Dear Emily. Fern Michaels
the six-year-old Chevy onto Route 22. She took the first turnoff, waited for the light before she headed back in the opposite direction. She almost missed the Somerset Street turnoff that would lead her to Park Avenue and the third-floor apartment they lived in. She was home in twenty minutes. She was stunned to see Ian sitting in the kitchen eating a cheese sandwich. “Want a sandwich, Emily? I opened some tomato soup and saved some for you—it’s on the stove. I fixed an extra sandwich.”
“How did you know I was coming home, Ian?”
“I heard you tell Esther. Your car was gone. I called over to Terrill Road and they said you’d just left. See, I’m a sleuth. I knew you’d be cold so I made the soup. Besides, I wanted to change my shirt. I have clean ones, don’t I?”
“Of course. I ironed late last night, they’re hanging on the pantry door. Ian, do you know how long it takes to iron twenty-one shirts every week? I think we should start sending them out. I don’t have the time anymore and do you really have to change your shirt three times a day? And when you get called out at night, you put on a fourth one. It’s a bit too much, Ian.”
“You’re the one who got me into that. You specifically told me I should always look crisp and professional and you were right. I can’t tell you how many compliments I get on my shirts. You know just the right amount of starch to put in them. The laundries either use too much or too little. I hate it when they do my shirts. You do it perfectly, Emily. Are you ticked off about something and taking it out on me?”
“Of course not.” Damn, she should have reheated the soup. The sandwich on the plate looked dry; Ian didn’t use mayo or butter the way she did.
“It’s snowing out,” she said, to have something to say. “Did you pack yet, Ian?”
“Not yet. I thought you were going to do it. I can do it if you don’t have the time. You’re too busy, right?”
Emily shrugged. “Where are the tickets, Ian?”
“In my desk at the office. I had them sent there because I had to sign for them and I’m never really here. Did the agent make a mistake or something?”
“No. I was just curious. Esther asked me if we had any stops and I said I didn’t know. Do we?”
“Beats me, I didn’t even look at the tickets. I just shoved them in the drawer. Emily, Emily, I can see right through you. You should know you can’t pull off deviousness. You think I just made up the trip, that we aren’t going because the new clinic is opening in a few days.” He shook his head in disappointment. Emily looked away and said nothing. She bit into the cheese sandwich.
“Well, isn’t that what you thought?”
Emily turned around and eyeballed her husband. “More or less.”
“Dear Emily, we’re going and we’re going to have a wonderful time. I’m telling you now I’m not taking a lot of clothes. I plan to live like a beach bum the whole time. How about you?”
“While you’re being a beach bum, I’m going to sleep on the beach. I plan to live in a pair of shorts and halter.”
“I wouldn’t do that, Emily. You don’t have a midriff anymore. You need to be rail thin to dress like that. I thought women were self-conscious about things like that. If it doesn’t bother you, though, it won’t bother me. A tan will help your legs, cover those bulging veins a bit. I thought you were going to see Dr. Metcalf.”
“When have I had the time, Ian? I plan to make an appointment in the spring. The support hose help quite a bit.”
“You can’t wear support hose on the beach.”
“Then how about if I wear long underwear? That way I’ll be covered from my neck to my ankles. Sometimes, Ian, you are very cruel and thoughtless. You don’t seem to have any regard for my feelings.”
Tears flooded Emily’s eyes as she started to wash the soup mugs and sandwich plates. She didn’t say anything—what was the point?
“See you, honey,” Ian said, kissing her on the cheek. “I love that new shampoo you’re using, smells like a summer breeze.” He ruffled her hair. “Don’t ever cut this wild mane; it’s you, Emily. I think your hair is part of the reason I fell in love with you.”
She was suddenly shy, confused, unused to compliments like this. “If it wasn’t soooo curly…” She should be saying something witty, something with a double meaning, but the words stuck in her throat. “Guess I’ll see you tonight.”
She didn’t want to think. Instead she moved by rote the way she did every day. First she shed her skirt and blouse, pulled on the thick support hose that were more elastic bandages than hose, and pulled them up. She was exhausted with the effort. If only she could take an hour-long bubble bath and then lie down. The long shift she had to work at Heckling Pete’s loomed ahead of her. “Don’t think, Emily, just move your butt and do what you have to do,” she muttered to her made-up reflection. She did her best to calculate the minutes and the seconds until she could return to this tiny bathroom, shed the elastic stockings, and take a long, hot bubble bath. Of course Ian might have something to say about running the water at two o’clock in the morning. Once he’d said the light shining under the bathroom door bothered him so she’d resorted to taking her bath by candlelight and running the water through a bunched-up towel. “I’m crazy. Nobody in their right mind does the kind of things I do for Ian. They’re going to come and lock me up.”
“Do you believe this weather?” Ian asked, seven days later, as he snapped the lid of his suitcase. “God, we’re going to be lucky if we make it to the airport. When was the last time it snowed like this?”
“About five years ago. I think we had fourteen inches. I’m going to the airport if I have to walk.”
“We’re going, so wipe that look off your face.”
“Okay, Ian.”
They were doing a last-minute check of the apartment when the phone rang. They stared at one another. “Don’t answer it, Ian.” The phone continued to ring, six, seven, eight rings. It stopped suddenly in midring and then rang again a few seconds later. Emily shook her head.
“I have to answer it, Emily. I’m a doctor.”
Emily sat down on the arm of the couch and watched her husband’s face. When she heard him say, “I’ll meet the ambulance at Muhlenberg. Not half as sorry as I am,” she took off her coat.
“I have a patient in crisis, Emily. Mrs. Waller had a heart attack. At the clinic. They’re transporting her as we speak to Muhlenberg. I have to go. Damn, she was doing so well too. I don’t want to lose her, Emily.” He was ripping at his heavy jacket, at his cable knit sweater. Emily automatically picked them up and folded them.
“What should I do?”
“Take the Honda and drive to the airport. Leave my ticket at the counter, and when I’m satisfied Mrs. Waller is in stable condition, I’ll take the next flight. Check my bags with yours. It’s the best I can do,” Ian said, slipping into his coat. “Don’t say anything, Emily. This is an emergency and I am a goddamn doctor. Go, get in the car and go. I’m the one missing out. I’m using your car.”
He was gone. She could hear the Chevy sputter once, twice, three times before it caught and rolled over. Even if it didn’t, Ian could walk the three blocks to Muhlenberg. Now what was she to do?
Well, she wasn’t going to the Cayman Islands, that was for sure. In her heart she knew Ian wouldn’t join her.
She leaned back on the sofa. The old lady had touched some deep chord in Ian just the way the children at the clinic did. Everyone appeared to love Ian. He had a wonderful bedside manner and he always seemed to know just the right words to soothe anxious patients. And it paid off in referrals. Everyone who came in wanted to be treated by Dr. Thorn.
Emily picked up her purse and threw it across the room.