Trapped (13 page)

Chapter Twenty-Four

Mike and Lisa stood next to the U-Haul, which held most of her worldly possessions. She grasped his hand. “It’s strange
what events signify life’s change. I moved away from home, graduated nursing school, Rudy died, and I found and married you, but moving out of Phoebe’s apartment is almost more than I can bear.”

“
Love has its limits,” Mike said. “But I’m not towing that U-Haul with my S2000; not with my baby.”

“Would I put your baby in harm’s way?”
She laughed. “We’ll pull it with the Wagoneer; that is, if it has enough guts left.”

Mike, Lisa, and Phoebe walked back and forth to the trailer carrying Lisa’s stuff, and it took all three to move her furniture.

Phoebe looked around the suddenly more spacious apartment, looked at Lisa, and said, “I’m going to miss you so much.”

“Me too,” Lisa
said, “but I’m a few miles away, and you’re getting a new brother to boot.”

“I’m so happy for you.
”

“Listen, are you free Friday night? Mike has someone he wants you to meet.”

Phoebe’s transformation was instantaneous. “Who is he? What does he look like? What does he do? How tall is he? Does he have all his hair?”

“Easy
, girl,” Lisa said. “His name is Jason Carlin, and he’s a radiologist at UC Medical Center. Mike says he’s good looking, whatever that means coming from Mike.”

“Carlin
—that doesn’t sound Jewish.”

“Do you really care?”

“Not really, but I’m better suited for an East Coast palate, don’t you think?”

“Well, Mike says Jason was born a Jew, but hasn’t seen the inside of a synagogue since his bar mitzvah.”

“Tell me more.”

Mike entered the room, looked at Lisa and said, “Is it a go?”

“Yes or no, Phoebe?” Lisa asked.

“A definite yes.”

“Should I tell Jason to wear body armor?” Mike asked.

“If I like him,” said Phoebe, “it won’t do him any good.”

As they drove back to their apartment, Lisa said, “What do you think about Phoebe and Jason?”

“Who knows what makes people click, but Jason’s smart, has a great sense of humor, and maybe he’s unconventional enough to interest Phoebe. When they meet, we’ll know in two minutes.”

“I’m so excited for Phoebe tonight,” Lisa said.

“You mean she’s never had a blind date before
?” Mike asked.

“Of course she has,” Lisa smirked
. “I loved your impression of Jason, and how he might match up with Phoebe. She’s the best, but there’s that New York brashness that tends to put some people off.”

“I wouldn’t worry about it. I love Phoebe
, too, and maybe Jason’s the one.”

“What makes it work between us?”
She asked, looking up at Mike.

“God only knows
.” He grasped her by the waist, and kissed her neck.

She playfully punched him in the arm. “You haven’t learned a damned thing about women, Dr. Cooper.”

Mike looked at his watch. “You better get going, or we’ll be late.”

“I have to shave my legs, and then I’ll get dressed.”

“Good luck, sweetie, but first you’ll need to find my razor.”

“That’s okay. After shredding my poor legs time and again, I bought a Lady Remington electric shaver.”

“You could have gone for hot waxing.”

“Only if you do it
, first.”

The hostess seated Lisa, Mike, and Phoebe in a corner booth at Bacci’s Trattoria in Emeryville at the foot of the Bay Bridge.

Phoebe’s plan was simple seduction. She wore a midnight blue sleeveless silk dress
, which was draped to expose her ample cleavage. She had put her dark hair up with a clip to expose her neck and frame her face.

Mike was
unconsciously staring at Phoebe’s chest.

When Phoebe noticed, Mike blushed.
“They look great, don’t they, Mike?”

Mike stuttered, “I didn’t mean…
”

Lisa laughed, “She looks fantastic, doesn’t she?”

Mike smiled. “Any man who doesn’t give his woman an occasion to dress up, to transform herself from time to time, needs his head examined.” He kissed Lisa, held both their hands, and said, “You both look incredible.”

A moment later, Mike’s friend walked up to the table.

He’s a cliché
, thought Phoebe,
tall, dark, and handsome,
but before she could solidify her impression, he looked at her, and smiled broadly.

I’m melting
,
Phoebe thought.

Mike stood, shook Jason’s hand
, and said, “Jason Carlin, meet my wife, Lisa. And this,” he nodded toward Phoebe, “is Phoebe Davis, who I told you so much about.”

Jason shook Phoebe’s hand,
and leaned over to kiss her cheek. “It’s great to meet you, Phoebe. Mike said you were terrific, and I can see why.”

