The Life Saver

by Lilian Darcy

  Fine.

  Better, really.

  He'd leave a message on the voicemail in her room to say he couldn't see her tonight. He'd begun to find their evenings together a serious strain. She'd been urging him, 'I don't want you to make a decision yet, Rip. I'm not asking for that.' And it had begun to feel like some kind of stalling to him, even though she was presenting it as something they needed—that he needed in particular.

  Time.

  Time to think.

  He wasn't buying it any more. She'd always had the capacity to be manipulative when she thought she needed to be. He'd known that about her from early on. Of course he had. He wasn't an idiot, and he trusted his own perceptions about people.

  But he'd felt that knowing it gave him an armour against it. He'd called her on it sometimes, and she'd admitted to it, and the admission had usually pushed them onto a level of honesty that worked better for him. For them both, he thought.

  But he discovered as he drove home that he'd lost patience with the preliminary emotional game-playing. Why couldn't they get to the honesty without jumping through all those hoops on the way?

  Cut to the chase, Tara.

  There's something else going on, and I need to know what it is before we go any further.

  He called her hotel room as soon as he got in the door of his house, but wasn't surprised that she didn't pick up. 'I have to cancel dinner, but call me back as soon as you get this,' he told her. 'I want to talk. Not in person. The phone will do fine. But I want to talk tonight. Late isn't a problem. I'll wait up.'

  Hours passed, however, and the phone didn't ring.

  CHAPTER TEN

  By ten-thirty, when he would otherwise have been heading to bed in advance of a six-in-the-morning alarm, Rip began to get seriously concerned. Surely Tara must be back in her hotel room by now? His message had been firm and unequivocal.

  Call me.

  And she hadn't.

  Could something have gone wrong?

  He'd worked in a hospital emergency department in the past, and he never made the classic mistake of thinking, It couldn't happen to me. On certain terrible occasions, the reason why someone you cared about didn't call you back was because they couldn't.

  They were frantically arranging flights to get across the country to a dying parent before the end came. They were unconscious in the OR. Their car had plunged through a highway barrier down a hair-raising slope, where no one would find it until morning.

  By eleven, the silence of the phone had gotten to him, and he couldn't stand the inaction any longer. He grabbed keys and jacket and got in his car. He'd check the parking lot at Tara's hotel first, and then if she wasn't there...

  If she wasn't there, then what?

  Call the local hospitals?

  Search the highway verges and lay-overs?

  Was that why he'd chosen the SUV?

  Ridiculous. He was hardly likely to be going off-road, and conditions weren't icy tonight. If she really was missing, he'd need to get the emergency services to instigate a proper search.

  The question turned out to be academic anyhow. Repeating his earlier cruise through the hotel parking lot, he found Tara's car almost at once, parked near the far entrance closest to her room, which was locked after hours.

  He knew why she hadn't called. It was a stunt she'd pulled before when she wanted to remind him of how much he cared about her. She would have checked her messages—she'd always bordered on obsessive about that, couldn't stand the thought of missing an important call. She might have been piqued that he'd cancelled dinner. And she would have heard the terse impatience and command in his instruction to call back, and she'd reacted against it.

  We'll just see if I'll call you right back, Ripley Taylor, after you've cancelled dinner with me.

  We'll see what's really important to you.

  Yeah, OK, so maybe he shouldn't have sounded so peremptory, maybe he should have gritted his teeth and gone ahead with dinner as planned, but he hated the combative approach she always used. Couldn't she have called back and covered the contentious issue of his peremptory tone and him standing her up via a civilised conversation?

  He sat with the SUV idling behind her vehicle for several minutes. Should he go in and confront her, generate an argument that would hopefully lead to a deeper resolution? Or should he call her bluff and go home and to bed?

  In the end, when he drove away, his decision wasn't about either of those things.

  'I'm worried, Jo. I've been having some bleeding,' Tara said.

  She'd appeared on Jo's appointment list again that morning, the last patient before lunch and not one Jo was keen to see. Tara, of course, had no idea what raw nerves she was chafing by her visit. She looked pale and dry-lipped and anxious, as well she might be if the bleeding was serious. Her pale, baggy sweater didn't lend her face any colour and emphasised her petite build.

