Cypress Point (15 page)

“I'll be your doctor,” Rebecca said. “But people love you here, Joelle.” It seemed odd to hear the word
love
come from those ordinarily cool and dispassionate lips. “I hope you have a very good reason for going.”

“Yes,” she said. “I do.”

 

As she was unlocking the outside door to her condo that evening, Tony, one-half of the gay couple who lived downstairs, poked his head out his front door.

“Joelle!” he said. “Come join us for dinner. We made stuffed portobello mushrooms and we got carried away. There's more than we can eat.”

“Oh, thanks, Tony.” She smiled at him with a shake of her head. “Not tonight, I'm afraid.”

“Well, we'll save you some, then,” Tony said, disappearing inside his condo again.

She walked up the stairs and into her own condo, remembering the last time she'd eaten with her neighbors. She'd made a huge pot of fish stew and invited Tony and Gary over to help her eat it. The three of them had stayed up half the night, drinking a little too much and singing oldies off-key. She liked those guys. They were by no means her closest friends, but they had potential. If she were staying in the area, maybe they would have liked being honorary daddies. Maybe even her labor coaches.

You've been watching too many sitcoms on TV,
she told herself as she lifted the telephone receiver to check her voice mail. She had one message, the mechanical voice told her, and she pressed her code to hear it.

“Hello, Joelle, a.k.a. Shanti Joy,” a woman's voice said.

Joelle frowned. Carlynn Shire?

“This is Carlynn Shire,” the woman said, answering her question. “I've been thinking about you, and was wondering
why I haven't heard from you. How is your friend doing? Would you still like me to see her? If you would, give me a call.” She left her number, and Joelle wrote it down on the cover of a catalog resting on the kitchen counter.

How strange, she thought with a bit of annoyance. Apparently Alan Shire had neglected to tell Carlynn he had asked Joelle not to call her. Yet, she was pleased to hear the older woman's message.

Setting down her purse and appointment book, she dialed the number.

“Shire residence.” It was a man's voice. For a moment she was afraid it might belong to Alan Shire, but then she remembered the man who had called to set up her first meeting with Carlynn. This was most certainly
his
voice.

“This is Joelle D'Angelo,” she said. “May I speak with Carlynn Shire, please?”

“Please hold for a moment,” the man said, and several minutes passed before Carlynn came on the line.

“Hello, Joelle!” she said. “How are you?”

“I'm all right, Carlynn, but I have to say I was surprised to hear from you.”

“Why is that?”

Joelle sat on a stool at the counter. “Maybe you didn't know this,” she said carefully, “but your husband contacted me. He told me you were retired and having some health problems and would rather not be seeing people. That's why I didn't call. I didn't want to bother you again.”

There was a moment of silence on the line. “Alan called you?” Carlynn asked.

“No, he came to see me at the hospital where I work.”

“And he said…?”

“He said you're retired and ill, that healing takes too much out of you, that—”

“Oh, horsefeathers,” Carlynn said. “He's an old worrywart, isn't he? He's right that I'm retired, and he's right that I'm ill, and there are few cases I'd be willing to take on these days, but you touched me with the story of your friend Mara. I would truly like to see her, Joelle.”

“Thank you,” she said, liking Carlynn a great deal for remembering Mara's name. “But, Carlynn…” She hesitated, wondering if she should bring this up. “Another thing your husband said concerned me. He said that talking to me would remind you of…I know you lost your sister right around the time I was born.”

“That was a very long time ago, Joelle.” Carlynn sounded completely unconcerned by the matter. “It overjoys me to see that a life I touched back then has flourished in spite of what I lost. So put that right out of your mind.”

“All right, I will,” Joelle said, thinking that Carlynn seemed quite capable of making her own decisions in the matter, despite her husband's concerns.

“Okay, then,” Carlynn said. “So, dear, when shall we see your friend?”

C
arlynn found Alan sitting at the table on the terrace, his feet up on one of the other chairs, a book in his lap, although he was not reading. Instead, his gaze was fixed on the gardeners working in the side yard.

She sat down on the other side of the table, and Alan glanced at her, then nodded in the direction of the yard.

“Crazy old man,” he said.

“What?” she asked. “Who?”

“Quinn,” he said.

She followed his gaze to one of the taller cypress trees, and saw the elderly man standing on a ladder, his head buried somewhere beneath the branches of the tree. She could see his weathered dark hands working the pruning shears. She shook her head.

“He can't hold still, can he?” she said with a smile. “Quinn!”
she called. “Come down from there. You're going to kill yourself.”

