Just Over The Mountain (3 page)

“It’s the middle of the week. This isn’t a vacation, is it?”

“No, it’s good news and bad news.”

“I hate those,” she said, not asking for either.

“I have a couple of days.”

“Is that the bad news?” she asked, knowing better.

“I’m being sent to the Ozarks…because I have such a lot of good goddamn mountain experience.”

She was quiet for a moment. “That’s too far away.”

“Don’t I know it.”

“Why didn’t you just wait till morning to tell me that?”

“I couldn’t do that to you,” he said. “There aren’t too many perks in this relationship. You’re entitled to the truth, at least.”

She smiled against his chest but didn’t let him see. To tell the truth, she needed him right now. And he’d been the last person she’d expected to come along and give comfort of any kind, much less the best kind.

“Why isn’t there meat loaf tonight?” he asked. “Patients?”

“We had an emergency. My nurse. Our nurse, Charlotte. She had a coronary on the job today. A real bad one. We almost lost her.”

“’Almost’ means you saved her?”

“John and I, by the hair on our chinny-chin-chins. She’s not in good shape.”

“I guess this means you can’t get away for a couple of days…on short notice.”

“If we’d met when we were much younger,” she began, “would you have chosen another line of work?”

“Would you?” he countered.

“You’d have made a terrible husband.”

“You’d have made a dynamite wife.”

“Flattery has never worked on me,” she insisted, wondering if he could feel her smile against his chest. Hell, her whole body was smiling.

“If you can’t get away for a couple of days, will you at least take all your clothes off?”

“Well,” she said, sighing heavily, “I suppose since you’re going off to war again, it’s the least I could do.”

His arms tightened around her. “I have one more piece of news. This one probably should wait until morning, but I don’t like holding things back from you.”

This made her shiver, thinking sexual things instead of practical ones. “What is it?”

“I don’t know if it’s good or bad. You’ll have to decide.”

“Well. What
is
it?”

“After this next job I’m going to be offered a chance to retire early, with full benefits.”

She lifted her head and looked into his eyes. Her mouth hung open slightly. Did this mean the next job was really dangerous? Would take a long time? Did it mean she wouldn’t see him for months? He’d said “offered.” Did that mean he might say no? Would he say yes…and show up at her door, planning to stay for good? There were a lot of issues inside that simple
statement, though she had no intention of staying up all night talking. She was not at all opposed to staying up all night…but not talking.

“Let’s not discuss it anymore right now,” she said. She bit his lower lip, but lightly. “I don’t want to waste any more precious time.”

I
n the middle of the night June got out of bed, plucked an article of clothing off the floor in the dark and crept out of the bedroom. How could a man who was so strong yet gentle a lover, so considerate of her every desire,
snore?

It turned out she’d picked up Jim’s T-shirt, which she put on. It came to her knees and slipped off her shoulder, but she pulled it around her in a hug and smelled the scent of him. She would only have him for one more day, then he would be gone again. But at some point in the not-too-distant future, he would be back. For good. For good?

She heard an objectionable snort come from the direction of her bedroom, but instead of grimacing, she smiled a secret smile. Adenoids. They’d have to come out.

Sadie so liked having a man in the house, she hadn’t even left the bedroom with June, and Sadie usually
clung to June’s side, following her everywhere unless she was instructed to
stay.
But even with that god-awful snoring, Sadie was content on the floor beside the bed.

Jim was forty and had never married; she was thirty-seven and hadn’t either. Their time together had been so brief, there were a hundred things they hadn’t discussed. What if he took that early retirement, came to Grace Valley to start a new life, and they found they were totally incompatible?

She sat on the floor, legs crossed, in front of her twenty-year-old record player. She leafed through old records in their dusty jackets. Her taste in music had always been odd; she liked things that would be more natural for her father. She put on a Perry Como record, the volume very low, and listened to his voice, like velvet, sing to her that she should make someone happy, just one someone happy…

Perry Como, Andy Williams, Nat King Cole, Mel Torme, Johnny Mathis. All were like drifting across a lake in a lolling rowboat.

She heard the jingle of Sadie’s collar and the click of her nails against the kitchen floor. Sadie flopped down beside her, but Jim came on silent feet and sat behind her on the floor, his long legs on either side of hers. His arms encircled her and he kissed the back of her neck.

“There’s something I’ve been wanting to tell you,” she said. “But only if you think you want a future with me. Not that I accept, I just want to know what your expectations are.”

“I want you forever,” he said.

“You think so?”

“So far. But I’m sure you could do better if you applied yourself.”

“Applied myself to getting a man?”

“Never mind. What was I thinking.”

“Okay, what I’ve been meaning to tell you is, I’m pretty sure I can’t have children. How do you feel about that?”

She felt him sit up a bit straighter, withdraw slightly.

“Ah,” she said. “You weren’t planning to have children?”

“June, we’re not kids. I didn’t think
you’d
be interested. You’re pretty busy, after all. You take care of the whole damn town.”

“I am interested,” she said. “But I don’t think I can.”

