by Barbara Ebel
“Hmm. Making yourself at home,” Danny said.
Dakota performed a few figure eights, slapping Danny with his tail. Rachel brought a ginger ale, set it on a coaster, then decided to get one as well. She took a sip after sitting on the floor next to Danny, who centered his head into a plush pillow.
“You don’t look so good yourself,” Danny said.
“Oh, it’s nothing,” Rachel said, “just a little stomach virus.”
Danny furrowed his eyebrows, concerned.
“I thought some ginger ale would help.”
Danny laid his right hand on her neck, lightly rubbing it. “Glad my nose dilemma is over with.”
“I agree.” Rachel let more soda quench her queasiness. “Your case this morning was magnificent. I’ve never assisted for an awake craniotomy.”
“I thought your last job covered comprehensive big city neurosurgical cases?”
“You must be more skilled and advanced than many neurosurgeons, Danny.”
They took turns channel surfing and finally stopped on a weather story. “I’ll be back,” Rachel said, grabbing Dakota’s leash. “I’ll take him for his last walk.”
There were plenty of trees and shrubs behind the complex, so she guided Dakota to the back of the building. He lifted his leg several times on vertical growth, trumping the scent of previous stray male dogs. His tail and head bobbed with the excitement of new territory.
When they’d gone far enough, Rachel yanked him and headed back. A man came toward them, from a lighted breezeway near the clubhouse. “Ma’am,” he said loudly into the cold air. “I don’t know which unit you are in or if you are visiting someone, but dogs aren’t allowed.”
“I wasn’t aware of that,” she said apologetically. “I’ll take care of it.”
The man had run out without a coat, so wrapped his arms to his chest. His right arm rose, he waved to acknowledge her understanding, and hurried through the passageway. Rachel and Dakota disappeared around the building corner and ran to Danny’s unit.
Inside, the Chessie’s energy popped like a cork. He raced like a thoroughbred into the back bedroom, pounced on the bed and circled, digging into the bedspread. Part of it clumped into a central bird’s nest. Rachel wrapped her arm around Danny’s shoulders, and they followed the dog’s path. Dakota lay in his newly created bed.
“Dakota,” Danny said, “off.”
Big amber eyes keyed to the direction of Danny’s voice. The dog sighed and took a jump, then spread out with his head between his front paws.
“You’d swear I hurt his feelings,” Danny said.
“You have. Now he’ll do anything for you.”
“I’d like him to play dead for a change.” Danny straightened out his comforter to sit on the edge of the bed.
“Anything to make you happy.” Rachel moved to gain eye contact with Dakota.
“Dakota, dead dog!”
Dakota shimmied his body to gain momentum, flipped and laid belly up.
“Damn,” Danny said. “Sometimes I think that dog is a lot smarter than we give him credit for.”
“No doubt.”
________
Late the next afternoon, Danny crunched along pebbles in the cul-de-sac after stepping out of his car, not wanting to park in his old driveway. He headed toward the front door, but stopped instead when the girls came out. Nancy readjusted a bra cup deep through the top of her wooly jacket, not noticing her father’s bewildered expression.
“What on earth? Are you wearing Ramen noodles?” he asked.
Nancy paused, one hip higher than the other and tilted her head. “That’s not funny,” she said. “It’s my new hairstyle. It’s called a perm.”
“Well, your light brown curls are … very becoming.”
“So is the new green,” she smirked.
“Oh, that. My face hasn’t decided what rainbow color to wear.”
Danny drove to Downtown Italy, stupefied by his third daughter’s alterations. Sometimes girls were a mystery to him. But, he felt some relief; the atmosphere seemed less thick than the other day.
Inside the restaurant, the aroma of Italian red sauce and pasta crept over Danny like awake electrical neuro-stimulation, reviving his memory of Downtown Italy’s scents. His father had languished over their family business; he had depended on the restaurant’s sustenance during med school, and a lot longer than that.
A mature teenager reached for elongated menus. “How many?” he asked.
“Three,” Danny said.
The teen showed them a table, unfolded napkins for the girls, lingered his eyes on Annabel.
