“They say it’s a mistake to mix business and pleasure.” Her mother tore open a pack of Sweet’n Low and poured it into her coffee. “If you see him again though, ask him if it’s true this stuff gives you brain tumors.”
“Sure, Mom. Why don’t I call him right now?” Catherine poured coffee for herself. If her mother’s endless obsessing about health matters didn’t irritate her until she wanted to scream, it would be comic. “Anything else you’d like me to ask him?”
“Don’t be sarcastic. Someone has to worry over these things.”
“So give someone else a turn.” The fear that she, herself, had the same genetic predisposition, scared her. Gary was always accusing her of worrying too much and then he’d give her something to worry about. Like threatening to take the kids. She shivered in the cold kitchen, got her fuzzy slippers from the bedroom and turned up the heater so the place would be warm when the kids got up. Then she busied herself at the sink where her mother couldn’t see her face as she thought about Martin.
Okay, he was attractive and no matter why he’d asked her to dance, she’d enjoyed it. In fact the memory still made her hot inside. And even though he’d first struck her as cold and unfeeling, he obviously cared about WISH. And a man who cared about children could definitely find his way into her heart. And she loved the way his accent faded in and out so that even ordinary words sounded exotic.
“Your washing’s done,” her mother said. “You didn’t hear the buzzer go off? Maybe you need to get your hearing checked. Your aunt Rose on your father’s side was deaf as a post at forty.”
“I heard it, Mom. I was thinking.” Catherine dumped the whites into the drier, loaded coloreds into the washer. For a moment she stood and watched as the water sloshed over the clothes. But what if she hadn’t imagined it all? What if he asked her out and things went really well? What about the whole sex thing? Where would they do it? Her bed? And what about the kids? Would she tell them, or just go to his place when they were at Gary’s?
Oh for God’s sake, you spent a couple of hours with the man. Did he say anything about seeing you again? Did he put any moves on you? Even a little good-night kiss? And what was that Derek said about Valerie Webb? Need more reasons? You’re still on probation at Western. Gary’s trying to get custody of the kids. Anyway, when have men ever done anything but screw up your life?
She went into Julie’s room, looked at her sleeping daughter, all tangled up in the Big Bird sheets. “Hey, sleepy-head.” She sat down on the edge of the bed, kissed her daughter’s soft, sleep-warm faced. “Rise and shine.”
After her mother left for a doctor’s appointment, Catherine went into action like a speeded-up 16 mm film. She woke Peter, ran another load of laundry, ironed Julie’s blue dress, took a shower and set out some clothes to wear. While the kids were getting dressed, she put on her makeup at the bathroom sink, double-checking to make sure she’d done both eyes. Then, just for the hell of it, she added a spritz of L’Aire du Temps and went into the kitchen to start breakfast.
“Mommy!” Julie’s scream rang out from the bedroom. “Get in here quick.”
“What is it, honey?” Fork in hand, her heart racing, she spun around. As she did, the floppy sleeve of her robe hit the bowl and sent it clattering to the floor. She stepped over the spattered pancake batter to find Julie standing on her bed, hands clutched to her chest.
“A mouse!” Julie squealed. “There was a gigantic mouse on my bed. Get it away, Mommy, I hate mice.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not too thrilled about them either.” Catherine’s heart went into overdrive. Mice terrified her, they always had. She dashed into the kitchen for a broom, then had another thought. “Let’s go see if Peter can catch it.”
Half an hour later, the tiny field mouse had been caught and dispatched by Peter who carried it by the tail to the end of the street and set it free, while he muttered under his breath about stupid females. The scare made Julie throw up on the dress Catherine had ironed and complain that she was too sick for school. She didn’t want pancakes and they were out of her favorite juice. Peter was wheezing again, and Catherine discovered that she only had black tights, which didn’t go with the red skirt she’d planned to wear. As she rummaged through the dresser drawer for another pair, the phone rang. Julie pounced on it, and Catherine heard her relay the mouse story.
