by Lilian Darcy
'And there's a light,' Jo said.
She glimpsed it through the trees then lost it again.
Her stomach rumbled. It was after seven.
She and Rip should have been at his house, sipping a drink, while he... The image in her mind shut down as she realised she had no idea if he cooked, or got take-out every night, or ate peanut butter on toast.
Well, he wouldn't cater peanut butter on toast for a guest, even if it was just his professional partner, but the range of possible options stayed wide and she couldn't picture how their scheduled evening would have played out.
Not like current reality, for certain..
The light flickered back into view,, the trees seemed to part like spreading fingers and they emerged into a snow-drifted clearing.
'Looks like a decent place,' Rip said. 'And I can smell food cooking. Something with garlic.'
He brought his car to a halt right in front of the cabin, and they both jumped out. Bill must have heard the engine noise, because the front door had already opened to spill yellow light across the wooden porch as they came up the short flight of steps, moving almost at a run. Temporarily blinded by the darkness of night and a cloudy sky, Harry's father peered out, trying to identify his unexpected visitors. He was a solidly built man, at home out of doors, intelligent but stubborn, Jo had gathered.
The sight of him filled her with a mix of relief because he was actually here—he easily might not have been—and dread because of what they had to tell him. And the danger didn't end with the telling. Harry needed hospital treatment, and that was three quarters of an hour away from this place.
'It's Dr Taylor, Bill, and Dr Middleton,' Rip said. Recognition dawned on Bill's face as the two doctors reached the spilling light. Bill and Rip both stuck out their hands for a brief handshake. 'I'm sorry to spring a visit on you like this, but we couldn't seem to get hold of you any other way. You've got Harry here?'
'Eating his dinner. Spaghetti and...' Bill's face paled suddenly. 'His mother's all right, is she? No, they'd send the police for something like that. An accident, or— It's his tests. Is it his tests? Hell, I should have called tonight!'
'A problem did show up, yes,' Rip began carefully.
Too carefully. He'd given Bill's thoughts enough time to go racing ahead.
'For you to have chased us up all the way out here, after dark, both of you...' He sagged against the doorframe as if his legs were about to give way from under him. It was painfully clear how much his son meant to him. Rip stepped closer, alert to the possibility of him falling.
'He's all right, Bill,' Jo said. 'There's a very good chance he'll be all right if we can get him to the hospital right away, and get treatment started. He has an extremely low platelet count—'
'Why? Are you saying it's cancer?'
'No, we don't know yet. There are a few possibilities, most of which have good outcomes in most cases.'
'OK, so...' Bill's breathing was shallow. He wanted answers faster and clearer than Jo or Rip could give them.
'At this stage,' Rip said, 'we're more concerned about the possibility of dangerous bleeding.'
'If he hurts himself? You mean more of those bruises?'
'It could happen internally, without any injury. We want to check him and get him to the hospital tonight, get him started on treatment and tests, but it's been hard to track you down.'
'What kind of treatment and tests?'
'IV platelets to get his count back up, an aspiration of his bone marrow, immunology blood tests, to get a diagnosis. Look, let's save this level of detail for later.'
'You've talked to Vanessa?' Bill's breath steamed in the cold air, and he hadn't yet gathered his control enough to invite them inside.
'Yes, she gave us directions,' Jo said.
'Is she coming up? Did she say? He only sees her every couple of weeks, but he's close to her.'
'She's meeting you at the hospital. Now that we know you're here, we'll call the ambulance and—'
'I should never have brought him here, not till I'd heard about the tests. I thought the break might do him good, or I might get something more from him about the bruises if we were on our own. Hell, you know, at some level I almost wanted to think Vanessa's new boyfriend might be that kind of guy.' He shook his head, disgusted with himself.
'Don't think about that now,' Jo said.
'We're not in cellphone range. I was going to drive down and phone your office first thing in the morning. You have to get almost to Sherrington.'
Rip and Jo exchanged glances.
