Passing Through Midnight (8 page)

He said something, but her eyes lost their focus on his
handsome face. Her head became too heavy for her neck. She rested it on
his chest.

Then she was in his arms. She looped an arm about his neck
to keep from falling. Then there was blackness and stars and cold air.
He said something about a bed, and she groaned. His timing was
terrible! She couldn't possibly go to bed with him now… Oh!
To rest… So foolish!

"No. Please," she said, lifting her head from his shoulder
with no little effort. The air was cool to her nose and clearing to her
mind. "Put me down. I'm… fine. I just needed some air.
I… Gawd, I feel so stupid."

"You sure?"

"Yes. Please. Set me down." He did, cautiously, as if she
might topple like a house of cards. "I'm really sorry."

"No need to be."

"Are you okay?" Fletcher asked, behind them all along.

"Yes. I feel like an idiot. But I'm fine." She was still
holding Gil's forearms for balance. The fog in her head was lifting.
She was breathing normally, and the stars had stopped spinning.

"I bet working with you in that doctor's office was real
exciting," Fletcher said. There was amusement in his voice.

"What?"

"Dad said you worked in a doctor's office."

"Oh. Right. Exciting," she said quickly. She wasn't
feeling like the sharpest knife in the drawer.

"Get her some water," Gil told him, his eyes never leaving
her face. And when the boy was gone, he asked, "Are you sure you're all
right? You're still as pale as a cloud. Come inside and lay down."

"No. Really. Please. I…" She laughed softly and
self-consciously. "I feel like such a fool. I can't believe this is
happening to me. To me of all people."

"Lots of people are squeamish," he said in an
I-don't-know-anyone-personally-but… tone. "I don't like
needles. I don't pass out or anything, but I get real uncomfortable.
That sort of thing just isn't for everyone."

"It is for me," she said, almost beside herself with
pent-up frustration. "I live for that sort of thing. I thrive on blood
and guts. I think I should go home now," she said, hearing Fletcher at
the back door.

"I'll take you." He was still trying to dial in on her
thriving on blood and guts. It might not be wise to let her drive home
alone.

"I have my car."

"Here's your water." Fletcher handed it to her. She took
several small sips for his efforts and handed it back to him. "I could
follow you guys in the truck."

"Any good excuse to drive, huh?" she said, teasing him,
her hands shaking as she tried to make light of the situation. "Sorry.
Maybe next time. I can drive. I'll be fine."

"I'm taking you," Gil said. It was a fact, no discussion
required. "We'll take your car."

"But…" He was helping her along with a
propelling hand on her arm, and that wasn't open for discussion either.
"But what about Baxter and Matthew. I should say good-bye."

"Good-bye," Matthew bellowed heartily, having heard her
from a few yards away. He and Baxter were leaving the barn and coming
toward them. He razzed her, "Come again, anytime, and we promise not to
make you sick."

"I'm so sorry about this," she said, turning to him.
"Dinner was wonderful, and then I had to go and spoil all the
excitement of the new calf."

"Don't you fret," Matthew said, placing a huge comforting
hand on her shoulder. "I suspect it's going to take you a while to get
all your strength back. There'll be plenty more calves born around
here. You haven't spoiled a thing. In fact, this is the first time in
months these two haven't fought about grades and a driver's license
over dinner. It was a real treat. You come back soon."

"Come back tomorrow," Baxter said. "You'll feel better and
the calf'll be cleaned up and walking and she won't make you sick
again. She'll just be cute."

She bent at the waist to speak to him. "She's cute now,
Bax. I'm sorry if I spoiled your project."

"You didn't," he insisted. Then wondrously he added, "I
didn't even know Dad could carry a whole girl like you."

She laughed. "Have you named the calf yet? Let me guess.
Ah… Emily or Elmo."

He laughed and nodded. "Baby Emily."

Gil reminded her of a twenty-pound salmon in a sardine
can, driving her home in the Porsche. His legs were a little too long
and his shoulders a little too wide for it to be a spacious luxury
vehicle for him… but then he wasn't driving it all that far.

He wasn't anything but polite and solicitous on the way,
but the little car was ready to explode from the stress and pressure
between them. He parked it in the garage and turned off the engine.

