Forever Sheltered

by Deanna Roy

  “Razors?”

  “Nice sharp ones. Part of my art tool chest.”

  “You got help after?”

  Tina snorted. “More than I wanted. I thought I’d never get free of the social workers.” She snorted again. “And now I’m going to be one. That’s a lark.”

  She pulled her sleeves down, forcing me to let go. “Is it too freaky for you?”

  I wrapped my arms around her and tucked her in a little closer. “Not too freaky.” Truth be told, this didn’t surprise me at all. The signs had all been there from her history. I wished she hadn’t had to go through it, though.

  She relaxed her head on my shoulder. “I have five people who attempted suicide coming to my art class. Four teens and an older man. So much hurt in the world.”

  I definitely agreed on that.

  She got quiet, as if she was waiting for me to say something else.

  “It’s part of who you are, Tina. It’s all right.”

  But this didn’t get her to relax.

  “Is there anything you want to tell me?” she asked.

  I tensed a little. Was that what this was about? A secret for a secret?

  Had Cynthia spilled something?

  I had to go face the whole mess tomorrow to make sure she got her chemotherapy. I couldn’t jeopardize it right now.

  Tina began to pull away. Damn it. I needed to do something. Maybe I was wrong. Maybe she just expected me to say something else about her history.

  “I’m not spooked by it,” I said.

  She stood up. “I’m not normally the sort of girl who dates anybody long term,” she said. “I don’t even know how to do this.”

  I got up too. “There isn’t any one way. I think we’re doing fine.” I tried to squeeze her shoulders, but she shrugged me off.

  “You don’t think there is anything in your history I should know? A marriage? Anything?” She wouldn’t look at me.

  “I’ve never been married, Tina. Did the Google search maybe point you in the wrong direction? Or is someone telling you something about me?”

  “No. No one knows anything about you.”

  “You’ve asked?” I tried to keep my voice even.

  She whirled around at that. “Not really. Everyone thinks you’re this obstinate, coldhearted machine.”

  “I can’t help the impression people get of me.”

  “Of course you can!”

  “Tina, what do you want me to be?”

  She walked toward the kitchen. “I don’t know! Honest with me, maybe?”

  “What do you want to know?”

  She leaned against the wall, facing away. I had no idea how to manage her moods. She was so hard to figure out.

  “You don’t have a daughter?” she finally asked, quietly.

  Where would she get that idea? “No, I do not have any children,” I said. “I’ve never been married.”

  “I see,” she said.

  I stood in her living room, not sure what else to say. I knew it was probably time to explain about my sister, but she seemed more worried about my marital status. I had no idea where that was coming from. As upset as she was acting, bringing up Cynthia seemed like a bad idea.

  “I’m still tired and hungover,” she said. “Can we just call it a day?”

  “I was hoping to take you to dinner. Do something simple.”

  She hugged herself, still not looking my way. “Maybe tomorrow.”

  “I have a twelve-hour —”

  “Right,” she said. “That’s fine.”

  I walked toward her, but she held up her hand. “Tomorrow,” she said. “That’ll be better.”

  I wasn’t sure what else to do, so I just agreed with her. “Okay,” I said. “Tomorrow.”

  But I had a feeling that this was the wrong answer.

  Chapter 39: Tina

  I couldn’t think about anything but Darion, Darion, Darion during all my art therapy sessions the next day. Had he straight out lied about Cynthia? I didn’t think so.

  But he wouldn’t tell me anything either.

  This wasn’t good. He had been completely unmoved by my confession.

  He wasn’t the right guy.

  The aide wheeled Albert in, and my excitement over getting to see him was immediately squashed by his haggard appearance.

  He slumped in his chair, holding tight to the arms as though if he let go he would simply fall out.

  “I didn’t want to bring him,” the aide said, “but he insisted.”

  “Pshaw,” Albert said. “You guys are always making me out to be sicker than I am.” His eyes sparkled as they always did when he winked at me. “If I get well, who will they flirt with?”

  The aide wrote a number on a piece of art paper. “Page me directly if you need me,” she said.

  When she was gone, I said, “You were doing so well on Friday.”

  “Easy come, easy go,” Albert said. “The whole thing is one step forward, two steps back. Tricky when you’ve got one foot in the grave.”

  He held up his hands, and the shaking was so pronounced that even holding a brush was probably impossible, much less using it.

  I tried to think of something we could do, but Albert was shaking his head. “Stop worrying about it. Let’s work on yours.”

  “And here I thought you just came down to escape all the unwanted attention of the nurses.”

  He laughed weakly. “You have me all figured out.”

  I turned my canvas around to show him the colors I’d done so far.

  “Very nice,” he said.

  “I’m not sure how realistic I want to make the mother and son,” I said.

  “Your hand will decide,” he said. “Have you done enough work over the years to find your style?”

  “I don’t think so,” I said. “I’ve been kind of all over the place.”

  He waved at the painting. “Then you’ll do this image many times in your life before you get it right. Consider it a trial run. Don’t get too attached to this one effort.”

  I laid the canvas flat on the table. No one had said anything like that to me in art school.

