~ Chapter Seventy Three ~

Nick's driving had always been a little too aggressive and testosterone influenced for Stacy's liking.  She didn't have to actually grab the dashboard, but still, riding in a car with Nick made her slightly nervous.  It was a little like riding a roller coaster, she knew it was perfectly safe, but still, there were moments of terror. 

"Damn it, come on!"  Nick yelled at the red stoplight in front of him. 

Stacy bit her lip to keep from telling him to calm down, knowing that wouldn't do any good at all.  She was just as worried as he was.

"What did he say?"  Stacy asked again.  "What happened?"  All she had managed to get out of Nick as he bolted for the door was that it had been AJ on the phone and Felicia was in the hospital again.

Nick shook his head as the light changed, and he pulled into the parking garage of the hospital.

"Nick?"  She tried again, as he parked the car.

"I don't know!"  Nick snapped, before leaning his forehead against his hands on the steering wheel and taking a deep breath.  "I don't know."  He repeated it in a quieter tone this time.  "He wasn't exactly making sense, ya know?  I just know it's not good, he can't get a hold of Denise... he was pretty upset."  He unsnapped his seatbelt and got out of the car, carefully closing the door behind him. 

"Hey, you okay?"  He added as she caught up to him next to the elevator. 

"Yeah, I think."  Stacy was fine, other than she was more than a little worried about Felicia, and AJ for that matter.  "I just hope this isn't a repeat of the last time she was in the emergency room."

Nick nodded, leaning against the wall off the elevator as it rose up to the main floor of the hospital.  "Okay, this way."  He took stock of the blue signs on the wall as the door opened, and set off down the hallway. 

Stacy raised her eyebrows in surprise and hurried after him.  The take charge attitude was a new one for Nick.  She had seen a semblance of it on the field, especially when he was dealing with the media, but off the field, Nick had never been the one to take initiative. 

"AJ!"  Nick spotted the pitcher in the waiting area at the end of the hallway, slouched in his chair, not particularly paying attention to the fussing baby in his arms. 

"Dude, what happened?"  Nick dropped sideways into the chair next to AJ, completely oblivious to the annoyed glance the woman in the next chair gave him. 

"Hey, Nick."  AJ sighed.

"Here, hand her over."  Nick reached over and took Natalie, correctly judging that she was about to start a first rate baby screaming fit.  "AJ, what's going on?"

"They're pumping her stomach, okay?"  AJ said shortly, folding his arms across his chest. 

"Oh God, no."  Nick's mouth fell open as Natalie latched her tiny hand onto one of the pull strings to his sweatshirt hood.  "Please tell me she didn't..." He broke off, chewing on his lower lip while Natalie happily gummed the blue string. 

"That's what they're telling me."  AJ's voice was barely audible now.  "S---, I don't believe this is happening."

"Did you get a hold of your mom?" Nick wondered.

AJ stared at him blankly for a moment.  "Yeah... about ten minutes ago.  Nick, what am I going to do?"

"I'm not sure."  Nick stared down at Natalie's dark head, resting against his sweatshirt.

"Mr. McLean?"  Nick was interrupted by a man in the standard hospital garb of blue scrubs and clipboard.  "Would you mind coming with me?"

"Yeah, I'm coming."  AJ ran his hands through his hair and stood up slowly, following the doctor back down the hallway.

"Nick?"  Stacy slipped into the chair AJ had vacated.  "I missed most of that.  What happened?" 

"They're pumping her stomach."  Nick repeated. 

"Yes, I heard.  I missed why they're doing that."

Nick arched one eyebrow slightly.  "Because she OD'd."  He said it perfectly calmly, as if it was completely normal and nothing to be worried about. 

"What?"  Stacy finally spit out, after her mouth refused to cooperate with her vocal cords for several seconds.  "Nick, are you insane?"

"Not right now."  Nick shook his head.  "Stacy, she tried to kill herself.  You can't say it much clearer than that."

"But... why?"  Stacy leaned against the back of the poorly padded chair and tried to make some sense of what she had just been told. 

"'Cause she's screwed up."  Nick said evenly.

"Nick!"

"She is."  He interrupted firmly.  "You don't try to kill yourself unless you're screwed up.  Trust me on that one."

Stacy stared at him again, realizing yet again exactly how little she really knew about him.  "Nick..."

"Not now."  He shook his head firmly. 

"Okay."  She left that subject alone.  "This is one of my best friends."

"I know."  Nick said in a softer tone than before.  "I'm sorry, Stacy.  Come here."  He added, reaching over with his free arm to pull her over towards him. 

She scooted over to the far side of the chair and leaned up against him, ignoring the wooden chair arm digging into her side, watching Natalie fall asleep.

~*~

Denise hurried down the hallway, back towards the waiting area.  Of all days for something like this to happen, why had it happened on the day she was wearing pantyhose?  She could deal with things so much easier if there wasn't a tube of spandex and nylon constricting her lower body.  She would have taken them off, but walking around barefoot wasn't exactly a thrilling idea either. 

She could see Nick and Stacy sitting in the fairly deserted waiting area, Stacy leaning up against Nick's arm, and Natalie sprawled across his other arm, dead to the world.  Sleeping wasn't a trait Natalie had inherited from AJ.  As a baby, AJ had rarely slept, and never in a public place.  Even then, he had been too busy charming people. 

