Chapter 47

“What was the name of that resort you went to?”

Sarah and Helen were shopping for baby clothes. Helen was due back to work in a week. Her maternity leave had flown by.

Sarah laughed. “I don’t know if I should tell you. Everyone who goes there ends up dead.”

“I’ll be dead if I don’t get some kind of vacation. I can’t believe I have to start right in on medicine wards.”

“Couldn’t they put you on something else?” Sarah asked.

“Unfortunately not. I used all my elective time while I was pregnant. I’m lucky I didn’t need to go on bed rest. Then I would have had to go back sooner. Or extend my residency. But it’s back to the wards for me. I think a vacation before I start would be good for Scott too. He’s about to be a solo dad.”

Helen pushed her double stroller between the racks, holding up pink and blue outfits and putting them back. “Too small. Too small,” she kept saying.

As she took out an enormous size eighteen-month outfit, Sarah gently put her hand on her arm and guided her to a chair.

“They’re not even three months old.” She took the dress from Helen’s hand. “They won’t wear this size for a year.”

Helen’s mouth twisted as she tried not to cry. “Look at them. They’re growing so much. I’m going off to work and they’ll get bigger and I’ll miss it all.” She wiped her teary eyes on a yellow bib with a duck. The twins were sleeping, leaning backward and tucked into blankets.

Sarah sat with her arm on Helen’s. Helen gave her eyes a final swipe.

“Look at me. I’m a mess. How am I going to function at work? My hormones are raging, my emotions are a roller coaster, I cry at commercials, I’m not getting any sleep. Look at these babies. I wish I had a stroller to sleep in like this. All I think about is sleep.”

Sarah laughed. She remembered feeling so tired once as an intern that she envied a sick patient lying in a hospital bed. “When do they start on a routine? Is there any semblance of a schedule yet?”

“Oh, yes, they have a schedule. They each have a schedule, and the two have no bearing on each other. They each sleep four hours straight at night, just not the same four hours.”

“How’s Scott doing?” asked Sarah.

“Now that he got them to take a bottle, Scott does almost as much at night as I do, so we’re both walking around like zombies this week. It’s hard to be pleasant on so little sleep. We just snap at each other. I think a change of scene would do us good.”

“I have an idea,” said Sarah. “I have a weekend between rotations. Why don’t I come with you and I can take the twins at nighttime, and you and Scott can sleep.”

At first Sarah thought Helen hadn’t heard. Then she started to cry again, and Sarah could see these were tears of joy.

They drove down together with Helen in the back between the two baby car seats. Scott was absolutely jubilant and had actually brought a newspaper to read in bed in the morning like he used to. Helen looked serene and said she was going to do absolutely nothing. Sarah was armed with chocolate-covered espresso beans to help her stay awake.

The day was bright and sunny but cold, typical for January. They heard the surf crashing as they got out of the car. Sarah smelled the familiar pine and salt. Helen inhaled deeply and said this was just what she needed.

The proprietor recognized Sarah immediately. “Welcome, Doctor. Who have you brought this time?”

Sarah laughed in spite of herself. Three visits in eight months. It did seem like a lot. And she didn’t even have children. She introduced Helen and Scott.

“Sarah’s spoken so well of this place, we had to come before I go back to work and my life is over,” Helen said dramatically.

“What adorable babies,” the proprietor said. “What a shame you have to go back to work. You can’t put it off any longer?”

“No, I’m a doctor like Sarah,” Helen said. “But I’ve lined up very reliable day care.”

Scott groaned.

They filled out the registration cards. The man read off Helen’s employer and asked Scott for his.

“None,” Scott replied tersely.

“Right, then.” The proprietor moved on quickly. “Emergency number?”

Scott looked at Helen who looked at Sarah. “We would probably put you, but you’re here. Who did you put?”

“It’s just in case of emergency, someone to notify,” said the proprietor. “People often put down a relative, parents or a sibling.”

“Nope,” said Scott. “No parents. No siblings.”

“What?” said the proprietor. “Neither one of you?”

Helen explained about how they had met.

“Jeepers, what a coincidence,” the proprietor said.

“That’s why I married him,” Helen said. Scott rolled his eyes.

“I meant it’s a coincidence because I’m an orphan too,” the proprietor said.

“Oh, wow. I’m sorry,” Helen said.

