Chương 2
He stared at her.
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“Because you hate hospitals.”
“I hate olives too. You’ve never tried this hard to get me away from a salad.”
Under different circumstances, she might have laughed. Mark almost did. His mouth twitched automatically before he caught himself.
That tiny reaction stayed with her.
There were moments in a marriage when the body continued performing old intimacy after the mind had already left the room.
Then Dr. Carter returned carrying the cream folder.
She did not look at Mark first.
She looked at Laura.
And Laura knew.
Now, in the garage, Mark finally spoke.
“It wasn’t as simple as she’s making it sound.”
Dr. Carter’s expression did not change.
“I haven’t characterized your motives at all.”
“I’m talking to my wife.”
Laura flinched at the word wife.
Mark saw it.
He took a breath through his nose and lowered his voice.
“The result didn’t mean you were sick.”
“What result?”
“Laura.”
“What result?”
He glanced at Dr. Carter, as if hoping she might spare him from a sentence he had already avoided for six years.
She did not.
Dr. Carter said, “The laboratory identified a pathogenic variant associated with an inherited form of cardiomyopathy. That finding does not tell us exactly what will happen to you. It does mean your family history and today’s event need to be taken seriously.”
Laura heard inherited.
Her mind went immediately to Sophie.
Not to herself.
Not to her mother.
To Sophie standing on a kitchen chair the previous Sunday because she had decided five-year-olds were capable of making pancakes without assistance. Sophie with Mark’s dark hair and Laura’s narrow hands. Sophie complaining that the blueberries looked “too wet.” Sophie asleep with one foot outside every blanket in the house.
Laura looked at Mark.
“You knew before Sophie?”
He closed his eyes briefly.
That was answer enough.
The folder slipped against her sweatshirt.
Dr. Carter reached for it, then stopped before touching Laura.
Laura said, “Did you know before I got pregnant?”
Mark’s face tightened.
“Yes.”
The fluorescent lights hummed overhead.
Laura stared at him with such concentration that later she would remember strange things: the pale thread coming loose from the sleeve of his black T-shirt, the rainwater shining on the rear tire of the sedan, the faint red mark beginning to rise on his cheek where she had struck him.
She hated that she had hit him.
She hated that some part of her was still cataloging his injuries.
“You told me it was negative.”
“I know.”
“No. You don’t get to say you know like we forgot to pay the water bill.”
“I’m not.”
“You looked me in the face.”
“I was scared.”
“So was I.”
“I know.”
“Stop saying that.”
He stopped.
Dr. Carter said softly, “Laura, I want you back upstairs.”
Laura turned toward her.
“I’m not having another episode.”
“That isn’t why I’m asking.”
“Then why?”
“Because you just learned something destabilizing about your health and your family. Because you collapsed today. Because I don’t want you driving. And because I’d rather answer what I can tonight than send you home with six years of questions and an internet connection.”
The last part was so practical that Laura almost resented her for it.
Mark stepped forward.
“I’ll take her home.”
Laura looked at him.
He stopped moving.
“No,” she said.
One word. No tremor.
Mark rubbed the side of his jaw.
“Laura, please.”
She handed the car keys to Dr. Carter.
“Can somebody get me back upstairs?”
Dr. Carter nodded.
Mark said, “What am I supposed to do?”
Laura almost laughed.
It came out as a small sound that hurt her throat.
For six years, apparently, Mark had been deciding what she was supposed to do.
She looked at him across the roof of their sedan.
“Figure it out.”
She followed Dr. Carter toward the elevator without looking back.
The elevator smelled faintly of bleach and someone’s fast food.
Laura leaned against the mirrored wall while Dr. Carter pressed the button for the cardiology floor. Their reflections looked oddly formal together: doctor and patient, white coat and hospital wristband, both women standing too straight.
Laura’s hand stung.
She looked at her palm.
“I shouldn’t have hit him.”
Dr. Carter kept her gaze on the floor numbers.
“No.”
Laura waited.
The doctor added, “That doesn’t make what you learned less serious.”
“I’m not asking you to make me feel better.”
“I know.”
Laura gave her a tired sideways look.
Dr. Carter almost smiled.
“Sorry.”
The doors opened.
Back in the room, Laura sat on the edge of the bed while a nurse reconnected the monitor. The nurse was named Kevin and had no idea that her marriage had just cracked open three floors below. He asked whether the adhesive was irritating her skin. He apologized because one electrode would not stick. He told her the cafeteria coffee was terrible but the vending machine near the east elevators had surprisingly decent pretzels.
Laura wanted to hug him for being boring.
Instead she said, “Pretzels sound good.”
After he left, Dr. Carter placed the cream folder on the rolling table between them.
“I need to be precise about what I know and what I don’t.”
Laura pulled the blanket over her knees.
“Okay.”
“The report is real. I verified the laboratory information and the identifying details. There is documentation showing the result was communicated to your designated surrogate while you lacked capacity to manage your own medical decisions. There is also a signed acknowledgment in that packet.”
“Mark.”
“Yes.”
“Why wasn’t I told when I woke up?”
“That is one of the questions the hospital needs to answer.”
“You work here.”
“I do. I wasn’t involved in your care six years ago.”
Laura opened the folder again.
“Somebody was.”
“Yes.”
“Did somebody just decide my husband counted as me?”
“No.”
Dr. Carter’s answer was immediate.
May you like
Then she slowed herself.
“At that time, the team documented that your health-care proxy had been activated because you were temporarily unable to make decisions. That may explain why he received information while you were ill. It does not explain why there is no clear documented handoff of this result to you after you recovered. I don’t want to pretend I have that answer tonight.”
