PREVIOUSLY

"Welcome to the family, kid," Todd whispered, putting his hands on Tea's shoulder.
"This is the best Christmas present ever!" Starr exclaimed.
And no one laughed at her childish excitement.
Because it truly was the best present anyone could have ever hoped for.

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

Part 9: Detriment

Tea awoke that night feeling disoriented, naseous, and downright miserable.
Todd sat beside her bed.
"Welcome back," he greeted. "How're you feeling?"
"Sick," she replied weakly, "Really sick."
"The doctor said you'd feel crappy. It's from the chemo." He paused. "You okay? You look a little green."
Tea shook her head. "I'm gonna--" she fumbled for the basin beside her bed and emptied the contents of her stomach.
Todd held her hair and rubbed her back. "This only lasts for a little while. Soon you'll be cancer-free and I'll take you and Noelle home."
She nodded, wiping her mouth with a tissue. "When can I hold her?"
"Lancaster says in a couple days she should be strong enough to be handled."
Tea sighed. "I can't wait. I hate this feeling....having this new little person and not being able to spend any time with her. She doesn't even know who her mommy is."
"I'm sure she knows. She's probably seen you peeking in through the window every half hour."
"I just can't get enough!" Tea exclaimed. "She's so beautiful and she's ours!"
Todd kissed her cheek. "I gotta get out of here. I had to pull some strings to get in here after hours and if Lancaster catches me..." he trailed off implicatively.
"See if you can find out how many more treatments I have to endure. I can't stand this place."
Todd was at the door. "I will," he promised.
The door closed and the room was bathed in darkness once more.

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

The doctor lifted Noelle out of the crib. The infant yawned and opened her blue eyes, blinking and squinting and pinching her little pink face.
Tea laughed softly.
The doctor placed Noelle gently in her mother's arms and with a wink, left them alone.
Todd put a finger into his daughter's palm and she closed her little fingers tightly around his.
"I've never....nothing like this has ever happened to me," Todd said in awe. "Even with Starr....by the time I....came back from the dead, Starr was already sitting and crawling."
Tea fingered the little hospital bracelet around Noelle's wrist.
"Soon we'll be able to leave this place," she crooned, watching as her daughter's eyelids fluttered closed.
Tea felt her arms, weakened from the chemotherapy and radiation, begin to give.
"Todd..." she gasped, quickly shifting Noelle into his arms.
Dr. Lancaster poked his head in the door.
"Are you ready?" Dr. Lancaster asked.
Tea nodded, giving one last, longing look at Noelle. "Ready."

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

"Has there been any change, doctor?" Tea asked anxiously when he re-entered the room. She glanced at Noelle asleep in the crib beside her bed, and at Todd asleep in an armchair in front of the window. "As of yet....while the chemotherapy and radiation are making some progress....the cancer is just spreading that much faster."
Tea blinked. "What does that mean? Are these stupid treatments even helping?"
The doctor sighed.
"Look, don't sugar-coat things, just give me the honest truth!"
"The truth is....if we had begun the treatment even a month earlier than we did, things might be different."
Tea's face turned deathly pale. "Y-you're saying that I'm..." she trailed off, not able to finish the sentence.
The doctor took both of her hands in his. Tea's heart began to beat wildly.
"I'm saying that there's really nothing we can do to stop the cancer. It's in your bloodstream."
"No...." Tea murmured, numb with shock and fear.
"However," the doctor continued softly, "we can continue the treatments. It'll buy you more time."
"How...how long do I have?"
"A few months, at best. If we had only known sooner..." He looked at her sleeping husband and child before standing. "If you need me, I'm--"
"I know," Tea choked, pulling her blankets up to her chest.
Stifling a sob of pure grief, she rolled her baby's crib closer to her bed and tucked the soft pink blanket securely around Noelle.
Gazing at her sleeping infant, tears of sorrow more powerful than anything she'd ever experienced rolled down her cheeks and soaked into her blue and white hospital gown.

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

"I've already told Dr. Lancaster that I don't want to continue treatments," Tea murmured sadly. "I don't want to spend my last months weak and wobbly. I want to be strong enough to hold Noelle," she choked on her daughter's name, "so she knows how much I love her."
Todd sat in stunned silence until Tea finished speaking. Then, with a growl, he flung open the door. Tea could hear his screams of rage and sorrow as he ran through the hospital corridors, searching for the stairwell.
Raging like a madman, Todd threw open his car door and climbed inside, smashing his head against the steering wheel again and again.
"No!" he screamed hoarsely, pressing his palms tightly into his wet eyes until he saw painful spots.
"No...."

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

When Todd returned a half hour later, having shoved his emotions aside to concentrate on his wife and baby girl, he found her scribbling furiously in a floral print, leather bound notebook. So engrossed was she that she didn't notice him sit on the bed beside her, tangling his fingers gently in her soft brown hair.
"Whatcha doin'?" he asked softly.
She looked up quickly. "Oh. I'm...this is a gift for Noelle.
So she can read it, when she's older. So she can know who I was. You know?"
"I would never let her forget, Tea."
"I know....but this is more personal. All you could ever tell her is facts. What I looked like, the smell of my perfume. But this....this lets her know my heart. My soul. The real Tea Delgado."
Todd nodded in complete understanding.
There was an awkward silence.
"Todd," Tea began, "I want you to take me home."
Todd's eyebrows knitted together in confusion. "What are you talking about? Take you home? But the hospital...the doctors...they can help you if anything happens. I can't."
"I don't want to spend my few, precious last weeks on this earth in a stuffy hospital! I don't want to have to havevisits with my own daughter! I want to take care of her in our home. I want to die at home." Todd moved back as though the word itself were repulsive.
She took his hands in hers. "Please, Todd. I feel fine now. I can help you take care of Noelle. Please. Let me die with dignity. Let my little girl know at least as much of her mother's love as I can give her before I go."
Todd nodded slowly, closing his eyes. "I'll....get the release papers."
"Thank you, Todd," Tea sighed, squeezing his hands lightly.
"Thank you."
TO BE CONTINUED

....