The Doctor's Tale Read online

  Lori’s wasted body slumped against the cane back of the wheelchair. “Eddie! I need Eddie!” She moaned and cried out. “He’s the only one that can get me into the car, and not make me hurt so bad.”

  “C’mon here, baby, let me get you into the front seat,” Eddie said. His rough hands gripped her frail arms, wasted from disease and inactivity. The dense pollen caused her to sneeze and gasp between moans. Her eyes rolled back in her head, like they always did when the pain got too bad.

  “Help me, Eddie! Help me!” It seemed to be all she could manage to say, over and over again.

  With the little hope that remained in his battered heart, Eddie wished he could help her. But this cancer, it was bigger and badder than both of them put together. He knew one thing. The Lori he knew and loved—well, folks—she was gone. He didn’t know where she went, and he was pretty darn sure he never would.

  “You gone be able to handle this, Mr. Eddie?” Nurse Potts’s gaze riveted on Eddie’s weary face, lined with worry. “You know, you could act a little more cheerful ‘bout all a this, hear? Your wife needs a smile from you. You think you can find one for her?”

  Eddie struggled to smile. “Sure I can.”

  “Well Corky, I’ll just have to take your word for that. ‘Cause you ain’t made me smile yet.” The nurse’s eyes narrowed with suspicion. “And you ain’t fooling me neither.” She hugged Lori and shut the door. “Ya’ll take it slow now, hear?”

  “I will,” Lori said. “Thanks for making me better.”

  She began to fidget in the passenger seat. “Eddie I need to get home. Rest in my own bed. I’m just so tired.” She glanced at the backseat, almost as if she expected to find Starr there, chewing bubble gum and filing her nails. “I feel so wasted. You know what I’m talkin’ about, honey?”

  Eddie gunned the engine. The Pontiac jolted into the narrow, pitted street, and Lori moaned in agony. “Sorry about that baby,” he said. “Keep your eyes on the road, just like I’m doing.”

  “Eddie?” Lori said. She stared straight ahead at the narrow city street, lined with rows of parked cars on both sides.

  “Yeah? You need something, baby doll?”

  Her voice faded to a whisper. “I need to ask you something.”

  “So? Ask away. But, you’re gonna have to speak up, Princess. I can barely hear you, the way you’re mumbling.”

  The stoplight turned from yellow to red. The Pontiac stopped. The engine idled. The couple waited in silence. Vehicles surrounded them on all sides—some with toddlers in car seats, others with repairmen in trucks, and still others with teenagers in souped-up fixer-uppers. Busy people running their busy lives.

  “So, come on, Lori,” Eddie said. “What is it?”

  Lori struggled to take a deep breath. “You know, Eddie… It’s just that… well, I’ve been wondering about something. It’s bothering me.”

  “So, what is it?” Beads of sweat glistened on Eddie’s face.

  Again, Lori inhaled and stifled a cough. “This morning, I thought I heard Starr call you Honey. I’m pretty sure I did, anyway.”

  From the pit of his belly to the tips of his ears, Eddie’s body tingled at the thought of Starr. “Lori, what are you talking about? You know how Starr is. Starr calls everybody Honey. It’s Honey this, and Honey that. She probably calls that Spezia guy Honey. Hell, I’ll bet money I don’t even have, that she’s back in that hospital right now, charming the life out of another doctor. If it’s a man in pants, Starr calls him Honey. So, whatever you heard, it might not sound right—but, that don’t mean it’s wrong.”

  The stoplight turned green. Eddie felt confident again. He shifted gears, and the Pontiac lurched into a stream of traffic. Handled that question pretty good, he thought.

  Lori gazed out the window, like she had every day for the past week. Funny, wasn’t it, the things a woman saw when she looked out a window? You know, if she looked real hard. Women noticed things—like the things Lori noticed the other night while Nurse Potts arranged her dinner tray.

  At first, Lori didn’t believe what she saw, because those people sure looked to her like Eddie and Starr. The longer Lori stared at the couple with their arms wrapped around each other, laughing and giggling like two teenagers, she decided, it was Eddie and Starr. Sure was. Eddie looked like he did when Lori first met him. He was twenty-three, so good looking he was back then. The other night, when he was with Starr, she saw that same Eddie again, young and happy and well…yes, he was very happy. Now, that image weighed on her mind like a pile of wet bricks. There was something else too, something worse. Lori wasn’t exactly sure, but that same night, when the Pontiac cruised out of the gravel parking lot, she thought she saw Starr in the front seat, nice and close to Eddie.

