“She didn’t leave a living will.”
“That I also know. Most people in our facilities haven’t. Quite frankly, it’s why our business is so good.”
“Nate, I went to see this woman.” Nate was surprised. Why would she do that? “I saw a lifeless old lady being kept alive by sophisticated machines and it broke my heart. It also is breaking the President’s heart.”
“I’m not clear on what you’re getting at.”
“Are there ever situations where the plug is pulled? Where your team finally admits to the family that there is no hope?”
“Of course. If someone is brain-dead, we don’t want to just take the money. But that is not the case with the President’s mother.”
“Come on, Nate, I saw the activity. It’s so minimal most medical experts think it isn’t enough to even have a thought.”
“I know, Susanna, but many legal experts say if you disconnect with a wave present you are committing murder. I’m not smart enough to know the real answer, but I know the law, and my people do not terminate when there is any activity.”
She leaned in. Her voice got soft. She wanted to take his hand, but didn’t.
“Nate … this is killing the President. He can’t bear to see his mother like this. He knows her wishes. He wants her to rest in peace.”
“Are the wishes written down anywhere?”
“No. Nothing is written down. But the President knows his own mother and he wants this agony to end.”
“We don’t know if it’s agony, Susanna. She might be having a wonderful dream.”
“Or a nightmare. And is a dream worth the cost of keeping those bodies warm?” Nate looked at her. He was not a fan of the President and he knew what she was getting at.
“Susanna, I know what Matthew Bernstein ran on, and I know when this happened to his mother it went against his promise to terminate life at first blush.”
“Please, Nate. You know that’s not what he wants. He wants precious, precious resources to be used for people who need it and can benefit by it. It’s his opinion that the people in your facilities don’t. That’s all.”
“And he’s entitled to his opinion, but I respectfully disagree.”
“Can you help? In this one case? Can you help? I’m sure the President would be grateful.”
And there it was. It had taken a half bottle of wine to ask the plug question directly. Nate Cass had to admit he was intrigued. There were not many chances to do a favor for the president of the United States and the secretary of the Treasury in one fell swoop. And what a favor.
“Susanna, let me look into this situation more carefully. I will talk to some senior staff and see what we have here.” Susanna was pleased, but she realized immediately how disastrous it would be if this went wrong.
“Nate, I have made you a lot of money and I consider you a friend, and the most important thing, the very most important thing is that this conversation did not happen. I appreciate that you will look into this, but if anyone, anyone at all, even an ex-wife knew about this it would destroy me. I know you’re not crazy about the President but I am asking this as my favor. I came to you because I trust you and you have always been known for discretion.”
“First of all, I’m only going to look into this. I knew the President’s mother; I met her several times and liked her. I am doing this because I want the best for her. That’s all.”
Susanna was shocked. “You knew the President’s mother? I had no idea!”
“I’ve never met her, Susanna. I don’t know her from Adam.”
“But you just said—”
“Quiet. I am showing you that there are ways to approach this that can come from me.”
And Susanna got it. But Nate didn’t want to give it up just yet. He had the White House begging him and he wanted to milk it for all it was worth.
“I am only saying I will look into the condition. Possibly it has deteriorated and possibly not. But she was someone I liked, so I will take a personal interest.” Susanna now played along perfectly.
“I appreciate that. I’m sure since you were friends you know how much his mother would appreciate it, too.”
“I will look into it. And by the way, Susanna, I don’t talk to my ex-wives.”
And that was the end of that discussion. For the rest of the lunch it was never mentioned.
* * *
Kathy had never seen Max really depressed before. After they got back from Dallas, he went into a serious funk. She still loved him, but now she was watching a man change before her eyes and she didn’t know if it was positive or not. He was angrier. More easily upset. One night they were having dinner at her house and he bit into a prune and got part of a pit. He lost it. He stood up and threw the fruit at the wall. “Why the fuck do they call these pitted if there are still pits? What the fuck is that about?” Kathy got up and recovered the half-eaten fruit, cleaning off the mark it had made. Max left the table and walked outside. He sat on the curb, smoking a joint. Kathy followed him out and stood there, saying nothing, waiting for him to suggest that she sit down. He didn’t. For almost a full minute he sat facing the street, getting high, and not saying a word. She turned around and walked back into the house, then closed the door, went to the kitchen, and cried. Really cried. This wasn’t about the moment; it wasn’t even about the relationship. It was about everything.
Max had taken her away from her problems, but they were still there and they were substantial. Kathy knew she had to sell her father’s house at a loss to make any more payments toward the medical loan. She couldn’t afford to attend college, only take some classes electronically, and that still was viewed as second class even though there were laws to make it equivalent. But employers always asked, “Did you actually go?” Kathy had been holding all of this in and now the floodgates opened.