“Is Angelo here tonight?” Danny asked.
“Yes. Would you like him as your waiter?”
“Would appreciate that.” The young man poured them ice water and left.
Annabel slid her coat off her shoulders, exposing a ribbed camel sweater with mid length amber beads lying against her chest. His girls were becoming young ladies under his eyes.
“Dad, we’ve figured out Thanksgiving,” Annabel said, placing a breadstick on a plate. “Dad, are you listening? We’re all eating early at Mary’s. Casey too. Later in the day when Mom goes home, you can come over. We’ll have plenty of leftovers. Casey can go upstairs or something, if you want.” She ran her tongue over her braces after nibbling away at her bread straw.
“Why doesn’t Casey just go home?”
“Dad,” said Nancy, filling in for her sister, “Casey and Mary are living together now.”
“At grandpa’s?”
“Well, yeah, you mean Mary’s.”
“Bon jorno.” An exuberant Angelo bowed his head. “So pleased to see you.”
“Angelo, you too,” Annabel said.
“You girls are getting lovelier.” He smiled at Nancy’s locks. “Those waves are lapping against the sunshine of your face.”
Nancy straightened from slouching. “Wow, thanks, Angelo.”
“Now, where is your most beautiful counterpart?” Angelo asked Danny. “Shall I ask Gianni to make her favorite appetizer?”
“Mom and Dad,” Annabel said, “are getting divorced.”
“Dad doesn’t live with us anymore,” Nancy said.
“I am sorry to know this,” Angelo said, crestfallen. “But sometimes adults don’t match together.”
“No,” Annabel said, “that wasn’t it.”
“Like, not at all,” Nancy added.
Danny frowned, hid his face inside the menu jacket, and carefully avoided reading descriptions of Sara’s favorite entrees.
Chapter 20
“I’m giving Dr. Tilson five more minutes,” Mark Cunningham said to his secretary, “then I expect you to be gone and me not far behind.” He slapped a file folder into her inbox for the morning just as Danny huffed and puffed his way through the double door, having taken the stairs two at a time instead of waiting for an elevator.
Danny heard a guttural “good evening” from Mark and followed him to a small and messy office. He sat in one of the two chairs in front of the desk while Mark plunged into a rolling black leather chair across from him. Silver plated bowling trophies lined the top of the bookcase behind his attorney and a studio photograph of Mark and his wife jutted out from the clutter on his desk.
“You’re in vogue, going green,” Mark said. “And ouch, that must have hurt.”
Danny wanted to roll his eyes like a teenager. “It’s fading,” he said. “So what happened with my wife’s attorney?”
“Her attorney, Jim Dorsey, is a babe just hatched, maybe hasn’t even rolled a shaver over his face yet.” He laughed, amused at himself. “Must’ve known somebody for Tom Werner’s group to have hired him.” Mark unpeeled a miniature piece of gum from a fancy square box and popped it into his mouth.
Mark quickly rolled and leaned forward as if the gum had an energy boost in it. “I’ve talked some sense into him, though. Told him he can experiment with his other cases, but this is how I see it: bicker, fight and spin paperwork fo
r a few years or just get all the money dealing flat squared right off and you both sign divorce papers as soon as possible.”
“I’m listening,” Danny said.
“Child support.” Mark scrambled through a paperwork pile and opened a yellow pad. “Figured from straight charts and your pay, give or take other info, comes to … both girls … thirty-two hundred a month. If your wife isn’t a mall cruiser and takes care of your girls, she’ll bank it for their college.”
Danny gulped. “Whoa, slow down. I forgot to tell you something. My Dad left almost all his assets to my girls. They have a huge trust, payment starts when they turn eighteen. College is already taken care of. We can decrease payments to Sara.”
“Every time I think I’ve seen it all, I haven’t,” Mark said. “Your girls are in for a big caboodle, but you’re left out? I take it your father never dreamed his son would bail out of his marriage?”
Danny nodded, dumfounded. His lawyer had a talent to cut to the core.
