Destroy (A Standalone Romance Novel) (22 page)

“Did you have a good
time?” she asked quizzically. “How long did he stay?”

“Not very long after
Mother went to bed,” I replied. “And, yes, I had a good time.” I decided there
was no way I was going to lie to Tiffany. She was a friend. I needed to have
her stand by my side. I knew I was in for a battle, if any of what Jeff had
said was true. And if it wasn’t, and there was no divorce in the offing, I
would need her shoulder to cry on at some point. “Are you coming?”

“Sure, give me a minute
to change,” she said, rushing back to her bedroom.

While she was gone to
freshen up, I folded the hide-a-bed, and examined the carpet, hoping there were
no tell-tales of our little interlude. But there was nothing visible to the
naked eye.

We were about to walk out
when my mother came out of the bedroom. She was clad of a nice bathrobe, but
looked tired still.

“Don’t tell me you two
are going to work on a Saturday,” she said, looking at us with raised eyebrows.

Tiffany and I exchanged
an amused glance and erupted in nervous laughter.

“No, Mom, we’re not.
We’re going jogging around the park. Do you want to come?”

“Good grief, no wonder
you’re as thin as a rail. At that rate, you’re going to be the ghost of you
before the time comes.”

“Be back soon,” I told
her, closing the door on both of us.

When we were trotting
toward the park, Tiffany asked, “So, did he tell you anything about his
situation? Is he divorced, or separated?”

“Neither.”

She turned a stunned face
to me. “You mean he’s not even separated?”

“I don’t really know,
Tiff. He says that she won’t sign the divorce papers.”

“A likely story! He’s the
bastard who wants to have his cake and eat it too. Mark my words, Hattie, he’ll
hurt you. Sooner or later, he’ll drop you for someone else.”

“I’ve got a gut feeling
that it’s exactly what’s going to happen.”

“So why on earth are you
accepting to have sex with him? Is he that good?”

“Better.”

“Well, why don’t you make
a deal with him? He’ll get his lollypop only when you see a signature on the
dotted line of his divorce papers.”

“You know, maybe I should
do that. Besides, I was thinking of something last night. If he really wanted
me that bad after we met in New York why didn’t he ask for a phone number or even
try locating my parents in Omaha? Because it’s purely coincidental that I was
accepted in this hospital.”

“Exactly. I think you
need to slam on the brakes a little harder, Hattie.”

“I think you’re right.
Besides, if his wife starts investigating his after-hours activities, she could
easily find out about us if we’re not careful.”

“Again, Hattie, you can
be so extremely rational when you’re away from him and so idiotic when you
sense him near you.”

I began laughing and
stopped jogging. Laughing and jogging together are too hard on one’s heart.
“I’ve told myself that very same thing hundreds of times now, but the only
conclusion I can come up with is that I’m addicted to the man.”

“What about going to
rehab?” Tiffany asked as we resumed our trotting.

“What do you have in
mind?”

“Well, for a start we
could spend our evenings somewhere else than at home. Then we could take off
and visit a bit of the countryside…”

“You’re thinking of
escaping the comforts of home for a while–until this blows over?”

“Yes. I think we’re both
due for an escape of sorts, don’t you?”

“I agree. And while my
mom is here, why don’t we start by driving her around today and tomorrow?”

“That’s a grand idea.
Would you be willing to share in a tank of gas, though?”

“You don’t have to ask, Tiff.
You know I will. And I’m sure my mom will spring for an ice-cream or two.”

“Yeah, that’s an idea.
You’ll have to show us where that retro-parlor is. It sounds like great fun.”

“That’s a deal. I think I
remember where it is. I can Google it anyway.”

A half-an-hour later, we
came home to the smell of eggs and bacon. I didn’t remember buying any bacon;
neither did Tiffany. We exchanged a glance before we opened the door.

“Ah, there you are!
Great. I was just going to crack the poached eggs.”

