A violent fuchsia sun was just visible at the tip of the trees to the east.
Daybreak, at last.
The asphalt of the parking lot was wet. Lavender steam rose up in pockets around them like ghostly bouquets. Gerome was on his side, his head in Maggie’s lap.
She was doing something with her hands, running them up and down his body. Any other day, any other setting, and this might have seemed normal. Just his wife giving the family dog a little shoulder massage while he slept. Mark wished they were back home, back in their apartment, in Chicago. He wished the asphalt was their Oriental rug and the hotel was just a wall. He wished the minivan was their sofa, and he wished what Maggie was saying right now was, “Bring me some coffee, will you? I don’t want to disturb Gerome while he’s sleeping so peacefully.”
But that’s not what she was saying. And the would-be urban setting of his imagination fell away, and he was back again squarely and cruelly in a parking lot at daybreak, his wife yelling up at him. “In the car,” she was saying. “In the glove compartment. Get me my kit.” He didn’t know why he wasn’t moving, but he wasn’t. Not yet. “Mark,” she said. “Goddamn it.” She smacked him in the calf. “Get my kit. Do it now.” Her other hand was still on Gerome, still performing some terribly clinical massage. The dog yapped and opened his eyes. They gazed upward at Mark. The look of confusion was galling. “Go,” said Maggie again, and now Mark did go. He ran to their car, unlocked the passenger side, swept the contents of the glove compartment to the floor, and picked out the medical kit. Had he known such a thing existed? Had he known that Maggie kept it there? But when had she put it there? And when, before putting it there, had she taken the time to put the kit together? There was so much he hadn’t thought of, so much he hadn’t taken into account.
He ran back to Maggie. Her right hand was stationary, pressing hard on the dog’s side.
“What now?” said Mark. “Tell me what to do.”
“In the side pocket,” she said. “The one with the zipper.” She looked up. “Yes, that one. There are two needles. Do you see?”
He unzipped the little side pocket. “There’s no blood,” he said. “That’s good, right? He’s in shock, right? That’s it?”
Maggie ignored him.
“Read the baggies,” she said. “Do you see the one that says Telazol?”
Mark held out one of the needles. He was somehow unable to read what it said.
“Not that one,” she said. “The other one. Hold it up for me.”
He held out the second needle.
“Yes, okay. Good.”
Gerome had started to pant. She leaned down and put her mouth to the dog’s ear. Mark couldn’t hear what she was saying. With her left hand she was stroking Gerome’s neck.
She sat up again and looked at Mark. “Open the package for me. I can’t do it with one hand.”
“You need this?”
“Open it.”
Mark opened it and held out the needle.
“What does it do?” he said. “Will it calm him down?”
Maggie took the needle.
“Good boy,” she said. With her free thumb, she rubbed at a spot on his front leg. “Good boy.”
She looked up at Mark. “Kneel down.”
Mark knelt down.
“Put your hand here.”
“Here?”
“Just there. That’s right. Just how my hand is.”
Mark did as he was told. The skin was hot and he felt—oh god—what did he feel? What was that protrusion under his dog’s skin? He looked at Maggie.
“He’s bleeding internally,” she said. She was so calm. She was so matter-of-fact. “Do you understand?”
Mark could feel the lump beneath his hand. Was it getting hotter? Was it growing?
“No,” he said. “I don’t think I understand.”
Maggie nodded. Her thumb was still rubbing at a place just behind Gerome’s elbow. “I’m going to give him this shot. It will calm him. Like you said.”
Mark found that he was nodding in time with Maggie, two metronomes perfectly in sync, though he felt several measures behind.
“Just to calm him,” Mark said.
“And to take him out of pain.”
“Good, good,” said Mark. “Good. Yes. Do it.”
“Are you still pressing? The pressure helps take away the pain too.”
“I’m pressing.” And he was pressing, and what he was pressing into felt like it was pressing back. “I think I can feel the leak,” he said. “I think it’s right here. Is that good? What happens next?”
Maggie’s head was bowed in concentration. She pushed the needle into Gerome’s arm, where her thumb had been. Slowly, she pressed the plunger until the top was flush with the barrel. Gerome let out a little sigh. Maggie set the syringe down. She stroked the dog’s ears. “That’s better,” she said. “That’s better.”
Now she reached for the kit and from it removed the second syringe.
“What’s that?” Mark said. “What are you doing now?”
Maggie looked at him. Had she been crying the entire time? It seemed to him that she hadn’t been crying before. Only now she was. Now that things were better, that Gerome was beyond danger and out of pain.
“Mark,” she said, tearing at the package with her teeth. “This will happen fast. Okay? This will happen very quickly.”
Mark was shaking his head now. “What are you talking about? What are you doing? He’s fine.”
“He’s not fine.” She was rubbing him again, awful circular motions, only now she was rubbing the spot above his heart. A little sniffling sound came from somewhere on her face. “He’s bleeding internally. There’s nothing I can do. There’s nothing either of us can do.”
She moved her hand from Gerome’s shoulder to Mark’s fingers. She squeezed them just slightly. “This isn’t anyone’s fault. Even if we were in a hospital right now, this would be the only option.” Now she had her hand fully on top of Mark’s, the one that had been pressing so purposefully on Gerome’s side. She squeezed again. “You can let go,” she said. “Love, you can let go.”
But he didn’t want to let go. He didn’t want it to end this way. This wasn’t right. He wanted her to fix him. He wanted her to make it better. He wanted to feel that strong heartbeat, which he realized now, beneath his open palm, had slowed considerably.
“Come around here,” she said. “Come here. Come be by me. Come talk to him. Let him know it’s okay.”
She pulled at Mark gently. He obeyed.
“When I put this needle in, when the liquid is gone, it will happen fast,” she said.
Mark cupped his hand around the dog’s ear.
“Nod so I know you understand,” she said.
He nodded.
“This one goes into his heart. It sounds painful, but it won’t be. He’s sleeping already. You see? So this needle goes in and then it takes fifteen seconds, that’s it.” She spoke deliberately, evenly. It was possible she didn’t know she was crying.
She put her left hand on Mark’s again and then around and under Gerome’s neck. She raised herself onto a knee and, with her right hand, guided the needle into the spot above Gerome’s heart.
The plunger moved down the barrel.
The liquid disappeared.
Maggie removed the needle.
All at once, she gasped, then threw the needle aside. She put her hands suddenly to her face and slumped into a little heap at Gerome’s side.
Mark sat there, helpless.