Heroes...And The Rest Of Us.

It's two days after Thanksgiving, and I'm just getting around to eating the leftovers that Mike brought me from my parents. All the food is on a big, separated tray. Turkey, potatoes, stuffing, green beans and two pieces of pie, pumpkin and coconut cream. I separate the two pieces of pie and take them to my bedroom to eat alone. Mike is in his room, asleep. Charlie's in there with him. While I eat the filling out of the pumpkin pie, I get a text from Adam.

'Come let me in' It says.

I leave the plate of pie and go to the door in my sweat capri's and a cami top. When I open the door I see him standing in the driveway smoking a cigarette and messing with his phone. He looks up at me when I open the door. He shuts the phone and drops the cigarette, smushing it with his foot, and walks up to me. I can smell alcohol on his breath when he passes by me to go inside. I follow him in after I look and don't see his car in the driveway.

"Where's your car?" I ask, taking in his appearance. He is wearing jeans and a black, long sleeved shirt with the sleeves pushed up to his elbows. He has sunglasses on top of his head, keeping his hair out of his face.

"The guys dropped me off" He says.

"Oh" He leans against the counter without a word.

"I see you've been drinking" I say. He smiles a little, and walks over to me and kisses me hard and sloppily on the lips. I push him away from me.

"What are you doing?" I say.

"Kissing my girlfriend"

"I'm not in the mood, Adam"

"I want you" He whispers in my ear, kissing my neck. I push him away again.

"That's obvious, but the question is how far are you willing to go to satisfy that want" I say.

"What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"

"You know what it means" I don't even know what it means, but I'm in that kind of mood. He follows me into the living room.

"Well, I've never forced myself on anyone, if that's what you're asking" He says, a little loud.

"That's not what I meant"

"Well, feel free to explain what you meant"

"You obviously don't get that I'm grieving, Adam! I just had a miscarriage four days ago, or did you forget about that when you were drinking yourself stupid? I didn't just get over it"

"No, I didn't forget about it. You don't think I'm grieving? You don't think I'm mad as hell?"

"Well, why don't you act like it? Instead of coming over here, drunk off your ass and expecting me to spread my legs for you" I yell back.

"You want to see me get angry? Fine, I'll get angry!" He grabs a glass from off the coffee table and throws it against the wall.

"Real mature, Adam" I say, rolling my eyes.

"You wanted angry, you wanted grieving. Well, this is it"

"What I see is not grieving"

"You don't see that I'm grieving, Sophie? Why do you think I got drunk tonight? I don't drink like that very often"

"Get out" I say. He just looks at me blankly.

"You just want to end this?"

"Yes, get out please" He stomps to the door and slams outside. I go to my bedroom and text Tobin.

'Adam needs a ride, he's walking home from my place. I don't want hit to get arrested'

'OK, thanks' is my response.

I hear Mike out in the living room, when I go back out there, he's standing there with no shirt on, staring at the mess Adam made.

"What the fuck happened? I heard the door slam, it woke me up" He says.

"Sorry, watch where you walk"

"Who broke the glass?"

"Me" I lie. He comes over to me and gives me a hug, exactly what I need.

"Thanks, I'll pick it up. Don't let Charlie walk in here"

I pick up the glass while Mike peruses the kitchen for food.

"We have nothing" He says.

"I'll go to the store tomorrow before work" I've been lucky enough to have the last couple of days off, this is usually a really busy time of year for us, but Sully is an amazing boss and will pretty much let me off any day I ask.

***************************************************************************************************

The next day, I go to the grocery store to get food for our house. I'm not really sure what I'm getting, random shit mostly. I'm standing in front of a shelf of canned goods, staring at nothing when I feel someone push their cart into mine. I look up and see Neil smiling at me.

"Hey" I say.

"Hey, how are you?"

"Good, just doing a little shopping"

"Same here, the wife has me slaving" He says, laughing. I laugh too.

"Yeah, Mike was crying because we didn't have any food two days after Thanksgiving. I say.

"Nice. You wouldn't happen to know what a collard green is, do you?"

"Not a fricken clue" He laughs.

"I have a feeling that it's some sort of green vegetable, but other than that I have nothing"

"Well, good luck" I hear my phone ringing in my purse.

"I'll talk to you later" He says.

"See ya" A weird number is on my caller ID.

"Hello?" I say.

"Is this Sophie Ross?" A female asks.

"Uh, yeah"

"I'm calling from Grace Liberty Hospital, your father has been admitted to emergency"

"What?!"

"I was asked by a family member to inform you" I run as fast as possible through the store out to my car. I shove my phone into my purse without hanging up or saying goodbye to the woman on the other end. It's an hour long drive to the hospital they took him to. I wonder why they didn't take him to the hospital in town, it must have been something serious.

