Page 74 of Love: Take Two

"Noah!" Dad breathes, making me jump when he whips open the door. There are bags under his eyes, and his shirt is partially untucked. He looks nothing like the stern, put-together man who raised me and everything like a distraught husband unsure how to fix things.

"Thanks for coming so quickly," he croaks. He retakes his perch on the side of Mom's bed, doing his best not to crease the sheets.

It's hard to reconcile the frail woman lying before me with Mom, who just last Sunday was wrangling everyone like tigers in a circus. A baffling number of dishes left the kitchen as if on an assembly line. Lasagna. Homemade focaccia. Caprese Salad. Chicken Parmigiana. Even chocolate chip cannolis. It was Italian night—my favorite.

Mom fluttered around like a hummingbird, barely eating herself but keeping everyone's wine glasses full and scooping extra helpings onto her new daughters' plates. She was beaming, seemingly overflowing with joy at all the new facessurrounding her dining room table. But was it too much? Did she work herself too hard and—

"The doctor said it was a mild cardiac event," Dad says finally. His voice is barely a whisper, and he's staring at where his hands hold Mom's. "One second, she was pulling Tupperware lids out of the cabinet, packing leftovers for tomorrow's lunch, and the next, she was…" He clears his throat. "If I hadn't seen her fall... Hadn't gotten up to ask where my blue tie was for an arraignment..."

He keeps trailing off, as if the thought of what could have happened is just as painful as whatdidhappen. Dad hasn't been without Mom since his twenties; more than half his life. Who would he even be without her?

I move from my seat in the chair by the window to stand behind my father. Should I put my hand on his shoulder? Does he even want my support?

"What exactly is a 'mild cardiac event'?" I ask, choosing words over physical contact. He snorts.

"That was my question," he grits out, obviously still angry. "It means the blockage in her heart is only partial, not complete. They gave her blood thinners and statins to stabilize her, and they don't think she'll need surgery. She'll be under observation for a few days, though."

In a rush of emotion, I pull my dad up to hug him. How must it have felt to almost lose the woman he loves? The woman at the center of his entire life? She's at the center ofallour lives, and apparently, we need to do a better job of lightening her load.

"Were you out partying when I called?" he asks. I stiffen and drop my arms immediately. He gestures to my shirt. "I can smell the marijuana on you."

Shit. Why is it that every time I'm around him, I feel thirteen years old again? Caught smoking pot in Mom's herb garden when I was supposed to be doing my chem homework. It's not like I'm still high now; the adrenaline from his text was like a shot straight to the heart.

"I was at home, actually. I had a rough day. And if you didn't know, it's legal now." I can't keep the hurt out of my voice, and he turns to me. He frowns when he sees my guarded expression.

"Noah," he sighs. "You and I have never seen eye to eye. I know I'm to blame—I pushed too hard, expected too much—but I'm trying. Is there any way we can get past all the mistakes I've made?"

I shrug one shoulder.

"Maybe start by not saying you expected too much. Henry met those expectations. Heexceededthem. And all you see me as is a disappointment?"

"I was trying to say that my expectations were unreasonable!"

He rakes his hand through his hair—a mannerism he passed down to me, though his is cropped low—and tries to bring down the volume of his voice.

"I had no right to push you into Debate Club when you really wanted to take the Marketing elective. I should've listened when you said law school didn't feel right instead of shutting you out.

"That fight—" His voice breaks, and I see him swallow. "Your mother almost left me over the things I said that night."

"I remember," I murmur.

He'd been furious when I went behind his back to transfer from Yale to USC. Said I threw away all the strings he had to pull to get me in. He swore he'd stop paying for school if I chose to waste my potential, but I did it anyway. He didn't speak to me for three months. The same months I first knew Awa, and retreated into my schoolwork and an unhealthy level of hedonism.

He idly brushes his fingers over Mom's hand, then turns to face me directly.

"I was wrong." I can hear the sincerity, the remorse. "You were your own man then, and you've more than proven yourself in the years since. Not that you need to!" he rushes to add.

Manly or not, I'm holding back tears. The apology isn't perfect—he isDad, after all—but it's still a miracle. I turn to wipe my eyes with my sleeve, but he grabs my arm, pulling me in for a hug.

"Almost losing your mother puts a lot of things into perspective. I don't want to lose any of you. Youare my everything."

His words are muffled by the fabric of my shirt, but they land, right in my heart.

"I guess my plan worked," I hear in the background.

"Mom!" I wail at the same time Dad cries, "Marie!"

We pull apart and throw ourselves at Mom, careful not to give her our weight or jostle the tubes to the many machines.