“We never had mice in the old house, Daddy,” Julie sobbed. “How come they have to come to this house?”
“THE HOUSE IS NOT vermin infested, Gary.” Catherine downed her second cup of black coffee for the morning and glanced at the clock on the office wall. Seven-forty. Martin was supposed to meet her at ten. Gary’s call—as she’d walked into the office—had temporarily blocked all thoughts of Martin, but she had a job to do.
“Look, I don’t have time to talk about this now,” she told him. “I’ve… No, I’m buying Julie’s ballerina dress. I don’t care what Nadia promised her. We’re getting it tonight. So please drop her off in time for me to get to the mall. Peter, too. Six, okay? No later.”
She slammed down the phone. Today was Gary’s day to pick up the kids from school and she just knew he was going to somehow screw up her plans to take Julie shopping so that Nadia could save the day by buying the dress. Along with her kids’ affection. Anger and caffeine made her heart race so hard, she felt dizzy. Okay, she couldn’t deal with Gary stuff right now. Where was Martin? No, not Martin. Dr. Connaughton. She took some deep breaths, gulped down more coffee and wrote out half a dozen sound bites for him to use at the press conference. After that, she took her hand mirror from her desk, checked her makeup and paged him.
He still hadn’t answered thirty minutes later when Nate Grossman dropped by to find out how many stations were covering his announcement. Every station in town, Catherine proudly told him. Ten minutes later, he was back to inform her that a medical emergency had come up and he either had to talk to the press immediately or he couldn’t do it.
At nine, Derek came in and took over arrangements for Grossman’s announcement. Catherine paged Martin again. Ten minutes later when he still hadn’t responded, she was on her way up to the unit to find him when she ran into Ed Jordan who wanted to know whether she had finished the piece on his speech the night before. He would like to see a draft by four that afternoon, he told her.
There is a lesson to be drawn here, she thought. She pressed the button for the elevator. Never think you have things under control. The minute you think you do, you will, without a doubt, be proven wrong. Make that two lessons. Daydreaming about tall, blue-eyed Irish doctors is a bad idea.
MARTIN LOOKED DOWN at Holly. A tube, held in place with adhesive tape, ran from her mouth into her lungs. The tube was connected to a ventilator that kept her lungs open. More tubes in her umbilical cord carried water, sugar and other nutrients into her body. Electrodes on her chest measured her heart and breathing rates. Another on her stomach measured the oxygen that passed through her skin. Alive thanks to technology.
“Hey, Martin, there’s someone from public relations looking for you,” a voice behind him said. He turned to see Tim Graham, eyes crinkling above his surgical mask. “Seemed a little rattled. Something about a press conference at ten”
“Watch her legs.” His attention was on the baby. “Not much movement, is there? It doesn’t look too good.” Then Graham’s words registered. “Oh Jesus, the press conference. It went right out of my head.” As he started to leave, he noticed the white spot on Holly’s leg, left where his finger had been. It meant she was retaining too much carbon dioxide and not getting enough oxygen. Her color wasn’t so hot, either.
“Let’s bag her,” he told the respiratory therapist.
The therapist unplugged Holly from the ventilator, started pumping oxygen with a black rubber bag. Seconds ticked away. The baby’s chest heaved mechanically each time the bag was squeezed.
“Dr. Connaughton.” The unit secretary spoke at his shoulder. “There’s someone from public relation
s to see you.”
Martin watched Holly for signs of improvement. Any positive change would be a temporary solution at best. For now, all they could do was buy time.
“Dr. Connaughton. She said it’s urgent.”
“Let’s see how she does.” He watched the baby for another minute, then turned suddenly, startling the secretary who had her hand raised to touch his shoulder again. He pulled his surgical mask around his neck, went out to find Catherine. She stood in three-quarter profile, a cellular phone to her ear, long brown hair pulled back with a gold barrette.
Whether it was lack of sleep or too much on his mind he didn’t know, but he couldn’t focus. Jumbled images flashed through his brain. Holly with her panoply of hardware. Her fool of a father with his cowboy boots. Catherine’s green eyes, her hair brushing his face as they’d danced last night.