“Why is that?”

“The last couple of times you were here, I forgot the diaphragm. But nothing happened. And if I’m honest with myself, I’ve always been a little sloppy about birth control.” She turned and looked over her shoulder at him. “Funny thing for a doctor to admit, huh? It’s the thing I absolutely harangue my patients about.”

“If you think that, why’d you remember the diaphragm last night?”

“On the off chance I’m wrong. Though I have been wanting a baby.”

“If you’re wanting a—”

“Oh, I wouldn’t do that to you! I wouldn’t do that to any unsuspecting man. If I decided, seriously, to try to have a baby, I’d use an anonymous donor.”

Frank Sinatra began to sing “New York, New York.”

“Women are very strange,” he observed. “Right down to their taste in music.”

“Would you be wanting children?” she asked.

He laughed softly. “I’m very flexible.”

“Well, then would you be willing to have your adenoids removed?”

In the morning, without the benefit of much sleep, June showered, dressed and kissed the sleepy agent goodbye. “I like this, kissing you goodbye in the morning.”

“Oh, it won’t be long before you’re complaining that I don’t have your breakfast ready on time.”

“I have to go to the hospital at least twice today, since Charlotte’s there, but I have an idea. After you’ve had a leisurely morning, why not drive over to Westport. There’s a small inn near the sea. It’s connected to a mediocre steak house and you can hear the surf. We could spend the night there. It’s pretty close to the hospital.”

“Are you allowed to do that?” he asked.

“Uh-huh. If I lie.”

“Oh, I see.”

“Well, that’s your doing. Your job thing.”

“Not for too much longer.”

He hadn’t said yet how much longer, nor had he given her other details about this next mission or early retirement. She’d had her wish, they’d done things other than talk. “Maybe we can talk about all that tonight, while we listen to the surf. That way you won’t have to stay invisible here at the house.”

“Good idea. Just ask for Dr. Stump.”

“Can you come up with a new alias? It sounds so…I don’t know…awful…”

“I’ll specify that I’m an orthopedist. How’s that?”

She stroked his beard, ignoring his crudity. “It’s interesting, this beard. Are you keeping it for a while?”

“I’m taking it to the Ozarks. I’ll probably have to shave it then. Why?”

“It hides your face. Makes you so mysterious.”

“It hides the scars. Remember?”

“Too well,” she said.

After his mission in the Trinity Alps had been completed and the marijuana camp busted up, Jim had had to run for his life. He’d slid down a steep, rocky hill and was stopped once by a tree with fiercely sharp bark and once by the asphalt of the road. He’d been scuffed up all over and one side of his face had been skinned raw.

Without knowing whether he was safe, June had been in the clinic all that night, tending both law enforcement personnel and criminals who had been arrested, all injured in the raid. She had come home to find Jim waiting for her in her house, bruised and bloody.

Now she’d like to see how he had healed.

June wasn’t at all surprised to see Elmer’s truck in the hospital parking lot. She had to pass through a clot of four of the six Burnham offspring circled around one of the few outdoor ashtrays. Sadie went with her as far as the information desk where an elderly woman in a
volunteer’s pink coat offered to dog-sit. June found the other two Burnham kids waiting in a special room off the Intensive Care area. Small town and country hospitals were used to whole families practically moving in and refusing to leave until their loved one did.

June took one look at Charlotte and thought it quite possible they would leave without her. She was gray, the color of death, and though her eyes were open, there was very little life in them. She had a plethora of tubes coming out of her.

Elmer sat at her bedside, Bud stood on the other side. June went to the nurses’ station and asked to see Charlotte’s chart. She reviewed the last EKG tape, the meds that had been prescribed by the cardiologist, the doctors’ orders for the day. The one thing she wished she could read here was not going to appear. Would Charlotte survive this?

While June read the chart, the nurse urged Bud and Elmer away. “Okay, gentlemen, time’s up. Charlotte needs her beauty sleep, you know. Someone can see her again in an hour.”

Intensive care personnel were very strict about limiting the visitors and the time spent at a patient’s bedside during these critical hours. But June was not hustled out. With the chart in hand, she went to the bedside. She touched Charlotte’s hand, which was clammy. She gave the hand a squeeze. Charlotte had a tracheotomy and oxygen, so couldn’t speak, but she looked into June’s eyes and mouthed, “Thank you, Doctor.”

Doctor.
June felt a swell of tears. “You’ll be okay, Charlotte. You’re tough.”

Charlotte nodded, but there was no conviction in it. She closed her eyes.

June found her dad in the waiting room, chatting with one of the Burnhams. “Dad, got a second?” He excused himself and went to June. “Are you needed here? Or can you escape for a few moments?”

“What for?”

“I have another patient here. You might enjoy seeing her.”

“Who?”

“Jurea Mull. There’s going to be an unveiling.”

“This morning? I wouldn’t miss it!”

