No More Swedish Meatballs Pt. 03

"You're in shock. You'll have a delayed reaction I guess. But don't give up on relationships. You're only 16. You and Ryan have something very special. Don't blame him for not telling you about your Mom. He probably thought it should be left to your dad to break the news."

"I guess. I'm not giving up. I'm just getting started. I'll take Ryan since Paul McCartney's not available." Kristen gave a dry laugh.

"Well, you haven't lost your sense of humor. Right now Ryan's a wounded bird. He's going to be a rotten patient. I remember when he got the mumps. He was hell to live with. This is gonna be worse than that. He'll have to stay with us. At least for the first week or so.

"I'll be a genuine Florence Nightingale. How long do bullet wounds take to heal?"

"A while. You'll be in school before he's really up to speed."

"Oh good," Kristen said with a malicious smile. "He'll be at my mercy. I'll get all kinds of concessions from him."

"Uh oh. What do you have in mind?"

"Well, I want him to start training me to be a Guardian right away. I'll be good and go to school but he's not going to make me sit things out for four years. And if he thinks I'm going to fall for some college nerd he's out of his mind. He's stuck with me. I wonder how long he'll be out of commission for, uhm, sex."

"I knew this was going to be an interesting summer when I read your cards," Leslie said shaking her head in dismay.

"I guess I'll have to take the initiative, won't I, with his shoulder trussed up? Maybe I should get a book. Rita told me about one where the women dressed in black and tied their men up…."

"You're a devil," Leslie laughed. "You're just trying to see how easily I shock."

"That's not true. You probably started doing it as early as I did. But your generation wasn't allowed to talk about it. How many lovers have you had? You sure knew what you were doing with Tom tonight. I'll be he has wet dreams for the next month. You're going to call him, aren't you?"

"Oh stop it." Leslie blushed to the roots of her honey blond hair. He's much too young for me. Besides, I'm sure he was just being polite."

Kristen roared with laughter. "Tom O'Leary was not being polite. He was about to trip over his tongue. You're the hottest thing that's happened to him since he quit the fire department. And if you stick with him, you might just shake him up enough that he'll start getting on with his life."

"What do you mean?" Leslie's curiosity was piqued. She stopped herself. "Oh, what do I care? He's too young."

"How old are you," Kristen asked," wanting to resolve the issue.

"I'm 32."

"Oh. That's perfect." Kristen clapped her hands, happy as a child. "There's only a ten year difference."

"Ten years. That's an eternity. It's impossible."

"What do you mean? Ryan and I are eight years apart and you don't think there's anything wrong with it."

"But that's different," Leslie said trying to quell an upsurge of feeling which was suspiciously like hope. "Tom a guy. It'd be like 'The Graduate,' dating him."

"Oh, that's crap and you know it, Kristen said heatedly. "First, you're not married. You don't have any grown kids Tom might want to date. And Tom's not a virginal nerd.

Leslie had to laugh. "But ten years!"

"You're the one who told me it's relative – that the difference between 16 and 24 was much greater than 36 and 44. 32 and 22 isn't bad, and just think, when you're 66 he'll be 56."

"That doesn't make me feel any better."

"It should. It's a fact that women live longer than men. So why should there be a taboo about older women and younger men? And anyway, I'm an empath. I can tell. You need to call him. When's the last time you had sex, anyway?"

"I give up," Leslie said with mock despair, too amused by Kristen's diatribe to be angry at her impertinence.

"So you'll call him."

"Maybe."

"And you'll go out with him," Kristen pressed.

"If he asks me. I'm not going to ask him. That would be taking things much too far. The next step would be a seedy hotel room."

"You don't need a hotel. You have a perfectly good house."

"I was just thinking about 'The Graduate' again," Leslie sighed.

"Oh, right. You gotta get past that."

"I'll do my best." Leslie rolled her eyes and shook her head and then turned the car radio up to silence further conversation. Kristen shrugged and decided to rest her eyes for a moment. Soon she was nodding off with her head rolling to the side. She jerked awake when her mouth fell open, then settled into a more comfortable position and slept for the remaining ten minutes of the trip.

The bright lights of the hospital awakened her and she sat bolt upright. Leslie had to drive around a bit to find a parking space. She hated paying for a lot but ultimately didn't have a choice in the matter. They left the car in a spot as close to the Emergency Room entrance as possible and hustled inside.

