They returned to Biloxi at first light. Paul kissed Susan good-bye on her front porch, then spent a hectic day at his office catching up.
Luther took rounds that night, but after hours Paul slipped into the side door of the hospital and went into Mark Baxter's room. Tubes connected his small body to the medicines and machines that kept him alive. According to his chart, there had been very little improvement since his initial stroke. Paul took hope in the fact that he was showing some movement in his left leg.
Watching the rise and fall of Mark's fragile chest, he remembered how it had all happened. The Code Blue, the frantic rush to SICU. He recalled every detail with excruciating clarity, even to the way the scalpel had felt in his hand.
He had done everything possible for Mark Baxter, and in the end he had failed. As he counted back over the years, he knew that his successes far outweighed his failures. He understood, too, that no matter how brilliantly he performed, he couldn't win every time. Death had to have his due. And somewhere in the book of fate it was written that pain and suffering must exist. Doctors didn't get to choose the recipients, and that was a mixed blessing.
He brushed the soft hair off the child's forehead, then bent down and kissed his soft little cheek.
He left the room as quietly as he had entered, left with his head high, his hands steady, and his eyes turned toward the horizon. He wasn't a miracle worker, but he was a surgeon with a gift for healing. The gift hadn't deserted him; he had deserted it.
In the doorway he turned. "God be with you, Mark . . . and with me as well."
He needed all the help he could get. He intended to reclaim his gift.
o0o
When Jean woke up she discovered she’d been crying in her sleep. She turned to her side and hugged the covers around her shoulders. A red leaf broke loose from the sweet gum tree in her yard and drifted down to rest on her windowsill. She shut her eyes, and fresh tears rolled down her face.
The grandfather clock in the hall, an heirloom passed down through three generations of Tylers, chimed out the hour. Eight o'clock in the morning. There were so many hours left in the day . . . but only six before the anniversary of Sonny's death. One year ago at exactly two o'clock in the afternoon she'd been standing in the downstairs hallway talking on the telephone while a car came out of nowhere and killed her child.
Gasping for breath, she struggled out of the covers and fumbled on the nightstand for tissues. It was such a small sound, blowing her nose, but it echoed around the room, magnified in the emptiness of her house.
Oh, God, she needed someone. Reaching for the phone, she automatically dialed Maggie's number. The phone rang only once before Jean replaced the receiver. It was Saturday. Why should she ruin the weekend for Maggie?
A morning breeze freshened over the gulf and, turning inland, stirred the branches of the sweet gum tree. Another painted leaf drifted to the windowsill. She got out of bed and drew the curtains to shut out the sight of red.
In the bathroom she gazed at herself in the mirror.
Her cheeks were filled out, her hair had regained its gloss. She even had a love life ... if you could call what she and Curt did love.
She had become very good at pretending.
It took a while to adjust the water in the shower to her liking. When she got in, she stayed an hour, scrubbing and scrubbing.
She couldn't get the red leaves off her mind, and when she finally got out of the shower she didn't know whether her face was wet with water or soaked with tears.
Taking small, precise steps she made her way to her closet. She'd worn white wool to Sonny's funeral. The dress was buried at the back of her winter clothes. She pulled it off the hanger, then hugged it to her chest as she made her way to the bed.
The clock in the hall ticked off the time. Another hour? Sitting on the edge of the bed with the white dress clutched in her hand, she didn't keep count. Time had ceased for her the day she put her son into the ground.
Finally she stood up and dressed. She took extra care with her hair, her nails, her makeup. Sonny had always been proud of her looks.
She didn't want to disappoint him.
On her way to the car, she stopped in the kitchen, trying to decide what to eat. The decision was monumental and took her another thirty minutes. She wasn't hungry, but she knew she had to eat in order to keep from fainting.
At last, sustained by a glass of milk and two graham crackers, Jean got into her car and made her way to the cemetery. She sat in her car a long time, seeing the markers through the wrought iron gates. The last time she'd gone through those gates she'd been leaning on Paul's arm and following a tiny coffin.
Through the wrought iron bars she could see the monument they'd erected for their son, a marble angel with its beautiful carved face lifted toward the heavens. Slowly Jean got out of her car and walked toward the angel.
The breeze had picked up speed and chill. Standing at the graveside she shivered. Was Sonny cold?
A stillness came over her as she waited at the graveside, and after a while she felt as if she and the angel might have been carved by the same sculptor.
