Page 28 of Just One Kiss

“I don’t mind explaining,” Dr. Willette said with a smile.

“We want to rule out anything serious that might be going on with Jaden’s heart. An irregular heartbeat, for instance, can be a minor nuisance or it can be potentially dangerous.”

“And this monitor will tell us that?” Josh asked.

“If the results are inconclusive, we’ll keep digging.”

“Isn’t it possible he just overheated? Or didn’t get enough to eat?” Josh sounded hopeful. As if his saying so could make it true.

“I suppose it’s possible, but we’d like to be sure,” the doctor said.

“We appreciate that.” Josh nodded.

It struck Carly how grown up Josh seemed. That rebellious teenager with the chip on his shoulder had been replaced by a mild-mannered, successful adult. She knew he had money now, but she was fairly certain that wasn’t what had changed him.

He caught her watching him, and she did her best to recover. “Uh . . . So what do we do in the meantime?” Carly knew the doctor needed to be the one to give the directives or Jaden wouldn’t listen.

“Take it easy,” he said.

“The indoor training facility opens this week,” he said. “I’ve gotta be there.”

“You can be there,” Dr. Willette said. “You just can’t train.”

Jaden huffed. “You serious? We start conditioning for the high school team next week.”

“Jaden.” Carly’s tone warned.

“I can’t sit out, Ma,” he said. “We’ve got a new coach. He doesn’t know me yet. If I miss the summer practices—”

“We want to avoid any other problems,” Dr. Willette explained, keeping his attention on Jaden. “If you’ve got an undiagnosed arrhythmia, strenuous activity could exacerbate the issue, increasing the likelihood of a serious episode. Jaden, hopefully it’s not forever, but it is for now.”

“What do you mean ‘hopefully’?”

Dr. Willette paused. “I don’t want to get ahead of things here. We should just wait and see what the monitor tells us.”

“No,” Jaden said. “Are you saying there’s a chance I won’t be able to ski?”

Carly’s heart sank. Jaden’s worry was palpable.

“Like I said,”—Dr. Willette kept his tone calm to offset Jaden’s rising temper—“we don’t have any evidence of anything. It’s too soon to jump to any conclusions.”

Jaden glared at the floor, clenching and unclenching his fists. Carly knew all her son heard was “hopefully.” Beyond that, no other words mattered.

The doctor met Carly’s eyes and smiled, but only slightly, as if he knew what she was up against.

“We’ll make a follow-up appointment for a week from today,” he said.

“Great,” Jaden mumbled.

Carly smiled, embarrassed.

“Thanks, Doc,” Josh said as the man stood.

“I know this isn’t the way you want to spend the first week of the summer.” Dr. Willette still focused on Jaden. “But your health comes first. We want to take the best possible care of you.”

He clapped a hand on Jaden’s shoulder, shook Josh’s hand and then turned his attention to Carly. “Call me if you have any questions at all.”

She shook his hand and noticed he held on a few seconds longer than she thought he would. She looked up and found his eyes fixed on her. He smiled, then walked out of the room.

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