Page 23 of Love at a Funeral and Other Awkward Conversations

“The emergency room.”

“You’re not serious, Cassie!”

I don’t move, and she takes out her own phone.

“You know I work for the hospital network, right? And you don’t have a doctor.” She grumbles. “What the hell am I going to do with you?” She continues to murmur to herself but is cut off mid-sentence. “You’re exactly the type of person we’re trying to get health insur—Kate, hey, how are you? Good, I’m all right. Listen. I’ll be back at the office tomorrow, but I’m going to need you to make an appointment with Dr. Parikh for my niece.” She tugs on the earlobe of her cell-phone-free ear. “I know she’s usually full, but tell them my niece is having heart palpitations and that she’s recently been made aware of genetic heart disease in the family. Use my name.”

Aunt Joanie tosses a victorious glance my way. “Great, thanks. Text me the date and time for the appointment.” She hangs up then holds her phone above her head in triumph. “It’s nice to be the boss.”

“Head of the hospital mafia or something?”

“I do run my department like Michael Corleone. Minus all the murder.” She yanks me to her when she stands, hugging me tight. “I love you.”

“Love you too.”

She pushes me back slightly to look me in the eye. “I’ll need proof you went to the appointment.”

“You won’t believe me if I say I went?”

“Of course not.” She taps my nose. “You are my niece after all.” Then she pets my hair and kisses my cheek. “Be brave.”

Those two words roll through my body, knocking the reality of the situation into my bones. The unimaginable has happened, and I have to get through it somehow. I have to be brave. Not like face off against a giant with a pebble kind of brave, or even the naked and alone in the jungle brave. No, she wants me to be emotionally brave. Solid. Sturdy. Words no one has ever used to describe me.

I want to laugh at her, but she gazes at me so earnestly, I have no other answer besides, “I’ll try.”

She kisses me once more then heads to the kitchen, I assume to say goodbye to my mother, but I can’t stay to hear it.

I traipse downstairs to my room, where it’s quiet. Everyone’s gone, and it’s all back to normal. Except normal is relative. Normal is broken.

When I lie on the bed, it doesn’t escape me that I’m in a basement, well below ground level, on my back. My brother is in the same position right now, underground, on his back.

I squirm and twist onto my side.

CHAPTER 9

Icheck in at the front desk for my appointment with Dr. Parikh and have a seat in the nondescript waiting room. I refuse to admit that I’m actually anxious about this and pretend I’m totally cool, flipping through social media posts, randomly liking but not reading any of them. Although, my body can’t convince my mind of my supposed calm demeanor, betrayal in my foot shaking back and forth, palms sweating profusely.

Aunt Joanie’s been texting me every day for the past three days, making sure I attend this appointment. I was told I’m going to have an EKG, ultrasound of my heart, and stress test. I don’t know what these things are, and the unknown adds to my worries. I watch the second hand tick in circles around the brown-and-white clock on the wall for a few minutes before a nurse in pink scrubs and a black cardigan calls me back.

She introduces herself to me, but I’m too tense to remember her name. I can barely follow her directions to remove my clothes from the waist up and put on the blue hospital gown, yet I smile at her before she leaves the room. I wiggle my fingers, hoping to stop their tremoring, and remove my top and bra, only to replace them with the loose cotton material left for me. I button up the gown and wait again.

This time, it’s much longer. By the time the doctor enters the room, I have myself worked up into a ball of nerves, bouncing around the room, literally unable to sit still.

“Cassandra?”

I drop the stethoscope on the counter, caught red-handed in my exploration. “Yes.”

“I’m Dr. Parikh,” the black-haired woman says in introduction. “How are you?”

I hold my gown closer to my body. “I’m okay.”

She nods at me, in that way people have been for weeks, slightly tilted and with down-turned lips. She gestures to the table, and I follow the cue to sit down as she says, “I’m sorry to hear about what happened. I’m friends with your aunt.”

“Thanks for squeezing me in,” I say.

She waves her hand nonchalantly. “Anything for Joanie.” She asks me some general questions, covering what the nurse did, my age, activity level, drug and alcohol use, and types notes on an iPad. “We’re going to run a full battery of tests to make sure you don’t have the same heart defect as your brother. It’ll take about an hour, but you won’t leave without seeing me again, okay?”

When I agree, she opens the door to call out two names, Tina, the nurse from before, and Patrick, a baby-faced physician’s assistant who appears to have just graduated. “You’ll be in good hands,” Dr. Parikh says and waits for me to meet her dark and reassuring eyes. “It’ll be over in an hour. No sweat.”

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