by Robin Cook
“I think that’s a great idea,” Brian said. “Is that right, Pumpkin? You want to take a nap?”
Juliette nodded, and he could see she had her eyes closed. “Okay,” he said. “Hopefully you’ll feel back to normal when you wake up. We’ll be downstairs if you need us, okay?” He straightened up and herded the others out of Juliette’s room.
As they were descending the stairs, Jeanne asked if Brian might be willing to give Grady Quillen a call to see if he was comfortable giving the names of the Inwood families he’d served over the last year.
“I suppose, but to be honest, I’m not sure I have the stamina at the moment to pursue the kind of Erin Brockovich investigation you have in mind.”
“Of course you don’t,” Jeanne reassured him. “As I said, I don’t know how you are functioning as well as you are. But I have both the time and the inclination. If you can get me the names, I’ll start the process and you can participate as much or as little as you’d like.”
“All right,” Brian said. It was the least he could do in the face of all the help and support Jeanne was so generously providing.
CHAPTER 29
September 2
As dawn’s light slowly crept into the master bedroom preluding sunrise, Brian’s eyes popped open. Other than his eyelids, he purposefully didn’t move a muscle lest he disturb Juliette, who was sleeping on her side with her head on a pillow facing him. She was in Emma’s place in the bed, and Jeannot Lapin was on its back between them with Juliette’s arm thrown over the stuffed rabbit’s midsection.
As far as sleep was concerned, the first part of Brian’s night had not gone well. He’d had trouble going to sleep even though he was clearly exhausted from having slept so poorly the night before. He’d even dozed off in the kitchen while having something to eat with both Camila and Jeanne. They’d encouraged him to go to bed, which he did, but by the time he got upstairs, out of his clothes, and brushed his teeth, he no longer felt tired.
Finally, after ten o’clock, he’d broken down and tried one of Emma’s Ambien tablets, which provided a few hours of sleep before he was awakened by the sound of his bedroom door creaking open. By reflex from his martial arts training, he’d tensed, ready to spring up and face any potential intruder, but it wasn’t necessary. With the help of the half-light in the room coming in through the white, gauzy curtains from the streetlight outside the window, he recognized Juliette in her nightgown holding Jeannot Lapin. Brian had sat up and asked her if she was okay, and she’d answered by asking him if she could sleep with him.
“Absolutely, Sweet Pea,” Brian had said immediately, throwing back the edge of the sheet. Juliette responded by jumping up onto the bed, scrunching down under the covers, and placing Jeannot Lapin between them. A moment later she’d melted his heart by saying: “I miss Mommy.”
With some difficulty, Brian had told her that he understood and that he missed Mommy, too. With those few words spoken, Juliette had fallen asleep and eventually he had dozed off while hoping he could at least partially fill the void that Emma’s passing had created.
As the intensity of the daylight gradually increased, Brian got a progressively better view of his angelic daughter’s features, and he marveled at the sheer mystery and mind-boggling implausibility of the reproductive process. How could it have been possible for him and Emma to create such a perfect human being? But then in the middle of his appreciation, he noticed something disturbing. Juliette’s forehead was covered with tiny, iridescent droplets of perspiration, and the discovery brought a pang of fear down his spine. With the pandemic threatening a fall surge, a prolonged fever was certainly not a welcome sign.
Being careful not to wake his daughter, Brian slipped out of the bed. As carefully as he could, he folded down the light cotton blanket, leaving only the sheet to cover her. He then turned down the air-conditioning a few degrees before he went to retrieve the thermometer in her bedroom. Although he hated to do it because she was sleeping soundly, when he got back he woke her by gently shaking her shoulder.
Juliette’s response at being disturbed was to cry and then complain that she didn’t feel well. He could see that the whites of her eyes were mildly suffused red.
“What’s bothering you?” he asked. “Is your throat sore?”
Juliette nodded. “And I have a headache,” she said, putting her hand momentarily on her forehead.
