by Elle A. Rose
*
Before heading to the hospital to check on Maddie for the day, I stop by the local bookstore to purchase her a new romance novel. I noticed the day before that she was almost finished with the one she brought with her to the hospital. I asked her yesterday how she managed to think about bringing a book with her to the hospital in the midst of everything else that was going on. She chuckled and said she always has a book in her purse.
‘I never know when I may get stuck waiting somewhere or have a few extra minutes on my hands. I’ve learned that if I carry a book in my purse at all times, I’ll always be able to busy myself when the time arises.’
It made sense. I wish I would have thought about that before. Granted, I do not carry a purse with me too often, but when I do it, would be wise for me to start to carry a book in there.
Stepping off the elevator, I notice that one shift is ending and another is about to begin. The nursing staff is bunched in the corner reviewing a board with what looks to be all the patients on this floor’s names on it. A few names are new and a few have been removed. Hopefully all the ones that were removed were discharged and have gone home to their families. Opening Maddie’s door, I pick up a scent of a male. I have smelled this scent before, and from what I detect of their conversation, it sounds like someone Maddie knows pretty well. They stop talking when they see me in the room. The gentleman is seated in the chair closest to the bed facing Maddie. He turns his body to see who has entered. I tried to make as much noise as a human would, so not to startle them with my unannounced entrance. Maddie smiles and tries to sit straighter in the bed. I wish she would stay still. I can hear the strain it puts on her heart to have to move her whole body.
“Good morning, Maddie.”
“Good morning, Amber. This is Doctor Larry Franklin. He was Lance’s partner in the practice.”
Ah, yes, I do remember seeing him at the funeral, and I believe at the house afterwards. “Larry, this is Amber Harris, the dear friend of the family I was telling you about.”
He stands and puts his hand out.
“It is very nice to meet you, Dr. Franklin,” I say as we shake.
“The pleasure is all mine. Please call me Larry.”
Larry looks to be Lance’s age, if he was still alive. He is shorter than Lance. I do believe he looks to be five foot eight or so with off brown hair. I am assuming he is one of those men that has decided to dye his hair. I wonder if he knows his eyebrows are still gray. He is not as slender as you would think he should be for a doctor, but that may be something he can blame on his age. His green eyes are being encroached upon by a bluish-gray outer ring. I ponder if he still practices medicine? I give his hand a light squeeze, since I do not want to hurt him. Letting go, I make my way to the foot of Maddie’s bed and place the book on her lap. I start to back up and say, “I’ll let you two finish, and I’ll come back in a little while.”
As I turn to leave, Larry speaks, “Don’t go on my accord. We were just catching up. You are more than welcome to stay.”
Maddie, who is examining her new book, puts it down and pats the side of her bed for me to come and sit.
“Yes, don’t run off. Larry and I were just talking about old times, and the fact that he was surprised to see that I hadn’t called Brenda. I was just explaining to him why I decided to call you instead.”
Brenda, ah, yes. It appears that Brenda is not as touchy of a subject for Maddie anymore. After the scene in the living room where Brenda and Phil ended up storming out of the house—well, Brenda stormed, and Phil trailed behind her—Maddie waited a few days to give her daughter time to calm down before she tried to call and speak to her. She felt bad for hitting her in front of all of those people and wanted to apologize. She called and left at least ten messages asking her daughter to call her back, but she never got a response. In my fifth month of the visit, Maddie received a letter from Brenda listing in detail why she hated her and why she would never speak to her again. Maddie took the news extremely hard. I have to say, I do not blame her. Brenda had such gibberish as ‘when I was twelve, I wanted you to buy that dress for my friend’s birthday party and you didn’t. Because of you, I was the only one that didn’t have a new dress at the party, and all of the girls picked on me.’ Brenda listed everything that Maddie and Lance did not do right in her eyes for every year that she was alive. At the end of the letter, she noted that since Maddie chose the “skank” which I am assuming was me over her, she no longer considered herself a part of the family. She was disowning Maddie, because she never felt she was treated the way she should have been as her only daughter.