  She had to stop thinking about all of this for a while. Her body ached. Every time she inhaled even the tiniest breath, throaty coughs rattled her chest. Like Nurse Potts told her when she helped her pack to go home: no bad thoughts allowed. She shouldn’t think negative thoughts. Lori whisked the tears from her cheek and stared straight ahead at the road. That’s what Eddie always did, just like he did right now.

  She decided she would do the same.

  Starr lingered in the basement of City Hospital, in the long hall outside the Clinic. She thought she might have a friendly chat with Dr. Freeman. After all, he wasn’t bad looking. He talked a lot, but she talked more. Besides that, she didn’t have to listen if she didn’t like what he said. It was just like when Eddie talked. She never listened to a word that fool said, especially when he got to yammering on about his wife. Most of the time, though, she thought Eddie could be a whole lot of fun.

  She already missed her Eddie Bear. They sure had a great time last night. She’d never forget their rendezvous at the Howard J’s, the one on the way to the shopping center. As far as she was concerned, the good ones were all taken…yeah, why was that? Like this Freeman guy—was he married? Yeah, probably—but, he sure acted like he could use some company. Wait a minute. She heard him before she saw him, rounding up some surly patients in the long hall.

  “Okay, listen up!” Dr. Freeman said. “I’m your Doc today.” He pointed to an old wooden church pew in the hallway. “I want the working men here.” His thick fingers gestured to the filthy terrazzo floor. “Put the bums over here. I see the working men first. Okay, first up!”

  Starr sighed. Nothing for her here. Not now anyway. Besides, the place smelled like a cheap Laundromat. Much more of this steamy air and her hair would go flat. She decided to drive back to her apartment. Last night, Eddie said something about a little homecoming party for Lori. Well, right about now, a party sounded real good to her—whether Lori could make it or not.

  SIX

  “Okay, then,” Nurse Potts said. “Just follow me, like you do Dr. Skelton, and I’ll tell you when to talk and what to say. Just like he does. Understand?”

  I nodded. After just a few days at City Hospital, I was beginning to comprehend a basic rule of survival: when Nurse Potts was content, so was everything around her. Such a simple concept, really.

  I watched the stocky nurse scan the long, wide hall outside Mrs. Raines’ room. No one saw us hustle down the steps and into the foyer. Today, even the receptionist’s desk was unattended. With a rustle of her starched uniform, Mary pushed at the massive front door. Predictably, it whined. We bustled into the glare of the noonday sun, and into a maze of side streets that I did not recognize. I must have looked confused, at least to Mary.

  “Know where you are, Doctor?”

  “No, I can’t say that I’ve ever been this way before, ma’am.”

  “Call me Mary, won’t you? I can’t have you calling me ‘ma’am’, like I’m some old lady.” When she grinned at me, the gold crowns on her teeth glistened like stars in the moonlight.

  The sun slid behind a pile of heavy gray clouds, and she quickened her pace. Mary said a storm was a brewing, no doubt about that. She said something else that I’ve never forgotten: the harde
r the rain, the brighter the rainbow. “Better hurry up and do what we came to do,” she said, “ ‘Cause the sun likes to set on itself too.”

  Lightning crackled across the summer sky. We passed newsstands, beauty shops, and corner grocery stores, until finally, we reached our destination. Not a pretty place well no, it wasn’t. Mary said she’d never done anything like this; but, she’d do whatever she had to do, same as her Grammy and Mamma. She shrugged like she was changing soiled sheets on a bed. It was simply her turn to clean up another mess, that’s all.

  The plate glass doors glinted in the afternoon sun. I watched Mary mount the stone steps, two at a time. Her stubby fingers grasped the metal handles on the glass doors. Suddenly, she turned to face me. Despite the heat, her body shivered.

  “My aching back!” she said. Her body trembled with a fierce determination. “Dr. Spezia, I never in my life thought I’d be visiting an adoption agency. No one can know about this, hear? No one. Now, just wait here and if I want you to talk, I’ll nod at you. You know, just like Dr. Skelton does. Understand?”