"Would you like a lift home?" she asked quietly.

He chuckled. "Thanks. But I think I'll walk." He didn't
move to get out. She didn't either. Neither was ready to call it a
night. "Can I ask you something?"

He probably could—but whether or not she
answered him or answered him truthfully had to remain a last-second
decision.

She didn't
feel
ready. She had no
answers in or about her life. She was still afraid to feel anything,
afraid she might not be feeling the correct emotions. She was afraid to
respond to another human being; terrified of the pain they could
inflict upon her. Even her attraction to Gil was something to be wary
of… very wary.

She nodded her consent, but he couldn't see it in the
dark. However, since she didn't decline his request, he turned as much
as he could in the seat to face her and asked, "How did you get hurt?"
. It wasn't the question she'd been expecting.

"I told you. It was a car accident."

"But
not just
a car accident," he
said, relying on his instincts. "Was anyone killed?"

"Me. Almost." She felt nothing with that statement, one
way or the other. "And some poor man who was in the wrong place at the
wrong time."

"What happened?" he asked, his deep rumble of a voice as
gentle as a dream touch.

He had no reason for asking the question, except that he
simply wanted to know. Had to know. An accident was an accident, right?
It was over, and she'd survived. What difference did it make
now?… save the feeling he had that it made a big difference
to her.

What happened?
How had it happened
?
she wondered for the millionth time. She'd sat up nights wondering how
it had happened. Speculating on the dynamics of it. Pondering the
choices she'd made that night.

Weeks of torment in a hospital bed. Nights of living hell
in her empty apartment. Long, lonely nights in the Averback farmhouse.
And the only conclusion she'd come to was that life had betrayed her.

"You didn't really send a gift, did you?" She could
remember her mother asking that question.

"They sent me an announcement. What was I supposed to do?"

"Just tell me you didn't send a gift."

"If you insist, but you know what a terrible liar I am. It
hardly seems worth the effort." She'd slipped her pen back into the
breast pocket of her white smock and handed the chart she'd been
writing in back to the nurse standing beside her. "I'll be in, in a
minute," she told the nurse. "Get those X rays stat. If they're okay,
we'll send the poor little guy home with his folks."

"I think you're crazy," her mother was saying on the other
end of the telephone.

"Maybe," she said, speaking again to her mother as she
watched an ambulance pull up in front of the emergency room doors. "I
pawned that ugly sterling vase his mother gave us for our fifth
anniversary to buy the gift. And, frankly, I think my being a good
sport about all this makes him look incredibly selfish and small."

"It makes you look like a fool. You should have sued him
for his last dime."

"I wouldn't have gotten it. I can support myself,
remember?"

"You should have hired a hit man." Dorie loved her
mother's mind. She admired the zeal with which she defended her only
daughter. "Blown that sucker away."

"The man wanted children, Mother. He was honest and
aboveboard about it. He didn't even cheat on me. You can't kill a man
for wanting children."

"Yes, you can. The two of you could have adopted children."

"He wanted his own children," she said, frowning as she
noticed the commotion beyond the glass doors. The doors of the
ambulance hadn't been opened yet. There were people milling about,
looking angry, pointing to the ambulance, shouting it seemed, though
she couldn't hear what was being said.

"But to leave you after ten years of marriage, just
because you couldn't conceive his children is… is…"

Dorie held the phone away from her ear while her mother
cataloged her vocabulary for just the right words, to get a better look
at the disturbance at the door.

People were shoving one another back and forth. The police
had arrived and appeared to be trying to disperse the crowd.

"Mother? Mom? Let it go. I'm trying to," she said, hoping
her voice sounded upbeat and resilient, despite the twinges of anger,
failure, worthlessness, and almost nonfemaleness she was experiencing.
"I still have a life. A good one. Doing what I love to do. I'll live. But I have
to go now. I'll call you tomorrow."

"You never do. I'll call you."

"Fine. Whatever. I have to go. I love you."

Watching the door, she absently cradled the receiver as a
second ambulance pulled into the drive, lights flashing, siren
screaming. The crowd grew more restless. The electric doors would open
and close as feet crossed the pads outside. Weeping, angry shouting,
screams.