Uncharacteristically, Phoebe felt her face turning red.

What are you, a schoolgirl?
She thought.

Phoebe and Jason sat opposite each other, and
, in sixty seconds (it didn’t take two minutes) they were in deep conversation, smiling and embracing each other with their eyes.

Lisa leaned over and whispered, “Do you think they know that we’re still here?”

“They look right together, don’t they?” Mike asked.

Mike subtly reminded them that he and Lisa were still there
, and the dinner went on with friendly, occasionally hilarious conversation, as Jason was a great storyteller.

“We have an early day tomorrow,” Mike
said. “I think you guys can get along without us.”

“What?” Phoebe
asked, smiling.

“Never mind,” Mike
said, “have fun.”

“Count on it,
Mike,” Phoebe said with a wink.

Jason rose
, shook Mike’s hand, and whispered, “You were right. She’s wonderful.”

As they drove home, Lisa leaned on Mike’s shoulder, and said, “If you ever get tired of medicine, I see matchmaking in your future.”

After Mike and Lisa departed, Phoebe and Jason stared at each other for several minutes in silence. When Phoebe tilted her head slightly, looked up at Jason with her dark eyes, and then batted her long eyelashes, they burst out in laughter.

“I can almost read your mind, Phoebe.”

“Tell me.”

“I said
almost. I’ve learned from experience that mind-reading is a form of projection, that is, I subconsciously assume that someone else shares similar thoughts.”

“And desires?”

“That, too.”

“And that works for you with women?”

Jason laughed. “No formula of any kind works for women.”

“Ah, you enjoy the mystery?”

“It
is
mysterious, don’t you think?”

“It’s only mysterious
, Jason, if you’re not willing to explore beyond the obvious.”

“The obvious?”

“Don’t go West Coast on me now, Jason. You were doing so well.”

“Don’t tell me you read my profile on E-Harmony.com?”

“I don’t think a guy like you needs an online dating service.”

“A guy like me?”

“If you think that a good-looking, single, Jewish physician means anything to me…” she paused, “then you hit it right on the nose.”

“And what about you, Phoebe? Beautiful, smart, sassy as hell, honest, and maybe not
as tough as the image you’ve perfected.”

“Keep talking. You’re getting me hot.”

Jason burst out in laughter, and then reached across the table and took her hands. “Here’s something you’ll appreciate, this is one hell of a blind date.”

“You ain’t seen nothin’ yet, Dr. Carlin.”

They talked until the restaurant’s cleaning staff asked them to lift their feet so they could vacuum. Taking the hint, they moved to the curb as the valet parking attendant drove up in Jason’s car, a 1965 Chev
rolet Corvette convertible.

Phoebe let out a wolf whistle. “A family car?”

“Got to enjoy it while I can, although I can’t wait to drive my minivan or Suburban.”

“Right.”

“If you’re not in a rush to get home, let’s take a ride up to Grizzly Peak. It’s a clear night.”

“I’m game.”

He drove into the Berkeley hills, then through Tilden Park and parked at the appropriately named, Inspiration Point, overlooking the east bay with San Francisco shimmering in the distance.

“Some
day,” Jason said, “I’d like a home in the hills. I never tire of the view.”

“How long have you known Mike?”

“We trained at UC for three years. We ran together for a while.”

“Ran together?”

“You know, tennis, parties, and dates. Mike’s a great guy, and now with Lisa, a lucky one, too.”

“Well, if I were you, D
oc, I wouldn’t depend on luck, tonight.”

“You’d better talk nice to me, Phoebe, or you won’t get me into bed.”

“Oh, yes I will,” she smiled.

Three months later, Phoebe and Jason moved in together. Although they were in love, Phoebe hadn’t lost her unique outlook on life. Lisa and Phoebe remained as close as ever and the couple became close friends.

Lisa couldn’t wait to be with Mike at work or at home. She’d flush with emotion each time he appeared, and sensed that all was right in the world. In contrast, when he was absent or late, she’d worry.
It’s stupid—ridiculous, and useless,
she thought.
The legacy of life with father that she’d overcome someday.

Those were the moments that brought forth her worst fears,
and she remembered Madame Helene, her crystal ball’s view of Mike, and the despair in her eyes.

Lisa shared her fears with Phoebe who, she knew, would have a few choice words for
fortune tellers and crystal ball readers, yet Phoebe’s reaction surprised her.

“Life
gets to us in one way or another,” Phoebe said. “I used to think that if you watched TV and paid attention to the news, that you’d conclude our lives are full of misery and strife. It isn’t that way. Then, if you took the time to look closely at the lives around you, agreeing with Thoreau would be easy, that most people ‘lead lives of quiet desperation’.”

