His problem, Phillip had reasoned, was that he didn’t understand women.
It took almost eight months for Phillip to realize that Marsha had pretty much hit the nail on the head. Phillip was married to the hospital, but there was more to it than that. He hadn’t viewed himself as remote or distant. He’d never been one to share his troubles or wear his heart on his sleeve, but that didn’t make him emotionally inaccessible, as both Heather and Marsha had accused. And yet his tendency to keep his thoughts and feelings to himself seemed to be a problem. His friends were few, but that was the way he liked it. Life shouldn’t be a popularity contest.
After Marsha he’d more or less sworn off dating for a few years. With determination he’d started building a life outside the hospital, but it was a constant struggle not to revert to old habits. Every so often he longed for a woman to hold, but he honestly felt as if he just didn’t know where to start or if it was in him to give what they all seemed to want and need. When it came to romantic relationships, he was at a loss as to how it should be—the baring of souls, the shared intimacies—all that seemed beyond him. For someone others considered smart and intelligent, he was having a difficult time figuring this out.
This evening was a good example. The Blaines had entrusted their son’s life to him, and they were relying on his skill to correct their infant son’s heart. If he succeeded, the boy had a good chance of living a normal life. He admired the way the parents leaned on each other. They were partners, friends, lovers. Phillip wanted that kind of relationship, too, a wife and family of his own, only he didn’t know if it was possible for him. At thirty-nine he was set in his ways.
The trouble was that most of the women he met came with baggage. Either they were divorced and embittered, with two or three kids, or they were like him, married to their careers.
On Thursday morning, Phillip woke to the sound of his alarm. He stumbled into the kitchen and got a cup of coffee brewing while he grabbed his workout clothes.
He was at the gym lifting weights when he saw the woman he’d met Monday in the hospital elevator. The one who’d arrived with the two girls and the preemie hats.
She was alone this morning; apparently the friend she usually worked out with didn’t make it today. They made eye contact and she stiffened and looked away. Phillip figured he deserved that. He’d taken one look at her daughter and recognized trouble, and he’d probably been a bit brusque as a result.
He didn’t envy … oh, what was her name again … Lesley, Lindy … no, Libby. He wondered if she knew her daughter was pregnant. He doubted it. In fact, she seemed completely oblivious. Unfortunately, the girl couldn’t be much older than thirteen or fourteen. He might have misread the situation, but he doubted it. He’d been around pregnant women far too long not to recognize the symptoms. The teenager wore loose clothes but they couldn’t hide what he found obvious. He gave her high marks for being clever, though. He suspected she was six to seven months along; she hid it well. His guess was that Libby didn’t have a clue. It was unfair to blame the mother, but clearly she wasn’t paying nearly enough attention to her daughter.
Well, Libby was in for a shock. And the girl probably wasn’t getting the medical attention she needed, either. This could be a formula for disaster. He’d toyed with the idea of saying something right there in the elevator but had changed his mind. He didn’t want to overstep his bounds. This wasn’t his business. Still, he was concerned for the young teen and the possible consequences for her and her baby.
“Hey, Phillip, you coming tonight?”
Distracted from his thoughts, Phillip turned to face his friend, pediatrician Michael Everett. He set the weight down while his mind unscrambled his friend’s comment.
“Poker. We’re meeting at Ritchie’s place. You coming or not?”
“Coming, and this time I intend to win my money back.” Ritchie was Michael’s brother-in-law from his first marriage. Hannah’s brother. Michael had taken his wife Hannah’s death hard. For months the pediatrician hadn’t been himself. He’d holed up completely, refusing invitations and doing only what was necessary. Grief had crippled him. His staff and friends had worried he would never recover, and then, a year or so after Hannah’s death, Michael had met Macy.
Michael slapped him across the back. “Good. See you at Ritchie’s at seven.”
“See ya.”
Ritchie and Michael routinely worked out together, and Ritchie stood next to him with a weight in each hand. Ritchie laid down the weights. “Did you hear?” Michael asked Phillip, grinning sheepishly. “Macy’s pregnant.”
Phillip slapped his fellow physician across the back and experienced a twinge of envy. “Congratulations.”
Michael nodded, looking pleased with himself. “Yeah, we just found out. See you tonight.”
“Tonight,” Phillip echoed. He was happy for his friend. Michael was a good man and a wonderful doctor, popular with the staff and respected. Phillip had met Macy once and rather liked her. Really, it was difficult not to. She was like a beam of sunshine. He’d met Hannah, too, and felt she would have approved of Michael’s choice.
When he finished his regular workout, Phillip headed back to his condo. He didn’t need to be at the hospital for another hour. He showered, got dressed, and decided on a second cup of coffee. He took a fresh mug from the cabinet and noticed the flower on his windowsill. He’d brought it home from the office because it’d looked sad and unhealthy. He’d hoped the sunlight would help if he placed it in his kitchen window.
Instead it had withered completely. It had died from neglect.
Chapter 6
The job situation looked bleak. Libby didn’t have a single prospect on the horizon and was getting more depressed by the day. She’d knit so many baby hats that she knew the pattern by heart. At the rate she was going, she’d have two hundred hats completed by the end of the month.