The city hospital was large and fairly new. The parking lot was light as day and everything about the emergency room shouted URGENT. An ambulance shrieked up and skidded to a halt outside the door just as Kristen and Leslie entered the building. It was a busy night and the ER looked like a confused mess. They paused to get their bearings, and then walked up to the kiosk to get information about Ryan. The receptionist looked overwhelmed by the activity in front of her desk. Kristen wondered if it was her first night on the job. It seemed like hours before the woman pulled things together enough to answer their questions. "Ryan Peters? Gun shot wound?" The receptionist looked at them like they were from another planet. "I don't think…. No…. Oh, yes! I remember. Where did they put him?"

Kristen looked at Leslie in dismay. "God. They probably sent him to the morgue by mistake."

Leslie laughed. "I don't think he was ready for the morgue. Miss," she said to the receptionist. "You must have an intake form. That should tell you where he was sent."

"Oh. Yeah. That's a good idea," the woman replied. She started rummaging through a mess of clipboards on the desk. "Ah ha. I got him. Oh. He went to surgery."

"Surgery," Leslie said with concern in her voice. "What time did he go?"

The woman shrugged her shoulders.

"Which way is surgery?"

The woman pointed to a sign overhead. "You'll have to take a seat in the waiting room."

"This waiting room?" Leslie asked, looking around at the messy room which was full of misery.

"No. Go down the hall to the end. Make a right and then a left. Follow the signs. They'll get you there."

"Thanks," Leslie said relieved. "Let's go, Kristen. I gotta get out of here. It's making me sick. Leslie was hit with a wave of nausea. The smell of fear and pain mixed with anesthesia and bodily fluids was overwhelming.

They found their way to surgery through the maze-like halls of City Hospital. There were three operating rooms in an L shaped corridor connected by a small waiting area and a nurse's station. The area was dimly lit and painted an unwelcoming pea green. There was no one manning the nursing station, and no way to tell which room Ryan was in.

A young woman was crying quietly in the back of the waiting area. Leslie and Kristen took seats in front and prepared to wait a while. After about ten minutes a surgeon came out of operating room 2 and walked over to weeping woman. She stood listening and wringing her hands while the doctor spoke to her in a muffled voice. As the doctor talked the woman became more cheerful. He smiled at her and patted her back, and then returned to surgery.

Kristen glanced at the clock on the wall. 2:15. Time dragged as Leslie and Kristen shuffled through old magazines on the coffee table in front of their chairs.

"I hope we're in the right place," Leslie whispered worriedly. "How long does it take to pull a bullet out of a shoulder? It's taking too long. I wish there was a nurse or someone, anyone to talk to."

"It's okay," Kristen replied, "I've been here before. They focus on the people who need attention. They'll tell us what we need to know when we need to know it."

"When were you here?"

"About a year ago I went to a party in the City. A friend of a friend got wasted and went running into a barbed wire fence. He didn't feel a thing. But when he lifted his shirt what I saw wasn't blood, it was stomach fluid. I raised hell until I found someone willing to take him to the hospital. We brought him here. They took really good care of him. He was in the hospital for a week."

"God. Some party!"

"Yeah. That one was a real bust. The kid's parents threw a fit. They were gonna sue the parents of the guy who threw the party. I never heard what happened about that. I started avoiding that crowd right after that."

"You've been in the line of fire a lot, it seems," Leslie said, somewhat cautiously; unsure how deep she should probe this matter."

"What do you mean?" Kristen asked, puzzled by the statement.

"Well. A few days ago you told me about a girl you took care of after one party and now I hear about a boy with a punctured stomach. Sound's like you needed a first aid kit to get into those parties of yours."

"No. Come on. Stuff happens. They're just parties."

"Not like any party I ever went to."

"Yeah, but you're …."

"Old?" Leslie laughed mirthlessly.

"I didn't mean…."

"Sure you did. It's true. I'm from a different generation."

"Maybe. But you're not like my dad, all dry and used up."

"Is that what you think of your father?"

"Yeah. Sometimes. Seems like life for him is all work and worry and bills. It was worse when Mom…." Kristen paused in her diatribe and looked guilty. "God. I can't believe I said that now that I know how she ended up…. But it's true. It was worse when she was around. I mean, I loved her and all. But unless she was nurturing one of us she was always so angry and unhappy. Even at parties with friends. She'd be, like, frantic to have a good time. So she'd toss down a few too many drinks too fast and by the middle of the night she'd either be sappy or angry drunk. And poor dad would suffer in silence, embarrassed to death by her cavorting.

