by Sally Mandel
She’d read somewhere that a man achieved mystical sexual heights if ice were applied to his genitals at the moment of his climax. Opportunity lost—they could have used her feet.
She covered her toes and picked up the inventory, deciding to skip everything between ankles and navel, since those areas seemed basically unaffected. She couldn’t recommend heart transplantation for sex therapy patients, at least not today. The idea of body contact sent tremors of agonized protest along her scar tissue. She hadn’t yet braved looking at it, but with her fingers gently traced the track running from her neck to the middle of her abdomen. Which brought her stocktaking to the piéce de résistance—the heart of things, so to speak.
If, out of fear of alarming her, they had told her she’d undergone a gall bladder operation instead of a heart transplant, she’d known the truth despite their denials. She could almost hear the steady, efficient hum of valves meshing, the rhythmic click of an effortless pulse.
But the sense of loss astonished her. What had they done with her poor old, incompetent, derelict, flabby, wheezing heart? Certainly they snipped off a piece to examine under their microscopes and marvel over. But the rest? Did they chop it up and flush it down the toilet? Did they stuff it into a bottle of formaldehyde to repose on a dusty shelf with fellow rejects—lackluster livers, somnambulant spleens, careworn kidneys? If she’d had the foresight, she would have requested that they feed it to the handsome Bengal tiger Brian had reported seeing at the Santa Bel zoo. Surgical consent forms should include the patient’s instructions for the destruction of offending organs.
The fact was, she missed it—pathetic, unserviceable thing—and wondered how Cyrano de Bergerac would react to a nose job. Certainly he’d rue the loss of his grotesque protrusion even as he admired his sleek new profile in the mirror.
Disposal seemed abhorrent, almost sacrilegious. Poor heart, house of all her most intimate yearnings. She wouldn’t ask.
That decision made, at least temporarily, the ultimate dreaded topic flashed through her mind in bright-red capital letters: DONOR.
Fear invaded her stomach and sat there like an indigestible lump. She thought of Diller and her angry outburst. She had never before lost control of herself like that. But it wasn’t only the surgeon. There had been moments these last few weeks when she’d felt the madness rising in her throat with the staff, with her parents, even with Brian. She would clench her teeth against it, trying to wait it out, feeling as if she were engaged in a battle against an unfamiliar and violent enemy, who had taken up residence inside her.
They wouldn’t tell her that morning, when they’d pieced together their final vital tests and rushed her, drugged and protesting, down to OR. In the elevator it suddenly seemed so crucial that she receive the heart of someone simpatico. Through her tranquilized fog, she’d begged to be taken back upstairs. She’d rip up the consent form she’d signed under the pleading eyes of Brian and her parents the night before.
Please, she’d joked. Let it be someone who played the harpsichord. I’ve always wanted to play the harpsichord. They mustn’t give her a mortician. Or a child abuser. Or a schizophrenic—these things were chemical. A dream is a wish one’s heart makes—so give her a heart that makes nice wishes. A gentle, sensitive, intelligent heart. She’d grasped the hand of the nurse as the elevator doors opened and they rolled her bed out of the door. “Please,” she’d cried, “Don’t let it be inharmonious. The rest of me …”
Then her bed became a silver and white ship that sailed upon a white sea. Her tongue grew fatter and fatter, and her brain turned to flannel, and there’d been no more protesting until she woke up in the ICU to finish her sentence: “… won’t like it.”
Today the operation sat in her mind like a dark, snaking question mark, and somewhere within its coils lurked the secret of her future. She felt sick and frightened. When Brian came later, she’d try out her courage again and perhaps ask him what she so desperately wanted-yet-didn’t-want to know.
Perfect gambit for a new quiz show, she thought. They’ll call it Name Your Donor. The master of ceremonies will introduce the recipient, offering a brief medical history, perhaps even including a film clip of his or her transplant operation. Then a curtain will rise, revealing four marble slabs upon which repose four dead bodies, each with an identical scar (three of them provided by skillful network makeup artists). Each “donor” is accompanied by his next of kin, who answers the recipient’s questions: “How did Number Three pass away? … Number Two, when was brain death established? … Number Four, what legal process is necessary to permit donation of organs for transplantation?”
