How To Save a Marriage in a Million (7 page)

She sniffed, but before she managed to bring her hand up to her eyes to wipe away the evidence of memories she’d tried to put behind her, Richard enfolded her in his arms. And she was powerless to resist. She felt the steady thud of his heartbeat, the gentle movement of his chest with each breath, the solid, reassuring strength of his arms around her, the feather touch of his lips on her forehead.

‘No!’

No way. The stakes were too high. She couldn’t bear even the slightest possibility of heartache all over again.

Richard dropped his arms as she pulled away.

‘What’s the matter, Jo?’

She wiped away the remains of her tears with a handful of tissues and blew her nose.

‘Nothing’s the matter. I’ll be all right in a few minutes.’ She took a deep breath to steady her voice. ‘I don’t want tea after all. I need to be on my own.’

The cold stare she sent him did the job and he
gathered the jacket he’d shed before attending to her injury.

‘Are you sure you’re okay?’

‘I’m fine,’ she almost growled.

‘Right. I’ll see you at work next week, then.’ He opened the sliding door, the lines on his face indicating a mixture of bewilderment and concern. At the last moment he turned. ‘I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—’

‘Just go,’ she said, and closed the door firmly behind him.

CHAPTER FOUR

W
HEN
Richard arrived back at the hospital the auditions were in full swing. He couldn’t face going back in, though. And he was too emotionally drained to even talk on the phone to James Francis. So he decided to leave a message at the switchboard, requesting them to contact his colleague and ask him if he could look after his saxophone until Monday.

Maybe by then he would be in a fit state to apologise and explain.

Maybe his busy weekend—shopping, moving into his new house, going through the motions of settling in—would take his mind off the disturbing thoughts of Joanna that wouldn’t leave his head.

But it didn’t.

He was still thinking of her when he arrived on the ward early Monday morning to do a quick check of the weekend admissions. When he found
out Joanna wasn’t starting until nine it was difficult to disguise his disappointment.

A busy morning in the long-term follow-up clinic at least cheered him up and gave him something outside himself and his inner confusion to concentrate on. The morning was taken up with seeing the happy, living evidence of all the hard work his team did in the early stages of diagnosing and treating childhood cancer.

It always gratified him to know more than eighty per cent of his charges survived their disease for longer than five years and the majority of those went on to live normal adult lives. All of the patients he saw that morning had done well: Jenna, who’d had a brain tumour removed as a baby, now a lively toddler; Jay and Tom, two young adults who’d been the same age when they’d developed osteogenic sarcomas affecting the tibia, a bone in the lower leg. Tom had needed amputation but Jay’s leg had been saved. Though the boys lived in different parts of the state they’d stayed friends and always organised their clinic visits for the same time. And, of course, the majority of leukaemia victims did well.

When he waved the last patient out the door, Richard packed his things.

‘See you next time,’ Margaret, the sister in charge, called as he headed towards the door. ‘Have a good afternoon.’

‘I’ll try,’ he replied, feeling an unexpected jolt of nerves at the prospect of seeing Joanna again.

He had a quick lunch and headed for Matilda Ward for the first round of the week—a teaching round. He expected it to be demanding because it included the junior doctors as well as two or three medical students.

And Joanna would be there.

If his first working week was anything to go by, the ward rounds she attended always seemed to have an air of cheerfulness. She could be counted on to lighten the atmosphere if either staff or patients got bogged down in the sometimes daunting complexities of the diseases and their treatment.

If there was a bright side, she’d find it.

And there she was. He could see her through the glass partition enclosing the day ward, where procedures like outpatient chemotherapy, lumbar punctures and transfusions were performed. Her eyes were bright with encouragement as she assisted
with supervision of three children having chemo. Though he couldn’t hear what she was saying, one of her charges laughed and the others were smiling at her animated conversation.

He held up his hand in what could be interpreted as either a wave or a truce, but she ignored him and continued her jovial chat with the kids.

Did the woman have endless reserves of strength? he wondered as he swung into the nurses’ station, almost colliding with Anita, the resident.

‘Sorry, I was just coming to find you,’ she said. She’d only been working on the unit a couple of weeks but Lynne had told him she’d already proved to be keen, competent and a quick learner.