"Well. Sounds like he knew how to torture himself."

"Huh?"

"Why didn't he just ignore her and have a good time? It's not like they were Siamese twins. He didn't have to consider her actions to be a reflection on him.

"Ya know, I never really though about it that way. None of us did. We all inwardly cringed whenever Mom acted out."

"Maybe in some sick way that's what she wanted," Leslie suggested.

"Like a baby acting out to get attention," Kristen agreed, "but always getting the wrong kind of attention. Except at Christmas. There was always something special about our Christmases. It was the only time mom and dad worked together. They used to put on a Swedish dinner with all the trimmings," Kristen said wistfully. "But at other parties mom would act out and dad would sink into himself chagrined and embarrassed. Jesus. And you wonder why I worry about getting involved."

"But you and Ryan are nothing like your mother and father."

"Thank God."

"And, you don't know if this relationship with Ryan's going to last. Chances are it won't. You're both so young. Enjoy what you have but don't assume it's going to last forever. I don't think partnering for life is realistic anymore in our society,"

"Why? What do you mean?"

"Well, for one thing we're living a lot longer than our ancestors. If you marry at 16 and live to be 80 you could be stuck with the same man for sixty four years. That's an awful long time. And now we have a whole lot more opportunities and choices. We're not stuck with the boy or girl next door any more. It's a smorgasbord out there."

Kristen started to laugh. "Sounds like you're hungry."

"That's the truth."

"Have you ever been in love?"

"Yeah. A couple of times," Leslie said with a wry smile.

"You don't sound so happy about it."

Leslie sighed. "I've been stuck with a lot of almosts and unrequited crushes. I'm still waiting to capture that elusive whatever it is. I've been head over heels twice. Neither guy was head over heels with me. The first time it happened I stuck around too long and made an ass of myself. The second time I bowed out… Maybe too soon. I don't know what would have happened if I'd stuck with it but at the time I thought I saw the writing on the wall. 'I love him, he loves somebody else' but we sure were compatible. I couldn't take it. He'd say 'I love you' in his sleep, but never to me when he was awake. So I split. On Valentine's Day."

"Ouch. You've got guts."

"I don't know. Maybe I didn't think I deserved him so I sabotaged it. I don't know. Sometimes I think what if I'd been bitchier about his crush on the other woman - stood up for myself, nagged him, thrown tantrums. But that's not me. And then there's the down part of being an empath. I could always tell what he was feeling. So if I screamed at him and he felt bad, I felt bad and didn't get any satisfaction. Or if he got angry I'd understand his anger and not get angry in return. I guess being an empath is kind of like being an emotional bomb squad. I'm always defusing situations. But when it comes to my own heart – well I have a kind of 'shoot myself in the foot' syndrome."

"Oh, come on, I doubt that. You're so…um, I don't know what to call it. Well centered I guess is how I see you. I think it just hasn't happened for you yet."

"Really?" Leslie was pleased by the compliment. "But it's true. Get me within a yard of a guy I'm attracted to and I become a gibbering idiot."

"You weren't a gibbering idiot around Tom."

"No. But he's…."

"Too young. Get over it. Maybe it's a good thing he's not perfect. You won't expect anything great to come of it so you'll be able to relax and enjoy the ride, so to speak."

"So to speak," Leslie Laughed. "I don't know. I did feel a certain something with Tom. I didn't want to admit it."

"Alright!"

Just as they ran out of conversation the door to Operating Room 3 opened and a tired looking, green garbed surgeon walked into the waiting room. He looked around and spotted them. "Are you here for the gunshot wound?" he asked curtly.

Leslie and Kristen jumped to their feet. "Yes," Kristen said eagerly. "Ryan Peters. How's he doing?"

"Peters, uh huh, he's fine. We had to do a little digging. He's been stitched up and is ready to go to recovery."

"Can we see him?" Leslie asked

"Are you family?"

"Yes. His sisters."

"Okay. It'll be about ten more minutes until he comes around. Why don't you go get some coffee or something before you see him. There's some machines around the corner on the way to recovery."

"I could use a soda," Kristen said. So they sauntered down the corridor to the snack room and fumbled for change to get a couple of Diet Pepsis and a bag of chips. Then they found their way to the recovery room. Ryan was coming out of the anesthesia as they entered the room.

Kristen's heart lurched when she saw him all pale and stretched out on the bed. "How ya feeling? She asked cheerfully." She wanted to hold him in her arms, but knew he would hurt if she touched him.