“I think you might have a fever.” He felt her forehead with his hand, admitting to himself that she did feel warm. “We need to take your temperature.”
Although she initially complained that she didn’t want her temperature taken, she eventually succumbed to Brian’s persistent urging. As they waited for the requisite three minutes, he stroked her head, marveling at the color of her hair and wondering where it had come from in either his or Emma’s genealogy. Juliette kept her eyes closed the entire time.
When the time was up, Brian took out the thermometer. When he read it he caught his breath. It was 102.3! Making an effort to camouflage his concern, he said: “Yes, you do have a fever. Do you feel warm?”
“No, I feel cold,” she said, and ostensibly shivered.
Quickly, he replaced the blanket that he had earlier turned down. After he told her to stay in bed, he slipped on his robe and walked down the hall. When he reached Camila’s room, he knocked softly. From inside he heard a muffled: “Just a minute.” A moment later the door opened, and a sleepy Camila stood in the door frame, clutching her robe closed.
“Juliette has awakened with a temperature of over 102,” Brian told her. “Sorry to wake you, but we need your help. As much as I hate doing it, I think she’s got to be seen again at the ED, and I need you to drive us so I don’t have to worry about parking.”
“Oh, no! I’m sorry to hear,” Camila said, now looking more alert. “She seemed fine yesterday after her upset stomach. Are there any other symptoms?”
“Yes, she again has a sore throat and headache. On the positive side, I don’t think she has any digestive complaints, but I didn’t specifically ask her.”
“Do you want to go right away?”
“I do,” Brian said. “I’d like to get in and out of the ED as quickly as possible. We’re both expected to show up for Emma’s funeral mass at ten and the sooner we get there the sooner we’ll be seen.”
“Let me throw on some clothes.”
“Of course,” he said. “I’ll dress also and get Juliette’s robe. At the moment she’s in my room. She came in in the middle of the night feeling lonely and ended up staying with me.”
“The poor dear. Okay, I’ll be quick.”
After returning to his room with Juliette’s robe in hand, Brian approached the bed. Juliette appeared to have fallen back asleep, but her eyes opened the moment he sat down. “I was just talking with Camila,” he said. “She’s going to drive us back to the hospital so the doctors can take a look at you again.”
“I don’t want to go to the hospital.”
“I’m afraid we have to go,” Brian said, suppressing the urge to say he didn’t want to go, either. He sat her up and helped her get her arms into her bathrobe. “We have to find out what’s making you have a fever, so we can get you some medicine to make you and Jeannot Lapin feel better. I imagine she’s not feeling so well, either.”
While he ducked into the master bedroom’s walk-in closet to dress, he found himself suddenly transfixed by the sight of the clothes hanging on Emma’s side. At this moment, with no warning whatsoever, his glass house of denial spontaneously shattered, forcing him to acknowledge that his wife had died, that she was gone, that she wasn’t coming back, and he was never again going to hear her crystalline voice or her infectious laughter or feel her touch or experience one of those marvelous episodes when they shared the very same thought at the same time. “Shit,” he hissed through clenched teeth, quiet enough so Juliette couldn’t hear. The existential q
uestion of why this terrible loss had happened to him leaped into the forefront of his mind, but he had no answer. All he knew was that this totally unexpected, unforeseen tragedy had happened because of a tiny mosquito.
Feeling suddenly drained of strength, Brian was forced to reach up and grab the hanger rod to keep himself upright. At the same time, he felt a rush of tears, and he let himself cry. But after a few quiet sobs, he regained his equilibrium. Remembering Juliette out in the room, he yanked himself back to reality. “Pull yourself together!” he commanded in a forced whisper, recognizing that Juliette’s needs trumped feeling sorry for himself. She needed him to buck up, and with the kind of determination that had characterized his life to date, he rapidly put on the same dark suit he’d worn for his brief appearance at the wake. Not knowing how long he’d be in the emergency department, and certainly hoping it wouldn’t be as long as the previous day, he wanted to be ready for the funeral mass at ten.
