Lone Star Family Values

Chapter 21

Home Sweet Fire House

            Four days home from the hospital and Bailey was going crazy. Her dad and papá had been extremely vigilant in her healing, making sure that she didn't overdo it. She still wasn't set to start back at school for another three days and she was definitely not going to just sit at home all day. Noah had begun coming over after school to bring Bailey's homework. Their relationship was still very mild, a good friendship at best, neither having very much confidence to ask the other out formally. Her dad and papá were happy to see Bailey enjoying herself, seeing her have fun with her peers. Noah was only older than her by about eight months so they weren't worried about him taking advantage of her. It also helped that he knew Carlos had a gun in the house and he'd have to answer to the entirety of the 126 if he did something to her. When Bailey hadn't responded to him for several hours he'd reached out to Carlos through his father to make sure that she was okay. It had taken every bit of persuasion on both he and Noah's father's parts to keep Noah from coming down to the hospital. It didn't stop him however from coming to the house the second that Carlos said that it was okay.

Her papá was rostered to work all day but her dad never expected to get a call saying that the person filling in for him had come down with the flu, leaving Nanci and Tommy working alone. He'd been apprehensive about saying that he'd work with Bailey still under strict rest orders but he hadn't had much choice. So, Bailey was set to go to the fire house for the first part of the day and then the police station until Papá got off at 5:00 that evening.

"Why can't I just stay at the fire house or the police station, why switch mid-day?" Bailey asked, shoving her laptop into her backpack.

"Because it's supposed to be 105° today and the AC is scheduled for maintenance at 2:00, it'll take a couple hours and even then it'll take a while before the house will cool down again so I don't want to risk you overheating. And papá is out on patrol until his lunch break and you can't ride along with him." Dad explained.

"Dad will drop you off on his lunch break and we will hang out for a bit. It probably won't be as interesting as the fire house but you never know." Papá said.

Bailey rolled her eyes. She had tried convince them that she was fine to stay home alone but neither of her fathers were on board with that plan. They wanted to make sure that she was okay and for them that meant that somebody was with her.

"Okay, I think I'm ready to go," Dad said, looking around for his duffel and keys. "Bailey, you have everything that you need? Sketchbooks, pencils, medication, bandages?"

"Yeah, dad, I have everything I swear," Bailey said. "Besides, we're going to a fire station where you are a paramedic, it's not like we aren't going to have access to bandages and medical equipment."

Carlos chuckled.

"She has a point babe," He said. Carlos pulled TK into the kitchen while Bailey leaned up against the half wall on her phone. Once they were just out of ear shot Carlos gripped TK's waist lightly and gave him his classic 'Carlos cow eyes.' "You gotta relax, TK. She's okay, she's alive. Trust me I'm stressed about her doing more so soon after her surgery too but she's seventeen-years-old, we can't exactly quarantine her to the house."

"Well we can certainly try," TK said. "It's only been four days, Carlos, I can't help but think that it's too soon."

Carlos shook his head.

"Yeah, it has only been four days, you're right but the doctor did say that she could start doing some moderate movement three days post-op, so she's not exactly early." He said.