“Where are you going with this?”

“I don’t know, but for me, it’s a matter of choice, and as long as I can choose, I choose to think that I love you and Mike, I love Jason, and I love my family. I don’t know how long any of us will live, or if I’ll lose someone’s love, so I choose to enjoy it all, to stay in the moment, and not fret about what might happen in an uncertain future. Convince me that anguish can change the future, Lisa, and we’ll worry together.”

Chapter Twenty-Five

After a year, Lisa and Mike decided to forsake convenience for lifestyle, and moved to a home in Pleasant Hill, twenty-five miles from Brier Hospital. Their early hours put them ahead of the commuter traffic, and gave them a house in the country with plenty of outside space for a family.

Mike and Lisa had grown up with dogs, so after a visit to a local animal rescue operation, they returned with Daisy, a twelve pound, one
-year-old terrier mix. It was love at first sight.

Lisa had always wanted children of her own, as did Mike, but after trying for six months, he said, “It’s time to find out why you’re not getting pregnant.”

“I hate the poking and prodding,” Lisa said, “but I expected to be with child by now.”

She went to her gynecologist, Harvey Russo, who examined her and ran some routine tests. Everything was normal.

Harvey Russo was the last of his generation of obstetricians/gynecologists (OB/GYN) who still delivered babies. At age sixty-two, when most OB/GYNs dumped the OB part of their practice on the younger physicians in the group, Harvey refused to abandon the activity that had drawn him to the specialty in the first place.

The son of an Air Force master sergeant, he’d grown up on military bases around the country, but the Alameda Naval Air Station had been the family’s longest stay in one place.

Harvey went to Berkeley High
, and then entered the University of California, Berkeley campus, in the midst of the student unrest of the 60s.

Far more liberal than his father, Harvey participated in the demonstrations, but refused a student military deferment.

Harvey, the son of a career NCO, excelled in Basic Training, especially in hand-to-hand combat. He thanked his father for his insistence on years of Martial Arts training. Afterward, he enjoyed nine months in Austin, Texas, training to be a combat medic, and then spent the next year in the Central Highlands of Vietnam. He’d grown to hate the war, the deaths, and devastating injuries to so many young men, and despised the victimization of the indigenous Montagnard tribesmen by Americans, as well as the Vietnamese governments, both north and south.

Harvey worked as a corpsman for Eddie Hawkins, a West Virginia OB/GYN, drafted into the Army, made an officer by act of congress, and sent to Vietnam as a battalion surgeon.

“An obstetrician is an interesting choice for your job, Eddie,” Harvey had said.

Eddie smiled. “Never doubt the wisdom of the US Army.”

“I hate this war, Eddie. What keeps me going is helping our guys and working the Civil Action Patrols (CAP) with you.”

The CAP’s allowed them to helicopter into Montagnard villages
to treat the injured and sick. It was a useful, but dreadful business; an awkward meeting of Iron Age and modern culture. Simple medical and dental treatments often earned the kind of appreciation that American sought, but rarely achieved in other venues.

Harvey’s epiphany came on one CAP when a Montagnard woman dragged them into a smoke-fill
ed hut that sat on stilts where a thirteen-year-old girl had been in labor for three days. It was only through the authoritarian demands of their translator that the women permitted Eddie to examine the girl.

“This is a big baby, in the breach position. If I can’t get this baby in the right position and out soon, they’re both going to
die.”

“Tell me what you want me to do,” Harvey
said.

“Get me a sterile scissors, antiseptic, and a local anesthetic. We need to do an episiotomy to make room for the baby.”

Harvey watched in awe as Eddie applied gentle traction to the baby’s hips, then manipulated and delivered the shoulders, one at a time. “Here’s where I need you, Harvey. I want you to feel her belly. Find the baby’s head, and push as I deliver it.”

Harvey pushed with gradually increasing force
, until Harvey shouted, “Enough, Harvey. I don’t want it to pop out. I’ll do the rest.”

When Harvey moved to loo
k over Eddie’s shoulder, the baby’s head slowly, but fully, emerged. Seconds later, the baby coughed, and then let out a loud scream.

“That’s incredible,” Harvey
said. “I’ve never seen anything like that before. I think I’ve found my calling.”

Harvey used the GI Bill and loans for medical school. The Army offered to pay his tuition if he’d serve a year for each year they’d paid, but he declined their ‘generous offer’. Two years in the military was enough for a lifetime.

