Shock (2 page)

"That I don't know," Paul said. "It depends. I prefer to hold off and see how events play out. What do you know about Kristin Overmeyer's arrival today?"

"She came in her own car," Sheila said. "It's out in the parking lot."

"She came alone?"

"No. As we advised her, she brought a friend," Sheila said. "Her name is Rebecca Corey. She's out in the main waiting area."

As Paul started for the door his eyes locked onto Carl's.

"I'm sorry," Carl said.

Paul hesitated for a moment. He felt like telling the anesthesiologist what he thought of him, but changed his mind. Paul wanted to keep a cool head, and getting into a conversation with Carl at that point would have gotten him all worked up. It had been enough that Carl had kept him waiting for so long.

Without even bothering to change out of his surgical scrubs, Paul snatched a long white doctor's coat from the room that served as the surgical lounge. He pulled the coat on as he descended the metal stairs in the stairwell. Passing the first floor, he exited out onto the lawn, which was showing the first signs of spring. With the coat clutched around himself against the blustery early April New England wind, he hurried down toward the clinic's stone gatehouse. He found the chief of security behind his scarred and worn desk, hunched over his department's schedule for the month of May.

If Kurt Hermann was surprised by the sudden arrival of the man who ran the Wingate Clinic, he didn't show it. Other than looking up, his only acknowledgment of Paul's presence was a slight questioning elevation of his right eyebrow.

Paul grabbed one of the straight-backed chairs that lined the sparse office and sat down in front of the security chief.

"We have a problem," Paul said.

"I'm listening," Kurt said. His chair squeaked as he leaned back.

"We've had a major anesthetic complication. Catastrophic, actually."

"Where's the patient?"

"Still in the OR, but she'll be out shortly."

"Name?"

"Kristin Overmeyer."

"Did she come alone?" Kurt asked as he wrote Kristin's name down.

"No. She came by car with a friend named Rebecca Corey. Dr. Donaldson said she's in the main waiting room."

"Make of the car?"

"I have no idea," Paul admitted.

"We'll find out," Kurt said. He raised his steely blue eyes to meet Paul's.

"This is what we hired you people for," Paul stated tersely. "I want you to handle it, and I don't want to know anything."

"No problem," Kurt said. He laid his pen down carefully as if it were fragile.

For a moment the two men stared at each other. Then Paul stood up, turned, and disappeared out into the gusty April morning.

ONE

OCTOBER 8, 1999 11:15 P.M.

SO LET ME GET THIS straight,' Joanna Meissner said to Carlton Williams. The two friends were sitting in the dark inside Carlton's Jeep Cherokee in a no-parking zone on Craigie Street alongside the Craigie Arms apartment building in Cambridge, Massachusetts. "You've decided that it would be best for us to wait to be married until after you finish your surgical residency some three or four years from now."

"I haven't decided anything," Carlton said defensively. "We're having a discussion here."

Joanna and Carlton had been out to dinner in Harvard Square that Friday evening and had been enjoying themselves until Joanna ;id brought up the sore subject of their long-term plans. As usual, from that moment on, the tone of the conversation had deteriorated. They had been over this thorny issue many times in the past as a consequence of their engagement. Theirs was a quintessentially long affair; they had known each other since kindergarten and had been dating each other exclusively since the ninth grade.

"Listen," Carlton said soothingly. "I'm just trying to think of what's best for both of us."

"Oh, bull!" Joanna blurted. Despite her vow to herself to stay calm, she could feel anger brewing in her gut as if she were a nuclear reactor about to go critical.

"I'm serious," Carlton said. "Joanna, I'm working my tail off. You know how often I'm on call. You know the hours. Being a resident at the MGH is a hell of a lot more demanding than I'd ever guessed."

"What difference does that make?" Joanna snapped, unable to keep the irritation she felt from being painfully obvious. She couldn't help feeling betrayed and rejected.

"It makes a lot of difference," Carlton persisted. "I'm exhausted. I'm no fun to be with. I can't have a normal conversation outside of what's going on in the hospital. It's pathetic. I don't even know what's happening in Boston, much less the world."