  'Most women panic when they see bleeding during pregnancy,' Jo said, struggling to find a manner that was both professional and gentle. She'd been dreading this visit all morning. 'But it often means nothing. Is it heavy?'

  'Not at the moment...'

  'But it was?'

  Tara frowned. 'There was, um, yes, more of it during the night.'

  'Any pain or cramping?'

  'Um, yes, some, I think.' Her manner was odd. 'Would that mean something?'

  'It can mean the start of a miscarriage. Let me give you a check, and I may send you for an ultrasound, too, depending on how everything seems.'

  Jo sent Tara through into the treatment room, where a clean sheet covered the examination table and where Tara could unfold a second sheet to drape over her lower body once she'd removed her stretch jeans, shoes and underwear. Jo washed and gloved her hands, trying to get her feelings back onto an even, professional keel. Tara was ready and waiting just a minute later.

  The physical exam didn't take long. Jo laid one hand over Tara's lower stomach, where the expanding uterus would be, while using her other hand to check the cervix. It was thick and tightly closed. She took in a breath, ready to tell Tara that this was good news, but then the significance of what else she was feeling struck her.

  This wasn't the orange-sized uterus of a woman who was only around five weeks pregnant. It was way bigger than that—the size she'd have expected at the end of the first trimester, just at the point where the web of muscles across the lower abdomen began to loosen and a woman found that her clothes no longer fit quite the way they used to.

  Jo slid her hands from beneath the sheet, and saw only a tiny smear of old blood on her glove—less than she would have expected, given what Tara had said about bleeding during the night.

  Tossing the gloves in the bin, she told Tara, 'Everything's looking good. Very good. Almost no bleeding, and your cervix hasn't opened. Are you having any cramping at the moment?'

  'No, I'm OK right now.'

  'I'll check your breasts, too...'

  She gave the kind of manual exam she did when checking for suspicious lumps, and found breasts which again suggested a more advanced state of pregnancy than Rip's ex-wife had estimated. 'Are you sure of your dates, Tara?'

  'Oh. Why do you ask? Yes, I am.'

  'Because your uterus is bigger than I would have expected. I'm wondering if you could be further along than you think.'

  'There was a tiny silence, then Tara said, 'Or having twins!'

  'That's possible,' Jo agreed cautiously.

  'But you don't think so.' She sounded a bit uncomfortable, a bit impatient.

  Jo couldn't read her very well, and felt uncomfortable, too. Usually, a pregnant woman's emotions were pretty simple—wildly changeable, but simple. Tara's layered attitude seemed strange, and didn't help Jo to relax with a patient she hadn't wanted to see in the first place.

  'I think it's more likely that your dates are wrong,' she said carefully. 'You've been having some bleeding. Could you have mistaken bleeding around four and eight weeks ago as a period?'

  '
Is that the explanation? Is that why I've been feeling so horrible? I'm more pregnant than I thought.' Abruptly, she covered her face with her hands. 'That's even harder to deal with. Can I ask you again, Jo? Please, please, don't tell Rip!' Tara looked full into Jo's face, her big, dark eyes intense and beseeching. 'Even if there's a medical reason for it, because he's a colleague. I just cannot have him know about this!'

  'Won't he have to, eventually, if you're staying in Harriet?' Jo answered gently. 'You'll start to show soon.'

  'I need to think. I'm not sure if I am staying in Harriet, to be honest. That depends on... Well, Rip and I are talking about it. Are we done now? Is there any treatment I need...or anything?'

  'Just take it easy, that's all. Rest as much as you can. At three months, the most usual danger period for miscarriage is past, and after checking you out I'm not too concerned. But it never hurts to take things easy. And I'm going to send you for an ultrasound to confirm your dates, so I'll give you the paperwork for that.'

  She stepped back into her office, printed it off and gave it to Tara.

  'Thanks. I'll be in the cafe. Can you tell him that? If he needs to see me?'

  'He still has a patient or two...'