Sharon Jennings, the nurse she’d met on Monday, had mentioned that volunteers were needed in the nursery. She’d also said that rocking the babies was comforting. Libby needed something, anything, that would soothe her troubled spirit.
Finding inner peace appealed to her, and rocking newborns was a whole lot cheaper than buying a bunch of books on the subject. What she found difficult to explain was the draw she felt toward these babies. She certainly hadn’t felt a twinge of it when her ex-husband had been cajoling her to get pregnant. But now the pull felt magnetic. She longed to hold an infant in her arms. It was so completely counter to what she knew about herself, but there it was.
Well, she didn’t have anything better to do with her time; she might as well give it a try. Thursday morning, after working out at the gym, she decided to stop off at the hospital and fill out the application. The form was lengthy, and it took far longer than she’d expected. Most job applications were shorter than this. She was finger-printed as well. Apparently a complete background check had to be done and submitted before she could be approved.
Sharon Jennings phoned the following Monday morning to tell her she’d been cleared to volunteer at the hospital.
“Oh, great, thanks.” Libby had assumed there wouldn’t be a problem. She didn’t have so much as a jaywalking ticket.
“When would you like to start?”
“Ah …” Libby wasn’t sure. In the few days since she’d submitted the application she’d had time to think about it, and she’d realized that being with the newborns might not help. While she craved the comfort and peace Sharon had promised, she was afraid being around newborns might make her long for a child of her own. She was already past her prime childbearing years, although it was common these days for a woman to give birth in her late thirties or even her early forties. But with no man in sight, it wasn’t likely to happen for her.
Rocking infants could very well be dangerous to her mental well-being. Doubts had already gnawed away at her self-confidence. What she didn’t need was a constant reminder of what she’d given up with the divorce. How different her li
fe would have been if she’d given Joe what he wanted. She didn’t need to add guilt or regret.
If Libby was going to volunteer for a worthy cause she should consider working at a legal clinic. The problem was that most people who walked into a free clinic weren’t interested in setting up estate planning, trust funds, or foundations, and that was her expertise.
“Could you be here at noon?” Sharon wasn’t taking no for an answer.
“Ah …”
“We could really use your help.”
“Sure,” Libby capitulated before she could stop herself. Oh dear, what was she thinking?
Sharon’s gratitude was immediate. “Wonderful; I’ll see you then.”
At precisely twelve o’clock, Libby arrived at the nursery. Sharon had her put on a hospital gown over her street clothes, and then she brought her into the nursery.
“Pick up an infant and start rocking” was all the instruction Libby was given.
The nursery was a cacophony of squalling babies. The noise was deafening. “Which one?” Libby asked, not knowing where to start. She hadn’t even begun and she was already in over her head.
“Whichever one you like.”
Libby chose the closest baby: a fat, healthy, eight-pound baby boy with a thatch of dark brown hair. The surname was Burzotta. Italian, she suspected. Libby carefully lifted the infant from the soft bed and settled into the wooden rocker. The baby cried all the louder until Libby started rocking. The heated red face relaxed and the baby’s lower lip trembled as he gradually settled down.
Libby didn’t know any lullabies and so she softly sang the only song she could think of, which was a Rick Springfield hit from the eighties. It might not have been Brahms, but her low voice appeared to do the trick. Within minutes Baby Boy Burzotta was sound asleep in Libby’s arms.
She placed the infant back inside his crib and reached for another little boy. He was downright angry, his face twisted into a scowl. “You’ve been fed, young man,” Libby whispered, rocking gently. “The chart tells me your mother fed you no more than thirty minutes ago. It’s naptime.” Baby Jassin wasn’t as easily appeased as Baby Burzotta had been.
Libby rocked and softly sang to him as well, easily slipping from one rock song to another, from Springfield to Springsteen. It surprised her that she remembered so many of the words. As a teenager, after her mother died, Libby had drowned her grief in music, listening to her cassettes, and later CDs, for hours on end. That had been long before iPods. She’d lie in bed, immersed in the songs that helped drown out the world and her loss. Her father never complained about the volume. He seemed to know she needed it loud. When he married Charlene that had changed. Charlene had claimed Libby would damage her hearing and it wasn’t good for her.
Libby had dutifully turned down the music.
It took the equivalent of an entire CD of songs before Baby Jassin fell asleep in her arms.
Nurse Jennings was right. Even in the midst of a dozen wailing infants, Libby felt a sense of peace, a sense of rightness. A calm washed over her, and all she did was rock babies. The worries that had weighed her down since she’d lost her job seemed to slowly fade away. It was as if she’d entered another world. A welcoming island where all that mattered was holding a baby in her arms and singing softly.
“Now, now,” she said gently, picking up a third baby. “The world isn’t such a bad place. Your mommy and daddy are going to love you so much.” She placed the newborn over her shoulder and gently patted his back.
Sharon returned sometime later. “So how’d it go?”
“Great.” The nursery was almost silent. “What time is it?”
Sharon glanced at her wrist. “Three. I’m surprised you stuck around this long.”