'I'll go,' he told her. 'Bill, Dr Middleton will stay here with you and talk to Harry about what's happening, answer your questions. I won't waste time on this, I'll head back down toward Sherrington now. With the ambulance station in Pagineau, it won't take them long to get here, but then Harry will have to go down to Duchesne County Memorial.'
'Come in, Dr Middleton,' Bill invited her vaguely, at last. Rip had already thumped down the steps to his car. 'They'd better drive fast, those paramedics... Harry?' He went over and hugged his son gently, hardly touching him, concerned about how fragile he was. Then he bent his tall body so that he and Harry were at eye level. 'Got some news, buddy, about those tests you had.'
* * *
The wait for the ambulance was tense, despite the inviting warmth and colourful clutter of the open-plan cabin. Bill managed to pack some things for himself as well as Harry, and Jo encouraged the little boy to finish his meal. While he did so, she gave him a quick visual check, and her stomach dropped a little further when she found that one of his knee joints was swollen.
'Does it hurt, Harry? Your knee's all swollen—is it hurting?' She palpated it gently—he was still chewing a last mouthful of spaghetti—and he nodded. 'Why didn't you tell your dad, honey?'
He shrugged, gave a crooked grin and said, 'Don't know.'
'You didn't think about it? Are you a little tough guy?'
'Dad says I'm tough.'
Jo could imagine Bill taking pride in the fact' also. While keeping a close eye on the child, particularly in regard to the mother's new boyfriend, he wouldn't have encouraged complaints.
'Let's put some ice on it,' she told Harry.
Bill arrived back in the room with their packed bags, and she sent him to the freezer for a packet of peas. The paramedics would have a better ice pack, and the sooner they got here, the better.
Rip arrived first, with the news that the emergency vehicle was on its way. 'Lights and sirens. They'd been having a quiet night.'
'That's good,' Jo said.
'Should only be about ten minutes. Maybe less. I'm going to head back out to the turn-off to direct them.'
'Car still skating on that snow patch?'
'Not now that I know when it's coming. I'll follow the ambulance back in.'
'Tell them about the snow, too.'
There was little that the paramedics could do for Harry on the spot. Getting him to the hospital as fast as possible was their top priority. Bill would be able to accompany his son in the back of the vehicle.
'Are you coming to the hospital, Dr Taylor?' he asked. 'Dr Middleton?'
Rip flicked a quick glance at Jo, and she gave a tiny nod. There was no real need or obligation for them to go, but she shared Rip's feeling that they should see this through, and that they wanted to, after the dangerously slack communication from the pathology service and Jo's own questions about how she'd underestimated the significance of the bruising.
'Yes, we'll make sure you're settled in safely,' Rip said.
'I hope Vanessa's there. If some after-hours crisis has come up in her precious department...'
'She was planning to drive up right away, I think,' Jo answered as neutrally as she could.
A family doctor couldn't afford to take sides in this kind of issue between divorced parents. Three feet away from Rip, she could almost feel him thinking what he'd voiced aloud numerous times over the past year and a half—thank heaven that at least h
e and Tara hadn't had kids. Jo couldn't help wondering if Tara ever saw their break-up in those terms.
He and Jo followed the ambulance as far as the end of the track, then it powered ahead of them along the much smoother and faster roads that led towards the interstate highway and then west in the direction of Burlington.
Still dressed in a neat business suit, with her blonde hair in a low knot on her neck, Vanessa was waiting at the hospital. Bill had gone straight in to the paediatric section of the emergency department with Harry and the paramedics, and had only just come out to the waiting area, to find her pacing there, with little idea of what was going on. Somehow the busy desk staff hadn't yet let her know that her son and ex-husband had arrived.
'You're here,' Bill said. 'Thanks, Nessa, for doing this. I mean that.'
She wasn't impressed, and her voice dropped to an irate mutter. 'I'm not here as a favour, Bill, I'm his mother. I've been pacing in front of this triage desk for nearly an hour, not knowing when he'd get here, or how he was, or what was happening. I've tried your cellphone at least six times, but you never switched it on.'
