"Any change?" Kenji handed Dena a cup of coffee.

"He's still asleep."

"The kids have been asking. He was awake by now last time."

"I know." Dena took a long sip.

"That why you didn't go home? You wanted to see him wake up?"

Dena sighed. She knew what Kenji was suggesting. And the thought had crossed her mind.

"It was only a couple of minutes. There's no reason to believe."

"But why did it happen at all? That has its own questions."

"Yes it does." Dena smiled softly. "But my gut tells me to have faith. And I always trust my gut. Jordi is going to wake up today. He'll be fine and he'll be back to driving the girls crazy with those beautiful big brown eyes"

"And the Latino rocker boy hair." Kenji laughed. "Not to mention the guitar, girls dig the guitar."

"There's a few boys that do too."

"Sure, if he was about ten years older. And I hadn't cleaned vomit off him a dozen times. In a week." Kenji glanced at his watch. "I better get back."

"Thanks for the coffee. And the sandwiches."

"Sure thing."

Dena made her way back to the room. Adam was asleep in a chair by the bed. Dena set the bags on the bedside table. She gently lifted the stethoscope from around his neck.

"How's he doing?" Adam whispered.

"Didn't mean to wake you up." Dena sighed. "And he's fine. Vitals are all right where they should be."

Adam stretched.

"You should go home."

"So should you. Don't you have a shift tonight?"

"Kenji said he'd cover it." Dena smiled. "Hey, there. Look who's waking up."

"Hey buddy." Adam smiled softly. "How do you feel?"

"My head's fuzzy." Jordi murmured. "And my chest feels like someone sat on it."

Dena and Adam shared a glance. They had debated about what to tell Jordi when he woke up, how to tell him, when to tell him. Dena nodded.

"About that." Adam perched on the edge of the bed. "I need to tell you something and I need you to listen and try not to get upset, okay?"

Jordi nodded.

"The surgery didn't turn out like we planned. Something happened and I couldn't finish it."

"I don't understand."

"Blunt honesty time, okay." Adam took a breath. "During the surgery, there was a moment when your blood pressure dropped. It was very sudden and extreme and your heart began to pump a lot faster and harder to try to get the pressure back up. And then it stopped."

"My heart stopped. I died?"

Dena could see Jordi biting his lip, trying not to panic or to cry. She reached out and took his hand. "Jordi, sweetie it was just a few seconds. Our bodies can handle a few seconds just fine. I mean you're here, you're awake. That's what matters. Right?"

"Yeah."

'Nurse Jackson's totally right. A few seconds is no big deal. It was scary. I won't pretend like it wasn't. Your chest hurts because we had to shock you, like they do on TV shows. Just to reboot the system."

"Like my phone. When a game freezes it up."

"Exactly." Adam nodded. "But the trouble is, we don't know exactly why it happened. Do you remember what I said when you asked me if I could promise you nothing would happen during your surgery?"

"You said medicine was managing risks."

"Thats right. And I had to make a decision because without knowing why you crashed I didn't know if it was going to happen again. I decided the risk was too great. I couldn't risk losing you to finish."

"So what now?"

"Well today, you're going to stay here where someone can watch you real close. Just to be absolutely certain there's nothing to worry about. Plus it will give us a chance to keep a close eye on your pain management. I did manage to get about maybe half way through the procedure and a lot of tissue got torn up. It's going to hurt. You need to rest so it's the good drugs and more fuzzy head time."

"Fun."

"Yep." Adam laughed. "Tomorrow if there's no concerns we'll draw some blood for tests and do a bunch of scans and x rays and the whole works and figure out exactly where we stand. With luck I was able to remove enough of the cancerous tissue that we won't have to increase your chemo meds too much, if at all, and we'll get a better result."

"Sounds like a plan." Jordi smiled. "I'm in."

"Okay."

"Just one thing."

"Shoot."

"Can I have my phone?"

"There's no phones allowed in the ICU."

"But I promised my abuela I'd call her when I woke up. She's going to worry."

"I'll call her. Tell her you're fine."

