Lifeblood

by Penny Rudolph

  She jumped, startled.

  “Whoa,” came the voice on the other side of the glass. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

  She peered, puzzled, at the speaker. The light in the garage was always dim. He moved a little closer, and the light from the cubicle lit his face.

  “Just wanted to say hi,” Gabe said. “I’m parking over here now. Most of the pharm staff is. I guess they figure we just sit around all day and need more exercise. Six blocks’ walk each way is supposed to extend my life. Saw you when I came in this morning, but you were busy.”

  “Nice to see you,” Rachel said.

  He gestured at the ledger. “Are you finished? For the day, I mean.”

  “As much as I’m going to be, I guess.”

  “Could I interest you in dinner?”

  Rachel looked at her watch to buy some time while her mind raced. Well, why not?

  Too many reasons to list.

  “You’d have to pick the restaurant, I don’t eat out much and don’t know LA very well.”

  Hank is probably having dinner with that woman in Sacramento right now.

  “Okay,” Rachel said. “Thanks. I’d like that.”

  A smile broadened itself across his face. “Where to?”

  “Someplace casual. And close. I have to be back to lock up. Have you been to The Pantry?”

  “Not yet.”

  “It’s been here forever. Very plain and straightforward. No frills, no nonsense.” She stopped. A smile played about her lips. “Like me.”

  “Are you?”

  “Sort of. Get your car.”

  “You’re on.” He headed up the ramp.

  A white Integra pulled up next to the booth. He lowered the window and clicked the door lock. “Hey lady, want a ride?”

  Suddenly flustered, Rachel got in and turned her face to the passenger window so it couldn’t be read, though she wasn’t sure what might be seen there. “The Pantry’s on Figueroa. Downtown. It’s not far, but the one-way streets are a pain. And with all the construction you can’t be sure a street that was open yesterday will be open today. I’ll try to navigate.”

  After a few double-back turns, she pointed to a small parking lot that was emptying of day traffic. The night life hadn’t picked up yet.

  The Pantry, however, had a waiting line. “Popular place,” Gabe said as he and Rachel joined the queue.

  “Plain, good, cheap food, and lots of it,” Rachel said. “That’ll do it every time. An ex-mayor owns the place now. I hear politicians do power breakfasts here.”

  “I guess 1940s retro is in these days,” Gabe said when they were finally seated at a scarred Formica table next to old photos of a younger Los Angeles.

  “What is that waiter carrying?” Gabe asked.

  “A billy club.”

  “A what?”

  “They’re open all night and I guess the clientele isn’t always the tuxedo crowd. I hear the waiters don’t hesitate to conk a noisy diner, but that might be apocryphal. I once saw them chase a guy who tried to leave without paying. Awesome.”

  “Cheap enough,” Gabe said, looking at the menu. “You sure the food is edible?”

  “Very. The rib eye is good. The other steaks are a little tough. The pork chops are good.”

  A waiter stopped at their table and fidgeted until they both ordered rib eyes.

  Rachel tried to ignore the tingle that went up her back when Gabe’s dark caramel eyes held on hers. Pheromones, she thought. I hate them. “So how’s your friend?” she asked. “Gordon something. The drug salesman.”

  “He doesn’t like to be called a salesman.”

  “Why not?”

  “He sees himself as a philanthropist. And in a way, he sort of is.”

  “How so?”

  “Oh, if some guy—somebody one of the docs knows or one of us in the pharmacy hears about—needs an expensive med and doesn’t have prescription insurance, Gordon gets it for him free. If it isn’t his company’s line, he trades another rep for it.”

  “That’s nice of him. But it doesn’t exactly make him a philanthropist. I mean it doesn’t cost him anything but time.”

  “These days, most people would rather give money than time.”

  Rachel thought about that. “You’re probably right. Okay, he’s a nice guy.”

  “One of the best.” Gabe glanced around the room at the decor. “In Albuquerque, we’re into the Route 66 craze, but it’s more ’50s. Booths with red plastic benches.”

  “That where you’re from? Albuquerque?”