'Lord, sorry! I was too panicked to think straight.'
'They gave me one or two updates on the ambulance, but there wasn't much detail. He had some bleeding in a joint, they said. Is that serious? I'm a mess. I'm...'
Shaking, Jo saw.
Bill touched Vanessa's arm. 'Yeah, yeah, I know. I'm sorry. Of course you are. Let's go and sit with him. Can we do that, Dr Middleton?'
'Yes, let me get someone to show you through.'
'They've got the doctor coming down,' Bill told Vanessa. 'Couple of doctors, I think.'
At the ER nurses' station, Rip and Jo spoke to the paediatric resident briefly, outlining Harry's history, the bruising, the tests, the platelet count, the chase up to the cabin in the woods, and the way-too-casual reporting of the pathology service doctor that afternoon. This hospital did not use the same service.
'We won't be either, as soon as we can make a switch,' Rip said. 'This shouldn't have happened. We could have gotten him here four hours ago if the lab had had their eye on the ball.'
Four hours that could still mean the difference between life and death, Jo knew.
'Any signs that he has had a further bleed anywhere?' the resident asked.
'No, just the left knee joint,' Jo said.
'Still, we're taking no chances. We're going to get platelets into him right away.'
'But he's not safely out of the woods yet.' Saying it out loud made her heart kick, and she knew she had to let her fear go.
'Hey, at least he's safely out of the woods—I mean the actual woods woods,' the resident joked lamely.
'The isolated location was a complication we didn't need,' Rip agreed.
'So's my humour, people tell me. Let me see what we can do with this kid...'
He went back into the cubicle where Harry and his parents were now talking to a nurse. She had set up a transfusion of platelets, and the pathologist had just arrived, stopping to say a brief word to Rip and Jo. She would perform the bone-marrow aspiration right away, going in through the sternum where only minimal bleeding would result from the procedure.
'Are you OK?' Rip asked Jo, a few minutes later, on their way out to the car. 'I'd like to call the hospital later on for an update, but for now...'
'I'm still a bit jittery, but you're right, there's nothing more we can do at our end.' She spread her hands and sighed. 'I wish there was.'
'And it doesn't stop us from thinking about it,' Rip said.
'Is your likely scenario the same as mine? I mean, your diagnosis. I don't want to think about bleeding in the brain. I just can't!'
'Idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura. You're right, don't think about more serious bleeds.'
'The name of the ailment is a nice mouthful!' She gave a shaky laugh. 'His parents are going to love it.'
'That's if the immunology tests are negative and the bone-marrow aspiration shows a high number of platelet precursors. It would be the most common cause of a count that low, coming on so fast, and it's treatable.'
The cause of the condition wasn't yet fully understood. It was known to be an auto-immune disease in which antibodies attacked the body's own platelets. In older people it could be triggered by certain medications such as quinine, but in children like Harry the prevailing theory was that it was a post-viral complication resulting from an overproduction of antibodies.
Rip knew that Harry would need medication to suppress his immune response, and that he'd be kept in the hospital until his platelet count rose to a safer level. Probably over forty, which should take two or three days. He'd come back to their practice for daily blood tests to follow up on his platelet count, and if the level continued to rise he would be fine. If Harry didn't respond adequately, the next step would be the removal of his spleen.
Rip hoped they wouldn't need to go that far, and for now he let the whole issue go. You just couldn't obsess about a patient 'Who was out of your own hands and in the care of hospital staff, even when that patient was a child. Especially then, in fact.
Jo was still upset, though, he could see.
'Look, he's got platelets going in,' he said, and brushed a strand of her hair away from the corner of her mouth. She looked as if she might start sucking on it at any minute, like a twelve-year-old before a school examination. 'With every minute that passes, the danger is less. Let's find a way to make those minutes pass as quickly as possible.'
'Miracle worker! You can speed up time?'