  'Right. So tell him where I am, but please don't let him know that this was another professional visit. I'm not sure about your ethical obligations to a colleague, but...'

  'Of course I won't say anything,' Jo said, feeling uncomfortable about Tara's insistence and about her narrowed eyes fixed on Jo's face.

  'No, I'm sure you won't,' Tara murmured, after a moment. She controlled a sigh.

  'I'll leave you to get dressed now,' Jo said, knowing she sounded awkward and not like a doctor with years of experience. 'And you can take this other door back to the waiting room whenever you're ready.' She indicated the second door that opened from the treatment room, and Tara looked at it, narrowing her eyes even more.

  'I never used to come in here much. Rip has his own treatment room, does he?'

  'Yes, the mirror image of this one, opening from his office, with another door back to the waiting room.' Jo guessed that Tara was once again concerned about the possibility of meeting up with him on her way out.

  'Thanks, Jo,' she said vaguely, still looking at the door. It wasn't fully soundproofed, and they could both hear Trudy talking on the phone at the front desk.

  'You're welcome.' Jo went back into her office and closed the door to give Tara some privacy.

  'Although maybe the privacy is more for me,' she murmured to herself.

  She'd found this visit from Rip's ex-wife even more unsettling than her first one last week. First the possibility of miscarriage, then the fact that the pregnancy could well be significantly more advanced than Tara had apparently known. Most of all, of course, the conflict of interest, underlined by Tara's repeated urging to her not to tell Rip.

  Be honest, Jo, dear, is it the conflict of interest?

  Sitting at her desk, she echoed Tara's earlier gesture and hid her face in her hands.

  No, it's just the conflict.

  This was an elemental contest between herself and Tara over which woman Rip would choose, and even though she hated to think of it in those terms, Jo couldn't help fearing that Tara held all the cards. The baby wasn't Rip's, but when he knew about it—as he'd surely have to soon, despite all Tara's attempts at subterfuge—wouldn't he do the honourable thing and step in to be a father to Tara's child?

  She felt miserable, tense, claustrophobic. Her lunch-break was due, but the thought of sitting here with the packed lunch she'd made this morning, or going along to the cafe where Tara would also be...

  No. I'll go home.

  She stood up, went to the door and then heard Tara out in the waiting room. 'Rip, hi!'

  His reply was just as clear. 'I still have a patient, Tara...'

  'I'm not here to— Never mind.' She blurted out, 'I've just seen Jo.'

  'Seen her?'

  'Look, I didn't mean to say that. It's...it's medical and confidential and between me and Jo.'

  Jo, who had opened her office door a bare three inches and was now leaning heavily on the handle because she wasn't confident her legs would hold her up.

  Tell him, Tara. You've just blurted out exactly what you told me you didn't want Rip to know, so finish the job.

  Ask him to meet you in the cafe so you can tell him, because this has to come out in the open, and I can't hang in limbo much longer the way I have been.

  But Tara didn't say anything more, and a few seconds later the street door opened and closed. She'd gone.

  When Jo marshalled enough impetus to leave her office, Rip was still in the waiting room, looking at his ex-wife's hurried progress down the front steps and along the street. He saw Jo at once—for the first time that morning, as it happened. Their comings and goings hadn't managed to coordinate until now.

  He must have read something in her face, because he frowned and stepped closer. 'You all right?'

  'Going home for lunch. Tense morning, and I need a break.'

  'Need a lunch partner?'

  She didn't. Not if it was Rip. Not now. 'Time to myself, I think.'

  He looked concerned, but didn't push. 'Maybe tonight.'

  She nodded. Maybe. 'Tara wanted me to tell you—I mean, you saw her just now, but she forgot to say it—that she'd be in the cafe if you needed to see her.'

  'Thanks. OK.'

  Do you need to see her?

  She didn't ask, just gave a couple of quick instructions to Merril and Trudy and went out the door. As it had been on the weekend, the weather was still bright, and the sky a glorious Vermont blue. She left her car parked at the side of the building and walked, needing the repetitive exercise, the fresh air, the space.