Finally the recipient is allowed to wander among the corpses, examining the scars for professionalism and originality, and is then given fifteen seconds to make the final judgment as to the identity of the real donor. During this moment the suspense mounts, with the frenzied studio audience shouting suggestions. Then the thinking-music stops, and the recipient announces his decision.
If he’s correct, he wins an insurance policy that will cover his medical expenses for the remainder of his life. The donor’s family gets a check for three thousand dollars and taxi fare to the nearest funeral home. However, if the recipient is persuaded to choose a fake donor, the dead person’s next of kin wins the cost of a funeral complete with horse-drawn hearse, marching band from New Orleans, and burial at Forest Lawn.
Sharlie thought it was too bad Bela Lugosi wasn’t around anymore. Maybe they could get Vincent Price as emcee.
She glanced at the clock above her head, crestfallen that the game-show idea had provided only five minutes’ worth of diversion. She wondered what she could possibly think about that wasn’t going to send her anxiety level shooting sky-high, past the meters on her monitor—no more distinguishable clicks, just the blur of frantic heartbeats in one alarming buzz.
When Brian suddenly appeared, she nearly leaped out of her bed. He laughed at her startled expression. “Don’t you recognize me without my Klan attire?”
“I recognize you,” she said quietly. “That’s more than I can say for me.”
Brian looked quickly at the door, and said in mock horror, “Good God! They sent me to the wrong room.” He started to get up, and she tugged at his hand.
“Hey, don’t leave me, whoever I am.”
He stared at her for a second. “Dr. Rosen’s coming to see you tomorrow,” he said finally. Sharlie’s eyes veered away. “The mood swings are not entirely chemical, you know,” he said softly.
“I was awful to Dr. Diller,” Sharlie said.
“He’ll survive.” She kept her eyes averted from him. “Sharlie, why can’t I look at you?”
“I’m ugly.”
“That’s no excuse.” He hooked a finger under her chin and turned her face to his.
“Amazing you managed to find anything to hang on to,” she muttered.
“Is that all this is? The temporary cherub look? I think you’re pretty cute.”
She was silent.
“Come on,” he said. “What is it really?”
Her eyes widened with fear. “I want to know who it was. Don’t tell me!” The last words came out an urgent plea.
He ran his finger along her shoulder and down one arm. “You don’t ever have to know about it. It’s not important. Just rejoice in those rosy pink toes and forget about where they came from, okay?”
She was quiet a moment. “I can’t,” she said finally. “I’ve got somebody else’s heart in here. I should at least write a thank-you note to the next of kin, don’t you think? It’s a pretty extravagant present, somebody’s dear-one’s insides.”
“Hey, listen, Sharlie, most of the time the patient doesn’t even know who the donor is. Like adoption—”
She interrupted him. “But this time everybody knows who it was. Except for me. There’s something special about this one.”
“Not particularly,” he said blandly.
“Brian, so
me nurse was in here and started talking about all the reporters in the waiting room and got all clutched when I started asking questions.”
“I think you should speak to Dr. Rosen about it.”
“It was somebody famous, wasn’t it?”
“No, not really.”
“Was it a man or a woman?”
“Look, do you really want me to tell you?”
“No. Yes.”
Brian waited.
“Just tell me how come everybody knows all about it this time.”
“Talk to Dr. Rosen about it, and if she says it’s okay, I’ll tell you all about it. Or she will.”
Sharlie’s eyes were enormous. He looked at her and shook his head. “It’s a hunk of flesh, a pump, an organ like a liver or a kidney. All that matters is that it’s a healthy one, even if the donor was Adolf Hitler.”
Sharlie’s eyes dropped. “That bad, huh?”
“You just talk with Dr. Rosen.”
“Chicken,” she said.
“Look, do you want to know or don’t you want to know?” he asked, exasperated.
She swallowed hard and then murmured, “Don’t.”
He nodded and started talking about a phone call he’d had from Barbara Kaye this morning mercilessly relating the recent woes of Mrs. Salvello. Brian repeated it all to Sharlie, with some embellishment, until she began to laugh again.
