She dressed for the day; she had been so out of focus lately, she had no idea what kind of schedule lay ahead. She couldn’t remember making any appointments for the morning. Still, she wasn’t rushing to Doc’s. It was early and she had a very important phone call to make.
“I wish I could see the look on your face when I tell you this, Joey,” Mel said. “I hope you’re sitting down. I’m pregnant.”
There was a gasp, then silence.
“Pregnant,” she said again. “Totally knocked up.”
“Are you sure?”
“Three months,” she said.
“Oh, my God! Mel!”
“I know. Kind of blew my mind, too.”
“Three months? Let’s see…”
“Don’t bother trying to do the math. I haven’t had a period since he touched me for the first time. I guess he’s potent enough for both of us. At first, I thought it so impossible, an absurd fantasy. I figured I was late because of stress, change, how weird my life is. But it’s real. I had an ultrasound.”
“Mel! How is this possible?”
“Don’t ask me—stranger things have happened. But not around here, apparently. I’m surrounded by women who were pretty sure they couldn’t get pregnant and voila! There’s a rumor about the water… I’m thinking of calling my L.A. infertility specialist to tell him about this place.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I’m going to marry Jack.”
“Mel—do you love him?” Joey asked, her voice subdued. Cautious.
Mel drew in a breath, trying to calm her voice, which she knew would be tremulous and emotional. “I do,” she said. “Joey, I love him so much, I almost ache with it. I never thought I could love this much. I was in denial about that for a while, too.”
“Mel,” Joey said, then began to cry. “Oh, my sweet baby.”
“It made me feel guilty, like I was doing something wrong—I was so committed to the idea that I’d lost my one true love and would never feel anything even close to that again in my life. I never considered the possibility that I might find something even more powerful. It seemed, briefly, like a betrayal. Jack even caught me crying to Mark’s picture that I was sorry, that I didn’t expect it to happen, and promising never to forget him. God. It was an awful moment.”
“Baby girl, you haven’t done anything wrong. You’ve been through such a lot.”
“Well, in my sane state, I know that. Jack knew about my problems, and he just hung in there, just kept loving me and loving me, putting all my needs ahead of his own, promising me I’d be safe with him, that I could trust him. Oh, God,” she said, tears coming in spite of the fact that she was so, so happy. “God, he’s wonderful. Joey,” she said in a near whisper, “he wants the baby as much as I do.”
“This is just unbelievable. When are you getting married? Because we’re going to be there.”
“We haven’t had a chance to even talk about it—I just broke it to him yesterday and he asked me last night. I’ll let you know when I know.”
“But does this mean you’re staying there?”
Mel laughed. “You were right, you know—coming here was completely crazy. It was irrational. To think I’d choose to go to a town where there’s no mall, much less a day spa, and one restaurant that doesn’t have a menu? Please. No medical technology, ambulance service or local police—how is it I thought that would be easier, less stressful? I almost slid off the mountain on my way into town!”
“Ah… Mel…”
“We don’t even have cable, no cell phone signal most of the time. And there’s not a single person here who can admire my Cole Haan boots which, by the way, are starting to look like crap from traipsing around forests and farms. Did you know that any critical illness or injury has to be airlifted out of here? A person would be crazy to find this relaxing. Renewing.” She laughed. “The state I was in, when I was leaving L.A., I thought I absolutely had to escape all the challenges. It never occurred to me that challenge would be good for me. A completely new challenge.”
“Mel…”
“When I told Jack I was pregnant, after promising him I had the birth control taken care of, he should have said, ‘I’m outta here, babe.’ But you know what he said? He said, ‘I have to have you and the baby in my life, and if you can’t stay here, I’ll go anywhere.’” She sniffed a little and a tear rolled down her cheek. “When I wake up in the morning, the first thing I do is check to see if there are deer in the yard. Then I wonder what Preacher’s in the mood to fix for dinner. Jack’s usually already gone back to town—he likes splitting logs in the early morning—half the town wakes up to the sound of his ax striking wood. I see him five or ten times through the day and he always looks at me like we’ve been apart for a year. If I have a patient in labor, he stays up all night, just in case I need something. And when there are no patients at night, when he holds me before I fall asleep, bad TV reception is the last thing on my mind.
“Am I staying here? I came here because I believed I’d lost everything that mattered, and ended up finding everything I’ve ever wanted in the world. Yeah, Joey. I’m staying. Jack’s here. Besides, I belong here now. I belong to them. They belong to me.”
Right after a light breakfast, she headed for Doc’s. She supposed it was in order to tell him right away, but when she walked into the house, she was greeted by quiet. Good, she thought. No patients yet. She went to Doc’s office and tapped lightly on the door, then pushed it open. He was sitting in the chair at his desk, leaning back, his eyes closed. Hmm. Doesn’t sleep in daylight, huh? She stood over him. It was good to see Doc docile for once.
Mel was about to leave and wait for a better time, but something made her take a closer look at Doc. His eyes were pinched closed, his face in a grimace and his coloring wasn’t right. He was gray. She reached down and squeezed his wrist with the forefingers of one hand. His pulse was racing. Mel felt Doc’s brow and found his skin clammy. His eyes opened into slits. “What is it?” she asked him.
“Nothing,” he said. “Heartburn.”
Heartburn does not make your pulse race and your skin clammy, she thought. She ran for the stethoscope and blood pressure cuff in the exam room, returning to him. “You going to tell me what it is—or make me guess?”
“I told you… Nothing. I’ll be fine in a few minutes.”
She took his blood pressure, though she had to struggle with him for cooperation. “Did you have breakfast?” she asked him.
“A while ago.”
“What did you have? Bacon and eggs? Sausage?”
“It wasn’t that great. Preacher’s a little off on the cooking…”
His blood pressure was elevated. “Any chest pains?” she asked.
“No.”
She palpated his abdomen, although excess lipid tissue on his pot belly made it impossible to feel his internal organs while he was sitting upright. And he slapped at her hand, trying to push her away. But as she palpated, he grunted in pain. “How many of them have you had?” she asked him.