"I've had better days," Ryan said groggily. "Are you going to get me out of here tonight?"

"I don't know. The doctor didn't say. It doesn't look like you're fit to go anywhere. Why don't you just relax and enjoy the drugs."

"Yeah, right. No. I hate hospitals. There's no reason for me to stay," Ryan persisted.

"Just the fact you lost a quart of blood and had a slug removed from your shoulder under general anesthesia," Leslie replied acerbically. "I think you're better off here tonight."

The doctor walked in looking tired and harried. "You should get a good nights rest here. You're going to be very tender for a while. You were lucky, though. There was minimal damage to the muscle and no major arteries were hit. You've got a lot of stitches in that shoulder. The arm will be useless for at least a couple of days. I'll look in on you in the afternoon. If you make good progress I'll let you go tomorrow evening with instructions and a clinic appointment. You may need some physical therapy. A gun shot wound isn't something you put a band aid on and forget about. You'll get another shot for the pain in about an hour. After that I'll have you on oral pain killers." The doctor made a couple of notes on the chart and walked off without even acknowledging the two women in the room.

"Well, that was warm and fuzzy," Leslie said sarcastically. "Was it just me or did that guy have an attitude problem?"

"Maybe he doesn't like women," Kristen suggested.

"Maybe he doesn't like life," Ryan retorted with a bark of laughter. "Paging Dr. Grimm, you're patients are revolting."

"How does someone with a chip on his shoulder like that end up in medicine?" Kristen wondered.

"Who knows? He's probably spent his entire life with his nose in a text book and all of a sudden he has to deal with humanity. He didn't expect it to be so troublesome to actually have to practice medicine," Leslie said. "What do you say we get out of here. It's really late. Ryan needs to sleep."

It was true. Ryan was struggling to stay awake. His head nodded a few times, he gave a small sigh and fell asleep.

"I don't know. I'd like to stay. After all that's been happening, I don't want to leave him alone. Who knows, the Cabal or the Company could be after him now. Or us. We should stick together."

"No one else knows we have your dad's papers."

"Unless Max told someone," Kristen said worriedly.

"I hadn't thought of that," Leslie replied. "But that's not very likely."

"I know, but still…. I want to stay. He looks so sweet – sound asleep. I want to be here when he wakes up."

"Alright." Leslie stood up and stretched. "I'm gonna go home. Thank God it's Saturday. I don't have to work. I'm gonna sleep."

"Keep an eye on the papers," Kristen cautioned.

"Where are they?"

Buried under the mess in your bedroom closet."

'Bout as safe a place as any, I'd say," Leslie laughed. "Do you have any money on you. For food and phone calls?"

"Huh unh."

"Here's five bucks. Make sure you get yourself something to eat. And try to sleep. Call me if anything comes up."

"Yes mother," Kristen said fondly.

"Stuff it," Leslie shot back as she walked out of the room.

Chapter

Ryan was released from the hospital late Saturday afternoon. Leslie insisted he stay with her and Kristen. He tried to be grouchy about it but failed. After all he was being cousined and coddled by two beautiful women. Sure his shoulder hurt and he was out of commission for a few weeks – well, not entirely. As it turned out Kristen had a few tricks up her sleeve which didn't require him to disturb his shoulder. She was quite the little seductress.

Karl's research was picked up by on of Ryan's colleagues the night he came home from the hospital. Things were pretty quiet on the cloak and dagger front for a change.

Leslie called Tom a few days later after much prodding from Kristen. She updated him on events and agreed, nervously, to met him for lunch the following Sunday. She was flushed when she got off the phone.

"You see," Kristen said haughtily, "I knew there was a spark between you. Are you going out with him?"

"Uh huh."

"When?"

"Next week. It's just lunch."

Lunch went very well and led to an afternoon of what Leslie had to admit was great fun. Tom took her to Valley Forge Park where they had a picnic by the river and talked for hours. There was an undeniable sexual attraction between them. Leslie wanted to be forthright about the age difference.

"It's pretty strange," she said hesitantly, "but I felt this tug, towards you when we first met. But here I am, over thirty…."

"Hey. I was there. I felt it too. I don't care what age you are. Maybe we're not star crossed lovers like Ryan and Kristen but there's definitely chemistry here. Hell, maybe we are star crossed lovers and are too stupid to figure it out. I don't know. But I like this feeling."