Page 40 of Fractured Reunion

“Mr. Chism, please, you need to relax.” Maggie put a hand on Oliver’s arm. “I will do my best, okay? I don’t have control over what the department decides.”

“Okay.” Chism pressed his hand to his chest. “I don’t feel so good.”

“Please follow the doctor’s orders,” Maggie said. “And you must know you need to find a way to get clean.”

Chism flushed and nodded. “I know I do.”

Aaron stepped forward. “We’re working on getting Mr. Chism transferred to Trinity Medical Center,” he said. “They are better equipped to handle adults with medical concerns.”

“Great.” Maggie managed a smile.

“Take care of Joey,” Chism said as Maggie turned to leave.

“I will.” She nodded at Officer Thomas and edged past Aaron, who followed her back through the emergency department. “That was rather unexpected,” she said when they were out of Oliver Chism’s earshot.

“Yeah, surprised me too,” he agreed. “I don’t know how much weight CPS will give to his request, though.”

“Probably not much,” she said with a sigh. “I can’t imagine they’ll look highly on a man who thinks you can hand over your kid like you do a car.”

“But if they did take his wishes into consideration, you’d willingly step in to care for Joey, right?”

“Yes.” She answered without hesitation. “I would love nothing more.”

They paused outside the bank of elevators. “Then why didn’t you want to adopt a child with me?”

“What?” She turned to stare at him. “Oh, you mean the offhand comment you made about looking into adoption while you were texting with the residents about one of your patients? That wasn’t exactly a conversation, Aaron. It was more like you couldn’t have cared less about what I was going through.”

It was his turn to be shocked. “What do you mean? I cared about what you were going through.”

She scoffed. “You never said you were sorry to hear the results of my fertility testing. You didn’t seem to notice I was grieving. Your attention was centered on the patient you were texting about, not me. Us. Or our future as a family.”

Had he really done that? Made her feel as if he didn’t care? He winced as he remembered she’d broached the subject of her final testing results after a particularly difficult surgery he’d performed earlier that day. So yeah, he probably had been distracted. But that didn’t mean he didn’t care.

“Never mind,” Maggie said, turning away. “There’s no point in rehashing our past.”

He reached out to grasp her arm. “Maggie, I’m sorry, but that wasn’t my intent. Of course, I knew you were grieving, but we talked about your testing. We discussed what the likely results would be. I guess I wasn’t surprised by the news and was already thinking ahead to our next steps. So yes, I mentioned adoption. I didn’t mean it to sound casual or offhand. I meant it when I suggested we go through the process.”

She eyed him thoughtfully. “Do you have any idea what the process is like? It’s not like you fill out a form and a baby gets dropped into your lap. You would have had to take time off work, Aaron. Uninterrupted time off work,” she said with emphasis. “Something you couldn’t manage even on our honeymoon.”

“We had a great honeymoon.” Or so he’d thought. “I only took a couple of calls; we spent an entire week in Paris like you wanted.”

“Paris was lovely, and you’re a good guy. But you took more than a couple calls, Aaron. There was one day you were on the phone for almost an hour straight.”

He nodded slowly, remembering the calls about a patient he’d cared for that had gotten readmitted with an infection. “Okay, you’re right. I did take calls. But we still had a wonderful time.” He paused, then added, “Didn’t we?”

“We did, but only because I didn’t make a big deal out of the calls you had with your colleagues.” She sighed. “When you made that comment about adopting, I guess I got angry. There you were texting away while I was reeling from the news that I would never have a baby. Our baby.”

The elevator dinged. The doors opened, and several staff members stepped off, going around them. Aaron realized this wasn’t the place to have this conversation. But he also knew that he couldn’t just let her walk away. Maybe he’d made mistakes, but Maggie hadn’t told him any of this when she’d filed for divorce.

“We need to talk about this, Maggie,” he said in a low tone. “We should have talked this through two years ago.”

“What’s the point?” She shrugged. “You can’t change who you are, Aaron. Look at you, Chairman of Pediatric Cardiac Surgery! That’s even more responsibility than you had back in Boston. You’re a born leader, and I get that.” She pulled from his grasp to jump into the elevator. “I need to get back to Joey.”

He quickly stepped through the closing doors, causing them to abruptly reopen. “I’m coming with you.”

She shot him an exasperated look. “There’s no reason for you to sit at Joey’s bedside.”

He knew what she was really saying. Their conversation was over. They were not getting back together anytime soon.

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