  “Sure,” I replied. Mary overlooked a major difference between the times I spent with Dr. Skelton and her request. Dr. Skelton always explained what we were trying to accomplish and provided the reason. Today, I still didn’t understand why we were here, or what we were trying to accomplish. Nevertheless, I watched and I waited, while Mary approached a gaunt woman behind the reception desk. The brass nameplate on her walnut desk said M. Gaines.

  “Miss Gaines?” Mary said. Her black eyes riveted on the pale woman’s face. The woman did not look at her. Instead, she continued to type on the keyboard. Her eyes never drifted from the page. Behind her, an elevator bell dinged.

  “Hmm?” she finally said. She punched a few more keys, but still, her eyes never wandered.

  “Your name be Mary too?” Mary shifted her weight from one foot to the other. I could tell she felt nervous.

  The woman nodded and continued to type.

  Did I think Mary Potts look irritated? Irritated? She could have invented the word. “Miss! I’m speaking to you, Miss.”

  The woman rearranged the pink cardigan sweater on her bony shoulders while she studied Mary’s scuffed shoes. “In what way may I, uh,…help you?” She rolled her eyes and sighed. “Are you sure you’re in the right building?”

  “I can’t see much in this dark room you got here.” Mary squinted at a paper scrap in her oversized purse. “This the Reliable Family Services? This is Broadway, isn’t it?”

  “What exactly do you want? I’m very busy today.”

  “Uh-uh. I can see how much you got to do.” Mary paused. “Look here, did a girl ‘bout fifteen years come in here with a baby boy? Would have been yesterday sometime.”

  “We’re an adoption agency, ma’am. I see girls with baby boys all day. Without specific details, I really can’t help you. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I do have work to do.”

  I watched Mary’s throat tighten. I was willing to bet she was fighting back some tears. Her stomach probably felt like a ball of knots. Still, she continued to fight. “Would ‘ve been yesterday she came in,” she said “I know that much.” Her voice sounded hoarse. “But she made a bad mistake, Miss. Now I came to get my kin, and I know he’s here. He’s got family—he can’t be adopted. He’s got family, hear?”

  M. Gaines punched numbers into a black telephone and stared at the front doors.

  Again, Mary rummaged in her purse, the one with the broken latch, and produced a fat wallet, overstuffed with plastic cards. “I got rights, hear?”

  Before the last words were out of her mouth, a pair of strong hands gripped her shoulders. “Don’t give us any trouble now, ma’am,” a man’s voice said, “and there won’t be any.”

  Mary’s shoulders tensed. Her meaty hands curled into fists. “All’s I want is what’s mine,” she said.” Now, you give me what’s mine, and I won’t give you no trouble, hear?” Mary glared at the muscular man. Suddenly, the hefty giant released his grip. A wide grin spread across his face. Mary’s shoulders relaxed. From where I stood, it simply seemed like a reunion of two very good friends.

  “Maypo! What in the world you doin’ here?” Mary said.

  “Mary?” the guard said. “If it isn’t Mary Potts! What you be talking about, giving you what’s yours? Don’t tell me you done had a child. I can’t believe what can’t be believed now, Mary. That’s the truth.”

  M. Gaines removed her sweater and draped it over the back of her creaky office chair. She rose and glared at Mary. “What is your name again?”

  “My full and legal name is Gladys Mary Potts. My friends call me Mary. ‘Christmas Mary’ is what my Mama always called me, ‘cause Christmas is my birthday. She wanted to name me Mary, after Jesus’s Mama. Daddy wouldn’t allow that. He didn’t believe in such things.”

  “I see. Maypo, please escort our guest to the parking lot. We are far too busy for social calls.

  “Yes ma’am.” Maypo grazed Mary’s elbow, ever so slightly. “I’ll take Miss Potts out the back way, Miss Gaines. Don’t worry ‘bout a thing. C’mon wid me, Mary.”

  “But, I ain’t got my grandbaby yet, Mays. I know D’Yan come here yesterday and…

  The massive front door opened, and a blast of heat scorched the frigid room. A man and woman approached M. Gaines’s desk. Like her, they both wore sweaters; like her, they were both very pale and seemed too busy for social calls. In fact, in every way, Mary thought they both seemed way too much like M. Gaines.