  He nodded. “I’ve got a little girl there. And an ex-wife. I’m thinking of going back. I sort of promised to stay a year when I signed on at Jefferson and I’d hate to renege, but I’m not crazy about LA.”

  “Recent divorce?” Rachel had to raise her voice. The restaurant was filled with chatter.

  “Almost a year.”

  “You probably won’t like anywhere for a while.”

  “You’ve been there?”

  “Not personally. Divorce, I mean. Albuquerque, either, for that matter. I’ve heard people talk about marriages splitting up.” A lot of people she knew in AA were divorced. “Why don’t you like LA?”

  He made a wry smile. “Don’t get me started.”

  “What’s Albuquerque like?”

  He chuckled. “Used to be a wide spot in the road. Fifteen, twenty years ago, some of the streets weren’t even paved. Now it’s LA without an ocean. Backed-up traffic, smog, housing developments multiplying like white mice. It’s growing so fast we’ll probably run out of water and be rationed to three cups per person, per day.”

  “So why would you go back?”

  Gabe laid his knife and fork across his plate. “You don’t have any kids?”

  Rachel shook her head.

  “It makes everything different.”

  “I’m sure it would.” She scooped up the last bite of steak, chewed, swallowed, then looked across the table at him. “Question.”

  “Shoot.”

  “A week or so ago I found a couple of kids in a van someone left in my garage. Not a regular customer. Someone who just got in and parked.” Trying not to notice Gabe’s eyes riveted on hers, she took sip of water.

  He tilted his head toward her. “And?”

  “Mexican kids, I think. Young. Nine, ten, something like that. Unconscious. I put them in my car and raced them to the hospital. Jefferson.”

  Gabe frowned, took a cellophane-wrapped toothpick from his pocket and laid it on the edge of his plate.

  “It was too late for one of them,” Rachel went on. “That’s what they told me at the emergency room. The other one, they said was just dehydrated. They said they were going to admit him.”

  “And?” Gabe prompted again.

  “I went back to see how he was doing.”

  “Nice of you.”

  “No. As a matter of fact, it wasn’t. At least the hospital didn’t think so. They kind of pitched me out the door.”

  He gave her a hard look. “You’re joking.”

  She shook her head. “Well, I probably got a little intense when they insisted no child like that was admitted at that time on that day.”

  Gabe’s eyes softened. He made a small smile and ducked his head.

  She wondered if that was to prevent her from seeing something in his face.

  “Somehow, that isn’t hard to imagine,” he said when he looked up.

  “So, you’re an insider at the hospital. You have any idea what might have happened?”

  “Dehydration can be really serious. You probably know that.”

  “So you’re saying maybe he died.”

  “It’s possible.”

  “Other people have suggested that. But wouldn’t there be some kind of record?”

  Gabe shrugged. “I’m not familiar with Jefferson’s procedure for admissions from Emergency. On the other hand, dehydration can be very mild. Maybe a little IV drip did the trick, and he just walked away.”
<
br />   “Would they let a child that age just walk away alone?”

  “I suppose that would depend on his story. Then again, he might have just got up and sneaked out or left AMA.”

  “AMA?”

  “Against medical advice. Without a by-your-leave. A hospital isn’t a prison.”

  “I don’t think he was old enough to know that. But even if he did, why no record?”

  “I’m not a good one to ask. No idea.” Gabe peeled off the cellophane and placed the toothpick in the corner of his mouth. Then he removed it and asked, as one does about smoking, “Bother you?”

  Rachel shook her head. “Of course not.”

  He replaced the wooden pick at the edge of his smile.

  She was thinking she was surely the only human in the world who thought that was sexy.

  “Great place,” Gabe said, looking around again. “I don’t suppose they do Cointreau or anything.”

  “Unlikely.”

  “You want to adjourn to one of the hotels?” He caught her startled look and, flustered, added, “For an after-dinner drink.”

  “Not tonight, but thanks.”

  They paid, crossed the street to Gabe’s car and drove back to the garage. He pulled into an empty parking space near the entrance.