  A movement in the hall window caught my eye. Darion walked by, slowly, looking in. It wasn’t the first time I’d caught him doing it.

  Albert noticed and turned. “An admirer?” he asked.

  “Something like that.”

  “Ah, a love affair.”

  I waved at Darion and turned to face Albert. “What gives you that impression?”

  “You changed when you saw him. Even the air around you was different. Suffused with this magnetic charge.”

  I folded up the easel. “Time to reverse my polarity, then.”

  “Trouble in paradise?”

  “I don’t think there ever was any paradise.” Not true, I thought. Most of it had been amazing. But it was the same as the one-and-dones, only it had just lasted a little longer this time. Encounters. Nothing more.

  Probably for the best.

  “You should draw him,” Albert said. “I found I could unknot most of my women problems by putting their image on paper.” He drew a face in the air. “Always, the answer was right in front of me.”

  That was an interesting idea. Draw Darion.

  Then add horns and a tail and cast him into hell.

  Chapter 40: Darion

  That hadn’t gone well. I had to stop walking by Tina’s room. She seemed downright annoyed with seeing me.

  I stopped by the nurses’ desk to pull up the day’s labs on my iPad.

  And felt like dancing.

  Cynthia’s bloodwork was spectacular. ANC at 1000! We hadn’t seen that in weeks. If it weren’t for the clinical trial protocol, I would have been sending her home for a few days.

  I ordered a bone marrow aspiration, certain she wouldn’t be hypocellular. If we were very very lucky, this new drug was the thing we were looking for. Something to knock this cancer into remission so Cynthia could go back to the business of being an eight-year-old girl.
>
  I began to think ahead. I could enroll her in school instead of using tutors, which I hadn’t even bothered with since we’d been here. She had been too sick.

  But now, I felt positively giddy.

  My hospital phone buzzed. Odd. It wasn’t a patient code. Duffrey himself wanted to see me in the admin offices.

  I glanced through my schedule. I might as well do it now. I wouldn’t have another free moment for hours. I couldn’t imagine what he wanted me for.

  Unless it was Tina.

  Or Cynthia.

  Either choice was bad.

  I girded myself as I wound through the maze of halls to Duffrey’s office. I didn’t much care what happened to me. But Cynthia. And Tina. Both were vulnerable.

  Duffrey’s dour secretary waved me on by as I approached. I didn’t knock on the door, just pushed through.

  Duffrey was perched on the corner of his desk, talking on the phone. He motioned for me to sit down.

  “Must run, love,” he said. “Meeting. Love you.” He set the phone down. “Mrs. Duffrey number three,” he said. “Trying not to piss this one off.”

  I was still standing. I didn’t particularly care to sit for whatever was about to transpire.

  Duffrey walked around his desk and picked up a file. “Do you have any idea why you’re here?”

  “I can think of twenty reasons.”

  Duffrey chuckled. “Good.” He held the folder up. “Pretty good snow job you did on this.”

  I glanced at it. The colored labels at the top didn’t match St. Anthony’s system, which was mostly electronic anyway. This was an old file from somewhere else.

  “Birth records,” Duffrey said. “Of one of your patients, a girl named Cynthia Miller.”

  I kept my face carefully neutral. This was it.

  “I know her. Pediatric leukemia, tough case, responding well to the NCI trial. We’re working with M. D. Anderson on it.”

  He waved away my summary. “I noticed something in her file.”

  My heart hammered, but I didn’t react. “What’s that?”

  “A paternity test.”

  “She has no father of record.”

  “But the man who took the test is your father.”

  Where the hell had he found that out? Time to shut up and listen.

  “When I saw that, I looked up the mother. Sandy Miller, mother of Cynthia Miller and Darion Marks.” He glanced up at me. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

  So, it was out, then. “She was a spectacular lady.”

  “And now you’ve brought your sister to my hospital for a clinical trial.”

  Time to play it straight. “I have.”

  “And you’re violating our rules on the treatment of immediate family.”

  “She’s got no one to look after her.”

  “And you for damn sure aren’t going to be now.”

  My jaw clenched. “My care of her has been perfectly in order.”

  “And it’s been transferred to Clements. All your current patients will be.”

  “What?”

  “You’ll be taking a four-week leave of absence. We’ll convene again at the end of it.”

  “What about her drug trial?”

  “She’ll remain on it. No reason to discharge her over this. She’s our patient. It’s you with the problem. You violated our protocols from the beginning, covered up your relationship, altered records.”

  “Nobody was harmed in it,” I said.

  “Which is why this is just a leave of absence. I expect you to obey visiting hours.”

  “Parents of pediatric patients are allowed to visit anytime.”

  “Don’t make me call in CPS to reassign her guardianship.”

  “You wouldn’t dare.”

  “Be a normal parent,” he said. “Do normal parent things.”

  Duffrey hesitated before he said the next thing, and I wondered if the hammer was coming down about Tina too.

  “What’s the deal with your father?” he asked. “He took a paternity test with his own wife’s child.”

  “You’d best stay out of that one,” I said.

  Duffrey held up his hands. “Works for me. I don’t tangle with the personal lives of men on the medical board.”

