Love's Healing Touch (7 page)

"How is he? Will he be all right?"

"I don't know, but he has the best doctor in the place taking care of him. I'll check in with her later and let you know." He sat in the green plastic chair next to her and took a hand that was still a little damp. "Why are you here so early?"

"I was going to eat breakfast in the cafeteria and be here when you got off."

"Well, go ahead." He reached into a pocket for a bill. "Get some breakfast."

"No, no. I don't feel like it now. I'll wait here."

"Then tell me what happened. You found him in the parking lot?"

"Yes. Poor man, he drove himself here. I saw him getting out of the car. He almost fell and his face was white." She fanned out the skirt of her long, gauzy mauve dress before she stared at the dark smears on it. "I didn't realize I was getting bloody. What should I do?" She glanced up at Mike. "I should change clothes."

"I'm worried. I'm sure he's a nice man, but blood can carry infections like hepatitis, which would be dangerous for you."

"I know, Mike, but I couldn't leave the poor man to lie on the pavement."

Of course she couldn't, despite the risk. "I'll get you a set of scrubs."

She straightened. "Scrubs?" She bit the words off with obvious distaste.

"I know they aren't your usual style, but scrubs are all we have. They're better than what you're wearing."

She nodded. "All right. I'll try scrubs."

"You'll make them look good."

As he stood, Dr. Ramírez entered the waiting room. Approaching his mother, she reached out her hand. "I'm Dr. Ramírez. I can't thank you enough for helping my father."

"I'm Tessie Fuller, Mike's mother." She got up. "I was glad to help. I can't believe your father drove himself here."

"What can I say?" Dr. Ramírez shrugged. "He thinks he can do anything."

"How is he?" His mother grabbed Dr. Ramírez's arm as she spoke.

"Dr. Price, a surgeon, is stitching up the arm. That won't take long, but we're going to keep him overnight. He lost a lot of blood and would have lost more if you hadn't helped." She nodded at his mother and smiled. "We want to make sure everything is okay before we release him."

"Oh, my, yes. I understand."

"I'm glad to meet you. Thank you again." Then she dropped the smile and said. "Fuller, transfer."

Before he could follow Dr. Ramírez into the E.R., his mother pulled on his hand. "She's a pretty young woman
and
a doctor." She studied Mike's face. "Nice smile. And you work together."

"Yes, Mother." He knew what was coming and tried to pull away.

"She could be the right one."

"Mom, she's a doctor. I'm a med-school dropout which makes her the absolutely wrong one." He pried her hand off his arm and said, "I've got to go back to the E.R., but I'll get you the scrubs when I can."

A long shift change ended at seven-thirty. Wearily, Mike walked into the waiting room carrying a set of scrubs. His mother wasn't there.

Great.

He asked the clerk if she'd seen his mother but she'd just replaced Marv and didn't know her. Maybe Mom had decided to eat breakfast. He'd taken a step toward the hallway when Dr. Ramírez called him from the door to the E.R.

"Fuller."

He turned back.

"Guess who was visiting my father when I checked on him at seven?" She shook her head and smiled.

"My mother?" His stomach tightened. Please, no.

She nodded. "Yep. If you're looking for her, you might try there."

Great. He jogged down the hall, pushed the elevator call button impatiently until the door finally swished open and he got on. His mother collected strays. That was how Francie had come to live with them when her father went to prison, but this stray happened to be Dr. Ramírez's father. The complications of a friendship between them overwhelmed him.

He got off the elevator on the fifth floor and walked down the hall looking for the room number the clerk had given him. When he got there, the door was open. Inside, his mother buttered a piece of toast and held it out for Mr. Ramírez to take a bite. The patient had his arm wrapped and elevated. A monitor was attached while an IV dripped. He had some color back in his face and gazed at his mother with all the interest a man in pain could.

Well, well, well.

After watching for a minute, Mike entered the room. "Mom, do you want these scrubs?"

"Oh, yes, dear." She wiped her hand on a napkin and stood. "I'm sorry, Antonio, but I need to go change now and go home. I'll call to check on you tomorrow." She put a sheet of paper in her pocket. "I have your number."