“That smells divine, Mrs.
Williams,” Tiffany said, before I could inquire about the bacon.

“Thank you, dear. But I
don’t deserve all the thanks; I got the bacon from Mrs. Camborne since you
didn’t seem to have any in the fridge.”

“Good gracious, Mom, you
went and disturb Mrs. Camborne on Saturday morning?”

“Yeah, that’s right,
Heather. She’s a friend and I think it wasn’t too much of an imposition to ask
if she had a couple of slices of bacon, do you?”

“But at this hour?”

“Oh but, dear, she was up
and cleaning her apartment already. You people around here are truly early
birds, aren’t you?”

“I guess we are,” I
relented. “And it does smell good. I haven’t had bacon and poached eggs in I
don’t know how long.”

“There you are then. You
can put it on your calendar, reminding yourself to buy bacon for Mrs. Camborne
next time you go shopping, and buying some the next time I’m in town.”

“You’ve got a deal,”
Tiffany piped up. “I’m going to have a shower first, if you ladies don’t mind.
I’m stinking to high heaven.”

“I’ll be right behind,” I
shouted to Tiffany’s back before I heard her bedroom door close on her.

That afternoon the three
of us went to the retro-parlor for an ice cream. If my mother was going to stay
longer than a weekend, I am sure I would gain more than ten pounds in a month.

She enjoyed the table
jukeboxes immensely. She spent quarters after quarters to hear the tunes that
she and Dad used to dance to when they were in their twenties. She hummed some
of the songs while telling us about Dad planting a row of flowers in front of
the old house–where she was born–during the night, so that she could wake up to
the scent of flowers every morning during their engagement. Of course, in those
days there was no way she would have accepted to have sex with my dad before she
had a wedding band on her finger.

That reminded me of the
fact that neither Jeff nor Elizabeth wore a wedding ring. Was it because they
both
played a dirty game of pretense?
Maybe they were both having affairs on the side. I would have to discuss the
possibility with Tiffany. She was more detached than I was in this case.

Next, we went to the
Washington Monument and spent a bit of time walking around the avenues
bordering it. Everything in D.C. was impressively big. It reminded me of the
Roman Empire–the Coliseum in particular. That huge stadium built brick by brick
to host the famous “games” where men fought for their lives against voracious
beasts and merciless gladiators. Only a thumb down from the emperor would send
a man to his death.

We sat on a bench later
that afternoon before going home and talked about Mom’s plans for Dad. Jeff had
mentioned that routine was as important as I thought it would be, but
afterward, “what would happen?”

“Well, the doctor said
that once Dad is settling down to a routine, the disease will progress very
slowly and the more activities we can do together, the better it will be. But,
it’s difficult.”

“What is, Mom?” I asked.

“The fact that he doesn’t
recognize people unless he has known them for a long time. He doesn’t want people
to talk to him and is sometimes quite belligerent if someone insists on talking
to him.”

“And what does the doctor
say about that?” Tiffany asked.

“He said that we can’t do
much for the time being. As long as he recognizes me and your brothers, Heather,
we should be fine.”

“Maybe I should come back
for a visit,” I suggested.

The smile that appeared
on my mother’s face would have made me cry.

“That’s a grand idea,
Heather. You know we’d love to have you–even it’s only for a couple of days.”

“Okay, I’ll see what I
can do. As long as you don’t take this as a promise, okay?”

“Deal,” Mom replied
unexpectedly.

The three of us erupted
in laughter. This little visit did a world of good for my mom’s spirit. After
all, I was pleased that she came down for the weekend.

Chapter
24

On Monday morning, after
an enjoyable evening between the three of us and driving my mom to the airport,
my mood was up at least ten notches. And when Dr. Kerry called us in for our
weekly meeting, and announced that we were going to watch Dr. Jeff Aldridge
perform a hip replacement surgery, I truly felt elated at the prospect.