‘What can I do for you?’

She looked a little put out, as if she was about to ask for bus fare to the moon.

‘I need supervision inserting a central line. Jack’s in Theatre with Tilly Farmer and the plastics team.’ Jack was one of the oncology registrars in his final year of specialist training, trying to learn everything he could and hoping for an overseas posting when he’d finished his exams. The young doctor took a long sighing breath. ‘And this
one will make up my quota so I can officially do them on my own.’

Richard glanced at his watch. He had twenty-five minutes before the round was due to start.

‘Is it set up?’

‘In the chemo suite. Joanna said she’s available to help if I need her.’

Right.

Joanna was available
.

Terrific. Wasn’t it? Of course it was. She was the best nurse on the ward and he wouldn’t let the unresolved issues he had with her distract him.

‘And the patient?’

‘Danny Sims.’

‘He’s an outpatient, isn’t he? Pelvic Ewing’s sarcoma.’

‘That’s right,’ the resident doctor said as they walked towards the specially set-up suite of cubicles. ‘Dr Price prescribed intensive initial therapy in view of the site and prognosis.’

The boy’s diagnosis made working with Joanna even more difficult as Danny had the same type of cancer that had taken Sam’s life. He wondered how Joanna would cope. Would she relive a little
of the pain of Sam’s illness every time she saw Danny?

Richard remembered seeing Alan Price’s notes on the boy and the chemo regime he’d worked out. Though cures were increasingly common for the extremely rare but often fast-growing tumour of the connective tissue associated with bone, location in the pelvic area meant a much poorer prognosis.

‘When’s he due to start treatment?’

‘Not until tomorrow but if we put in the catheter this afternoon, he should be able to start first thing in the morning. He’s staying overnight.’ She smiled as they entered the wash room where they scrubbed up. ‘Of course Dr Price asked that you review him before we start. I was going to ask you to look at his notes this afternoon after the round and get Jack to supervise—’

‘But he’s in Theatre, for a long haul.’

‘Probably all afternoon. And Pharmacy needs the okay today to make up his drug regime.’

‘No problem. Let’s go and say hello to Danny, then.’

Richard was pleased to find out the thirteen-year-old patient and his father, who looked more
nervous than the boy, had been well prepared. Anita had explained exactly what would be done and Danny had been given a mild sedative by one of the nurses as soon as it was confirmed the procedure was to go ahead.

Richard introduced himself.

‘I’m Dr Richard Howell, the specialist who will be looking after you from now on. Anita is going to put a tiny plastic tube into one of the large veins in your chest so you can have the amount and type of drugs you need without having to have a new line each time you come in.’

‘Will it hurt?’ Danny said drowsily.

‘A little,’ Anita answered with a smile. ‘You’ll feel the needle with the local anaesthetic like a pinprick, but that will make the skin go numb.’

Richard turned when he heard the curtains of the cubicle part.

‘Hi, champ,’ Joanna said cheerfully, as if she had known Danny for years. Richard’s worries about any difficulties she might have coping were immediately allayed. ‘And I checked up about…ahem.’ Joanna made a theatrical show of clearing her throat. ‘That very special person
is
coming to the ward on the day you have your second treatment,
but you mustn’t tell a soul I told you. It’s supposed to be a big surprise,’ she added with a wink, and Danny managed a grin.

‘Our secret,’ he said.

She nodded in the direction of Danny’s father. ‘Jenny’s with the kids today, is she, Pete?’

He nodded and then paled, looking as if he was about to faint.

‘It’s getting a bit crowded in here. Why don’t you go and make yourself a cuppa in the parents’ room?’ she said tactfully, glancing in Richard’s direction for his approval to give Pete an excuse to leave. He nodded, aware that their young patient’s anxiety level had definitely ebbed after Joanna had appeared. ‘Okay, Danny?’

The teenager’s eyes had drifted closed and he opened them briefly, managing the slightest smile. ‘Yeah, you go, Dad, but you’ll stay, won’t you, Sister?’

She patted his leg. ‘Of course. Someone has to keep an eye on these doctors. Is that okay with you guys?’ she asked.