Max walked back into the kitchen. He put his hand on her head and stroked her hair. “I’m sorry, baby. I’m just upset.” Kathy said nothing. She actually wanted him to leave so she could experience these emotions in private. “I just got angry. I thought I chipped my tooth. I don’t know how they can put ‘pitted’ on the package when there are still pits.”
She wiped her eyes with her sleeve. “They also say that some may contain pits. Didn’t you see that?”
“No. I didn’t.”
“Well, that’s what it says.”
And both of them just stood there.
Kathy walked over to the sink. Try as she might, she couldn’t help but have the conversation. Without turning around she said, “Do you think we should be apart for a while?” She was surprised by how vehement he was.
“No fucking way! Do you think that? Just because I threw a prune? That’s crazy.”
“It has nothing to do with the prune. You’ve been down for a long time now, and it’s getting worse. Possibly it’s us and if so, I don’t want to contribute to your anger.”
Max got serious. He loved this woman more than anyone else he had ever known. Everything she said was right, but it wasn’t about her. He walked over to the sink and turned her around and kissed her.
“Listen to me. You are not the cause of my despair. Yes, I’m in a funk because I want to make a difference. I thought that had something to do with Sam Mueller. But Dallas changed that. I need to do something bigger. So that’s what you’re seeing. I’m taking my frustration out on you and I’m sorry. Please, don’t take it personally.”
Kathy gave him a little smile and went into the living room. She sat down and felt like crying again. She believed what he was saying, but she didn’t understand how this was going to translate into making her life better now. Max followed her.
“What’s wrong? You believe me, don’t you?”
“Yes. But when I first saw you speak and when we first fell in love, your energy was enough. I thought I could ride on that and it would carry me. But now I’m confused. My problems seem to be mounting and I can’t escape them.”
“What problems?”
“How much do you need right now to ease this?”
“I can’t take that much money from you.”
“How much?”
“I need a hundred thousand dollars. I could pay off several months of the loan and get some breathing room.”
“I’ll give it to you.”
“I can’t take it.”
“Then consider it rent.”
“But you don’t live here.”
“I will if you want me to.”
Kathy looked at him. When people moved in together, it was supposed to be because they couldn’t live apart; that was what she had always thought. Not to justify a loan. “I don’t think you should give up your place. It’s important for you to have your privacy and your work space.”
“I can work here.”
And then Kathy couldn’t believe what came out of her mouth. Sometimes people hold something in and think it’s locked away for good and then, in a moment they least expect, it comes sailing out all on its own. “I don’t want you putting up hundreds of pictures on the walls here. It was creepy.”
“What?”
Kathy wished she could take it back, but now it was out. “I came to your place one day when I was nearby, and I looked in the window. I saw the Sam Mueller wall. I got scared. It looked like you were crazy.”
Max responded very tenderly. “Do you think I’m crazy?”
“No,” she said, quietly.
“Baby, you should have just told me right away when you saw that. It was no big deal. Charts and photos on a wall are not crazy indicators, unless you’re crazy to begin with. Tell me honestly, do you think I’m crazy?” Kathy had to smile.
“A little. It’s why I fell in love with you.”
“Okay, then. So what’s the big deal with having a crazy wall?”
“Nothing, I guess.”
“Here’s what’s going to happen. I’m going to give you the money to keep you from losing the house. We won’t tie it in to living together. I’ll keep my place and use it for an office. And when we have more meetings, we’ll do it here. You can consider the money a payment in advance for the meetings.”
“A hundred thousand dollars for a meeting?”
“There will be several.”
“This is a loan,” she said. “I’ll pay you back.”
“If you want.”
“I do.”
“Then consider it a loan.” Kathy started welling up again, from a combination of relief and confusion. She knew she cared about this man, but she didn’t want to think it had anything to do with the money. Was she just replacing one creditor with another? Then she looked on the bright side. At least she liked having sex with this creditor. And that’s exactly what they did that night. They went into the bedroom and had a weird combination of makeup sex with some debt sex and crazy-wall sex thrown in for good measure.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
One of the things that told people that a new Los Angeles was on the horizon was the smell. As the Chinese started arriving, people could smell the cooking in the air near the communities where they lived. Nothing smelled better than sweet rice as it was being steamed. It produced a lovely aroma, some said akin to pancake syrup, and all the other favorites of the Chinese table added something wonderful. That smell alone began to be associated with progress.
A century earlier, dirty smoke filling the skies told people that a city was growing, but now that was replaced by food steamers. Angelenos couldn’t understand exactly what it was about that cuisine that smelled so good. Hamburgers didn’t do that. Eggs didn’t, either. Was it the spices or the fact that the American nose wasn’t used to it? Whatever the answer, it was very welcome.
Shen Li officially took responsibility for the health of the city two months after he arrived. He kept some of the temporary centers the army had set up, but mostly he started on the ambitious plan of rebuilding the hospitals and urgent-care facilities and then adding his smaller health centers every five to six miles.