  “We’ll be going now, don’t worry,” Maypo said. “Mary don’t want no trouble.” He winked at Mary. “C’mon Mary, it’ll be all right. C’mon with me.”

  Mary nodded at me, and I strode across the lobby to join them. Whatever this game was, I would play it.

  Mary approached M. Gaines’s desk. “Thank you for your time and trouble, ma’am. I’ll be going now,” she said.

  M. Gaines did not respond to Mary. She barely glanced at me.

  Maypo ushered us both into the cluttered supply room in the dark hall, located behind the receptionist’s desk. When he put his fingers to his lips, Mary and I didn’t ask questions. Together we would listen, and together we would learn. We had no idea what all of that might demand on her part, but I knew we could trust Maypo. Through a crack in the door, the two old friends and I eavesdropped in silence.

  The couple in sweaters, or more accurately, the couple and their check, consumed M. Gaines’s attention. The air conditioner hummed.

  “Five thousand dollars. That is correct,” M. Gaines said.

  “That amount seems high,” the man said. He turned to the woman beside him. Blond hair, the color of honey, framed her narrow face. “Don’t you think so, Margaret?”

  “Raymond, the lady on the phone never mentioned a check for five thousand dollars. Something like that, I am sure I would remembered.” Her lower lip quivered. “Something like that. I am sure.”

  “Well,” M. Gaines said, “we do charge a higher fee for those applicants who did not submit a prior deposit. And of course, you did not. We are taking a significant risk, you see. We didn’t perform our usual battery of background checks and home visits, not to mention the financial audit. Of course, we don’t really believe a significant risk exists, or we wouldn’t allow you to take the child home. And of course, you, Mr. Surlee, are not a U.S. citizen. That, well, is another major issue that we have chosen to, shall we say, overlook.” She paused and smacked her lips. “Of course, if you wish, we can forget the whole thing.” Her mouth smiled, while her eyes resembled cold, blue marbles. “It’s really up to you.”

  Though Mary and Maypo couldn’t see much of anything, they heard the rustle of paper and the click of pens. The air reeked of rubbing alcohol and lilac air freshener.

  “Five thousand then,” M. Gaines said, “and of course, all medical and legal costs are your responsibility. In fact, in these types of circumstances, we make no guarantees of any kind.”

  “Circumstance
s? What types are you referring to?” the man said.

  “We acquired this child purely by coincidence, Mr. Surlee. A teenage mother brought him to us just yesterday. We know very little of the baby’s background, the mother, or indeed, the family. And, of course, as you know, the child is a black male.”

  The woman with the honey-colored hair audibly gagged. For a moment, she appeared to be choking. Finally, she composed herself, and managed to speak.

  “What…what did you just say?” she said.

  “Dear God!” the man said.

  “The race and sex of the child were made perfectly clear in the telephone interview, Mr. Surlee.”

  “Whoever it was, must have misunderstood our request,” the man said. “I clearly specified that I wanted the baby to closely resemble my wife. I’m afraid this arrangement will not be at all suitable.”

  The pale woman tugged at the sleeves of her pale pink sweater.

  “But Raymond, you said…”

  “I’m sorry, Margaret,” the man said. “We’ll discuss this issue later… well, no, we won’t. We won’t discuss it at all. Now, as far as the return of my check—”

  M. Gaines shook her narrow head. “I’m afraid there is nothing to discuss, Mr. Surlee.”

  Mary heard a thumping sound. It might have been a fist pounding on a desktop. She glanced at Maypo, and he put his fingers to his lips.

  “Shhh,” he said. He shook his head. “Hush.”

  “Thieves!” the man said. “That’s what you are! I’ll have my attorney all over this, I—”

  “I doubt that, Mr. Surlee. I doubt that very much. You and I both know about the lenient policies of the immigration officials, don’t we, Mr. Surlee? I wouldn’t want to have to notify anyone of a problem.” She slipped the crisp new check into a manila envelope and dropped it into her desk drawer. “Have a good day,” she said. “I believe our business here is finished.” The drawer slammed.

  For a moment, I felt stunned and confused. I wasn’t exactly certain what we had just witnessed. No matter who spoke, the whole transaction sounded criminal to me. Still, the only part that mattered to Mary was M. Gaines’s reference to the teenage girl and the baby boy. At that moment, I saw the big smile on her face. She was sure these folks just had to be D’Yan and her baby boy!