earlier rolled down his cheeks. Let Norman mock him for not being manly enough. He didn't care about anything but Cassie and the utter despair that engulfed him at the possibility of her dying.

“She was so eager to get to you,” Anna said. “She almost made it.”

“She sent me a text,” Zach whispered. “I didn't know.”

To Zach's surprise, Esther grabbed on to his hand. “Doctor, they told us Cassie was in surgery. How is she? Did you operate on her?”

Zach wiped his cheek and shook his head. “I just got here myself. They told me she has some internal injuries. She's lost a lot of blood. I'm hoping one of the surgeons will talk to us soon.”

“Help us, Doctor,” Esther said, her hand firmly around Zach's, her voice trembling with emotion.

“I'll do anything I can.”

“I hope I did the right thing,” Anna said. “I gave her your letter this morning. She wants to go back to school. She wants to be with you something wonderful. Her car wouldn't start, but she wanted to see you so bad she took the buggy.”

Esther's face was a map of painful memories. “What do you mean, Mamm? Cassie never told me such a thing.”

“It's true,” Norman said. “Right before the accident, she told me she didn't want to be baptized.” He inclined his head toward Zach. “It's all his fault.”

Zach wouldn't have guessed that sweet Anna Helmuth had an indignant bone in her entire body. “Norman, you'll not say one bad thing about the doctor.”

Norman frowned and glanced at Linda. She nodded sternly at her husband, and he closed his mouth.

To Zach's utter relief and dread, Rhonda Miles, the head OR nurse, walked into the waiting room in her surgical hat and scrubs with the surgical mask pulled from her face and hanging around her neck. Rhonda was young, but a crackerjack nurse in the OR. She had brilliant eyes and sharply angled cheekbones. She didn't have much of a bedside manner, but she was a gifted nurse and Zach trusted her completely.

The sight of her stole his breath. Would he be able to bear the news she was about to deliver?

“Are you Cassie's family?” Rhonda asked.

Esther stepped forward. “I'm her mother.”

Norman pointed at Zach. “He's not family.”

Anna hooked her elbow around Zach's arm. “Yes, he is.”

Zach felt as if she'd thrown a warm blanket around him. His eyes pooled with tears.

“Are you Cassie's doctor?” Esther said.

“I'm one of the nurses. The doctors are doing everything they can to save Cassie's life. They asked me to talk to you.”

Save Cassie's life.
By the way she said it, Zach knew instinctively that it was a moment-by-moment effort.

“How is my daughter?” Esther said.

The lines of Rhonda's face looked severe, as if she were made out of hard, unyielding stone. “She is still in surgery. I'm going back as soon as our visit is over.”

“Will she be all right?” Anna asked.

Rhonda glanced at Zach, nodded her acknowledgment of a doctor in the room, then focused all her attention on Esther. “I'm afraid Cassie has been seriously hurt. She's lost a lot of blood. We will do everything we can to save her, but there is a real possibility that she will not survive. You need to be prepared.”

Rhonda sounded as if she were rehearsing a carefully prepared speech. She'd given it before.

“What are her injuries?” Zach asked.

“Ruptured spleen, collapsed lung, broken back. The spleen is out, but they can't get her blood pressure up. We're at twenty-five units of blood.”

Twenty-five units.

If Zach had been alone in the room, he would have lost it right there, but his demeanor had to give Cassie's family hope, even when hope was slim. Rhonda turned around and walked away, and he almost followed her out the door and into the operating room, just to get a look at Cassie. But no matter how he ached to see her, he refused to do anything to distract the surgeons from their work.

Everyone's gaze turned to Zach as if he could take charge and proclaim that Cassie would live a long and healthy life.

“What can we do, Dr. Reynolds?” Anna asked.

He recognized the helpless, hopeless feeling that overtook them. Like him, they each would have done anything for Cassie, but there was absolutely nothing they could do but wait.

“We can pray,” Felty said.

Zach took a deep breath. “Yes. We need to pray.” Cassie needed his faith right now, not his doubt. And certainly not his anger. “You can donate blood downstairs. They always need blood.” He winced. He couldn't even do that. It had only been six weeks since he'd donated for Austin.