Arnie pulled a wheelchair over.
“I don’t need that.”
“Does it hurt to walk?”
“Everything hurts.”
“Then ride in style, my man. Your insurance is paying for it.” Arnie gave him a hand hobbling into the chair. “Oh, Chuck said he and Cherry could get all these flowers over to your house.”
“Aw, that’d be great.”
“You’ve got more flowers there, by the way, all over the front porch.”
What could Dane say to that? He could only shake his head and feel as if he could cry again.
“So we’ll put her in low and away we go,” said Arnie, pushing Dane toward the door.
Going home, but without her. Dane could feel the bittersweetness already.
A lady in a white coat came to the door before they got to it. “Dane?”
Oh.He recognized her immediately: Dr. Margo Kessler, head of the emergency room, a lovely lady in a plain sort of way, somewhere in her late forties, with blond, neck-length hair cut in a practical, fuss-free style and running shoes for all the standing, walking, and running she had to do each day. She was there when the medics brought him and Mandy into the ER; she was there in the ICU when Mandy passed away; she was there through the whole thing, cool and efficient with her duties, warm and personal with her patients. “Oh, looks like I just caught you going out the door.”
“Slowly, but definitely.”
“I’m so sorry. I wonder if you might have a few minutes?”
“No problem.”
Arnie took his cue. “Didn’t they have some coffee down the hall?”
“Espresso, cappuccinos, lattes,” said Kessler with a smile. “They should be open by now.”
“My kind of place.”
“I’ll bring him down to you,” said the doctor.
Arnie stepped to the door. “Dane, you want anything?”
“Later maybe.”
Arnie headed down the hall.
“Need help?” Kessler asked, then helped Dane wheel back so he could face her as she sat in the room’s single chair.
He spoke first. “Thank you, Doctor, for everything.”
“You’re most welcome. And I’m very sorry things couldn’t have ended better. If you or someone could let me know what your funeral plans are—when you have them …”
“Well, it won’t be a funeral. I think I’ll just have a private cremation and then we’ll do a memorial service. How long does this organ procurement thing take?”
“That should be complete by now. I’ll check into it. And thank you.”
“Thank Mandy.”
“Yes. Thank Mandy.” Change of tone. “So. You’re heading for Idaho?”
“It’s where we were headed when we were hit. We made an offer on a ranch up there in Mandy’s old stomping ground. I’m going to stick with the plan, go up there, and close the deal.”
“Where in Idaho?”
“Hayden, up in the panhandle.”
“Are you retiring?”
“Well …” He would have had an answer for that yesterday morning as he and Mandy were packing the car: No, just looking for a change.But now, “Good question.” For the first time he thought about it in today’s terms. “We finished our run at the Horizons Hotel and we hadn’t booked anything else. We just wanted out of town, just wanted some time to think, pray, check out our life and where we were going. It was like a change in the seasons. We could feel it.” But yesterday’s dream was fading now; he could feel it turning away from him like a mailman with nothing to deliver. He was losing any reason to complete the thought even as he spoke it. “So it was time to move on, see what else there was. At least that was the plan.”
“Do it. Get that place up in Idaho. Spend some time there, and look at everything from a whole new perspective.”
Dane digested that a moment. It felt right. “May as well.”
Her chair must have been uncomfortable, the way she shifted in it. “Well I won’t keep you. Just wanted to see you before you left, see how you were and extend my condolences …”
“I appreciate it.”
“And … if I may put on my physician’s cap one more time. You have your meds and prescription from Dr. Jacobs.”
“Right. One or two every six hours, not to exceed six in twenty-four hours.”
“Very good. Only as needed, okay?”
“Right.”
“Because I need to tell you something.” Now she looked up as if the next thing to say was on the ceiling somewhere. Her hand drummed the arm of the chair and she drew a deliberate breath again. Dane felt nervous for her and for himself. “It has to do with the combination of medication and severe trauma such as you’ve experienced—are stillexperiencing. We’ve seen this before in rare cases, and since your case is very much like those cases, I wanted to give you a heads-up.”
Dane was listening, not yet following. Waiting, too.
Dr. Kessler finally continued, “Well, how has your mental state been? Let’s just get right down to it here. Have you had any nightmares, recurring dreams, um, flashbacks of the accident?”
He was glad she asked. “Yes. Every time I close my eyes and sometimes when my eyes are wide open. I slept last night because I was doped and that’s the only reason.”
Dr. Kessler nodded. “Mm-hm. That’s normal. That’s to be expected. But that’s why I’m bringing this up, so you won’t be alarmed. You see, especially in a severe post-traumatic stress situation, the stress and the injuries coupled with the medication can produce, um … delusional disorders, mild hallucinations, especially concerning the loved one.”
“I’m trying to stay with you here …”
“Reliving the accident?”
“Oh, yeah. Over and over again.”
“Expecting Mandy to come into the room …”
“I’m going to do that until I die.”
“You might think you hear her voice; you might even see her, or think you see her.”
Dane could imagine it, and he smiled. “That would be nice.”
Dr. Kessler matched Dane’s sad and whimsical smile. “I suppose, but it would be a hallucination and something we’d want to know about.”
“If I could take a pill that would bring Mandy back, if only for a moment …”
“Well, it wouldn’t be just the pill. There could be a head injury or a stress-related factor, that’s what I’m saying.”
Dane mocked disappointment … sort of. “Right.”
“So Dr. Jacobs may not have warned you about this, but that’s because it’s not listed in the literature and because hallucinations produced by this medication only crop up in severe post-stress situations, which is what you have.”
“So …”
“So if you think you see Mandy or someone who really looks like Mandy, or you think you hear her voice, anything like that, please let me know.” She gave Dane her card.
“Because if I see things and hear things that aren’t there, I might be crazy?”
“No,” said the doctor. “You might be in danger.”
chapter
5
By her second day at the Spokane County Medical Center, Mandy was willing to believe she wasn’t in the company of aliens—or any other creepy, time-warpy, Twilight Zonesci-fi creatures. The CAT scan machine looked as if it couldhave sucked out her brain, but it didn’t. A nurse named Carol took a sample of her blood, and that wasn’t weird—she used a real needle. Leaving a urine sample in a little jar was tricky, but she worked her way through it. She even got a few meals, a warm, clean bed, and good old down-to-earth questions about insurance.
Midmorning, June took her to a nice sitting room just off the main hallway, where sweet lovin’ Johnny the cop was waiting for her. She sat in one comfortable chair and he sat in another comfortable chair directly across from her so he could keep an eye on her.
Now, in addition to a modest pair of scrubs and a robe, she had slippers that slipped right on and slipped right off. She had to dig into them with her toes so they’d stay with her when she walked, but it was so much better than being barefoot, and as for the scratches and cuts on her feet, June had taken care of those.