SETTLING IN
That evening, R.J. came home from the office to the rich smell of roasting leg of lamb. There was no need to announce that David had returned, she realized. If he had gone to the general store to buy the lamb, by now most of the people in town knew he was back.
He had made a wonderful meal, baby carrots and new potatoes browned in the gravy, corn on the cob, blueberry pie. She let him do the dishes while she went to her room and took the box from the bottom drawer of her bureau.
When she held it out to him, he wiped his soapy hands and carried it to the kitchen table. She could tell he was afraid to open the box, but finally he removed the cover and lifted out the fat manuscript.
“It’s all there,” she said.
He sat and held it, examining it. He riffled through it, hefted it.
“It’s so good, David.”
“You read it?”
“Yes. How could you just abandon it like that?” The question was so absurd, even she had to laugh, and he put it into perspective.
“I walked away from you, didn’t I?”
People in the town had various reactions to the news that he had come back and was living with her. At the office, Peggy told R.J. she was happy for her. Toby said reassuring things but was unable to hide her apprehension. She had grown up with a father who drank, and R.J. knew her friend was afraid of what the future held for someone who loved an addict.
Toby quickly changed the subject. “We’re about reaching saturation point in the waiting room every day, and you never get to go home at a reasonable hour anymore.”
“How many patients do we have now, Toby?”
“Fourteen hundred and forty-two.”
“I guess we’d better not take any more new patients once we reach fifteen hundred.”
Toby nodded. “Fifteen hundred is exactly what I figured would be right. The trouble is, R.J., some days you get several new patients. And are you really going to be able to send people away untreated once you reach fifteen hundred?”
R.J. sighed. They both knew the answer. “Where are the new patients coming from, mostly?” she asked.
Together, they huddled over the computer screen and pored over a map of the county. It was easy to see that she was drawing patients from the far outskirts of her territory, mostly in towns to the west of Woodfield, where people had an extremely long trip to get to a doctor in Greenfield or Pittsfield.
“We need a doctor right here,” Toby said, placing her finger on the map at the town of Bridgeton. “There would be lots of patients for her—or him,” she said with a quick smile. “And it would make life a lot easier for you, not having to go that far for house calls.”
R.J. nodded. That night she telephoned Gwen, who was involved with the task of moving her household three quarters of the way across the continent. They discussed the patient population at length, and over the next couple of days R.J. wrote letters to the chiefs of medicine of several hospitals with good residency programs, including details of the needs and possibilities of the hill towns.
David had gone to Greenfield and brought home a computer, a printer, and a folding worktable, which he set up in the guest room. He was writing again. And he had made a difficult telephone call to his publisher, fearing that maybe Elaine Cataldo, his editor, no longer was working there, or perhaps had lost interest in the novel. But Elaine came on the line and spoke to him, very carefully at first. She voiced frank concerns about his dependability, but after they talked at length, she told him she had suffered terrible personal losses too, and that the only thing to do was to go on with life. She encouraged him to finish the book and said she would work out a new publication schedule.
Twelve days after David’s return, there was a scratching at the front door. When he opened it, Agunah came in. She walked around and around him, pressing her furry body against his legs, reclaiming him with her scent. When he picked her up, her tongue lapped at his face.
He petted her for a long time. When finally he set her down on the floor, she walked through every room before she lay down on the rug in front of the fireplace and went to sleep.
This time she didn’t run away.
Suddenly, R.J. found herself sharing her household. At David’s suggestion, he bought and prepared their food, provided the firewood, did the household chores, and paid the electric bill.
All of R.J.’s needs were tended to, and she no longer came home to an empty house when her work was done. It was a perfect arrangement.