with her true self? All of the above?
“Ah,” said a voice behind him. “You must be the son.”
Adrian let go of the railing and turned. The doctor who’d entered was an elderly man, short and cherubic, head bald but for a white tonsure. He wore a lab coat open over a plaid golf shirt. Smiling, he held out his hand and they shook.
Then he looked past Adrian and shook his head in disapproval. “Lucy, you’re back. You know, she won’t float away if you go home and watch a sitcom, take a long bath, get to bed early.”
Adrian supposed that was a good way to describe his childish fears about his mother: that she might float away if he let go. There had always been something insubstantial about her, not quite anchored to the here and now.
Lucy smiled, but said, “I didn’t want Mr. Rutledge to feel abandoned.”
Adrian knew vaguely that women like this did exist—caretakers, nurturers. Or perhaps he was jumping to a conclusion where she was concerned. Maybe it was only his mother who inspired this fierce need to protect.
“It sounds as if Ms. Peterson went to a lot of effort to locate me,” he said.
“And thank God she succeeded. Ah…I’m Ben Slater.”
“I appreciate your taking care of her, Doctor. I’m hoping you can tell me more about what’s going on with my mother so that I can make decisions about her care.”
“I haven’t been able to do much. The truth is, with brain injuries we’re most often left waiting. However much we learn, there’s more we don’t know. Someone who got a minor knock on the head dies, someone who falls ten stories to the sidewalk barely has a headache. I wish I could tell you how much damage she sustained, but I can’t. She has a broken hip and ribs as well as some internal bleeding from the impact of the car, but the real problem is that she was lifted in the air and flung a fair distance onto the pavement. She struck her head hard. We did relieve some swelling in the brain, but it’s subsided satisfactorily. She may yet simply open her eyes and ask where she is.”
And she may not. Adrian had no trouble hearing what Slater didn’t say.
On the other hand, how many head injuries had this small-town doc actually seen? What was he? Their trauma specialist? They did have an E.R., so they must have a specialist.
“Has she been seen by a neurologist?” Adrian asked, knowing the answer.
“Oh, I’m a neurosurgeon,” Dr. Slater said cheerily. “Retired, of course. My wife was from Middleton, and we always intended to retire here. But I still do some consulting.”
This fat little guy in the plaid shirt was a neurosurgeon? Was that possible?
Barely managing to suppress his you’ve-got-to-bekidding reaction, Adrian asked, “Where did you work?”
“Ended up at Harborview in Seattle. I was on the University of Washington faculty.”
Adrian’s preconceptions didn’t quite vanish—it was more like watching a piece of paper slowly burn until only grey, weightless ash hung insubstantially in the air. His mother wasn’t being cared for by some small-town practitioner who’d probably been in the bottom quarter of his class. By bizarre chance, her doctor might be one of the most highly qualified specialists in the country.
“My mother is fortunate you happened to be here.”
“She would have been if I could fix her. I can’t.”
“And you don’t think anyone can.”
He shook his head, his gaze resting on his patient’s face. “It’s up to her now. Or to God, if you believe. Lucy—” he smiled at the young woman “—may do more good by sitting here talking and reading to your mother than I can with all the technology at my disposal.”
Neurosurgeons were not known for their humility or fatalism. Adrian still had trouble believing in this one. But perhaps a lifetime of trying to salvage brain-damaged people made a man both fatalistic and humble.
Dr. Slater talked some more, about reflexes and brainwaves, but Adrian had begun to feel numb. The guy noticed, and abruptly stopped. “We should talk about this tomorrow. I understand you haven’t seen your mother in years. You must be in shock.”
“You could say that,” Adrian admitted.
“Lucy,” the doctor said briskly, “did you make arrangements for him for the night?”
Rebellion stirred, but honestly Adrian hoped she had a better suggestion than the crummy motel with kitchenettes he’d seen half a mile back.
“Yes, Sam’s holding a room for him,” she said. “If that’s all right,” she added, looking at him.
“Sam?”
“My sister Samantha. She owns a bed-and-breakfast. It’s very nice.”
He nodded. “Then thank you.”
“And unless you had dinner on the way…” Seeing his expression, she said firmly, “We’ll stop at the café on the way. It’s late, but we’ll come up with something.”
“Good.” The doctor patted her hand, shook Adrian’s, said “I’ll see you tomorrow,” then departed.
Lucy picked up her book and started toward the door in turn. “I’ll leave you alone with your mother for a few minutes. Just come on out when you’re ready.”
He was ready now, but in the face of her faith that he wanted to commune with this unconscious woman, he once again stepped to the bedside and looked down at her face. The resemblance to the mother he remembered was undeniably there, but in a way that made him uncomfortable. Age aside, it was like the difference between a living, breathing person and an eerily real cast of that person at a wax museum. He might as well have been standing here looking at his mother’s body at the morgue.
But he knew why Lucy had been reading aloud. The silence had to be filled. “It’s Adrian,” he said tentatively. “I missed you. I didn’t know what happened. Why you went away. I still don’t know. I’d like to hear about it, when you wake up.”
He couldn’t quite bring himself to touch her. Not surprising, given that he wasn’t much for hugs and hand-holding. Maybe he was afraid he’d find her hands to be icy cold.
“Well. Ah. I’ll be back in the morning. I’ll probably make arrangements to move you to Seattle, where you can be close to me.”
An uneasy sense that she might, in fact, not like his plan stirred in him, but what the hell else was he supposed to do? Leave her here and drive back and forth for obligatory visits? Did they even have a long-term nursing facility here, assuming that’s what she required?
He cleared his throat, said, “Good night,” and escaped.
LUCYWAS PRETTY sure she didn’t like Adrian Rutledge, but she was prepared to feel sorry for him when he walked out of his mother’s hospital room. This had to be hard for him.
However, his expression was utterly composed when he appeared. “You needn’t