  “Look, I’m not blind,” he said, turning to her. “I saw the engagement ring before. Now I don’t see it. I don’t know what that means.”

  Avoiding his eyes, Rachel saw the pale place on her finger where the ring had been. “Truth is, I don’t know what it means, either.”

  “So that’s why you picked the most unromantic restaurant in California.”

  “It was close and quick.”

  “Will I be rude if I ask who’s the guy?”

  “Yes,” Rachel said, then added, “okay, he’s an engineer. He’s on assignment in Sacramento right now.”

  “A quarrel?”

  “You could call it that.”

  Gabe got out of the car, and she was wondering if he was just leaving her there without a goodbye when he appeared at her door and opened it. She slid out of the passenger seat. They were very near the same height.

  He didn’t step closer, but put both palms against her cheeks and gave her a very quick, small peck on the cheek.

  Chapter Twenty

  “Gabe isn’t as good looking as Hank,” Rachel told Goldie over a lunch of greens and macaroni and cheese in Jefferson Medical Center’s main cafeteria. “I don’t know what it is that attracts me to this guy. Just chemistry, maybe.”

  “Maybe it’s something plain and simple. Like you’re just mad at Hank.”

  “You think he took that woman out to dinner because I didn’t leap at the chance to set a date to get married?”

  “People have dinner all the time. Doesn’t mean they go jumpin’ between the sheets with whoever is sitting across the table.”

  Rachel took a forkful of the greens. “This stuff is fantastic. What is it?”

  “Turnip greens, mustard greens, collards, whatever’s in season; a little bacon or ham, a little vinegar and the rest is a secret.”

  “A secret? Why?”

  “Because whites can’t make it. They shouldn’t even try. It takes a black hand to stir the pot.”

  “Goldie!”

  “All right. Truth to tell, I don’t know. I don’t cook.”

  “You should learn.”

  “I will one of these days. Haven’t had time yet.”

  The noise in the cafeteria was growing louder as it filled with people, most in whites, a few in street clothes, some in O-R greens. “This place is big as a gymnasium,” Rachel said. “And Jefferson has another restaurant as well?”

  “That’s what I hear.”

  “Looks like this is where most of the staff eat.”

  “Course they do. They know where the good greens are.”

  Rachel devoted her attention to her meal for a moment, then looked across the table at Goldie. “My dad brought me something yesterday.”

  Goldie peered at her expectantly. “Yes?”

  “My mother’s wedding dress.”

  Goldie rolled her eyes. “Men have the worst timing of any animal on the planet. They must learn it in boys’ gym class.”

  “Do all men think women can hardly wait to get married?”

  “Yep,” Goldie said emphatically. “I was close to getting married once. Kenneth. A little boring, but nice. He managed a Chinese restaurant over in Toluca Lake.”

  “Was he Chinese?”

  “Course not. There you go doing stereotypes.” Goldie gazed out the window next to their table. “Everyone I knew, my family, friends, guys and girlfriends alike, were in such an all-fired hurry to get me to the altar they just about greased me down and slid me there.”

  “So what happened?”

  “I did what you’re doin’. I got my back up. If everybody wants me to do something, it’s for sure I don’t want to do it.”

  Rachel stopped the forkful of macaroni halfway to her mouth and looked at her friend. “You sorry?”

  Goldie shrugged ambivalently. “I saw him the other day. At Disneyland. I took my two nephews and Peter, the kid on the crew. Kenneth obviously had found himself another woman right quick. Good lookin’ one too, and two little kids—one so little he was carrying it in one of those slings around his neck.”

  “You wished you hadn’t dumped him?”

  “I don’t know. I wished something.” Goldie pointed her chin at Rachel’s left hand. “You took off your rock. You gonna break up with Hank?”

  “Maybe.” Rachel paused, asking herself the same question. Not finding an answer, she changed the subject. “I asked Gabe about that Mexican kid. What might have happened. He said the same thing everybody says. Maybe they both died. Or maybe the one wasn’t as sick as they thought and he just walked out of the hospital before he was admitted.”