'With both hands tied behind my back. No, but it's almost eight-thirty and we haven't eaten. Are we still up for dinner in Burlington? There's a nice place on the river, where we can relax and watch the water.'
'Oh, if it's the one I'm thinking of, yes. It's very nice.'
'And it lets my cooking off the hook.'
'Why? Aren't you any good?' she teased.
'I'm great with the basics, but it's fatal when I try to impress.'
'But that's OK, because you wouldn't have tried to impress me,' she decided on his behalf.
Wouldn't I? Rip wondered as he started his car yet again.
You mean I wouldn't have secretly dashed out during what was supposed to be lunch today to stock up on asparagus and filet mignon and cream and cooking chocolate? I wouldn't already have put wine in the fridge? And raced around like a crazy man, plumping up all those throw pillows, that Tara left behind?
His heart sank.
Do Jo and I know each other too well in all the wrong ways?
What is it that I'm hoping for here?
Jo seemed a heck of a lot more relaxed about it than he felt. Maybe she was still keeping her tension in reserve over the question of Harry Brown's health. Or maybe she'd taken genuine comfort from his reassurance to her earlier. He liked that idea a little too much—that he had a positive influence on her spirits.
When they were seated at the restaurant, taking a just-vacated table for two by the huge windows over the water, she studied her menu hungrily. 'Lunch was too small and too long ago, I'm telling you!'
'Order up big, then. It's on me.'
'Oh? Why?' Now she suddenly looked alarmed, and he remembered how scrupulous they'd always been in the past, on the rare occasions when they'd eaten out together or in a group, to split the tab.
This didn't quite explain the alarm.
Hell, does she think I'm going to expect payment in kind later on?
What an attractive idea, said the part of him that did its thinking below his belt.
. 'Because this was supposed to happen at my place,' he said. 'When obviously it would have been on me.'
Had he managed to hide how totally knocked for a loop he'd just been by the power of that very male, very physical fantasy?
'I'm not sure that I quite buy your reasoning, but thanks anyway. In that case, I won't order the whole Maine lobster, the truffles or the French champagne.'
'Jo, for heaven's sake, order what you like!
'
'Kidding, Ripley.' She took a slightly unsteady breath. 'Although I'm not surprised that you didn't pick up on it. I think we're both...kind of missing things with each other tonight.'
She made a little gesture with her index fingers, pushing their tips towards each other but letting them pass without touching.
Missed connections.
Different wavelengths.
Speaking a different language.
She looked over the fingers and smiled at him, and he almost...almost...reached across the table to take her hand.
Take it slow, he coached himself. Work out if you really want this or if you don't, because it'll be disastrous if you find out that you don't want it after you've made a move.
A move?
On Jo?
Lord, this wasn't a singles bar, and he wasn't in his twenties any more, the way he'd been when he and Tara had met. Wasn't this sort of thing supposed to get easier with age, maturity and bitter experience?
Apparently it didn't. Another illusion shattered.
'On second thoughts, though, French champagne would be nice,' Jo said slyly across the table.
'This time, I'm not going to let you get away with a claim that you're kidding, Dr Middleton.'
'Hey, no—'
'Yes.' He opened the wine list and deliberately chose something with a famous name and an expensive price tag, calling her bluff.
It was very good champagne, even though with a half-hour night-time drive ahead of him, Rip only allowed himself half a glass.
The food was very good, too.
And the conversation was great, because the food and the champagne helped them both to relax again. They didn't leave until after ten-thirty, and didn't get back to Harriet until eleven-fifteen. Beside Ripley in the passenger seat, Jo suppressed yawns all the way.
The suppressing was bad enough.
The apologising for the yawns was worse.
'I'm really sorry, Rip. That champagne made me nicely buzzy while we were eating, but now it's making me sleepy.'
'Shall I drop you home, then?' he suggested stoically, wondering if he'd ever remember how to feel sleepy again. Was she actively bored in his company, or merely relaxed? 'You can walk down in the morning, or I can come by and run you in.'