She was in total control, treating Richard like a consultant she was working with, behaving exactly as she should be. Maybe he’d blown out
of proportion her almost hostile reaction to him on Friday night. She was certainly better at filing away the past than he was.

‘Fine by me,’ Richard said, trying to adopt the same attitude, which hovered somewhere between professional and friendly-casual.

‘Good.’

Joanna peeled open another set of sterile surgical gloves and then tilted the bed head down to help fill Danny’s chest and neck veins. She went off to wash her hands while Anita carefully swabbed the skin of the right side of the boy’s torso.

‘Feeling all right?’ Anita asked, but Danny seemed to be drifting in and out of a light sleep, a sign of effective sedation. There was a good chance he wouldn’t even remember the catheter insertion.

Joanna returned and slipped her hands into her gloves.

‘I’ll just watch and let me know if you want any help or advice,’ Richard said as he moved back from the bed and stood where he had a good view of the two women at work.

Anita anaesthetised the skin just below the
clavicle then made a small cut to locate the subclavian vein, which sits beneath the bone but in front of the artery. Joanna dabbed at the small wound and placed a finger in the notch at the top of the breastbone so that Anita could line up the needle at the correct angle. Insertion of the plastic tube into the vein and its tunnelling under the skin went smoothly, a good back flow of blood indicating it was likely to be in the correct position. A small cuff on the tube was inflated to help keep it in place under the skin and an X-ray would confirm it was in the right place and that no damage had been done to the underlying lung.

‘Well done.’ Richard checked the time. ‘Can I leave you to suture, check Danny’s chest and organise radiology? I’ll speak to Danny’s father before he leaves.’

‘Yes. And thanks, Dr Howell.’

‘I’ll see you on the ward round when you’ve finished.’

Richard was only five minutes late to the round and Anita joined him and his group not long after, but he noticed Joanna’s absence.

‘Isn’t Sister Raven joining us this afternoon?’
he asked Lynne quietly when they were walking between patients.

‘No, she’s working in the chemo suite until the day cases finish. It’s better she stays there. Is there a problem?’ He chose to ignore the curious look in the charge sister’s eyes.

‘No, of course not. It’s just that…’

‘She brightens your day?’

Yes, that’s exactly right, he thought. She’s like a ray of sunshine generously shedding light and warmth wherever she goes.

‘She brightens everyone’s day,’ he conceded to say with a pleasant but what he hoped was detached smile as they reached a grizzling toddler in a cot.

‘Hello, Mrs Bryant.’ The child’s mother looked overwrought and overtired. Now was not the time to enquire how she was coping and he made a mental note to call back and see her at the end of the round.

‘Would you mind if Travis…’ he indicated one of the medical students ‘…gently examines Taylor’s tummy?’

The child had a Wilm’s tumour, a cancer arising from the kidney, and often presented as an
abdominal mass. She was undernourished and being fed by a nasogastric tube in order to try and improve her general condition prior to surgery the following week.

‘All right,’ Liz Bryant said with a sigh, but she moved protectively towards her daughter and began to stroke her head.

Travis completed the examination awkwardly, one of his hands big enough to span the child’s abdomen from side to side.

‘I’d like to come back and see you later on my own,’ Richard said quietly.

She picked up her crying child and rocked Taylor in her arms. She nodded then turned her back on the group and walked to the window. Richard wished Joanna was available to comfort her and realised, after one short week back in Matilda Ward he had begun to take her bubbly, happy, caring presence for granted. He was coming to depend on her being there for her tireless ability to comfort and offer hope in the grimmest situations.

He missed her…

He wanted part of the joy she spread for himself.

‘Come on,’ he said with enthusiasm. ‘Let’s head
for the tutorial room. Don’t think you can get out of it. Alan told me he’d asked one of you to prepare a case presentation.’

There was a general chuckle from the group as they followed him down the corridor and out of the ward.

* * *

Richard wasn’t like some of the other hospital consultants who would rather starve than go to the canteen, but sometimes, like this afternoon, he wanted solitude during his breaks. The couple of times he’d had lunch in the busy dining hall, hoping to see Joanna, he’d found himself bullied into sitting with a group of chattering nurses, at least one of whom would decide to flirt with him.