He did not respond, and she knew that he had either not heard her or was going to pretend that he had not. She knew Quinn would rather die by falling out of a tree than by the slow, miserable route she seemed compelled to endure.

“I need to talk with you, Alan,” she said, shifting her gaze back to the terrace.

“Should you be out here in the sun?” Alan turned to ask her, his eyes masked behind his sunglasses.

“I don't plan to be out here long,” she said. “I just wanted to understand why you would talk to Joelle D'Angelo behind my back.”

“Who?”

“You know who. The social worker who wanted me to see her friend. Why are you interfering in my business?”

“I think it's my business, too, don't you?” he asked. The sunlight on his head made the thick shock of his hair even whiter.

“Not really,” she said.

“Well.” He closed his book and set it down on the table. “I went to see her because A) you're not well, and B) you're not thinking straight.”

“I know I'm not well,” she said, “but there's nothing wrong with my thinking.”

“There has to be if you're willing to take on a healing,” he said. “For the last ten years I haven't had to worry about you. I don't want to start that up all over again.”

“You're operating out of fear, Alan,” she said. He always had. “I know your intentions are good and that you're trying to protect me. To protect all we've built together. But this girl—Joelle—needs me.”

“And without you, what will happen to her? Will she explode? Die? What? You're not going to heal her friend. There's
nothing in the universe that can be done to help a woman that brain-damaged. You're just giving Joelle false hope.”

“It's not her friend I'm interested in.” She looked down at her hands. They were not so yellow today, or perhaps it was the sun that made them look a bit less like the hands of a woman dying from hepatitis. “I've been thinking a lot about my sister lately,” she said. “I may be going to see her soon.” She smiled, knowing she would irk Alan with that sort of talk. She'd always liked the open-ended nature of spiritual questions, while Alan, ever the physician, had no patience for them.

“Well,” Alan said, “if you see her, send her my regards.”

Carlynn leaned toward him across the table. “I'm not particularly proud of the life I've led, Alan,” she said. “I need to find a way to set it right.”

“And this is it?” he asked. “Helping the social worker's friend?”

“Yes,” she said, rising to her feet. She rested one hand on his shoulder and bent low to buss his temple. “Please don't worry,” she said. “I'll be very careful. I promise.”

J
oelle slowed her car to skirt a golf cart parked at the side of the road. She and Carlynn were driving north along the Seventeen Mile Drive, heading toward Pacific Grove and the nursing home. “Was Alan upset about you coming with me today?” she asked as they passed the pricey and beautiful Inn at Spanish Bay.

“You have to forgive Alan,” Carlynn said, without answering the question directly. “He's very overprotective of me.”

“Has he always been that way?” Joelle took her eyes from the road to glance at the older woman.

“Not in the beginning,” Carlynn said. “But once people began going to great lengths to try to see me, hoping I could heal them, he really worried that I was either overdoing it, or that some loony person might try to kidnap me or heaven knows what.”

Joelle smiled to herself. It was funny to hear someone who
claimed to be a healer refer to anyone other than herself as loony.

“Are you…forgive me for prying,” Joelle said. “Is your illness very serious?”

Carlynn nodded. “I have hepatitis C,” she said. “Apparently I contracted it thirty-four years ago, when I was hospitalized after the accident and needed a transfusion. But it was silent until a couple of years ago.”

Joelle remembered that hepatitis C was serious, but knew little more than that. “What about treatment?” she asked.

“I'm done with that,” Carlynn said. “I had a couple of rounds of the best drugs medicine has to offer, but the side effects were horrendous and the treatment simply didn't work for me. I could go through it again, but frankly, I'd rather live a comfortable six months or so than a miserable year or two.”

“I'm sorry,” Joelle said. “It sounds as though it's been pretty frustrating for you.”

“Well, I feel fairly good these days,” Carlynn said with a nod. “So much better than I did when I was taking those drugs. Then I could barely get out of bed.”

“Seeing Mara might tire you out terribly, though.” Joelle suddenly wondered if she should have paid more attention to Alan Shire's concerns.

“I'd like to do some good before I die,” Carlynn said.

“You've already done a great deal of good, though,” Joelle said.

Carlynn smiled and turned to look at her. “I want to see Mara, Joelle,” she said firmly but kindly. “And that's the final word on the subject.”

She obviously didn't want sympathy, so Joelle changed the subject.

“How long have you and Alan been married?” she asked.
They were nearing the Pacific Grove gate, and Carlynn waved at the toll taker as they passed by.

“Forty-three years. We met when I was in medical school. I was keeping my abilities to myself back then, but he sensed there was something different about me.”

