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He kissed her and took the stroller from her.
“You’re the surprise. What’s going on at the house?”
“I met the plumber and he finished up and I didn’t want to start painting until I brought you and the boy back with me. Anyway, I wanted to talk to you first.”
“I’ll make coffee,” she said, shifting her eyes away. “I didn’t have my quota yet today.”
She didn’t mention the thwarted coffee date being the cause.
Chris got baby Stevie out of the stroller and brought him into the house. The minute he put him down, the little boy went right to his toy box.
At the counter, Annie tried to act natural, measuring out ground coffee into the filter-lined receptacle, waiting for Chris. “What did you want to talk to me about?”
“I’ll wait until you get your coffee. It’s kind of intense.”
She glanced over at Chris and he seemed concerned, but not despondent. She wondered how her ex, Steve, would act if she suddenly had a health crisis. He probably wouldn’t even react.
“Oh, well, that doesn’t sound too good.”
She waited for the pot to brew, busying herself with something on the counter.
“Yeah, it took me by surprise.”
After the coffee finished, she poured two cups and brought them to the table.
“Shoot,” she said.
He took the cup and looked up at her.
“Cindy has a thing by her heart called an aneurysm. It’s in the main vessel called the aorta.”
“I know heart anatomy,” Annie said, not able to keep a bit of annoyance from her tone of voice. “That doesn’t sound good.”
“It really doesn’t. Anyway, surgery would be super risky. But if she doesn’t have surgery, it could rupture at any time.”
“How’s she taking it?”
“Well, she’s home now, upset, as you can imagine.”
“Thankfully, your boys are grown.”
“Well, not really. Ben is a freshman in college. He lives at home, too.”
“That’s helpful because she’ll have someone there with her.”
Chris stood up and began to pace. “I’m not sure an eighteen-year-old boy is going to be enough for her.”
With a sinking heart, Annie could almost guess what his next words would be.
“I have to find a way to help her. Once she decides what she wants, if she’s going to risk surgery or just allow nature to take its course, maybe she’ll agree to get hospice involved. I just don’t know.”
“Something tells me I’m lucky I didn’t tell my former father-in-law that I was going to move out of this house,” she said, her anger growing. “I feel like I’m being unreasonable and I don’t want to be that person.”
“Annie, I know this is hard. I just don’t know yet what my role will be. I can’t turn my back on the mother of my children. They’d never forgive me and I’d never forgive myself.”
“Okay, well, I guess I’ll just ride it out then. Let me know what you need from me when it’s all figured out. But why didn’t you say something right away?”
He shook his head. “I wasn’t sure what was going on until Thursday, and then yesterday, when I got here, I didn’t want to ruin our night. That left today.”