Stacy was the first to notice Denise, straightening up and pushing her hair back behind her ears.  Denise bent over and gave her a hug.  She would have hugged Nick, but Denise hadn't been thirty five and holding for several years for nothing.  She could read body language quite well and there was going to be no hug for Nick. 

"Your arm must be tired."  She sat down in the chair across from them, and nodded at the limp, yellow clad figure in his arms. 

Nick shrugged his other shoulder, smiling slightly.  "Can't really feel my arm anymore, so I'm not sure.  Has she come around yet?"

"Felicia?  Not quite." 

"Here, let me take her."  Stacy interjected, reaching over to shift Natalie into her arms.

"Is AJ staying with her?"  Nick asked quietly, handing Natalie over.

"Yeah." Denise nodded.

"Good."  Nick bent his arm a few times.  "Yeah, okay, now it hurts."  He added. 

"Are you going to stay here?"  Stacy asked, ignoring Nick and his arm. 

"I think it would probably be a good idea." 

"What about Natalie?"

"We can watch her."  Nick pointed out calmly. 

"Oh no."  Denise shook her head.  "That's okay."  She could handle both a baby and AJ.  AJ didn't need much looking after anyway; he had always been fairly self resilient.  At least, he had been before. 

"Nah, you're gonna have your hands full here."  Nick protested.  "Really."

Denise frowned.  She should pick up some tips from Nick on how not to be argued with.  "Okay, fine."  She gave in and started fishing in her skirt pocket for her car keys.  "Contrary to what Alex would have you believe, I'm not that scatterbrained.  I've got a bag of her stuff in the car."

~*~

"Yeah, as much as I love my car, it wasn't designed for kids."  Nick shook his head and glared at the car seat in his hand.  "You'll get the backseat all to yourself though."  He added, with a grin, trying to wrestle it into the passenger seat of the car. 

"Here."  Stacy passed Natalie over and took over buckling the seat in.  If they waited for Nick to figure out something even remotely mechanical, they could still be there when Felicia left.  Stacy bit her lip, wondering exactly how long they were going to keep Felicia there.  "There."  She finished threading the seatbelt through and fastened it. 

"You alright?"  Nick tipped his head to one side.

"Fine." 

"Okay then."  He leaned over for a quick kiss, and handed a now squirming Natalie back.  "I'm gonna go give Denise her key back.  I'll be right back." 

"You do that."  Stacy watched him jog back towards the elevator.  What was up with him?  He had just gotten out of bed that morning and decided to suddenly have his act together? 

She buckled Natalie into the car seat, and started fishing through the so called diaper bag, looking for a pacifier.  Diaper bags were supposed to be pink gingham, or blue with little yellow duckies on them, but not for the McLean's.  It was black, and therefore coordinated with everything while looking chic at the same time. 

Natalie accepted the pacifier, happily curled her hands up inside her yellow pajamas and stopped squirming.  Stacy leaned against the side of the car, waiting for Nick to come back, and tried to make some sense in her head of the last couple hours. 

She couldn't even begin to understand what had possessed Felicia to do something like this.  She had a perfect little baby girl, she had a husband who practically worshiped the ground she walked on, what could have possibly been so horrible that she would have just given up on all of that?  She hadn't been feeling very good the last week or so, Stacy unexpectedly recalled, but still, Felicia had been sick before. 

What bothered her most was she hadn't even seen it coming.  No one had, and if anyone would have figured it out, it would have been AJ.

"Hey, you ready to go?"  Nick's arms surrounded her from behind, hugging her back against him. 

Stacy nodded, suddenly not trusting her voice. 

Nick turned her around, before slowly reaching up to brush at her face.  "Come on, don't cry."  He whispered.  "It's okay."

She shook her head, before swiping at her eyes.  She hadn't even realized she was crying.  Nick pulled her up against him again and let her cry. 

~*~

"Come on, Nick, she's screaming!"

Nick frowned at the red faced baby Stacy was holding, before turning his attention back to the writing on the formula can.  "Yeah, I can see that.  Where are the damn instructions on this thing?"

"Right there."  Stacy pointed at the can.  "Open the canister."

Nick did as ordered and pulled the top off, watching blankly as Stacy fixed the bottle with one hand and stuck it in the microwave.  It had been a very long day.  Just when things had finally started to get worked out, and Nick felt like his life was back on track, this happened.  Now he was being hit with feelings and emotions that he hadn't thought about in years. 

"How do you know all this stuff?"  He demanded, as Stacy pulled the bottle out of the microwave and headed back for the living room.

"I have no idea."  Stacy shrugged, shaking the bottle. 

"Why are you doing that?"  Couldn't she just stick the bottle in Natalie's mouth and stop the screaming?

"Because it doesn't heat evenly." 

"Oh."  He sank down on the couch next to her, resting his head against the back cushion.  This wasn't fair; he didn't want to go through all this again.  Still, he couldn't back off now, he was pretty sure Stacy had figured out what was going on, and the least he could do was explain everything. 

"What're you thinking about?"  Stacy nudged him with her knee.  Natalie had stopped screaming, and was greedily sucking on the bottle. 

Nick took a deep breath.  This was going to take a while.  "Stacy, I need to tell you something."