She was drawn to the doors and the turmoil on the other
side. On-duty nurses, a resident, and a couple of interns had already
stepped out to help admit the patient in the first vehicle. Some were
moving to the second. There was plenty of help out there. Still the
doors on the ambulances hadn't opened.

"What the hell's going on out there," she asked a nurse
who was hurrying in from the chaos.

"I'm calling security, and then I'm calling for more cops.
There's going to be a riot out there."

"What's happening?" she asked, experiencing a familiar
adrenaline rush. The fear and excitement were a part of this job she
loved so much, a part of who she was. As a doctor she could have chosen
from any number of specialties and made a career. But as Dr. Dorothy
Devries, she couldn't imagine being anything other than an Emergency
Room Specialist. Ready for anything—and usually getting the
worst of it.

"That's the stab wound they called in, and the other one
is a gunshot wound from the same incident," the harried nurse told her,
waiting for someone to answer her phone call. She spoke quickly and
clearly into the receiver, hung up, and dialed a new number saying, "One of those stupid gang things. One of them stabbed
another, then that guy's buddies shot him. And the families from both
sides are here. Kids in colors. Hello? No! Don't put me on hold! This
is West Side General. There's been a gang-related incident…"

Dorie looked back at the door. The soundless sights of
tension and hatred had escalated.

"Those kids'll bleed to death in the ambulances if they
don't let them out," she said, thinking aloud.

"Tell them that," the nurse said, waiting for something on
the phone, her eyes darting fearfully back to the wide glass doors.

"I will," she said, marching toward the doors.

There were police officers everywhere, and medical
personnel. It didn't occur to her to be frightened for herself. After
all, she was a doctor. She hadn't stabbed or shot anyone. She saved
people's lives. The crowd wasn't after her. And there was no reason she
could see, why they couldn't get the two boys out of the ambulances and
into the emergency room for treatment, while everyone else fought among
themselves outside. It seemed so elementary.

"Let me through here, please," she said, pushing and
shoving her way to the first ambulance. "Someone come help me here.
We're getting these boys inside. Now."

"Leave him. He's gonna die," said a very tall, very thin
man with long, dark hair and eyes so full of hate that Dorie averted
hers and kept pushing her way through the mob.

"Form a blockade or something," she shouted as she caught
one officer's attention. "Some of you get to the other one. See how bad
he is…"

When she was face-to-face with two ambulance attendants
who had themselves glued to the back of the van, protecting it, she
reached for the handle.

"Forget it," she heard the words as she felt the hands
pushing her sideways away from the door. She staggered, righted
herself, and turned to face a young man whose expression was so
distorted with anger, he looked almost demonic.

"He killed my cousin. He's gonna die. Right here. Tonight."

"Not if I can help it," she said, more angry at being
challenged than at being shoved by him. "Move aside."

"No way." He pushed his chest and neck up against her
face. She pushed back with her hands. "His homies shot my brother." He
pointed to the other ambulance. "Help him. This one's gonna die."

"Get out of my way. We're going to save them both. Move
it!" she shouted over the din of other hateful voices, shoving him away
with her shoulder like a one-hundred-and-thirty-two-pound tackle for
the Bears.

"You touch him, you die, bitch."

She could remember thinking that his statement was so
absurd, she wanted to laugh. She was too mad to laugh, of course, but
it was so much like you-spit-across-this-line-and-I'll-pound-you; so
much like some childish threat that he couldn't possibly carry out. It
was too ridiculous to consider. People didn't kill doctors. People sued
doctors. Doctors were liable for malpractice and neglect, not for
saving lives. It didn't make sense.

The crowd made sense to her. She was no innocent. She was
familiar with bigotry. She knew about an eye for an eye. She was
convinced that ignorance and hatred worked hand in hand with fear and
destruction. She felt sorry for the youths in the crowd who knew only
what they'd been taught; who were so hopeless, they had only death to
live for. She felt pity for the adults who knew only what
they'd
been taught; who were caught in an endless cycle of fear, hatred, and
death, the vortex of which was pulling them and their children and
their children's children into oblivion.