Life was like a kaleidoscope. All the different pieces fall into place to make a pattern. Then a slight movement and some of the pieces change and a new pattern begins to emerge. Another movement and… Catherine looked up and saw him. The spots of color on her face matched the red of her blazer.
“DEREK, I KNOW they’re all waiting.” Her heart racing, Catherine looked away from Martin. “I’m up here in the unit with him right now.” A pause. “Yes, I know that. Look, I’ll be down in just a minute. Okay?” Another pause. “I know that. Bye.” She flipped the phone closed.
“Dr. Connaughton,” she said. “You have a press conference in five minutes.”
“Right.” He ran his hand across his face. “The press conference.”
“Don’t tell me you forgot.” She smiled her PR smile, wide but short on sincerity. “We were supposed to meet at ten. It’s five to.”
“Right,” he said again. “Look, I’m sorry, I don’t think I…tell me what you want me to say.”
What did she want him to say? Catherine put her hand on the small of his back, then withdrew it as if scalded. No touching. Touching was trouble. They started for the elevator. What did she want him to say?
“Just answer their questions,” she finally managed to say. “Try to avoid medical jargon. Get in a plug for Western if you can.”
In the elevator going down to the conference room, she tried to deliver a media crash course, but kept losing her train of thought. Martin, his back against the wall, seemed oddly detached, as though part of him was still up in the unit. They got off the elevator, headed down the corridor at a fast clip.
“Don’t let them intimidate you.” She continued her tuition. “Don’t answer questions you don’t know the answers to.”
“Such as?”
Such as, why didn’t you kiss me last night? Did I really read you wrong? Such as, can I possibly act normal around you? Such as, what would I do if you tried to kiss me now? She bit her thumbnail. Martin pulled her hand from her mouth.
“Listen, Catherine. About last night—”
“Okay, here’s a hypothetical question…” She fixed her eyes on Martin’s face. Last night didn’t exist. Your interest in this man is purely professional. “A hypothetical question,” she said again. “Such as… ‘Are all the babies going to make it?’ Well, that was a bad example, we know they will all make it, but—”
“Actually, that’s not true. I’m not at all sure Holly will make it.”
She looked at him, suddenly focused. “The father was really upbeat when I saw him this morning. In fact, he was talking about some surgery that Grossman wants to do.”
“The father’s an idiot. Surgery isn’t going to save her life.” His face darkened. “It’s going to bloody well condemn her to life.”
“Martin…” All other thoughts eclipsed by his remark, she closed her eyes for a moment. “Please, please, don’t say that. Look, everyone is saying this surgery is the one hope Holly has. Jordan’s calling it a chance at a miracle. In fact, that’s the theme of our publicity campaign.”
She watched his face. Eyes dark now, troubled. He inhaled, slowly let out his breath. From inside the conference room, she could hear the muffled voices of the press. The chirp of beepers. A phone rang somewhere.
“I’m sorry, I can’t do it,” he said. “Yesterday, you told me all I had to do was talk about delivering the babies and do an update on their condition.”
“But that was yesterday. Before Dr. Grossman decided that Holly was a candidate for surgery.”
“The surgery is a publicity stunt. It can’t possibly help her.”
“The parents are really upbeat about this, though. Especially the father. I mean, put yourself in their place. I know you don’t have children so—”
“So I couldn’t possibly understand?”
“I didn’t say that.” Startled by the anger in his voice, she frowned at him. “All I’m saying is, maybe you’re wrong about the benefits of surgery. This is a new procedure, it hasn’t been tried yet. Medicine is art not science, right? Maybe it will help Holly.”
“It won’t help Holly.”
She took a breath, trying for calm, but she could imagine the expressions on the faces inside when she told them Dr. Connaughton would have no statement.
“Look, I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t want to do this in the first place, I just agreed because…because of you, quite frankly.”