"That kind of comment might have some validity if we were dating casually. But the fact of the matter is we've been seeing each other for eleven years. And up until I broached this delicate issue of setting a date tonight, you were enjoying yourself, and you were perfectly fun to be with."

"I certainly love seeing you . . ." Carlton said.

"That's reassuring," Joanna interjected sarcastically. "What I find particularly ironic about this situation is that you're the one who asked me to marry you, not vice versa. The trouble is, that was seven years ago. I'd say that suggests your ardor has significantly cooled."

"It hasn't," Carlton protested. "I do want to marry you."

"I'm sorry, but you're not convincing. Not after all this time. First you wanted to graduate from college. That was fine. No problem. I thought that was appropriate. Then you thought you should just get through the first two years of medical school. Even that was okay with me since I could get most of my Ph.D. coursework out of the way. But then you thought it best to put things off until you got yourself all the way through medical school. Are you detecting a pattern here or is it just me? Then the issue became getting the first year of residency behind you. Stupid me even accepted that, but now it's the whole residency business. What about the fellowship deal you talked about last month? And then after that you might even think it best to wait while you set up your practice."

"I'm trying to be rational about this," Carlton said. "It's a difficult decision, and it behooves us to weigh the pros and cons . . ."

Joanna was no longer listening. Instead her emerald-green eyes wandered away from the face of her fiancé who, she recognized, wasn't even looking at her as he spoke. In fact, he'd avoided looking at her throughout this conversation; as far as she could tell, he'd only intermittently met her glare during her monologue. With unseeing eyes she stared straight ahead into the middle distance. All at once it was as if she had been slapped across the face by an invisible hand. Carlton's suggestion of yet another delay in setting a marriage date had spawned an epiphany, and she found herself laughing, not out of humor but disbelief.

Carlton halted in midsentence while enumerating the pros and the cons of getting married sooner rather than later.

"What are you laughing about?" he asked. He raised his eyes from watching himself fumble with the ignition keys and gazed at Joanna in the car's dim interior. Her face was silhouetted against the dark side window by a distant streetlamp whose light fingered its way through the windshield. Her sleek and delicate profile was limned by her lustrous flaxen hair, which appeared to glow in the half light. Diamond-like flashes glistened from her starkly white teeth just visible through her slightly parted, full lips. To Carlton, she was the most beautiful woman in the world even when she was badgering him.

Ignoring Carlton's question, Joanna continued her soft, mirthless laugh as the clarity of her revelation sharpened. Precipitously, she'd come to acknowledge the validity of what her roommate Deborah Cochrane and her other female friends had been hawking all along, namely that marriage in and of itself should not be her life's goal. They'd been right after all: she'd been programmed by the totality of her suburban Houston upbringing. Joanna couldn't believe she'd been so stupid for so long and so resistant to question a value system she'd so blindly accepted. Thankfully, while treading water waiting for Carlton, she'd been smart enough to lay the foundation of a rewarding career. She was only a thesis away from a Ph.D. from Harvard in economics combined with extensive computer skills.

"What are you laughing about?" Carlton persisted. "Come on! Talk to me!"

"I'm laughing at me," Joanna said finally. She turned to look at her fiancé. He appeared perplexed, with his brows tightly knit.

"I don't understand," Carlton said.

"That's curious," Joanna said. "I see everything rather clearly."

She glanced down at the engagement ring on her left hand. The diamond solitaire sucked in the weak available light and threw it back at Joanna with surprising intensity. The stone had been Carl-ton's grandmother's, and Joanna had been thrilled with it, mostly because of its sentimental value. But now it seemed like a vulgar neon reminder of her own gullibility.

A sudden sense of claustrophobia gripped Joanna. Without any warning she unlatched the door, slid out, and stood up on the curb.

"Joanna!" Carlton called. He leaned across the car's center console and peered up into Joanna's face. Her expression was one of fierce resolve. Her usually soft lips were set in grim determination.

Carlton started to ask Joanna what was the matter, although he knew all too well. Before he could even get the sentence out, the car door slammed in his face. Pushing himself back upright, he groped for the passenger-side window button. When the window opened, Joanna leaned in. Her expression hadn't changed.