June had become acquainted with the Mull family for the first time several months ago. One early morning she’d run for the kitchen phone wearing only a towel and found the four of them seated, nice as you please, in her living room. Clarence, a Vietnam vet, Jurea, his wife, and teenagers Clinton and Wanda. Although the Mulls had come in search of treatment for Clinton’s injured foot, the first and most obvious thing June saw had been Jurea Mull’s morbidly scarred face. One whole side was crushed, leaving a cheekbone caved in and her eye sealed closed by scar tissue. The accident had happened when she was a little girl and her family, mountain people, hadn’t had medical treatment available. The injury had healed, her cranium and facial bones grew, and the result was freakish.

June was able to convince Jurea to have a consulta
tion with a visiting plastic surgeon who, with his team of traveling volunteers, did surgery for the poor and uninsured. Jurea not only qualified in both categories, but her face presented the doctor with a challenge he could get excited about. Doubtless the case would appear in a medical book, or at least a periodical. In fact, Dr. Cohen was excited enough about the potential for Jurea’s facial reconstruction that he had decided to come to her, to Valley Hospital, and do the first surgery right away.

“The first surgery was the most taxing for Jurea,” June told her father as they walked toward her room. “Dr. Cohen sheared away some bone, inserted a plastic prosthetic piece under the cheek, reshaped part of her chin and removed considerable scar tissue. It was the most invasive. The consecutive surgeries will probably be concentrated on eliminating surface scaring and dermabrasion.”

“Will the whole family be there?” Elmer wondered.

“School hasn’t started yet, so I expect they will.”

The surprise was finding John Stone present. “Who’s running the shop?” June asked her partner.

“You didn’t think I’d miss this, did you? Jessie can handle things for a little while. Besides, I want to stop in and see Charlotte after.”

Jurea sat upright in the hospital bed, half of her head covered with a thick, bulky bandage. What showed of her face and arms looked tanned against the stark white of the sheets and hospital gown. June went first to her, asked her if she was nervous, then greeted each one of her family individually. If Jurea looked nervous,
Clarence looked terrified. Sixteen-year-old Clinton and fourteen-year-old Wanda, however, appeared excited. For these two, their odd little family was only beginning to take on some semblance of normalcy.

When June had first met them they were isolated in a small backwoods shack, Jurea hiding her morbidly scarred face and Clarence sheltering himself against the paranoia and post-traumatic stress disorder he’d brought back from Vietnam. With the introduction of counseling, a good antidepressant and a visit with a plastic surgeon, there was hope for this family. And they’d come out of the woods to rent a little house in town so the kids could finally attend classes in a public school.

“If there’s one thing I’ve learned,” Dr. Cohen said, flying into the room with a dressing tray he carried himself, “it’s show up early on the day you say the bandages will come off! Hello, everyone. Are we all ready?”

No one answered. They all held their collective breath.

Dr. Cohen was practiced at even this. He didn’t waste their time, but applied his scissors to the surgical dressings. He cut straight up from the chin to the scalp and the bandage broke away. An eye patch was all that remained in place, for Jurea’s eye, perfectly normal they’d discovered, had been closed by the scar and would be hypersensitive to light.

There were many imperfections and even some thick and heavy stitching, but this was the first time since
Jurea was five years old that her face had a normal shape. First time she had a cheekbone, an even chin, bone where her eyebrow should be and a cranium shape that formed a temple. Her face was almost symmetrical. And even though there was stitched incisions, harsh redness and some swelling, the improvement was almost too dramatic to believe.

The silence in the room said it all. The quiet was reverent.

“Mama,” Wanda finally said. “You’re beautiful.”

Dr. Cohen produced a hand mirror immediately. Jurea took it tentatively. It shook as she held it unsteadily. “My heavens,” she said in a breath. Her trembling fingers rose to her cheek, touching carefully.

“It’s a small, plastic disc, inserted under the skin to give you the shape you need,” Dr. Cohen explained. “We’re going to let the doctor of ophthalmology remove the eye patch and test you for vision impairment but, Jurea, underneath all that scar tissue, the eye appears to be normal. A few more surgeries, far more minor than this one was, will smooth out all the rough edges and give you a better finished product. A more beautiful face.”

She looked up at him, her fingers lightly touching her new cheek. “More beautiful than this?” she asked, stunned.

He laughed softly. “Much better than this, Jurea. This is just the first step. It’s the toughest surgery, so the worst is over now.”

“Never…” she began. A tear spilled down her cheek. “I never would have believed…”

June looked at Clarence and saw that his face was wet with tears, but just as she met his eyes, he bolted.

“Dad?” Clinton called out. “I’ll go after him, Ma.”

“Poor Clarence… He just wasn’t ready for it, I don’t think,” Jurea said. “When can I go home, Doctor?”

“After you see the ophthalmologist and the nurse gives you some instructions on how I’d like you to take care of the surgical site. This afternoon?”

“Really?”

“Sure. The hard part is over.”

A little while later, on the way back to the Intensive Care Unit, June tugged on her dad’s arm, pulling him to a stop in the hallway. “Dad, Charlotte looks bad.”