Chapter 36
Brian went downstairs for a cup of coffee. When he returned to the room, Sharlie was lying very still, staring up at the ceiling. Her body was stiff, and all the color had drained out of her face.
“Hey,” Brian said. “You okay?”
She blinked her eyes, but didn’t look at him. Suddenly he noticed the newspaper on her bedside table. It was folded open to the headline CRIME FIGURE DEAD IN GUNFIGHT DONATES HEART TO GIRL. He grabbed the paper and whispered hoarsely, “Where did you get this?”
Still, she didn’t answer him. “Sharlie, tell me. Where did this come from?”
She turned her head slowly on the pillow. “You shouldn’t have let them do it, Brian. How could you let them do that to me?”
“The guy saved your life.”
She grabbed the newspaper from his hand and, with a howl of pain and rage, threw it at his chest. It fluttered to the floor at his feet.
“Go away!” she screamed. “Just leave me alone!”
Brian hurried out to find someone who could give her a sedative and make sure she was all right. Once Nurse Wynick was on her way to Sharlie’s room, he telephoned Dr. Rosen’s office, but the psychiatrist was out of town until the next morning. Then he took the stairs eight flights down and stepped out into the warm breeze. He felt calmer after he’d walked the length of the grounds a few times, so he went back inside again. At the nurse’s station he was told that Sharlie was asleep and wouldn’t wake up until morning. He might as well go back to his motel.
He was dreaming about Walter and Mrs. Salvello when his telephone rang at two A.M. He groped for it and Margaret’s anxious voice said, “Brian? Is that you?”
“What’s happened?” he murmured, alarmed through his grogginess.
“Sharlie’s rejecting. They think you should come.”
“I’ll be there in fifteen minutes.”
By the time he got to the eighth floor, a confrontation was in progress outside Sharlie’s door.
Tiny, wiry Nurse Wynick was putting up a mighty struggle to bar Mary MacDonald from Sharlie’s room, and Mary was responding to Nurse Wynick’s defensive posture in her characteristic straightforward manner.
“Out of the way, you monkey-faced bitch, or I’ll shove your ass all the way to Hawaii.” She gave a push that sent Nurse Wynick sprawling against the wall.
“I’ll have your license. You’re a madwoman!” Nurse Wynick cried, her forehead above the gauze mask mottled with fury. A young nurse’s aide stood by, staring at her superior in horror and delight. Nurse Wynick brushed herself off and shrieked at the girl. “Don’t just stand there like an imbecile! Call Security. And page Dr. Lewis.”
Meanwhile Mary had slipped into Sharlie’s room. When Nurse Wynick tried to open the door, she found it locked. “Don’t you touch that patient!” she shouted through the crack.
The response from inside was unintelligible, but its intent was clear. Nurse Wynick tore off her mask and stomped down the hall with a flaming face.
Brian tapped on the door. “Hey, Mary. It’s me.”
In a moment the door opened a crack, and he slid inside. Mary quickly fastened a mask over his face.
“Know what that crazy Nazi was going to do? Spike her IV with Vibramycin. These hotshots may be able to do fancy footwork in OR, but when it comes to common sense, they’re a bunch of yo-yos.”
“What’s the matter with Vibramycin?” Brian asked.
“She’s allergic to it.”
“Oh,” he said, impressed. “Is she okay?”
Mary settled down next to Sharlie’s bed as if she intended to remain there throughout eternity. “Trying to murder my girl, they are, and her on foreign soil,” she muttered.
“Mary, this isn’t Borneo, it’s California. Is she going to be all right?” he repeated.
“She’s holding her own.”
“What about the rejection?”
“They upped her prednisone to a hundred milligrams. She’s responding, but we’re just going to have to wait.”
“But shouldn’t somebody be here? I mean from the staff?”
“Not when they don’t know their nostrils from their assholes.”
“Isn’t Margaret around somewhere? How did you beat me here anyway?”
“I didn’t like the way she looked at nine, so I stuck around. Her mother’s on the phone with Converse in New York trying to decide whether he could come out again.”
“Should he?”