“And I’m asking you to help me again.” Her heart raced. “There’s a lot riding on you doing this.” Like my job, for instance. “I don’t know what else to say except that I really need you…need your cooperation.”
For a moment, they stood together in the dimly lit corridor. She couldn’t tell whether she’d managed to convince him, didn’t know what she’d do if she hadn’t. Then something flickered in his eyes.
“You owe me one, Catherine,” he said.
TWO MINUTES LATER, still in his green scrubs, Martin stood before a bank of microphones in the administrative conference room. Nervousness knotted his stomach, his mouth felt like cotton. The feeling reminded him of a piano recital he’d been in as a boy. He wanted to do well, but wasn’t sure he could get all the notes right.
He located Catherine in the sea of faces. Arms folded across her chest, a frown of concentration creasing her forehead. As they’d stood together in the dimly lit corridor, she’d looked up at him through her lashes, and he’d seen the ghost of Sharon and had known right then that he couldn’t let her down. I need you. He had to get a grip. He ran his hand across his face. Catherine wasn’t Sharon. And now he was ready to sell out his principles.
A reporter who wore a cluster of tiny red Christmas bells at each ear asked him to describe his feelings as he’d delivered the babies. Another asked if he’d been nervous. Someone else wanted to know whether he’d ever done anything like this before. Eventually, the questions moved on to the status of the babies’ health.
“Berry and Noelle are doing well,” he said. “We’ll probably be able to get them off the ventilators and have them breathing room air very soon.”
“How about Holly?”
“Holly’s condition is a bit more serious.” Stopped by the understatement, he tried to gather his thoughts. “None of her systems—her lungs, her heart, her kidneys—are functioning well. Each one places a strain on the other. She’s also at risk for a number of complications, any one of them potentially life threatening.”
“You don’t seem particularly optimistic, Dr. Connaughton.”
“It isn’t a question of optimism. At this point with Holly, it’s too soon to tell.” He started to feel a little frantic. How many variations could he come up with on the same theme? “We’re racing against the clock, but we don’t really know the deadline. What we do know is, if she doesn’t start to do better after a while, she probably won’t.”
“Well, let me put it this way,” the reporter interrupted with a frown. “Dr. Grossman and Holly’s parents both seem considerably more upbeat about her prospects—”
“Dr. Connaughton.” Another reporter waved her hand. “About the surgery Dr. Grossman is proposing for Ho
lly? Some medical experts feel the dangers outweigh the possible advantages. What’s your opinion?”
Martin ran a hand across his face. His eyes searched the crowd for Catherine. Her smile had disappeared.
“Are you opposed to it on the grounds that it is considered experimental, Dr. Connaughton? What are your feelings?”
“Would you say your approach to treatment is more conservative?” It was the reporter with the Christmas-bell earrings.
“What I think,” he slowly started, “is that we need to accept the fact that some problems probably shouldn’t be treated.” He stared at his hands on the lectern. A pulse tapped in his eyelid. “I believe that we make a mistake when we look at every medical problem as a nail to be hammered away at with technology.” Lord, that didn’t come out right. He needed to correct it. “Just because we can do something.”
A bead of sweat rolled down his back. Again, he searched the crowd for Catherine. I need you, Martin. God, it had sounded so bloody fantastic. Even at the expense of selling out. Someone shouted another question, and he thought about just walking away and then suddenly Catherine was beside him on the podium.
“Sorry to do this to you guys.” She smiled at the reporters, “but Dr. Connaughton has an in-studio interview downtown, and I’ve got exactly ten minutes to get him there. We’ll have to get back to you later.” Before they could respond, she’d hustled him out of the conference room and into the corridor.
Outside they stared at each other.
“Studio interview?” he asked.
“I wanted to get you out of there.” She nodded her head in the direction of the conference room. “Look, they’re going to be swarming out of there any second now. It might be more convincing if we weren’t hanging around here.” One hand lightly held his arm. “We can go up to my office. You look as though you could probably use some coffee.”
The Doctor Delivers Page 8