"Thank you, Tessie." Mr. Ramírez smiled at her. "Thank you for helping me into the hospital and for feeding me breakfast. Please call."

"Of course, but you take a nap." She followed her son from the room.

"You fed him breakfast?" Mike smiled at her while they waited for the elevator.

"Poor man. He couldn't feed himself with only one arm, now could he? And the aides couldn't help him until much later. His food would have been cold." She put her hand on his arm and nodded, her dangling earrings bouncing with the movement of her head. "I believe it's so important to help others, don't you?"

Just terrific.

W
hen Ana walked into her father's kitchen the next day, Mrs. Fuller sat at the table with her dad. Ana paused for a minute and tried to think of any reason Mike's mother would be there.

In spite of what her family might say about her, Ana wasn't nosy. At least, not today. She'd dropped by to check on her father and start dinner, but he didn't look as if he needed her care. Which was fine, but she wondered what was going on. After all, the charming widow had spent time with her father while he was in the hospital. Now he'd been home for only a day and here she was again.

Her father held the business section of the newspaper— odd because recently he was only reading the sports page and doing the crossword puzzles. But when she saw the pen in Mrs. Fuller's hand and the pad of yellow paper in front of her, the reason for the rendezvous made sense.

With her nice, conservative black slacks, with a plain black cotton sweater, it was an outfit that looked like something Ana's mother might have worn with a pair of tiny gold earrings and the cross Papi had given her when they married. But Mrs. Fuller accessorized her outfit with a huge red scarf covered in gold swirls tossed around her shoulders. Her gold sandals with red bangles matched it. In greater contrast to Ana's mother, when Mrs. Fuller spoke she waved her hands and light flashed off the jewels of her many rings. The bangles on her wrists jangled and reflected the light coming in the window.

Flamboyant was the word that came to mind. Oh, Mrs. Fuller was lovely, full of energy but so very different from Mama. Sweet, loving,
quiet
Mama.

For a minute she watched them: Mrs. Fuller tapped her pen on the table, which caused her bracelets to clank together. Then she looked at Papi with a smile he returned. He said something to her, and Mrs. Fuller leaned toward him and laughed.

And so, in spite of the differences, Ana couldn't be unhappy. For the first time in over a year, her father was smiling. Mrs. Fuller seemed to pump him up, to delight him, to make him happy, all of which were good. He needed company during the few days Ana had made him stay home from the store. However, there was still the problem with Mrs. Fuller's criminal past, but this was hardly the place to discuss that.

"Hello, Mrs. Fuller. It's nice to see you again," Ana said.

Fuller's mother glanced up at her. "Hello, Doctor. Your father is helping me find a job." She scowled and tapped a pen in frustration. "I'm afraid I have no employable skills."

"Hello, Ana," Papi greeted her. "I was thinking when I go back to the store next week, Tessie could work for me and help with some of the little things. Answer the phone. Take messages."

"Oh, Antonio, really?" Mrs. Fuller's rings glittered when she clapped her hands. "At your store?"

"Sure, I can use the help for a while."

"I could be a gofer, too." Mrs. Fuller clapped, her bangles shimmering in the light from the window. Then she bit her lower lip. "But I don't want to take advantage of your good nature."

"It's a good idea." Ana slid past the table. "I don't want my father to overdo it."

"And it will give you some experience and a reference," Papi said.

"I don't have much experience," Mrs. Fuller said to Ana. "And no references." She sighed. "I've called fifteen places today, and they aren't interested. Even if I didn't have a record, they wouldn't be interested."

"We'll keep searching," Papi said.

"Oh, thank you, Antonio. I don't know what I'd do without your encouragement."

"Would you like to stay for dinner, Mrs. Fuller?" Ana opened the freezer to pull out a casserole. "We always have plenty of food."

"Please, call me Tessie." She glanced at the kitchen clock. "I didn't realize it was so late. I have to catch a bus and get home in time to fix dinner for the boys." She stood. "But thank you. Please ask me again."

"Has Tim found a job yet?" Papi asked.