It took Maddie a few days to even feel comfortable talking about it. When she finally let out everything she was feeling, she decided that it was going to hurt but she was going to respect her daughter’s wishes. Maddie knew deep down that Lance and she had met all of Brenda’s needs and mostly all of her wants. They had given her a good childhood, and if she was too blind to see that, then maybe no longer speaking to her, would be for the best. She hated the fact she was losing all of her family. But she was also grateful to have a piece of her son still with her. I felt terrible because it seemed I was the straw that broke the camel’s back when it came to her relationship with Brenda, but Maddie assured me that it was a long time coming, and I was just the scapegoat for Brenda. I knew she was right, yet even now, I still feel awful thinking I had a hand in any of it.
Standing to leave, Larry gives the excuse of being late for tee time with a few golf buddies. I grew bored with the conversation within the first seven minutes and decided to skip through Larry’s thoughts. He is lying. There is no tee time. Dr. Franklin is on his way to see his mistress. Some of the images that ran through his head were a little disturbing, but I guess I asked for it. I should have stayed in my own head. As he proceeds towards the door, he is met by Dr. Goust. They smile at each other, and Larry continues on to his home away from home. Dr. Goust’s smile seems to widen as he gets closer.
“Hello, Mrs. Grayson, Amber. How are you ladies doing today?”
I think I am going to like this doctor. He pulls the chair up that Larry has just evacuated and sits. Leaning back and placing his right foot on his left knee, he opens Maddie’s chart and begins to review it. He glances up from the chart, and smiles again before saying, “It appears that everything is pretty stable. I want to keep you here a few more days, but if everything stays on track, you should be able to go home by next Friday. Amber, we can go over aftercare for when she is discharged. It won’t be too much, I’ll just really need for her to take it easy for a while.” I nod in response and stand. While the doctor talked, Maddie drank the last of her water, and she is in need of a refill. Picking up the plastic container, I head to the nurse’s station. I hear Dr. Goust stand and give his goodbyes to Maddie. He tells her he will be back tomorrow to check on her, but if she has any questions to have him paged.
“Amber, can I, umm, can I talk to you for a minute.”
I stop and turn around. Dr. Goust is blushing. I wonder what has made him so nervous. He is also fidgeting with his stethoscope. “Yes, Dr. Goust?”
“Please call me Mark. I, well umm, I don’t do this often.” He stops talking and looks down at his feet, as he takes a deep breath through his mouth. “I was wondering if you would like to maybe have dinner with me sometime. Mrs. Grayson tells me that you are here visiting, but I was hoping to still maybe get to know you.” Out of all the things, I figured he was going to say, this was not one of them. I should have spent more time reading his mind instead of Larry’s. “Like I said, I usually don’t do this, but you seem like a very interesting person. I don’t want to think I missed out on something. I understand if you don’t feel comfortable…”
“Dr. Goust, Mark.” He glances up from staring at the floor. Reading his thoughts, I see that this really is the first time he has ever done anything like this. Well, the first time he has ever asked someone out while he was working. It seems he has
had a little encouragement from Maddie. He apparently showed interest in who I was, and if I was seeing anyone, so Maddie suggested he ask me out. She and I will have words later. “I don’t think us going out will be a good idea. I’m only in town for as long as Maddie needs me and then I will be heading back. Besides I’m kind of grandson sitting for Maddie, and I wouldn’t feel comfortable leaving him alone for too long.” This disappoints him, he tries not to let it show.
“All right. If you change your mind, the offer is still on the table.”
He gives me a lopsided smile and heads down the hallway. Watching his retreat, I am drawn to his shaggy hair. It reminds me of an old mop bouncing off the shoulder of a janitor as he heads to clean a spill up.