His path was clear from day one of medical school. Following graduation
, they accepted Harvey in the OB/GYN program at UC Medical Center. Afterward, he took a position in Berkeley with Clarence Potter, the OB who’d delivered Moses. In ten years, he’d be senior physician in the group.

“Six months is early to conclude that you have a problem,” Harvey said to Mike and Lisa as they sat across from his desk. “Let’s give it another six months.”

“Is there an
ything else we can do now?” Mike asked.

“You guys know all the tricks, don’t you? Basal body temperatures, timing of intercourse, attention to ovulations, positioning
, etc. Do you know when you ovulate, Lisa?”

“Yes, I can usually tell.”

“Well, if there’s any problem there, we have ovulation kits and some new high-tech stuff that can pinpoint nearly the exact time.”

“The phone’s for you, Dr. Cooper,” the NICU ward clerk said.

When Mike picked up the earpiece, he heard Harvey’s voice. “I have a patient, Marla Mayfield, who’s in labor at 24 weeks, and,” he hesitated, “I think she’s going to deliver a preemie soon if I can’t stop her labor.”

“That’s what I do, Harvey. I’ll be there when she delivers. Is there anything else I need to know?”

Harvey’s hesitation caught Mike’s interest.

“What is it?”

“This may be terribly unfair, and don’t quote me. Marla and her husband, Donald, are personal injury attorneys, specializing in medical malpractice litigation.”

“That’s great, Harvey.”

“Well, at least you know it up front. Get ready to dot
your I’s and cross your T’s.”

Mike knocked on the door of Marla Mayfield’s private room,
and then entered.

Marla, a beautiful woman in her early thirties
, laid in bed with a fetal monitor on one bedside table, and flowers on the other. Marla substituted a shiny designer nightgown for Brier’s blue striped hospital gown.

Donald Mayfield, a handsome, tall man
, in a dark-gray pinstripe suit, rose to greet him. “You must be Dr. Cooper. We’ve heard good things about you and the NICU that you and your partners run.”

Mike met Donald’s aggressive grip with a crushing one of his own, looked down at the man, and then approached the bed. “How are you feeling, Mrs. Mayfield?”

“Please, call me Marla. I’m feeling better now that the contractions have eased.”

Mike glanced at her slightly rounded abdomen. Clothed, nobody would
even notice her pregnancy.

He pulled a chair next to the bed. “Harvey’s been through this situation with you. I want to know that we’re on the same page.”

“Go ahead, Doctor,” Donald said.

“Harvey’s going to do everything he can to prolong this pregnancy. Every day, every week
, gives your baby more of a chance to survive, and to come through this unscathed. I don’t know how much you know about what we call Extremely Low Birth Weight Infants (ELBW), but those babies are born too early, and have poor mechanisms for survival.”

“Let me stop you for a moment, D
octor,” Donald said. “It would surprise me, considering the doctors’ underground network, if you didn’t know that we make our living suing physicians. We go through this eventually, in anything more than a trivial encounter with a doctor.”

“They don’t exactly run for the door when they see us,” Marla
said, “but it does place an extra burden on the doctor-patient relationship. Hell, if I was a doc, I wouldn’t be happy treating someone who is likely to sue me.”

“Are you likely to sue me?”

“Not if you don’t screw up.”

“That’s reassuring. I’d be lying if I told you that I hadn’t heard about you two. We’re pros here, and I can assure you
that we all want the same thing, a healthy mother and baby.”

“Let me finish my thought, and then you can go on
, Dr. Cooper,” Donald said in an officious manner. “We know many doctors, good and bad. We want an open, friendly relationship with the docs at Brier. I don’t want any of you to do too much—you guys call it defensive medicine—or too little. I don’t want any docs draping crepe, making things sound worse than they are, to protect yourself against litigation. We don’t like it. It’s dishonest. If you do your job, regardless of the outcome, then you have nothing to fear from us.”

Smooth, practiced
; the patina of reason designed to influence a jury. It all sounded great,
Mike thought,
but would I buy a used car from him?

“Thanks, Mr. Mayfield,” Mike
said.

“Call me Don.”

“Okay, Don. I’m going to give you a packet of information sheets outlining the problems we see with babies born prematurely. It’s more information than you want to know, but our own attorneys say that we should tell too much, rather than too little. I’ll go over these with you the next time we meet. Meanwhile, let’s keep both you and the baby at rest. The medication that Dr. Russo started will help your baby’s lungs mature, so that if he enters the world early, it will be with better odds.”

Mike visited again the next day, and went over the information sheet. He had nothing more to do until she delivered.