"Don't insult me by asking what's the matter," she said.

"You're not being very adult about this," Carlton stated firmly.

"Thank you for your unbiased assessment," Joanna retorted. "I also want to thank you for making everything so clear for me. It certainly makes it easier to make up my mind."

"Make up your mind about what?" Carlton asked. The newly found firmness of his voice vanished. In its place was a definite quaver. He had a premonition about what was coming, and it was accompanied by a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach.

"About my future," Joanna said. "Here!" She extended her clenched fist with the obvious intention of giving something to Carlton.

Carlton reached out hesitantly with a cupped palm. He felt something cold drop into his hand. Glancing down, he found himself staring at his grandmother's diamond.

"What's this all about?" Carlton stammered.

"I think it's pretty clear," Joanna said. "Consider yourself free to finish your residency and whatever else your little heart desires. I certainly don't want to think of myself as a drag."

"You're not serious?" Carlton questioned. Caught completely off guard by this sudden turn of events, he was befuddled.

"Oh, but I am," Joanna said. "Consider our engagement officially over. Good night, Carlton."

Joanna turned and walked back along Craigie Street toward Concord Avenue and the entrance to the Craigie Arms. Her apartment was on the third floor.

After a brief struggle with the door release Carlton leaped from his Cherokee and ran after Joanna, who'd already reached the corner. A few deep red maple leaves, which had fallen from the tree that very day, wafted in his wake. He caught up to his former fiancée as she was about to enter her apartment building. He was out of breath. He was clutching the engagement ring in his fist.

"All right," Carlton managed. "You've made your point. Here, take the ring back." He extended his hand.

Joanna shook her head. Her grim determination had disappeared. In its place was a tenuous smile. "I didn't give the ring back as a mere gesture or machination. Nor am I actually angry. You obviously don't want to get married now, and all at once, I don't either. Let's give it a rest. We're still friends."

"But I love you," Carlton blurted.

"I'm flattered," Joanna said. "And I suppose I still love you, but things have been dragging on for too long. Let's go our separate ways, at least for now."

"But

"Good night, Carlton," Joanna said. She pushed herself up onto her tiptoes and gave Carlton's cheek a brush with her lips. A moment later she was in the elevator. She hadn't looked back.

Putting her key in her apartment door she noticed she was trembling. Despite her airy dismissal of Carlton, she felt her emotions rumbling just below the surface.

"Wow!" her roommate Deborah Cochrane exclaimed. She checked the task bar on her computer to see the time. "Rather early for a Friday night. Wussup?" Deborah was dressed in oversized Harvard-emblazoned sweats. In comparison with the soft, porcelain femininity of her roommate, she was mildly tomboyish with short dark hair, a

Mediterranean olive complexion, and an athletic build. Her facial features contributed by being stronger and more rounded than Joanna's yet no less feminine. All in all, the roommates complemented each other and emphasized each other's natural attractiveness.

Joanna didn't respond as she hung up her coat in the hall closet. Deborah watched her closely as she came into their sparsely furnished living room and collapsed on the couch. She tucked her feet under herself and only then met Deborah's inquisitive eyes.

"Don't tell me you guys had a fight," Deborah said.

"Not a fight per se," Joanna said. "Just a parting of ways."

Deborah's jaw dropped. For the six years she'd known Joanna, from freshman orientation onward, Carlton had been a fixture in Joanna's life. As far as she was concerned there'd not been the slightest hint of discord within the relationship. "What happened?" she asked with astonishment.

"I suddenly saw the light," Joanna said. There was a slight trill to her voice that Deborah noticed instantly. "My engagement is off, and, more importantly, I'm not going to count on getting married, period. If it happens, fine, but if it doesn't, that's okay too."

"My word!" Deborah said, unable to keep the glee from her voice. "This doesn't sound like the 'butter cream frosting, silky bridesmaids' dresses' girl that I've come to love. Why the change of heart?" Deborah considered Joanna's march toward marriage almost religious in its unswerving intensity.