"Jean?"
Paul was standing on the opposite side of the grave. She hadn't heard his approach.
She merely nodded, for her mouth was too stiff to form words. He came around and stood beside her.
"I thought you might be here."
They looked at each other; then ashamed and guilty, they let their glances slide away. A lone gull soared in from the gulf and drifted over the marble marker, its unbearable whiteness gleaming in the cold October sun. Jean shaded her eyes to watch the gull's upward flight. When it had climbed high enough, it absorbed the blue from the sky and vanished, transfigured.
Oh, Sonny, my precious one, son of my womb, child of my heart.
"I said things I didn't mean that day, Jean . . . and afterward."
Paul was waiting, waiting for her understanding, waiting for her forgiveness. Even in her suffering, she was gracious.
"So did I, Paul."
"I'm sorry we hurt each other so."
She squeezed his hand, then let go. He was so warm, so alive.
They stood together a while longer, their bodies almost touching, their hearts miles apart. Then he kissed her cheek softly and walked away.
Relentless, time marched forward. The burning sun warmed the earth and stole the chill from the breezes. Leaves betrayed by the changing of the seasons were cast adrift by the trees. They floated around Jean and landed at her feet. One of them, its formation ravaged by the wear and tear of summer, fell onto her white dress and rested there, blood red, shaped like a heart.
She brushed the leaf away, then got into her car and drove home. Carefully. As if she could barely remember the way.
She opened the door to the silence of her house. Holding on to the railing she made her way upstairs to her bedroom. Then, still wearing her white dress, she went into the bathroom and took down her bottle of Valium.
o0o
The three of them sat on a quilt Susan had spread on the sand. Jeffy's laughter beat the air like the wings of birds. Paul caught Susan's hand and smiled at her.
"Have I told you how much you and Jeffy mean to me?"
"In a thousand different ways."
Beside them, Jeffy struggled upward. "Look, Paul. Only two legs," he yelled, squealing with laughter. His other leg lay on the quilt, the silver aluminum of the little cane burnished by the setting sun.
"Don't go too close to the water."
"I won't, Mommy."
She turned to Paul. "Dr. Freelander thinks he might be ready for surgery soon."
"Everything's going to work out fine, Susan." Paul squeezed her hand. "For all of us."
o0o
Later that evening, lying in his arms, Susan remembered his words. She rolled to her side, and propped on her elbow, gazed down at him.
"Paul, what did you mean this afternoon when you said everything was going to work out for all of us?"
Paul touched her cheek, then traced her lips with his fingertip.
"For Jeffy . . . for me . . . for you."
"For you and me together?"
He drew her down and kissed her. And the need rose again in them, bright and beautiful. If this wasn’t love, it was so close that no one could tell the difference.
Much later, they drew apart and he reached for her hand. She hung on, was still hanging on when the phone rang.
Alarmed, she glanced at the clock. Midnight.
He sat up with her and put his arm around her waist as she picked up the receiver.
"Susan Riley?"
"Yes?"
"This is Maggie McKenzie . . . Bill's wife."
A cold lump of dread settled in the pit of Susan's stomach.
"Is Paul there?"
'Yes."
"I need to speak to him."
Silently she handed him the phone, then watched long enough to see the puzzlement on his face turn to concern. Susan couldn't bear to watch any longer. She left the bed and walked to the window, keeping her face turned resolutely away from him.
She didn't have to hear Maggie's voice to know what she was saying. She was taking Paul away as surely as if she'd come into the bedroom, looped a rope around his neck, and dragged him off.
"I'll be right there," Paul said. The click of the receiver was loud in the room.
She hugged her arms around herself, waiting.
"Susan." Paul put his hand on her shoulder. "It's Jean. She's taken an overdose of Valium."
She felt as if all the life had suddenly been sucked out of her. White with fear, she turned to face him.
"I knew ... I knew when the phone rang."
"I have to go to her, Susan."
She searched his eyes and saw agony, studied his face and saw pain. Don't go, she wanted to scream, and then she felt selfish, selfish to the core.
"Please understand . . . she needs me."
“I understand.”
“Thank you.” He kissed her cheeks first, then kissed her on the lips. Already, it felt like the touch of a stranger.
"I'll call you," he said.
He left her standing with her back at the dark window, hugging herself and staring at the closed door. She'd forgotten to ask if Jean was alive or dead.