the sympathy I could muster, which was plenty. “Has Mom been moody?”
He rolled his eyes.
“Snappish?”
“Like a turtle.”
“Unfocused?”
“Have you been eavesdropping on us, Whitney?”
“No, but I do read women’s magazines. There isn’t one in existence that isn’t discussing the topic. You know how it was for Grandma when she was in what she euphemistically called ‘The Change.’” There had been apocryphal stories about that time whispered around the family for years.
I rubbed his shoulders and was surprised at how small he felt. When I was a little girl, he was a giant…and now he’s just a man.
Dad and I were walking arm in arm toward the house when Mother burst through the front door waving a wet Baggie full of money.
“I found it! Oh, Frank, aren’t you glad?” She was panting a little, and her hair looked as if it had been electrified, but it occurred to me how attractive my mom is. If she hadn’t been my mother, I would have marveled at how young she looks. As it is, I take her for granted much too often.
“Why is it in a Baggie? And why is it wet?”
“You know I wanted to put it where no one would think to look for it. It was a stroke of genius, really. I bagged it up and put it inside the toilet tank. It’s been there all along. All I have to do is dry it out a little, and I can go shopping….”
“You put it in the toilet?” my dad said.
“Not the bowl, Frank, the tank. No one would think to look there!”
“Including you, Mom.”
“I’m good, aren’t I?”
We followed Mom to the house and watched her dry her money with a hair dryer. As we talked, I told them my news. They were very upset about Kim as well, but Mom tried to accentuate the positive.
“This is a disease that can be caught in time now,” she assured me. “Why, there must be a dozen or more women at church who have had breast cancer and are doing marvelously today.”
“I know, but that doesn’t make it less scary. And, of course, Kim thinks of Wesley.”
“I’ll notify our prayer chains at church and bring it up at Bible study,” Mom promised. “The couples’ group is meeting at the Bakersfields’ tonight.”
Dad perked up. “Really? Isn’t she the one who makes peach pie?”
“Yes, dear, and she said she was having a light supper beforehand, so don’t start snacking now.”
Dad’s face relaxed considerably. I wasn’t sure if his improved mood was the result of Mom’s finding the money or the thought of pie on the horizon, but I was happy for him either way.
October 17
Kim’s clinic isn’t far from the office. It sits near a man-made pond, and the lawns are manicured to perfection. I’ve heard a great plastic surgeon has offices here. She won’t admit it, but I think Mitzi has already started getting things lifted and tucked. I know for sure that Betty has. No one’s eyebrows should ride that high on a person’s forehead. If she were bald, she could just let them grow and comb them backward for hair. And Betty has this continually surprised look that makes her look like a wide-eyed kid at the circus.
I was so busy looking at the artwork on the walls (original, I think) and the cherry-wood furnishings that looked a thousand percent better than anything in my living room, that it took me a moment to realize Kim’s name had been called. She took my sleeve in her hand and tugged frantically.
“Kim, I can’t go in with you!”
“I’m not going if you don’t,” she said, and she meant it. “Listen, Whitney, I can’t do this alone.”
“Kurt should be with you.”
“If this is serious, he’ll get plenty of chances.”
If the tables were turned, I’d want someone there with me. Someone other than my mother, I think. Unless I could get her to quit reading medical books. If a side effect of a medication is shortness of breath or growing hair on one’s chest, Mom’s sure she has it. She pores over health magazines and reads medical thrillers voraciously. Being healthy as the proverbial horse, I’ve been such a disappointment to her—not an appendix scar or a root canal or even a mild case of acid reflux.
And she’s nothing compared to my grandmother, who grieved for months when Dr. Kildare and Ben Casey went off the air. (Never saw ’em, never had to—anyone over fifty can give you the lowdown, especially in my family.) She ultimately came out of her depression long enough to find other medical shows on TV—now we all know enough never to call her during E.R.
“Okay,” I said. “Although I don’t know that I’ll be much help.”
“Just your being with me is all the help I need,” Kim assured me. “That and prayer.”
“I can handle that.”
The doctor’s office was as warm and inviting as the waiting room. Dr. Chase Andrews, Internal Medicine, said the sign on the door. Inside, there were huge banks of cherry-wood cabinets to hide those unsightly files and models of human organs that came apart like puzzle pieces for demonstration purposes. There were no body charts on the walls delineating the veins, arteries, bones and muscles either. Nice as this place was, I decided Kim’s doctor probably used a PowerPoint presentation on a big-screen TV if a patient needed to be educated. And there was classical music coming from hidden speakers. How much did this guy charge, anyway? Kim said he was the best. Maybe he was giving her a deal, having been a friend of Kurt’s and all.
Kim perched on the edge of her seat, lifted her heels and began that annoying little bounce that nervous people often do. I walked behind her to massage the knots from her shoulders. I couldn’t think of a thing to say. “Everything will be all right” was not necessarily true and we both knew it.
Kim and I have a deal—no prevarication. We trust each other for complete honesty, the truth and nothing but the truth. What a liberating concept that is! I know there’s at least one person on the planet who will tell me if I have a streak of bed-head running down the back of my scalp or bad breath. After all, how can you fix things you don’t know about?
The door whispered open so quietly that I didn’t realize at first that the doctor had entered the room. It wasn’t until I saw him from the corner of my eye that I knew we were no longer alone.
Dr. Andrews stretched out his hand to Kim. “Hello, Mrs. Easton, I’m Chase Andrews. I’m glad we finally get to meet. Your husband is a great guy.”
“He says the same about you,” Kim ventured, her shoulders relaxing.
When he turned to me, I felt my legs turn into Gummi Bears. It was the dazzling man from the hall yesterday. This was Kim’s doctor? I felt immediately better. Just looking at him could probably cure a dozen diseases. His sandy hair was shot with gold, and as I looked down at the floor to break his mesmerizing