  “He won’t appreciate my leave of absence.”

  “You going over my head on this? With Dad?” His voice was a challenge.

  Of course I wouldn’t. I would do everything I could to make sure my father didn’t even know. But Duffrey could sweat it out for all I cared.

  I turned on my heel and headed for the door.

  The office doors were a blur as I headed through the halls. Damn it to hell. I’d only been at this godforsaken place for two months. A four-week leave! At least I hadn’t been escorted off the premises like Tina.

  Tina. I wanted her with a fierceness I had no intention of denying.

  I tore through the corridors. She would see me. I would make her.

  Chapter 41: Tina

  Darion looked like he was ready to blow his stack when he stormed into my room. I was cleaning markers with antibacterial wipes. This was my longest break in the day, lunch and a prep period.

  “Come with me.” He took my arm and pulled me to standing.

  I resisted, jerking free of him. “What has gotten into you?”

  “I just tanked my career. Will you come with me already?” He stalked to the door, then turned to see if I was coming.

  I refused to follow. “What are you talking about?”

  “I’m out. Four-week leave of absence.” He yanked the door open. “Will you come?”

  I glanced around. Everything was mostly ready for my next session. “I only have an hour.”

  “That’s enough for me.”

  I followed him down the hall. He was walking a hundred miles an hour, shucking his lab coat as he went.

  “You going to tell me what’s going on?”

  “Not here.”

  We took the elevator down. Darion stood angry and silent, glowering at the numbers as if he could make them move faster.

  I relented a little and reached for his hand, squeezing it. He held on to it, and even when the doors opened, didn’t let go. This surprised me, but I didn’t pull away.

  We headed toward the exit, and I realized nobody cared about us. We were just two people in regular clothes heading for the parking garage, like any visitors.

  When we got in his car, he didn’t start it right away. He turned to me, and pulled me in close, hanging on to me across the console.

  I had a million questions, but I let them go for the moment. His grip on the back of my neck was intense. He definitely was not the stoic guy I was used to seeing in the halls.

  “Did you just want to talk here?” I asked.

  He pulled back. “No, we’ll go somewhere.” He started the car.

  “You want lunch?” I asked.

  “Are you hungry?”

  “Not particularly.”

  He backed out of the spot and we left the garage, flying down the side street. After a couple turns, I knew where he was headed.

  The cliff.

  Torrey Pines was different in broad daylight than it had been just before sunset. The scrubby bald landscape seemed bleak. A cold front had blown in the day before, so it was considerably colder. I should have grabbed a jacket.

  We picked our way along the path to the cliff, Darion leading. The winter day was bright and clear. When we reached the edge, the Pacific spread out in blinding white blue, the waves sparkling like they were newly sprinkled with pixie dust.

  It was still magical to me. I looked down at the narrow strip of beach that edged the water, taking in more details for my painting. In the light of day, the drop seemed more treacherous. You could see every outcropping, every sharp rock.

  Darion plunked down, sitting with his legs dangling over the edge like he was considering a jump. That seemed too close to me, as the dirt was crumbly on the rocks. I pictured Albert’s painting of this
scene, the ground dropping away below the oblivious circus.

  But I sat next to him anyway. The danger of it made my belly buzz. We were completely alone. Between it being Monday and the frigid wind, no one was in the park. Nobody walked the beach below either.

  We were the only people as far as either of us could see in any direction.

  Darion stared out at the water for a while. I waited for him to talk. Maybe now he would say all the things I’d asked about yesterday. Maybe it was tied to what happened today.

  “Cynthia is my sister,” he said finally.

  Suddenly everything made sense. Her mom was his mom. He was taking care of her now that she was gone. And he couldn’t lose her too. God. How difficult.

  I moved closer and laid my head on his shoulder. “Is she doing okay?”

  “Fantastic, actually. Everything is going perfectly with the new drug.”

  “But —”

  “I lied to the hospital. Scrubbed any family references from her records before they were transferred here.”

  “Why?” I shivered, and he drew me against his body, blocking the wind.

  “It has to do with my mother. How she was cared for. And the mistakes the last hospital made with Cynthia. She lost a kidney because of them.”

  God, no wonder he lied. “You wanted to be in control.”

  “I changed my whole career path, my whole life, so that I could.”

  I let my hands wander along the path of his ribs, although I couldn’t feel them for the muscle. “And now it was all for nothing.”

  “Maybe not. If this drug works, and it looks like it is, I can discharge her. Well, Clements can.”

  “And try it all again somewhere else?”

  He sighed. “No. Hopefully have a normal life.”

  “They didn’t fire you, though, right?”

  “No. Just put me on leave. But that’s a big deal.”

  “It’s four weeks to spend with your sister. No long shifts. No work stress. That’s a win.”

  He lifted my face up to his. “How do you do that? Make everything seem like it was supposed to happen exactly as it did?”

  I choked out a short laugh. “Don’t be calling me Little Miss Sunshine. I’m all about the doom and gloom. It’s just obvious this time. Cynthia is better. You got busted. Now you can have a normal life for a bit.”