Joelle glanced at her again and saw that she was smiling, perhaps at the memory. Today, Carlynn wore a yellow T-shirt beneath denim overalls, a blue-and-yellow-striped scarf tied at her neck, tennis shoes and small, round sunglasses. She looked very thin, yes, and her skin was probably more yellow than it should be, but otherwise it would be hard to guess that this was a woman with a terminal illness.

“I envy you for being married so long to someone who cares enough to protect you,” Joelle said as she turned in the direction of the nursing home.

That coy little smile again. “Yes, I've been lucky. And I'm sorry about your divorce. It must have been difficult for you.”

“Yes, it was,” she said. “I think I told you that we were unable to have children. So, my husband found someone he
could
have children with.”

“Oh, my, I am sorry.” Carlynn shook her head. “Alan and I could have no children, either, so I know how you must have felt.”

“But Alan didn't leave.” Joelle turned the corner into the parking lot of the nursing home.

“No, I think our generation was quite different from yours. And Alan and I were bound together by so much…So very much.” Carlynn looked lost in her own thoughts for a moment, then she suddenly sat up straight in the seat. “Is this the nursing home? Let me shift my mental gears, then,” she said, taking off her sunglasses and folding them in her lap. “Let me sit quietly. I want to get ready to meet your Mara.”

Joelle parked the car and turned off the ignition. “Shall I leave you alone?” she asked.

“Just for a few minutes,” Carlynn said. “I'll open my door so I don't suffocate.” She giggled like a little girl as she opened the passenger-side door.

“There's a bench by the front door of the building,” Joelle said. “I'll meet you there, all right?”

“Fine.” Carlynn leaned her head against the headrest, folded her hands around her sunglasses in her lap, and closed her eyes.

Joelle walked slowly up the path to the bench near the front door of the nursing home. This whole situation was starting to feel a bit hokey to her now. The so-called shifting of mental gears, the sitting quietly to prepare herself for meeting Mara. The healer herself dying of hepatitis. Maybe Alan Shire had been trying to protect Joelle from being suckered. Whatever. It was too late now to change her mind.

She hoped she had timed the visit accurately. It was nearly five. She knew Liam would be visiting Mara alone today, without Sam and Sheila, and even if she and Carlynn spent a full hour with Mara, they would still have time to get out of the nursing home before he arrived. As long as Liam was not early, they would be all right.

Joelle did not understand why, but Sheila had turned cold to her recently. She and Sheila and Liam had been a real team after Mara became ill, working together to get her the best care possible. Sheila would often call Joelle for her opinion of a particular doctor's suggested treatment or of a nursing home's skill level, and sometimes she'd simply call for consolation or to chat. Joelle had felt like a true member of the family. Although she couldn't pinpoint the moment she'd noticed a change, Joelle no longer received phone calls from Sheila. As a matter of fact, Sheila barely even spoke to her when they bumped into one an
other, not even offering her a smile. Joelle had called her once, a couple of months ago, to ask if she had done something to offend her, and Sheila pretended she had no idea what Joelle was talking about. That left very little room for resolving the situation, and Joelle had given up.

Carlynn walked up the path toward her, using her cane, with only a hint of a limp in her gait. Joelle drew in a deep breath.
Sorry if I'm making a big mistake, Mara.
She stood up and led the older woman into the home.

Mara's bed had been cranked up into a sitting position, and she looked exactly the way Joelle hated to see her look. She was asleep, her face slack, aging her fifteen years. Her mouth hung open a little, a rivulet of saliva trickling down her chin, and her short hair, which Joelle cut herself once a month, was disheveled from the pillow.

Joelle took Carlynn's arm at the door of Mara's room. “She'll smile when she wakes up,” she whispered. “She'll look as though she knows who I am, but I don't believe she does.”

Carlynn nodded and followed Joelle into the room.

Joelle sat on the edge of Mara's bed, while Carlynn stood off to one side.

“Mara.” Joelle touched the pale hand where it rested on the covers. “Mara? It's Joelle, sweetie.”

Mara's long, dark lashes fluttered open, and she smiled the instant she saw Joelle.

Joelle took a tissue from the box on the nightstand and wiped Mara's chin with it. “Mara,” she said, “I'd like you to meet a friend of mine, Carlynn Shire.”

Mara didn't shift her gaze from Joelle until Carlynn moved closer to the bed, stepping into her field of vision. She looked at Carlynn, that vacuous but eternally happy expression on her face. Carlynn had to be taken in by her beauty, Joelle thought,
by the remarkable change in Mara's face once she was awake and alert, if
alert
was the right word to use. Her black eyes were extraordinary, and even the messy haircut looked stylish on her.