By the time they were in the Subaru heading for the hospital, it was going on eight o’clock. Hoping for the best but wanting to be ready for the worst, he again had his laptop with an attached DVD player and a selection of Juliette’s particularly favorite movies in a backpack. He also knew there was internet in the ED, so they’d also be able to stream PBS cartoons or other movies if Juliette preferred. Also, at Camila’s suggestion, he had some snacks if needed. All in all, he felt reasonably prepared provided they were treated fairly and didn’t have to wait for three hours. As he had anticipated, Juliette was obviously not feeling well and had resisted going, but now that they were in the car, she acted resigned and silent.
“If you can give me a little warning, I can be back here, so you don’t have to wait,” Camila said as Brian and Juliette got out at the hospital. He gave a thumbs-up as he and Juliette donned their masks and headed for the door.
The ED waiting room was sparsely populated, which encouraged Brian. At the information desk there was no line, and Brian was able to check in straightaway with one of the clerks who recognized them from having been there the day before. The clerk then passed on the information to a triage nurse who seemed distracted as she read aloud the symptoms of a 102.2 fever, sore throat, and headache with an episode of vomiting and diarrhea the previous day. She then wordlessly took Juliette’s temperature with a thermal scanner. Luckily Juliette was tolerant and silent through it all.
“What’s the temperature?” he asked.
“100.8,” the nurse replied.
“It was much higher less than an hour ago,” Brian said. He was relieved to hear it had come down yet worried it might put them in a less urgent section on the patient list. “Maybe you could take it again, please, just to be sure.”
Without comment, but with subtle signs of annoyance that were not lost on Brian, the nurse took the temperature again. “100.8,” she voiced with a roll of her eyes as if retaking the temperature had been an imposition.
“Excuse me,” he said. “Did my asking to retake my daughter’s temperature provoke you in some way?”
“I’ve been here since eleven o’clock last night,” the nurse responded, ignoring Brian’s question. “We’ll be with you as soon as we can.” She then walked off.
“Good grief,” Brian let out under his breath. Already his interaction with the ED staff was only marginally acceptable in his opinion, making him worried whether the current visit might end up rivaling yesterday’s fiasco.
Retreating to a relatively deserted corner of the waiting room, he and Juliette made themselves as comfortable as possible. Juliette wanted to lie down, and Brian allowed her to do so on a blanket he’d brought with them from the car. When he asked her if she wanted to watch something on the laptop, she said she wanted to sleep. As she settled in, he noticed that the perspiration that he’d seen earlier on her forehead had disappeared, making him more confident that the thermal scanner temperature the nurse had taken had been correct. It also made Brian wonder why, like yesterday, Juliette’s symptoms had suddenly disappeared.
“What about your headache and a sore throat?” he asked her, but she chose not to answer and already had her eyes closed. Thankful she was being cooperative, he didn’t press her. Instead he made himself as comfortable as he could, wondering how long they would have to wait. In the distance he heard the undulating sound of an approaching ambulance. As the siren progressively increased, he couldn’t help but selfishly hope it wasn’t some major trauma that would engulf the ED and extend the wait.
Trying to avoid revisiting the momentarily paralyzing episode he’d had in the closet, Brian kept his mind busy by mulling over the conversation he’d had the day before with Jeanne about how many other people in the community out of its sixty thousand residents had experienced the kind of tragedy that he and Jeanne had suffered. Although at the time he had thought that he didn’t have the time or the fortitude to participate in any intensive investigation in the near term, Jeanne had asked him to call Grady Quillen and ask if he would provide a list of all the neighborhood people he’d served in the last year or so.
As Brian had expected, Grady had been more than happy to provide the information, especially after Brian had assured him that his being the source would never be revealed to anyone, especially Premier Collections. Grady had promised he’d print out a list and get it to Brian, and also mentioned something particularly disturbing. Nolan O’Reilly, the friend who’d lost his son and house, had just died by suicide. If nothing else, that terrible news was enough to galvanize him to join Jeanne’s commitment to look into the problem as a neighborhood disaster.
