Three

                                    

                                              


                          


                          
I paced the waiting room, the tile floor cold under my bare feet, and my tasteless cup of coffee lukewarm in my hands. My mind didn't care about those things. Only one thing mattered. Was I about to lose the woman who raised me?

                          
I couldn't handle that. She was the only true family I had left. She was the only family I could remember at all. She'd taken me in as a baby after my parents were killed in a car crash and raised me as her own. She was my rock, my shelter, and I couldn't imagine living without her.
                          
"Calm down, Em," Katie told me, fidgeting in one of those horrible hardback chairs. "Everything will be fine."
                          
I spun, my coffee sloshing angrily around me. "How do you know that? You don't. You can't guarantee that."
                          
"I know," she replied helplessly. "It's just what people say at a time like this."
                          
"Yeah," I said, sitting down next to her, my anger gone as quickly as it came. I felt helpless, too, and I didn't know what to do about it. "I'm going to lose her, Katie."
                          
My grandmother was only in her sixties. That was way too young to worry about a heart attack, right? She was active, healthy, did everything the doctor told her, yet, here we were, waiting in the emergency room, desperately hoping that things would be all right.
                          
"What happened?" I asked again for the millionth time.
                          
My best friend sighed. "She was at her book club and collapsed. Your grandmother's would-be boyfriend didn't have either of our cell phone numbers so he called the house phone."
                          
"It was a good thing you were home," I said, feeling even guiltier for being out on a date. This was just another nail in the coffin to my love life. Nothing good ever happened when I dated and now the luck had finally taken a turn for the worse.
                          
"I only stopped by to change clothes. I had plans with Tad."
                          
I looked at her. My luck was affecting her love life as well. "I'm sorry. Can you still catch him?"
                          
Katie shook her head, her perfect blonde curls bouncing gently. "I'd rather be here. Your grandmother raised me as much as she did you. Even gave me a place to live after Ted and I split up. She's family and I need to be here for her."
                          
"Tad's your family, too," I said, gently reminding her of that fact. It had been almost a year since the breakup and they were finally on social terms. I didn't want anything to get in the way of that. I knew how much Katie loved him.
                          
"Ex-husbands aren't family, Em," she said with a frown. "Especially when they're the ones who asked for the divorce."
                          
I latched onto the conversation, desperate for something that would take my mind off my grandmother. "Then why were you going out with him tonight?"
                          
She shrugged. "He said he wanted to meet for drinks and I didn't have anything better to do. I figure, why not?"
                          
"Do you think he wants to get back together? He has been talking to you a lot more lately."
                          
"Who knows? I'm not really sure how I feel about it anyway. I'm finally getting over the heartbreak, you know? I don't know if I'm ready to risk the pain all over again."
                          
I sighed, leaning back in my chair. Tad and Katie were high school sweethearts. What hope did I have if someone like them couldn't find their happy ending? "But he was your true love."
                          
"No. He was my first love. We got married way too young, Emma. I'm only 30. I need to broaden my horizon." She looked over at me. "So do you."
                          
Yeah, sure, that was the problem. "It wouldn't matter how far I broaden my horizons. Bad luck will always find me. I'm terminally single. It's safer for everyone that way."