“Your misfortune. Sorry, it won’t change payment to your wife.” He turned a yellow page. “Alimony,” he said.
“My father gave Sara and me our house. Now she’s in it, so she gets my only part of my father’s inheritance to me. Why should I have to pay her alimony when she doesn’t even have to pay a mortgage?”
“Doubly not smart family planning on your part,” Tom exclaimed. “We can go back to the drawing board if you want to argue for the house. All this historical family info, again, probably won’t impact the outcome.”
Danny bit his tongue. It would take too much time, too much money in attorney fees to argue about it. He just wanted to ditch divorce conflicts and get on with a new life with Rachel. “Okay, tell me what they have up their sleeve regarding alimony.”
“Jim Dorsey and I contemplated two scenarios, your choice. Big payments for ten years, then stop. Or, medium payments until your wife turns sixty-five. I made a point that she could always return to teaching and make her own living.”
“What are we talking here?”
Mark looked at scribbled notes. “Twenty-eight hundred a month for ten years, or fifteen hundred a month for twenty-two years.”
Danny’s head spun. What would be left for him and Rachel?
“Each way has its advantages and disadvantages,” Mark said lifting the pad towards him. “Your wife prefers bigger payments per month for ten years, but overall she’ll get less by not going the sixty-five route. What would you like to do?”
Danny took a pen and calculated, taking his time, getting the number crunch correct. “I want to get this over with. Tell them ten years of payments.”
________
Talk of tender turkey, pumpkin pie, and NFL tradition circulated the OR as Danny began closing a patient’s back the day before Thanksgiving. Harold and Danny had flip-flopped OR rooms all afternoon, rotating a lumbar laminectomy schedule that would have taken two days if he had been a resident. Besides conversation, the ventilator droned, a CD played and his beeper intermittently blared. All dependable sounds; the day had been smoother than any he had had in a few weeks. Maybe that night at Rachel’s place he would bury himself in a novel. He looked forward to Thanksgiving Day off, except that he’d only see the girls and Mary later in the day.
Rachel had several days off. She left Nashville in the afternoon to go to her sister’s in Chicago and had invited Danny to stay at her place. “Perhaps you could mind Dakota, so I wouldn’t have to kennel him,” she had said. “He would be in familiar surroundings.”
Danny planted a large surgical needle into the patient’s back, ready for the last, outer layer skin suturing as the OR door swung open. Bruce held his hands out in front, signaling the scrub nurse to gown and glove him.
“You need to go to the office. I’ll finish this,” he scowled under his mask. The suture in Danny’s hand poised in mid-air.
“You’re being served,” Bruce said.
Danny couldn’t fathom it; Sara wanted an expeditious split as much as he did. Why would she be serving him with some kind of divorce papers unless she had reconsidered the settlement? He stepped to the side, gave Bruce medical and surgical details of the case, and left.
________
A uniformed man rose from a chair in the office waiting room. He walked to Danny, shoved an envelope with a face-slip into his hands. “Wet out there, Doc,” the man said, sliding on a black jacket with a slender furry collar. “Sign there.”
Danny went to the seclusion of his office. Behind his desk, he glanced between the serenity of the fishing print on the wall, and the white stuffed envelope. Finally, he slit it open.
Susan Dexter, Plaintiff, vs. Daniel Tilson, M.D. and The Neurosurgery Group of Middle Tennessee, Defendant. A shudder slinked under his shoulders and ran down his arms. A medical malpractice suit; virgin territory. He couldn’t remember names of patients from one week to the next. Who was Susan Dexter?
Danny trudged through the papers, every sentence causing panic and dread. Incriminating words scolded him: said doctor caused the patient’s delayed diagnosis; he mismanaged, he delayed treatment, he misdiagnosed, patient suffered severe pain and complications. And worst of all, a core shattering accusation: Dr. Tilson practiced negligently.