The ambulance he had heard approaching arrived, and it was obvious that it involved a major problem as various ED personnel started scurrying about. For a second Brian wondered if Emma’s arrival two days ago had caused the same stir, but he quickly pushed the thought out of his mind lest it lead to another emotional storm.
Over the next thirty to forty minutes, more ambulatory patients began arriving, forming a line with six-foot separations at the information desk. There were also several more ambulances. It was disturbingly obvious to Brian that the ED was becoming busier.
After an hour of waiting and with Juliette asleep, he got up when there happened to be no one in line for the information desk. Trying to keep himself calm but feeling progressively irritated that he and Juliette were being forced to wait as long as they had, especially since the time of Emma’s funeral mass was rapidly approaching, Brian headed over to the clerk who had initially checked them in.
After taking a quick glance back at Juliette to make sure she was still asleep, Brian got the clerk’s attention. “Excuse me,” he said, trying to keep the frustration out of his voice. “My daughter and I have been waiting more than an hour for her to be seen. What’s the holdup?”
A free triage nurse who’d overheard his question stepped closer and intervened. “What’s the name?” she asked in a neutral tone.
Brian gave Juliette’s full name, and the nurse consulted her tablet. “Okay, yes, I see your daughter’s name,” she said. “She’s definitely in the queue. You’ll just have to be patient. We have to deal with real emergencies first.”
For several beats, he debated whether to respond to the implication that Juliette’s fever of 102.2 with flu-like symptoms was not an emergency or whether to raise the issue about his seeing other patients come and go into the ED, but for the moment he held himself in check. He could hear Jeanne’s words from yesterday warning him that raising a ruckus could make things worse. Biting his tongue, Brian headed back to his seat next to Juliette’s sleeping form.
Thinking about Jeanne, he took out his cell phone and called her in an effort to keep himself under control. As the call went through, he worried again he was taking advantage of her and hoped she wouldn’t mind hearing from him so soon. To his relief, any concerns were instantly dispelled by the alacrity with which she answered.
“Good morning!” she said
brightly. “I’m so glad to hear from you. I’ve been wanting to call you but was worried it might be too early. Have you gotten the defendant list from Grady Quillen?”
“Wow! I’m impressed. You really are motivated about this.”
“I suppose I am,” Jeanne said. “Have you heard from him? Is that why you are calling?”
“I’m afraid I haven’t gotten the list yet,” he said. “No, that’s not why I am calling. Unfortunately, I’m back in the ED. Juliette woke up this morning with a 102.2 fever.”
“Oh, no!” Jeanne cried. “That’s not what I wanted to hear. Does she have other symptoms or just a fever?”
“She has a sore throat and headache again,” Brian said. “I was hoping that by getting here as early as we did, we’d be seen quickly. It didn’t happen. We’ve been here for more than an hour already, and we haven’t been called.”
“Oh, God! How frustrating!” Jeanne said. “I’m sorry. How is Juliette behaving?”
“She’s being an angel,” Brian said. “She’s sleeping. I’m the one who might misbehave. I’m feeling paranoid again that we’re being purposefully and passive-aggressively ignored.”
“Is the ED particularly crowded?” Jeanne asked.
“It wasn’t when we arrived,” he said. “At least it didn’t appear to be out here in the waiting room. Of course, I can’t see when ambulances arrive, and I know at least one did. What bugs me is that just like yesterday people have walked in after we did and already have been seen, and it’s getting more crowded now.”
“Would you like me to come over and keep you company?”
“That’s nice of you to offer,” Brian responded. “But I’m hoping we’ll be called soon, and I’m already feeling guilty about counting on you to come over later this afternoon to spend time with Juliette while I go out to the ESU Academy.”
Before Jeanne could respond, Brian’s phone vibrated in his hand, indicating he had a call coming in. It was Aimée. “I’ve got to go. My mother is trying to get through, and I’m sure it’s about the funeral.”