After the Silence. Rula Sinara
sample boxes and grabbed the edge of the counter to regain her balance, but Simba was already holding her by the arm and Jack was over in seconds with a backed chair from the small adjoining office.
“Are you preg—” Jack asked, picking up the inhaler samples.
“No!” Hope and Simba said simultaneously, glaring at him in disbelief. Then Simba looked at Hope with scary-wide eyes.
“No!” she confirmed. Talk about an impossibility.
“Pretend I didn’t open my mouth,” Jack said with raised palms. He handed her the boxes.
“I just got up too quickly. I’ll be fine now.”
“That’s it,” Simba said. “You’re taking medical leave. Some time off.”
“Have you lost your mind? I can’t. Zamir needs me at the hospital. Half his staff are gone.”
“Zamir called me today, worried sick. I’m not the only one who’s noticed you withering away.”
Hope felt the rush of blood heat her face.
“He didn’t,” she said.
“He did. I know I’ll have his backing on this. He’ll sign whatever is needed. The internship will still be there, Hope. If that’s what you want. But you need to pause.”
Hope rubbed her hands down her face. No. This was impossible. People would ask questions and spread rumors that she’d failed somehow. She’d embarrass her parents. She’d disappoint them, and she couldn’t do that after all they’d sacrificed to save her life and to give her nothing but the best. Being where she was in her life wasn’t just hard work, it was a privilege. It was the grand plan. And taking off would be the equivalent of being ungrateful...or worse, incapable. At least that was what people would think.
Simba was right, though. Doctors really did make awful patients, because if she was honest with herself about how she’d been feeling lately, she’d be surprised if her adrenal glands hadn’t shriveled up.
God knew, she wanted to help people. She really did. But lately all she was feeling was frustrated and depleted. She didn’t dare admit to her family how many times the idea of escaping all their expectations and all her responsibilities had crossed her mind. Kicking back. Partying. Traveling places she’d seen in movies or read about in books. Freedom. How selfish was that? Witnessing poverty and disease everyday and then yearning for something different than the life she had? Some wishes were better left unspoken.
She closed her eyes and a tear escaped. She swiped it away.
“Um, can I get you something?” Jack asked, rubbing the back of his neck. Hope cleared her throat. She needed to get home. This was all too embarrassing.
“No, no. Thank you, Jack. Simba is making a big deal out of nothing.” She scowled at her brother. “And you’re embarrassing me here. Why don’t you walk me downstairs, Simba? You can buy your little sister a snack to eat in the car.”
He couldn’t say no to getting food in her system. She really didn’t want to argue in front of Jack, nor did she want to pass out before getting to the car. Jack slipped over to his vials and grabbed a pair of sterile gloves from a box, granting them a little privacy.
Simba paced in front of her like...well...like a lion.
“Hope, I know you’re worried about what people will think. What Mama and Baba will say. I wasn’t born yesterday. I’ll handle them. Don’t worry. No one will judge.”
Hope sighed. “Look. I’ll take a weekend or a week and stare at the walls at home. Will that make you happy?”
She waited for her brother to say something. The hum of the sterile hood and the occasional clink of Jack’s tubes were the only sounds in the lab. Simba scratched his forehead, then looked around the lab as though in search of a scientific reason to nix her suggestion. He drew back his shoulders and braced his hands on his hips.
“No. This isn’t about a few nights of sleep. This is about you not killing yourself and having regrets. I know our parents mean well, but the fact is, they’re from a different generation. Even I have a decade on you and can see that. You’re my sister. I want you happy. I want you to have perspective. Choices. Which is why—” he hesitated, scrubbing his jaw and exchanging glances with Jack “—I think you should take a few months and go to America.”
The chair grated the floor as Hope stood, the bolt of shock keeping her on her feet this time.
“What? Jack, tell him he needs an MRI.”
Jack held his sterile gloved palms up.
“I’m not getting in the middle. A wise friend once told Anna and me his favorite saying—‘when two elephants fight, it is the grass that gets trampled.’ In this lab, that would be me.”
“Something tells me you’re already in the middle. America? Really?”
Hope knew her brother had come through for Jack when Jack had discovered the daughter he didn’t know he had was being raised in Kenya’s wilderness. Had Simba cashed in on a favor?
“I’m helping you here, Hope,” Simba said. “Haven’t you always wanted to visit America? I’ve heard you talking to Anna. This is the perfect time. The perfect chance. Jack’s family needs some help.”
Jack tipped his head in agreement as he loaded the centrifuge.
“Don’t feel obligated or anything, but when Alwanga here told me you needed to get away, it did make sense,” Jack said. “Ben, my brother-in-law, could use help with the kids.”
Hope gripped the sides of her head, then grabbed her purse off the hook and turned back to face the crazy men. There’d be no fainting. Her blood had hit boiling point.
“You expect me to go from medicine to childcare? A nanny? That’s your idea of a getaway? A break?” she said, pointing at both of them.
“Whoa. Not really a nanny. Not in the official hired sense. Let’s not complicate visas here,” Jack said.
“He’s right. More of an exchange,” Simba said.
“Yeah. You all are like my family here in Kenya. Mine can be like yours while you’re in America. I think a visitor would be good for them right now. A distraction.”
Hope raised a brow.
“Okay, so distraction might be a bad choice of word, but you know what I mean.” Jack looked between Simba and Hope. “I should keep my mouth shut now.”
Hope closed her eyes. She did know what he meant. His parents had lost a child. His niece and nephews, their mother. And their father—Ben—had lost a wife. She sucked in her bottom lip. Was her brain so foggy that what they were suggesting had merit? An escape while saving face? She felt Simba’s hand close around her shoulder. His voice deepened, and his words came slowly and reassuringly.
“You help out, and in return, you have a place to stay, people I trust around you, so that I don’t have to worry about you alone in a foreign country. It works,” Simba said.
Hope wrapped her arms around herself.
“What if Chuki’s sister needs medicine when I’m gone?”
Simba sighed loudly.
“I’ll take it. Give her my number here in case there’s an emergency. Maybe I can convince the pulmonary doctor I got the samples from to see her once at no charge. If you go.”
Hope studied the braided leather of her sandals.
“I’ll sleep on it. But don’t go buying plane tickets or anything,” she said. She gave Jack a tired smile for his well-intentioned role of trampled grass. “Or making promises of help. We have another wise saying in Kenya. ‘Thunder is not yet rain.’”