It's about six o' clock when I get to the hospital and because of daylight savings, it's already dark. I park in front of emergency and power walk to the door. I notice a police car in front of the building and see two officers and some other person in handcuffs sitting on a bench outside on the sidewalk in front of the hospital. When I walk past them, I hear Mike say my name, it takes me a second to realize the person in handcuffs was him.

"Mike? Oh my God, what happened? Why are they arresting you?" He stands up and clears his throat. I can see in his eyes that he was crying.

"Dad had a heart attack, he's in surgery on the third floor now, Billie and Liv and Braydon are up there"

"Why are you in handcuffs?" I ask.

"My dad is up there for some reason, and apparently he still has a restraining order on me and when I showed up in the same place he was, he freaked and told the cops I was stalking him, which is bullshit. Fucking phsyco"

"Oh my God, is he still up there?"

"Probably, acting like Billie's best friend after he had me arrested. The cops that showed are guys I've known since I was sixteen, so they said I could stay until you showed up and I could give you a progress report" He says.

"What jail are you going to?"

"Same old place"

"I'll come get you out when I find something out about Dad" I say.

"OK, give me your cigarettes, would you?"

"Yeah, here" I hand him my cigarettes and lighter.

"Now get up there"

"OK, I love you. I'll see you later"

"Give Billie and Joe my love, OK?"

"OK" I turn and run into the hospital. I go in the elevator and take it to the third floor. When I get there, I run to the desk and ask the nurses where my dad is.

"Sophie" I hear Braydon say. I follow him to where Billie and Liv are waiting. I hug them both.

"What happened?"

"He just said that he had chest pains and before I knew it, he was on the floor" Billie says, bursting into tears.

"How long has he been in surgery?" I ask.

"An hour" Liv replies.

"Where's Marty?"

"That fucker, can rot in hell" Billie says.

"Mike will be OK. I'll go get him when we figure something out about Dad, his real dad, not Marty"

We sit for half an hour until the doctor comes out and says that Dad is going to be OK and we can visit him one at a time. We all agree not to tell him about Mike being arrested and Billie goes in first. When it's my turn, I go in quickly. I see my dad laying on a bed, hooked up to all kinds of machines.

"Hey, Old Man" I say, forcing a smile.

"Hey Kiddo"

"You gave us quite a scare, you know"

"So I hear. I don't remember any of it"

"Wow" I give him a kiss on the forehead.

"I'll get going so that Liv and Braydon can come in and see you before you pass out" I say.

I leave the hospital and go to the jail to get Mike. Billie gave me some money for his bail, so I wouldn't have to pay it all myself.

"Hey, Dad's gonna be alright, he's asking for you" I tell Mike when I see him finally. I hand him the envelope with his belongings in it the cops gave me.

"Can we still see him tonight?" He asks.

"I doubt it. We'll get a hotel and stay overnight, go back first thing in the morning" He nods.

The next morning, we get dressed in our same clothes and head over to the hospital. I notice that I have a bunch of voice mails from Adam, but I ignore them. I have to focus on my Dad right now, my relationship can wait. Today, Dad is more alert than he was last night and the doctor allows Mike and I to go in together.

"Where were last night? I have a fucking heart attack and I can't even get you to pay attention?" My dad says to Mike.

"Yeah, well, I was busy"

"See where I rate"

"I was in jail, Dad. By the time I got out it was too late to come here"

"Why the hell were you in jail?" Mike tells him the story from the night before.

"That asshole" My dad says. I can see him stewing.

"Hey, don't worry about it. I'm alright, you're alright, that's all I care about. Not my already crappy record"

"It's just the point of it"

A little while later, I'm alone with my dad in his room.

"So, where's your husband?" He asks me. I roll my eyes at him.

"I don't know, we got in a fight the night before last and I haven't heard from him since"

"He hasn't called? I find that hard to believe" He says.

"No, he called, I just didn't answer"

"Why did you fight?"

"I don't really know, we both feel the same way, so I don't know why we fought" I pause, "He was drunk" My dad snorts.

"If I could blame every stupid thing I've ever done in my life on being drunk, I wouldn't be too bad off"

"Whatever, we'll figure it out, I'm sure"

"Really? You don't have to sound so confident"

"I'm done talking about it, is all" I say.

"Oh, OK. Whatever you say, dear"

Mike and I go home that afternoon, reassured that my dad is going to be OK. I still haven't talked to Adam. I'll deal with that later, I guess. I'm too tired to think about a relationship. I still haven't totally recovered from the miscarriage, physically, let alone mentally. Now this shit with my dad has sent me into a tailspin.

Why must life be so tough?