When she was finished, she had a solid, if unglamorous, wardrobe, large enough to last her several months. A passive decision that seemed to belie her rationale for leaving. Because she was no longer feeling sick. She could now climb a flight of stairs without resting. She could shower without feeling lightheaded. She had begun to walk further afield, locating other important things in her neighborhood: a coffee shop, a greengrocer, a secondhand bookstore. And yet, she had just bought enough clothes to get her through the fall.
She had written two more letters to the twins, but when she went to the library, intending to transcribe and e-mail them to Jason to pass on, she had not been able to do it.
She thought of the only other time she’d been away, when her father had had his stroke. Every time she’d called home, the twins had cried. Jason had said they’d been fine until she rang, reminding them she wasn’t there. Maybe writing them would only remind them she was away. Maybe it would only make it worse.
So instead of e-mailing them, she’d bought a yellow legal pad and continued writing letters as the woman on a business trip:
Dear Oscar and Liv,
It’s supposed to snow tonight. Not much. Not enough to stick, but they say it’ll be the first snow of the season.
She wondered if it would snow back in New York, as well, and if so, would anyone else know about their custom of going out to the fancy candy store for the six-dollar hot chocolates to commemorate the occasion?
She didn’t ask this, though. It wasn’t what the woman on a business trip would ask. Instead, after her weather report, she turned back to the memories of the twins, as she had in her earlier letters.
I don’t know if you remember this but last January there was a huge blizzard. They canceled school and I stayed home from work. The streets were empty and so we were walking down the middle of Church Street, because there was no traffic. Liv, you were running ahead and jumping into the drifts, squealing with delight. Oscar, you were a little more cautious, and you kept calling: “Yiv, Yiv, wait up Oskie. Wait up Oskie!”
Liv, Oscar, wait up Mommy.
20
When Maribeth arrived for her second appointment with Dr. Grant, she found that the price had dropped.
“Seventy-five dollars,” Louise said.
“I thought it was one-fifty,” Maribeth said.
“For a preliminary. This is the follow-up.”
“Is that like a special cash price?”
Louise made a noncommittal mmm, mmm sound, and Maribeth started to worry. Last month she’d edited a round-up of celeb-spa secrets in which more than a few of the pedicures had cost seventy-five dollars. What doctor charged so little? Maybe an internist at an inner-city clinic but who had ever heard of bargain-basement cardiology? There were no other patients in the waiting room this week, nor had there been any the last time.
You chose him, she reminded herself as Louise wrote out the receipt.
Louise ushered her into the examination room. There was no gown. “Don’t you want me to change?” Maribeth asked.
“No need,” Louise said.
Maribeth had to wonder if they’d run out of money for gowns.
Dr. Grant came in almost immediately. On a few occasions, Maribeth had seen Dr. Sterling without his lab coat but he’d always seemed like a doctor: all bowtie and bromides. Even with his lab coat on, Dr. Grant did not, although there was nothing particularly unprofessional about his appearance, except perhaps for the jeans. And his handsomeness. Were doctors allowed to look like George Clooney if they weren’t playing doctors on TV shows?
He listened to Maribeth’s heart and lungs, hooked her up to the EKG monitor. He checked her vitals. “You’ve lost some weight, but otherwise, all looks good. Why don’t you come back to my office to chat?”
She knew from experience that invitations to talk in doctors’ private quarters were never a good sign. It was from his inner sanctum that Dr. Simon, their IVF doctor, had always relayed the bad news that the pregnancies had not taken. Though Maribeth had always known. She could tell by the scans.
“What’s wrong?” she asked Dr. Grant.
“Nothing. I’ll meet you in a second. Would you like some tea?”
“No.” It came out gruff. She tried again. “No thank you.”
Alone in his office, she took the opportunity to snoop. There were diplomas on the wall from Northwestern Medical School and one documenting a cardiac fellowship at the University of Pittsburgh. Which was reassuring. He hadn’t gotten a degree from some Phoenix University type place.
On the bookshelf were several pink breast cancer ribbons, and on his desk a framed picture of a young, smiling, light-skinned African American woman in a canoe. His daughter? Or maybe his wife. Given his age and profession, she’d be wife number two. The trophy wife.
“Sorry to keep you waiting.”
Maribeth turned around guiltily as Dr. Grant strode in holding a mug of tea in both hands, a gesture that was oddly monkish. “I get cranky if I don’t have my four o’clock pick-me-up.” He nodded to the two chairs opposite his desk. She sat in one, he the other.
“What’s wrong?” Maribeth asked again.
He set his mug down on a coaster and, still smiling, asked, “Why do you seem like you’re waiting for the other shoe to drop?”
Seriously? What was it about men and shoe metaphors?
“A heart attack at forty-four,” she said. “An arterial puncture during a stent procedure. Double bypass. You’ll excuse me if I’ve become watchful for falling footwear.”
She waited for him to say the usual doctorly things. How it wasn’t worth getting upset about, how stress only made it worse, how she’d been through the brunt of it. But instead, he just said, “Yes, I can see why you might be.”