Walking back into Maddie’s room, I find her asleep. I wager she knew I was coming back to give her an earful about Dr. Goust. Setting the pitcher of water back on her bedside table, I lean over and pull the covers further up on her frail body, kiss her on the cheek and turn the light off as I head back out the door. I will let her sleep for now and we shall talk later. I need to make two quick stops before I pick Dominick up from school. Yesterday, he seemed as if something was troubling him. I tried hard not to read his mind, but figured since he did not want to talk about it, I would see if I could still try to help. The problem was easier than I would have thought. His friends’ birthday—the twins I believe he has been friends with since the first day of kindergarten—slumber party is this Friday to Saturday. He would like to go but he does not have gifts for each of them yet. He is not sure if he will have enough funds to buy them each a gift since he bought his new game. Besides the cash he had the other day, Maddie is adamant that he puts his lawn care earnings in the bank. Somehow, that information was not passed along to me. First, I will be stopping by the bank to replace and deposit the money that was spent on the video game, and then I will be making a stop at the mall to pick up the boy’s gifts that Dominick had in mind.
“Amber, I don’t think I want to go.”
Slowing the car down in front of Timothy and Thomas Ruggford’s house, I let out a slight sigh. Dominick has been fighting with me all day about going to this party. I have no idea what he is so nervous about, and I am at my wits end. I told myself I would not read his mind again, but I am at the breaking point. I do not understand why he is having a mental battle. They are his friends and he should be happy to go spend the night with them and celebrate their birthdays. Earlier today, while visiting Maddie at the hospital, I, with the help of a clueless Maddie, broached the topic of the festivities. Until then, Dominick had done a good job of keeping a tight lip about the birthday bash, so I took matters into my own hands. “So, Dominick, your grandmother tells me that you have a slumber birthday party to go to this weekend.” “Play along, okay?” Maddie, who was nodding in and out of sleep while reading her book, gave me a quick smile to let me know she would before going back to her half reading half sleeping state.
Dominick’s head, however, shot straight up from his homework with a pale look on his face. I did not have to read his mind, he was wondering when he told his grandmother about the sleepover.
“Well, I wasn’t sure if I was going to go. I didn’t want to bug grandma about the details of the party.”
I thought he recovered well, only thing was I had just played back his thoughts the other night to Maddie, who was now looking more awake. Placing her book down, she turned and glared at Dominick.
“I spoke to Mrs. Ruggford the other day and she told me the boys were excited about having you over. It sounds like you are going to have a lot of fun. Amber agreed to drop you off and pick you up.”
I smiled. I liked the way Maddie played. It was my turn next. I did not want to give him a chance to have a comeback. “I was thinking we should probably get you back to the house so you can get your overnight bag together.” Dominick did not say much after that, he knew he was cornered. On our way back to the house to get his stuff, once at the house and all the way to his friends’ house, he went back and forth with me and himself about if he really wanted to go or not. He just did not realize he had no choice in the matter. Even though on some nights I have sneaked out of the house, leaving him home asleep to check on Maddie, I always keep a mental check on his being to make sure he was all right. Tonight, I need to grab a bite to eat, and I would prefer not to use my abilities too much while I re-energize myself. The slumber party will not only be fun for him but it will be a food break for me.
He is still seated in the car. I, at a very quick human pace, have climbed out of the car and moved around to the passenger side door to open it. “Dominick, they’re your best friends and it’s their birthday. You’ll have lots of fun. I promise you. Now get out of this car before I pull you out.” My threat has left him wide-eyed. He hesitates for twenty-four seconds before he starts to unfasten his seatbelt. I learned from the first visit that when traveling with children you need a bigger car, well, at least a car with a lot of trunk space. Walking to the trunk of the Mercedes, I pull it open and start to empty the items. First, his sleeping bag, next his pillow and book bag, and finally, I reach in the back corner of the trunk and remove the two presents I painstakingly wrapped myself. I wanted the wrapping paper to be just right, and I did not trust the sales associates to do it. After three tries, I got everything lined up and even just the way I wanted it. “Here, don’t forget these.” Dominick gasps before reaching out for the gifts.
“How did you know? I mean, thank you, Amber! You’re the best.”
“Anytime, now go have fun. I’ll be back at one tomorrow to pick you up.”