Jordi shook his head. "She'll still worry, Nurse Jackson. She'll want to hear my voice."

"Jordi, it's hospital rules." Adam looked over at Dena. "So when you smuggle it in here, don't get caught."

"I don't know what you're talking about." Dena smirked.

"Exactly. I'm going to go take a shower and put on some clean clothes because I'm pretty sure I stink. I'll be back in a little while. Get some sleep okay?"

"okay. umm. Can I have another thing?" Jordi turned to Nurse Jackson. "Can you bring me some socks? My feet are cold."

"Definitely." Dena nodded. "I'll be back back in a few minutes with those socks. And maybe a book in case you can't sleep. Any requests?"

"I guess my copy of To Kill a Mockingbird. We're reading it for school."

"Okay." Dena pulled the covers up around him and brushed a strand of hair off his face. She waited for a moment as Jordi closed his eyes and seemed to nod off.

Adam was waiting just outside of the doorway. "Do me a favor, don't leave Jordi alone. Have one of the other nurses bring the stuff over. Kenji or Brittany. They won't rat you out over the cell phone."

"Adam I know you're worried about Jordi coding again but it's been hours. He's fine. It was a fluke."

"It's not that."

"Okay. Then what?"

"He didn't freak out. He almost did but he held it back. He should have been freaked out."

"You think he was bluffing. He's not okay with any of it but trying to have a brave face so you won't be disappointed."

"I'm not." Jordi called out. "And I can totally hear you."

Adam sighed. He walked back into the room. "Jordi it's okay to be freaked out. I just told you that your heart stopped and you have to keep having chemo. Either one is a good reason to be upset."

"I'm not, really. Okay fine. It's the song."

"The song?"

"The Rolling Stones."

"Still not getting it."

"Last night before Charlie left we took him up to the roof. Like a little party to send him off. He's one of us and it was our not so secret secret place so, well it made sense to us.

"We started singing, being stupid and silly. That song 'You can't always get what you want' and Charlie started singing with us."

"Charlie was singing. Our Charlie who hasn't said a word started singing. Jackson did you know about this?"

"Yeah. Slipped my mind in all the other excitement."

"It's the part he sang. 'You get what you need'. I don't think it was an accident he picked right then to jump in. I know it sounds crazy but he's really smart in a weird way. And I think that that part was him trying to tell us that we'd get what we need.

"I wanted to do the surgery because I wanted to be done with this. I was tired of being sick and throwing up and being tired all the time. But maybe a quick fix isn't what I need. Maybe that's why my first surgery didn't work out, why this one didn't. It sounds crazy but maybe I need to have to do this the hard way so I can look back and say I survived this. No matter what else happens it can't be as bad as right now. I survived having my heart stopped. I'll survive whatever else happens and I will survive this. And if I can survive this I can survive anything.

"And maybe, just maybe I got cancer, God let me get cancer, so I could learn to trust people, to not expect everyone to leave me and disappoint me, learn how to ask people for help. Cause maybe even though what I wanted was to be left alone, to be able to be free and not have other folks telling me what to do and where to do, what I need is this.

"Or maybe I'm just really high and I don't make any sense at all."

"No, you make a lot of sense." Adam grinned. "And you make me feel really honored that out of all the people you could have gone to, you came to me. You asked me to help you, You trust me to help you.

"Because you know what Jordi, I think maybe, just maybe, as messy as getting emotionally entangled with a patient can be. As much as we don't want something like that to happen, maybe you are what we need. Right Jackson."

Dena smiled. "I think you two might be on to something. Or just on something."

Adam grinned. "She's actually a big softie."

"I know. But don't tell anyone. She's got a rep to protect."

"Don't I know it."

"Are you two miscreants done?"

"Sorry, but it was getting heavy. We needed a laugh."

"Uh huh. What you need Dr McAndrew is a shower, cause you do stink. And Jordi. Sleep. I'll be back with your socks and your book in a bit." Dena winked at them.

"Thanks Nurse Jackson." Jordi grinned weakly. "I needed that."