“Yes, well…” said the proprietor.

“Maybe put Frances Noonan on the card, like I did,” Sarah said, realizing that not one of the four of them had living parents. At least she had her brother, Tim.

Scott settled into the room with two sleeping babies, his feet propped on the windowsill, newspaper in his hands. Sarah and Helen set out for a walk. When they looked back through the large window from outside, they could see he had already fallen asleep in his chair.

“This will be good for us.” Helen sighed. “Also bittersweet. I can’t believe I have to go back to work. I even thought about an extension, but that would mean not finishing my residency on time. Aidan and Emily are so little. They need me. I need them. I want them.”

They walked slowly down the steep stairs to the beach. Gulls swooped into the sea, crying and chasing each other. The few rocks were crowded with sea lions, and they sat on two towels to watch their antics.

“Look at that one. He reminds me of Karl,” Helen said.

Sarah squinted into the sun. Helen was right. Same sloping tall forehead as their fellow resident, same underhanded manner as the sea lion tried to get the best spot in the sun. He’d start out innocently on the edge of the rock, but each time the ones toward the center shifted slightly or lifted their heads to look around, the “Karl” sea lion would nudge his large mass closer in, closer in, until the sea lions in the middle fell off the other edge of the rock.

“Look! They’re actually going after him. Not like us,” Sarah said. At the hospital, Karl broke the rules but continued to barrel along without redress. The sea lion community wasn’t so nurturing. They banded together and jumped back onto the rock and used their combined weight to push Karl off. Kerplunk. He slithered through the water, found another rock with another group of sea lions, and the process started over.

“We should take a lesson from them. Did you know that he was supposed to work New Year’s Eve? He called in sick with a migraine headache. I think he started his celebration early. They even called me by accident to see if I could work,” Helen said.

“Yep, I know. Guess who ended up working New Year’s.”

“No, not you?”

“Yes, me. It was actually okay because Andy was still out of town, so I didn’t have any plans. I’ll get repaid at some point.”

“How is Andy? I haven’t seen him in ages. I haven’t seen anyone in ages. That will be one thing about going back to work. I’ll get out of the apartment and back among real people, adults.”

“Andy’s fine.” Sarah’s heart skipped a beat, a happy skip, like it did when she first saw him every day. “He’s trying to put together his elephant book and work full-time at the newspaper, so he’s busy, but so am I, so I guess it evens out. He’s in New York this week talking to the publisher, showing them his initial layout idea.”

“Good for him. I hope Scott’s PhD goes as smoothly. If he somehow doesn’t get his thesis finished in time, I don’t know what will happen. Until we can afford some kind of child care, he’s all we’ve got.”

“Hey, speaking of finishing things, Mrs. Noonan told me Paul Blackwell finished his book, and his agent found a publisher. I guess that’s what happens when you have a lot of time on your hands. She says it’s really good, they got a pretty big advance for it. Not that he gets the money.”

“It’s so eerie. You met them right here,” Helen said.

“I know. I’m looking around to see what it could be about this place that might cause something like that. Twice. Remember about the Philadelphia case. Maybe there’s something in the water.”

“I remember now that you mention it. I’d actually forgotten,” Helen said. “Baby brain.”

They looked out at the ocean, blue today under the bright blue sky. The beach was in a small cove with high cliffs curved behind them. Waves lapped innocently on the protected beach but were monstrous against the cliffs on either side. A tiny rainbow danced in the spray. It was a powerful sight from this vantage point. They hiked back up to the top and stood gazing out again. From above, looking down from the craggy cliff, the crashing surf was frightening.

“I think the tide’s coming in,” Sarah said.

“Oh, my gosh, what time is it? I forgot to take my antibiotics for the mastitis. I’ve forgotten half the pills already. No wonder it’s not healing. Baby brain,” Helen said again.

“You’d better lose that baby brain soon,” Sarah said. “You have to go back to work this week.”

“I know, I know. I’m hoping it’s gone by tomorrow after my first full night’s sleep in weeks.”

“Good luck,” Sarah said. “But that means I might be the zombie tomorrow.”

“Maybe it’s lack of sleep that caused those killings. Maybe that’s the common thread.” Helen seemed dead serious. “You should see Scott and me going at it. Sleeplessness could make a parent snap.”