"Yes, he's working at Burger Heaven a few blocks from where we live. He started last week." She picked up her tapestry purse and said, "Goodbye, Antonio. Goodbye, Doctor." With a swirl and to the jingling of her bangles, she dashed from the kitchen.

After she heard the front door shut, Ana said, "Papi, are you sure you should be going back to the store so soon?"

He gave her the don't-contradict-me expression he'd perfected years ago and didn't answer. She'd known he wouldn't.

Ana scrutinized the gunshot wound in the young man's thigh. Not much bleeding because the EMT had cut the trouser leg off and done a good job stanching the flow, but it hurt the patient on the gurney.

"What's your name?" Ana asked.

"Julio Rivera," he said through clenched teeth.

"How did this happen, Mr. Rivera?" Ana asked.

"A car drove by and someone inside shot me."

Ana observed the young man. His light brown complexion was dry, no sweating, no sign of shock, although pain was obvious in his dark eyes. "They're holding an operating suite for you. We'll take you there in a few minutes and will get you pain medication while you're in recovery." She shone her light in his eyes. The pupils were fine. No drugs, no concussion. Not that there would be with a leg wound, but it never hurt to check. Patients didn't always tell doctors everything.

"I don't understand." He shook his head. "I didn't recognize anyone." He closed his eyes. "I was waiting for the bus to go to work, not doing a thing to anyone, when they shot me."

"Gang initiation?" Mike spoke softly from behind her.

Startled by his closeness, Ana looked over her shoulder. To hide the pleasant flutter seeing him gave her, she said in her professional voice, "Maybe, but now he needs a transfer."

"Yes, Doctor." He moved the gurney around her leaving her to stare at his back as he moved farther away.

"Doctor," Olivia, the nurse, called. "Patient in Trauma 1."

A few hours later, Ana leaned against the wall around the corner from the emergency entrance. Despite the howling of ambulances and the shouts of the medical personnel, it was a peaceful place. At least as peaceful as it got around the hospital with maybe the exception of the chapel. She didn't know because she'd never felt like visiting the place.

Across the lawn was a small garden outside the west wing. If she ignored the noise and focused on the greenery, she could calm herself.

Feeling the approach of Mike, as she was beginning to think of him, she turned toward him. Yes, it was Mike Fuller. How amazing that she knew that. Not wanting to examine the phenomenon that made her a little breathless, she said as she watched his approach, "I didn't know you came here."

"Yeah," he said with no explanation.

"Did you know your mother visited my father at our home?"

"No." He frowned. "I slept most of the day and came in early."

"When I went to my father's house last night, she was there. He was helping her look for a job. What do you think?"

Mike nodded and leaned against the wall next to her. "What do you think?"

Just like Fuller to answer her question with one of his own. She watched his face but it was blank, no emotion showed anyplace. Here she was with her heart beating faster and longing to get some reaction from him, but the man never gave anything away.

"He hasn't smiled so much since my mother died last year."

"That's not what I meant." He dropped his gaze to his feet. "I mean how do you feel about your father seeing an ex-con?"

"I don't know." She considered her words. "Actually, I do. It bothers me because I don't know your mother, but this is my father's decision. I know better than to interfere in what my father does." She sighed. "If she makes him happy, I'll accept it. I'll be glad for both of them."

For almost a minute she watched Mike's hands on the top of the wall, powerful hands with thick, strong fingers. Finally she looked up to meet his glance. "What do
you
think of your mother's keeping company with my father?"

He shoved his hands in his pocket. "It's okay."

"They are, after all, adults who have raised families and can make their own decisions." When he didn't answer, she said, "Right?"

He nodded.

She shouldn't care if Mike communicated with her or not. They worked together. There was no reason for her to say much more to him than, "Transfer" and "Thank you" and "Fuller." He did respond well to those, transferring when asked, coming when needed, but not a lot else. She had no right to expect or demand more.

As he moved away, she said, "Let's not allow anything between our parents to affect our work situation."

"Doctor, orderly. Got it." Without another word, he headed back to the E.R.

"That's not— " she started to say but he was already around the corner. Taking a deep breath and attempting to gather enough calm to last the rest of her shift, she followed him into the building a minute later.