His mobile surgery units were not brought over initially, since people in Los Angeles had better access to operating rooms than people did in China. But Li was still surprised at how infrequently robot surgery was performed in the United States. In addition to the AMA, hospitals also resisted the robots. They wanted local surgeons to use their operating rooms, nursing staff, and other facilities. But Li was determined to change that. He would prove to America once and for all that robots offered the best care at the best price. If a patient needed a heart valve replaced, would he rather have someone in his city do it, or have one of the best heart doctors in the world do it? And for the same price, maybe less. The fact that that doctor was in Johannesburg would be irrelevant.
But it was still the small health centers that were the centerpiece of Li’s plan. He likened it to going to a good restaurant for the very first time. You had no idea what good service was until you got it and then, once you did, you never wanted less than that again. What Americans had given up on was the personal touch. And certainly one could see why. Emergency rooms were factories. Going to a private physician meant hours in a waiting room with only a few minutes spent with the doctor. Concierge medicine was more personal, but ninety-nine percent of people couldn’t afford it. Li would change the whole dynamic.
His health centers would have nurse practitioners that could diagnose almost every problem and treat it immediately. And for what they couldn’t diagnose, they had direct links to a doctor who could. These centers knew the patients’ names, and their children’s names, and what they did for a living, and they made everyone feel as if they lived in a small town. People loved the attention and as soon as they got used to trusting the live nurse–virtual doctor combination, they would never want to spend hours in a waiting room ever again. Li knew something else, too. When he showed how well this could work in Los Angeles, the rest of the country would be begging for it.
* * *
President Bernstein and his wife slept in the same bed. It was unusual in the White House. Most presidents had separate beds and some even had separate rooms. But thanks to the pills, Betsy slept so soundly that her husband could toss and turn to his heart’s content without waking her up. Except this one night.
Betsy was sound asleep until she was suddenly awakened by her husband talking loudly. She looked over and thought he was on a call, that there was a real emergency, but he was sleeping, obviously having a dream. She was about to go back to sleep herself, when his mood changed from being angry. A smile crossed his face, and in his sleep he was kissing someone. He said, very clearly, “Susanna … Susanna.”
Betsy got out of bed and went to the bathroom. She didn’t know how to react. She was tempted to wake him up and have it out right there, but she decided against it. It was a dream, after all. But that didn’t make her feel any better. She took a second pill and went back to bed. She would deal with this in the morning. And as she was getting drowsy and ready to fall off, she heard him again. “Love you … so much.” Now she was furious. But the second pill was too strong, so she closed her eyes and, filled with rage, fell back asleep.
When morning came Betsy said nothing. The President was already downstairs when she woke. She sat up in bed and wondered if it had been a dream. No. She knew it wasn’t. She decided to address it, nothing too heavy, just a comment at the right moment. Screw the right moment. After a shower, she went downstairs.
Bernstein was in the Oval Office with John Van Dyke and the French ambassador. Betsy asked to see her husband. She said it was important. The President’s secretary never said no to Betsy, no matter what was going on, so she buzzed Bernstein and told him his wife was outside. “Please ask her to come back in an hour,” he said. He heard his wife say, “I want to see him now.” In a second, Bernstein opened the door and smiled. “I’m in the middle of something, can this wait
?”
“No.” His wife rarely said that. Maybe it was bad news. After all, what good news comes with the caveat of not being able to wait? Instead of asking the men to leave, the President took his wife into a side office.
“What is it? Is something wrong?”
One of the good qualities about Betsy Bernstein was that with people she knew, she wasn’t a bullshitter. She performed her job well as First Lady and acted as if she were charmed by everyone she met, even if she felt nothing, but with the people close to her she always spoke her mind. “You told another woman you loved her in your sleep last night.”
The President reacted as if a medicine ball had hit him in the stomach. He said nothing. Then he decided to laugh. “In my sleep? Who?”
“Susanna Colbert.”
“I said two names? I said, ‘I love you, Susanna Colbert’? That sounds odd and corny, doesn’t it?”
“You didn’t say her last name, but there is no other Susanna.”
“Betsy, I can’t take a position on what I say in my sleep. Sometimes I have dreams of monsters and war and people I have met just once, and if I said ‘I love you’ to someone in a dream, then that’s where it should stay. In the dream. I don’t feel like apologizing for a dream. Haven’t you ever had a dream of another man?”
“Only sexual. Never love.”
The President was surprised. This was going to turn into more information than he wanted to know. “Well, there you go. You could have easily said a man’s name and if I was awake like you were I might have heard it. What is his name?”
“There are many of them.”
“Many of them? Well, okay, there you go. You dream about having sex with many other men and I accept it.”
“I am not in love with anyone else.”
Bernstein could have and should have just said, “I am not, either.” And for years afterward he wondered why he didn’t. But he said nothing, which hit his wife like a ton of bricks. When he finally spoke, which was only a few seconds later but felt like an hour, he said, “It was a dream. I can’t defend what I do in my sleep.”
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