“Hello, Mara.” Carlynn gently lifted one of Mara's hands.

“Would you rather she be in her wheelchair?” Joelle asked, standing up from the edge of the bed.

“No,” Carlynn spoke to Mara, “let's leave you in bed, where you're probably more comfortable.”

Joelle sat in the chair near the night table, while Carlynn rested her cane against the table and took her place on the edge of Mara's bed.

“My, you're very beautiful,” Carlynn said. “I've spoken with Joelle, and she told me all about you. How deep your friendship is with her. How much she loves you. You are a much-loved person.”

Mara merely blinked her eyes. Joelle was certain she had no understanding of Carlynn's words.

“Would you like to have a gentle massage of your hands?” Carlynn asked, but Mara's expression didn't change.

“I think she would,” Joelle said. “I've done that for her sometimes.” She realized as she spoke that it had been a long time since she'd given Mara a massage. She used to rub her all over with moisturizing lotion, and it had made her feel as though she was at least trying to help her friend. Sometime in the past year, she'd given up. Did Liam still do that, massage Mara, touch her that way, with gentleness? She hoped so.

Carlynn reached into her large handbag and brought out a bottle of lotion. Joelle craned her neck to see the label, expecting the lotion to contain special herbal ingredients or at least
something
out of the ordinary, but it was a plain pink bottle of baby lotion.

Carlynn poured some of the lotion onto her own palm, then gently lifted one of Mara's limp hands and began a slow, tender massage. Joelle remained quiet, not even watching the two women after a while, just listening as Carlynn spoke to Mara in an even, almost hypnotic, tone.

“This feels so good, doesn't it, Mara?” Carlynn asked. “Yes, you like the way it feels. You like to be touched with caring, I think. You can tell the difference if someone cares or not. You are very wise that way.”

After a while, Carlynn stopped talking and Joelle looked up to see Mara's gaze fastened on the older woman. There wasn't a sound in the room, and Joelle looked at their hands. One of Mara's hands lay limp in Carlynn's, but the fingers of her right hand, her so-called “good” hand, were moving against Carlynn's palm. She was massaging her! Could it possibly be? She didn't dare stand up to see, but something was happening between Mara and the healer. Something Joelle was not a part of.

Mara's eyes gradually fell shut and her breathing grew even, but Joelle felt certain that her face lacked the flaccid, droopy look of her usual sleep. Her facial muscles looked merely relaxed rather than limp and wasted.

Carlynn turned to smile at Joelle, then silently replaced the cap on the baby lotion. She was getting up from the bed when Liam walked into the room.

“Joelle!” he said, stopping short. He looked at Carlynn, then back at Joelle. “I didn't expect to see you here.”

Of course he hadn't. She had told him she was leaving work early to go to a doctor's appointment.

“Liam, this is Carlynn Shire,” she said, motioning toward the older woman, hoping he wouldn't recognize her name.

“Hello, Carlynn.” He reached out to shake her hand, then frowned. “Are you the Carlynn Shire of the Shire Mind and Body Center?” he asked.

“Yes.” Carlynn smiled warmly at him, reaching for her cane. “Although I'm retired now.”

Joelle saw his jaw muscles tighten beneath the skin of his cheeks and knew he was angry. He controlled himself, though, as he turned toward her.

“How is she today?” he asked, but there were a dozen other questions in his eyes.

“I think she's doing very well,” Joelle said, wanting to get Carlynn and herself out of the room as quickly as she could. “Carlynn gave her a hand massage, and now we're on our way out.”

Mara opened her eyes again, and when she saw Liam she let out the little squeal of childish joy that she seemed to save only for him. She raised her one good arm an inch or so off the bed, and he moved toward her, leaning over to kiss her unresponsive lips. Then he lifted one of her soft, baby-lotioned hands and held it tightly against his hip as he turned to Joelle.

“Could I speak with you a moment before you go?” he asked.

Damn.
“Sure,” she said. “Carlynn, would you mind waiting in the hall for me?”

Liam waited until Carlynn had left the room.

“What's going on?” Liam asked, the words coming out slowly and deliberately as he worked to keep his voice calm. Joelle knew he would not raise his voice around Mara.

“I…could we talk about this later?” she asked.

“You bet we can,” he said. “I'll call you tonight.”

“All right.” She picked up her purse and left the room. She'd wanted to hear those words from him for over three months now.
I'll call you.
This was one call, though, she was not looking forward to.