  “I don’t know,” Goldie said. “If the kid was unconscious, how could he recover so fast?”

  “I’ve been wondering something else lately. You think whatever happened to those two kids might have something to do with that peculiar closed-but-full-of-people ward upstairs here?”

  Goldie gave her a disparaging look. “If you aren’t the limit. I told you before. You’re just rolling two puzzles into one lump. What could that ward have to do with the kids you’re talking about?”

  “I don’t know, except both things are weird and both have to do with this hospital.”

  “You’re adding two and two and getting seven.” Goldie shook her head. “Weird things happen all the time. They don’t have to be related.”

  “How many rooms did your friend say are in that ward?” Rachel asked.

  “Twelve, wasn’t it?”

  “Each with three beds?”

  “Most. That’s what the guy said.”

  “More than thirty patients in an area that’s supposed to be closed.”

  “You got…me,” Goldie said. A man rose from the table behind them and, carrying a tray of dirty dishes, passed their table. Her eyes followed him. “Now that is one good-looking dude.”

  “Dan Morris,” Rachel said. “Security guy. Seems very nice. I don’t know if he’s married, but no ring. You want me to see if I can find out?”

  Goldie cocked her head until it gave her an attitude. “You might just do that, girl.”

  “I sure would like to get a look at that ward.”

  Goldie made a face. “I don’t want to meet him that bad.”

  “I didn’t mean you. I meant I’d like to see it.”

  “You going to try getting lost again?”

  “I’m not sure that would work a second time.”

  They finished eating. “There’s something else weird,” Rachel said as they stacked their dishes on the trays. “I never told you or anyone because I figured you’d think I was some kind of paranoid nut case.”

  “I suspect you have now overcome that fear.”

  “That day I got lost and saw that fo
urth floor wing. I was pretty sure someone followed me when I left.”

  “Followed you? You are paranoid. That sounds real unlikely. Why would anyone follow you?”

  “No idea. But I could swear I heard footsteps behind me.” Rachel could almost feel the slight chill she had felt that day. “The steps stopped when I stopped. I turned around twice, but there was no one there.”

  Goldie drew back. “Holy Jeez! And you wanted me to take a look around there?”

  “Well, I sort of convinced myself it was my imagination. But now I’m not so sure.”

  “If it wasn’t your imagination, it could’ve been my butt!”

  “Okay. I’m not asking you, am I? I’m trying to figure a way to get in there myself. Doesn’t that Jarvis whatever-his-name-is oversee the cleaning of the O-R along with all the other places? Doesn’t the whole operating room complex have to be cleaned like anywhere else?”

  “No.”

  “Of course it does. For that matter, it has to be cleaner than anywhere else.”

  “No, no, and no. I am not getting me or anyone else mixed up in this obsession of yours.”

  “All I want is some scrubs.”

  “Let me see if I got this straight. You want me to get someone to steal something?”

  “If I could look like a nurse or a tech, I’ll bet I could get into any part of any hospital without anyone batting an eye. I’d only use the scrub suit once. Then I’d wash it and give it back.”

  “No way, no how. No, no, no.”

  “Okay. Forget I asked. But it isn’t stealing. It’s borrowing. ”

  “Can’t you just buy some? From a hospital supply place?”

  “Probably. But I don’t have time to hunt one up.”

  They carried their trays to the front of the big room where a man in a long white apron and a small white hat that failed to hide his hairnet was stacking dirty dishes. Rachel was adding hers to the pile when a sudden commotion at a table near the cash register caught everyone’s attention.

  A young woman with dark Slavic features and a handsome, mysterious look had climbed up on a chair and was now stepping onto the table. Her blouse was dark pink with white flowers. With the moves of a dancer, she pulled the blouse open, pulled up a pink halter underneath and two round breasts popped out. She lifted the right one and shook it at the stunned and gaping crowd.

  She pulled her blouse closed, jumped down from the table and was out the cafeteria door before the watchers had closed their mouths.