Libby blinked. “I’ve been here for three hours?” Sharon had been in and out. Libby had noticed her several times but hadn’t paid her much attention.
“Three hours,” Sharon repeated.
Unbelievable. Libby had no idea where the time had gone.
“You did a great job,” the nurse said, and gave Libby’s shoulder a reassuring pat. “I hope you’ll come back.”
“I will.”
“There’s a sign-up sheet on the other side of the door. We’d love to have you return soon.”
Libby filled her name in on the clipboard and then left. Walking back to her condo she had the urge to talk to someone. She knew Robin would be busy, but she reached for her cell anyway.
“Prosecutor’s office,” her friend answered curtly.
“It’s Libby. I just finished rocking babies at the hospital.”
“What?” Robin demanded impatiently.
“I told you this morning I was going to volunteer at the hospital, remember?”
The line went silent. “You rocked … babies?”
“Yeah, for three hours. It didn’t seem nearly that long, and it was so … so peaceful.”
Again the line went silent. “Let me get this straight. You spent the last three hours rocking newborns.”
“I loved every minute.”
Robin snickered. “I’m worried about you, Libby. Very, very worried.”
Chapter 7
Libby arrived to volunteer again at the Seattle General nursery a couple of days later on a Wednesday afternoon. She slipped on the drab blue gown just before Sharon stepped into the room.
“I’m so glad you’re here,” the head nurse said. “The morning volunteer canceled and I’ve had my hands full.”
Sharon definitely looked like she could use a break. “By the way, did you see Dr. Stone?” she asked. The question had an expectancy to it, as if Libby was supposed to have met up with the good doctor.
“No.” Libby noticed that he hadn’t shown up at the gym the last couple of mornings, either, which was fine by her.
“He asked about you this morning.”
“He asked about me?” Her stomach tightened with a sense of dread. If Dr. Heart of Stone sought her out it couldn’t be for anything pleasant.
The last time she saw him at the gym she’d purposely looked elsewhere for fear that he would assume she was watching him. He’d ignored her, too, and she’d been grateful.
In fact, Libby and the physician hadn’t spoken once since their awkward encounter in the hospital elevator. As far as she was concerned he had issues. Yet in Libby’s mind she’d built it up to so much more. She didn’t want to think of him, but she found that he often occupied her thoughts, which irritated her no end. She couldn’t imagine what she’d done to cause him to be so curt with her.
“Dr. Stone asked when you were going to volunteer next,” Sharon said.
Libby wasn’t sure what the inquiry meant, but clearly it was not a good sign.
Sharon looked away and appeared slightly uncomfortable. “I might have mentioned you were on the schedule for today—hope that’s okay.”
“Oh.”
“I hope you don’t mind.”
“I … no, that’s fine.” If he wanted to clear the air then perhaps it was best to do it now.
“Usually I keep that sort of information to myself,” Sharon continued, “but it’s so unusual for Dr. Stone to express interest in someone here at the hospital that I was taken aback.”
Maybe the negative vibes coming off him hadn’t been directed at her.
Already Libby’s stomach was in knots. She had such little experience in male/female relationships that she wasn’t entirely sure what to make of this. Although she was in her late thirties, she felt so socially inept sometimes, and this was definitely one of those times.
Robin hadn’t given her any clues about her new love interest, either. The two of them were quite the pair. Libby suspected that was what made them such good friends. Robin had also been married, but her marriage had failed a couple of years after she learned that her husband had a gambling problem. She never spoke of Kyle or any of the relationships she’d had since the divorce.
“If I see Dr. Stone, you wouldn’t mind if I mentioned you
’re in the nursery, would you?” Sharon asked.
Libby hesitated, unsure she was up to a showdown.
“What’s the matter with you two?” Sharon demanded. “The minute I mentioned his name you tensed up. What gives?”
“I’m not entirely sure. He doesn’t like me.”
Sharon frowned. “Don’t be ridiculous. He wouldn’t be asking about you if that was the way he felt.”
“Then by all means, tell him.” Libby rubbed her open palms together, incapable of hiding how nervous she felt.
“He does this, too, you know?” Sharon said.
“I’m sorry. Does what?” He’d intimidated other women?
“Every now and again Dr. Stone comes to the nursery and rocks the babies. Not on a regular basis. He would rather I didn’t say anything about it. He’s like that; it’s almost as if he’s afraid someone might find out he’s got a soft heart, but I’ve seen him with these families with infants at risk. He’s patient and gentle. Watch him for yourself and you’ll see what I mean.”
Dr. Heart of Stone rocked the babies? Were they discussing the same man? It seemed highly unlikely.
As though she felt the need to build him up in Libby’s eyes, Sharon shook her head and continued. “Every woman here would give her eyeteeth to grab his attention, which isn’t any big surprise. He’s handsome as sin, successful, and beyond that, he’s an incredible doctor and human being. That’s a combination that most women can’t resist.”
Libby might have been too hasty in judging him.
Sharon patted her on the shoulder. “It’s encouraging that he asked about you.”
Libby wasn’t the least bit encouraged. Her head buzzed as she entered the rows of hospital cribs. A nurse was there the same as before, walking back and forth, taking the newborns in to be with their mothers.
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