For some reason my mind
had settled on the fact that I had a married lover. Subconsciously (if not
consciously), I had to accept the situation and deal with it. Coming back from
the airport, Tiffany and I discussed the possibility of Elizabeth having an
affair, too. Tiffany, who didn’t know the woman as well as I did, suggested
that perhaps it would be a good idea for me to talk about entertainment in D.C.
 
She said that since I was new to the
city I would have a great pretext for asking.

“And when she would talk
about the restaurants or clubs she’s been to, you’d have an idea whether she’s
been out often or not.”

“Besides,” I added, “she
might talk about she and Jeff going to that or that place. Then I’d know if
they are still going out together.”

“Exactly,” Tiffany
agreed.

Anyway, we were on our
way to watch the “roving surgeon”, as he called himself, perform an intricate
and lengthy surgical procedure.

A hip replacement is
often necessary when osteoporosis has settled on the joints of an elderly
sufferer. Osteoporosis can appear and ravage a body at any age. It largely
depends on how our metabolism absorbs the calcium we consume every day. Some
people have absolutely no worries in that regard, while others are riddle with
disintegrating bones, mostly in their lower back. The reason being that most of
the body weight rests on the pelvis and lumbar vertebrae.
 

In this case, the
patient’s chart revealed that he was a rather young fellow but that a car
accident had left him with a damaged hip in need of replacement.

To my surprise, not only
did Jeff enter the operating theater, but Elizabeth did as well.
What on earth is she doing here?
I
wondered. None of the interns recognized her behind the surgical mask, but I
did. Besides, none of them had met Dr. E. Aldridge apart from me. It was a fact
that the lady kept much to herself and didn’t go out to the terrace café that
often or didn’t mingle with the lowly interns often, if at all.

Jeff shot a glance toward
our enclosed ‘observatory’ and quickly returned his gaze to the patient when he
felt his wife at his side. I must admit, as soon as they got in the thick of
it, so to speak, my mind switched to what was happening on the operating table
and forgot about our “love triangle”.

The procedure was long
and would have been dangerously lengthy for an elderly patient. That’s perhaps
why they had two top surgeons working on the man’s hip. I was to learn later
that the reason Elizabeth was attending the surgery on this occasion was that
the very same patient had received a new kidney not so long ago. There had been
some fear that he might collapse during the operation–heart failure is not
uncommon in such cases. It’s like the body is saying, “Hey, guys, enough is
enough. I quit!”

A few hours later, it was
Gerald, our resident bragger’s turn to have a hand in removing a cancerous
tumor from a patient’s lung. Once again, Jeff was the primary surgeon. Gerald
had told everyone that oncology was to be his specialty. In this instance, Dr.
Kerry had told us that Dr. Vaughn, the oncology surgeon was away and that Jeff
would be doing the honors once again. Gerald was to assist.

I had to admire him–Gerald
I mean–he would have the right to brag about this one. His dexterity and
promptness of reflex was excellent. We even had to applaud when he pulled the
small tumor out of the lung without as much as a tremor of anxiety in his hand.
I saw Jeff smile at him. He, too, was pleased with Gerald’s performance.

After both operations
were over, we all headed for the terrace café. We were excited. We couldn’t
stop talking about what we observed, the notes we made, and even the photos we
were able to take. We were making our own little show & tell. We were all
avid to recall what we witnessed. A few weeks back, when we all filed into an
operating theater to observe a surgery first hand, we were literally in awe and
much too scared to do anything. Now, we were beginning to comprehend what it took
to be a surgeon, and a good one. We wanted to participate; we wanted to have a
hand in it, as it were. The fear of making a mistake was slowly being replaced
by a fervent desire to accomplish something.
 
And the sentiment was somewhat overwhelming. Our personal problems
seemed to dwindle in size and value when compared with what we could do for
another human being. Amid the noise we made as we scraped the chairs around a
couple of the café’s tables, I heard someone call my name.