  Nina's house came into view almost as soon as she'd set off—a pretty little clapboard place much like her own. She thought about Nina, her courage and warmth, her enthusiasm for the kind of devoted parenthood that wasn't an easy role in combination with her illness, and wished they knew each other better. She was desperate for another woman to talk to.

  Could I?

  Download some of this?

  But how could I tell her how I'm feeling, and tell her about Rip, without bringing Tara's pregnancy into it?

  Reaching the house, she stopped outside the front gate, inner debate raging. If there was a way she could talk about everything in generalised language, no names attached, and avoid the subject of Tara...

  She didn't realise that Nina had come around the side of the house with Genie until the dog, prancing ahead, had almost reached her. 'Hi, Jo!' Nina said. 'Were you stopping by?'

  'I was trying to decide whether to stop by,' Jo answered. 'But I'm on my way home for lunch so it would have been a quick one. And I see you're going out. I won't trouble you for coffee, then.'

  'Genie's demanding a walk, and I've been sitting at the computer all morning, so she didn't have to argue too hard. Cody's started his day-care—he's almost forgotten the hospital already—and Alice is in school, so my good girl is bored. I'll let her off the leash for a minute while we talk.'

  She bent down, and the dog seized on her new freedom and began to explore some complex scent trail that apparently wound around the sidewalk like a child's scribble pattern. Jo knew that if Genie had sensed an imminent seizure, she would have stayed much more closely by her mistress's side.

  Even though it was only a few minutes of small talk, the conversation grounded Jo a little, settled her jumpy nerves.

  I'll get through this, she thought. If Rip and Tara do pick up their marriage again, I still have options. If it gets too hard, I can leave Harriet. It wouldn't be an impossible transition and I wouldn't be letting Rip down. We'll have Shelley on board by then.

  The new doctor was due to arrive any day, to start settling her little family in before she officially began work next Monday.

  'Really nice meal the other night,' Nina was saying. 'Sandy got me inspired to try something crafty.'
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br />   A battered old pick-up truck turned into the street, higher up the hill. It had taken the corner a little too fast, Jo registered.

  'Yes, inspirational is the word when it comes to Sandy,' she said to Nina. 'Don't ever try telling her you don't have an eye for design. She'll just tell you that you haven't yet tapped into—'

  The pick-up was still coming too fast, and it wasn't in the right place on the road. It was going to run up the kerb. The whole thing happened in a second, too fast for any creature to move. The tyre hit the cement with a bone-jarring bump. Nina screamed. Genie was no more than a messy blob of black, right in the shadow of the big vehicle's wheel. Jo heard a high-pitched, horrible yelp and her stomach gave a sickening sideways jolt.

  The pick-up lurched away, back onto the road. Its brakes wrenched on and it stopped at an angle, its suspension rocking with the suddenness of its halt. Nina was screaming and running for her dog, who was moving, Jo registered. Moving strangely. Alive, then. Badly injured?

  'Genie! Genie! Oh, dear God, Genie! Oh, God, is she hurt?'

  'Oh, hell, what have I done? What did I do?'

  The driver of the pick-up had jumped from his vehicle, leaving it still in the road, where another car nosed cautiously around it and on up the hill, the young female driver not deeming it necessary to stop.

  The man—quite old, thin white hair—ran towards Nina and her dog, cursing himself and almost sobbing. At the kerb, he fell, but sat up at once, writhing and clutching his ankle...and his chest.

  And even though it felt wrong, Jo knew that as a doctor she had to choose the human being over the dog.

  'Yes, your temperature's very high, Bill, 103 degrees,' Rip told Harry Brown's dad, forcing his concentration.

  Don't miss something important, he told himself, just because you're thinking about Jo.

  Like hers did, his office faced the street and he'd seen her walking past on her way home for lunch. She hadn't taken her car, which was parked in one of the reserved spaces on the other side of the building.

  Bill Brown had booked a double appointment this morning, for his son's continuing daily blood test and check-up and because he himself was sick. Harry's blood tests continued to show an improvement in his platelet count, and Rip had found no evidence of further bleeding in the five-year-old. At the moment, Harry was playing with the toy-box that Rip kept for kids, and you would never have known how recently his life had hung so precariously in the balance.