Mary shook her head slightly, but Brian hadn’t taken his eyes off Sharlie for a moment. Mary went on indignantly. “I’m just glad I didn’t get on that plane home this morning. They’d have killed her for sure. I want you and Mrs. Converse to talk them into sending her back to New York, where she can get the proper care.”
This last was said very loudly for the benefit of Nurse Wynick, who had just arrived with a security man in tow. The women eyed one another malevolently, then Mary rose with great dignity, brushed imaginary lint off her skirt, and said to the security man, “I assume you have come to escort me, sir.” She crooked her elbow, which the baffled guard took, and sailed out the door.
Nurse Wynick stared after her with narrowed eyes. Finally she muttered, “Who does she think she is, Queen Elizabeth?”
“Wouldn’t be surprised,” Brian replied proudly. Nurse Wynick glowered and turned her attention to Sharlie, or rather to Sharlie’s bedclothes. She fussed over them busily, tucking in loose corners until Brian finally objected, “She can’t even wiggle her toes in there.”
This was too much for the vanquished nurse. She started to cry, her words punctuated by deep sniffs of mortification and indignation. “You people … you all think you know what’s right.… New York people … always the same, throwing your weight around … There are other places in this universe besides New York City, you know.”
Brian made some expression of sympathy, which only unleashed another flood of anguish. Her fresh mask was soaked with tears, and all the time, she fidgeted with the sheets, checked IV tubes, rearranged items on the bedside table.
“I’ve been in the hospital fifteen years, and I know as much about transplants as anybody, and I won’t have a bunch of ignorant … busybodies … coming in here and messing up my work and telling me how to do my job. I mean, if you people thought you knew so much, why didn’t you just stay where you belong instead of coming all the way out here? I won’t have this … importation of personnel on my floor.…”
Brian tried to interrupt with an explanation of Mary’s deep involvement with Sharlie, how
she’d been caring for her since birth. But Nurse Wynick immediately seized on it as proof of Mary’s lack of professionalism.
“Just keep that woman out of my sight until Miss Converse is discharged. If I see her on my floor again, I’ll …”
Brian waited curiously for the dreadful plans Nurse Wynick had in mind for Mary.
“… I’ll anesthetize her and slap her into surgery and transplant her insides with that ugly old orangutan we’ve got downstairs in the lab.”
With this she left the room, but not until she’d looked at Brian’s face to make sure he was impressed with her threat. He was, and she marched out with her spirits somewhat restored.
Brian sighed. If only one could harness the energy of those two veterans—it would cure the common cold, wipe out cancer, maybe even establish order in the chaotic tangle of the hospital accounting department. But now, left alone with Sharlie, no battling ladies of mercy to distract him, Brian panicked. He looked in every direction except at the neat bed with the crease up the middle that was supposed to represent the woman he loved. Finally he forced himself to focus on her. She was staring at him, wide awake, her eyes liquid and haunting in the middle of her distorted face.
“Brian,” she whispered, “tell me what’s happening.”
He did, not coming too close, despite his mask and gown, for fear of infecting her.
She considered what he’d told her, and after a minute said, “If I make it through this one, Bri, and if you still want me with my big fat face, I’ll marry you.”
She talked with effort, so he just smiled, squeezed her hand quickly and stayed near the bed until she fell asleep. A cardiologist and two residents arrived, and he left the room, guilty at the enormity of his relief to walk out of the hospital and into the California moonlight.
The next night he lay in bed listening to the murmur of voices through the thin wall between his room and Sharlie’s parents’. In the beginning, except for an occasional expletive from Walter, there had been silence, as if the room were unoccupied. Tonight, however, the dark was punctuated by Walter’s low rumble and the lighter response from Margaret. Brian strained his ears trying to catch pieces of these prolonged conversations. They hadn’t had much to say to each other in public, and Brian found the hint of private, intimate communication tantalizing. He remembered lying awake in the creaky old farmhouse when he was a child on those nights that seemed undefinably scary. How curious he was to know exactly what was being said by his taciturn father. There was even an occasional burst of laughter, low-pitched and full of love for the woman who had inspired it with some unseen bit of mischief.