The lawsuit charged him with flagrantly dismissing Susan Dexter’s symptoms and diagnosis. He had ordered an MRI; the radiologist’s report clearly described images of plaque denoting myelin loss, consistent with multiple sclerosis, or MS. Yet, he had told the plaintiff her MRI was negative, and that nothing was wrong with her, preventing her from seeking further medical treatment and self-care. The patient’s continued symptoms caused great dysfunction, pain and suffering. Treatment with steroids, intravenous drugs, physical therapy, appropriate self-care etc. was delayed because of Dr. Tilson.
Danny put the legal document on his desk and sat staring at Grandpa and Boy Fishing for a long time.
________
Dakota pulled a throw pillow off of Rachel’s couch, dropped it, and settled his head on top. He intermittently opened his eyes to monitor Danny, who didn’t feel as comfortable as the dog; the lonely holiday afternoon magnified his problems. He had flicked through every station and drank as much apple cider as he could stomach.
“Come on, Dakota. I’ll walk you before I leave for a few hours.” The dog jumped up, got the leash off a kitchen hook, and dragged it across the floor.
“Good boy,” Danny said, snapping it on. He couldn’t believe he was talking to a dog. Thanksgiving Day, no less. When he brought Dakota back in at five o’clock, he left for Mary’s.
The dog walk had warmed Danny against the chill; the strange day hinted at mixed seasons. Cold and damp, then crisp and sunny. He left his jacket unzipped after getting out of the car in Mary’s driveway, and went straight in the unlocked door without knocking, especially since Sara’s car wasn’t around. Casey was midway in the hallway, almost to the stairs. Each of them waited for the other one’s move.
“You don’t have to disappear,” Danny said.
The somber look on both their faces relaxed. “Your family deserves more from you,” Casey said, “but you’ve been my best friend forever.” He extended his right hand. Danny clasped it, their torsos briefly embraced.
“Happy Thanksgiving,” Danny said.
“You too,” Casey replied.
Both men walked to the kitchen where half the assortment of pots, pans, and dishes still littered the counters and where the smell from previous cooking intensified. Annabel poked Nancy, throwing her eyes in the direction of the two men. “You and I don’t even make up that fast,” Annabel whispered.
“Hey, Dad,” Nancy said, giving Danny a small hug. “My hair’s the same.”
“I notice that. It’s growing on me. Happy Thanksgiving everybody.”
“We’ve got a feast for you,” Mary said. “And we’re ready for a turkey sandwich.”
________
Parity Medical Malpractice Corporation sent two attorneys. Bruce and Danny
had set the meeting for 4:30 p.m. in their small conference room. Only a week later, their malpractice carrier wanted the facts and wanted to meet the physician in question: what kind of believability, credibility, and sincerity did he have as the defendant in a courtroom? The plaintiff’s attorneys would waste no time initiating discovery, and if depositions were forthcoming, the Parity attorneys wanted to get their client ready.
Danny thought they would send a senior and junior attorney. But that wasn’t the case. A female and male attorney, who had both worked for Parity for almost twenty years and seen their share of medical litigation, sat with Starbuck cups and legal paperwork. They cracked small smiles and shook hands robustly when both doctors entered.
“Ms. Stewart,” Bruce said, “thank you for the prompt visit.”
“You are welcome,” she said. Call me Stewart; it’s my first and last name. And Mr. Argon, here, will tell you to call him Richard.”
According to Annabel and Nancy, femininity was back in vogue, but that wasn’t obvious with the business-like female before them.
Bruce nodded. “First a few questions,” Richard said. He asked Danny for his full name, the number of years he trained and practiced, and whether he was board certified. Stewart confirmed the information she had or wrote on their forms. “What is your address?”
Danny told them. “It’s different than what we have,” Stewart said. “Have you moved? And are you married?”
“It’s a relatively new apartment. My wife is in our house. We are separated and filing for divorce.”
“Defendant going through divorce, left residence,” Stewart mumbled while writing.
“What does that have to do with anything?” Danny snapped. He expected a reply but they ignored him. The woman slid her eyeglasses along the bridge of her nose.
“Danny,” Bruce said, “Richard asked for Susan Dexter’s chart, which you are leaning on.”
Danny slid the chart across the table; the chart went from one attorney to the next, as if they had done it hundreds of times.
