Ninety-Nine Wishes, One Broken Marriage novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Nine Left

Bea shouts at Damian in front of his team and Jo refuses to sign, but Perry collapses on her shop floor and the ambulance takes him to the one surgeon on call: her husband.

I went to St. Brendan's at six-thirty Monday morning, before my shop opened, with the envelope in my bag.

Trauma rounds met outside the surgical ward.

Eight people in scrubs stood in a half circle, and Damian stood at the center with a tablet.

He saw me through the glass doors.

He did not stop talking.

I waited by the vending machines until Bea pushed through the doors with her badge swinging.

She had not slept. I could tell by the way she walked.

"Dr. Rowe," she said, loud enough for the whole half circle.

"Dr. Cushman, you're on rounds."

"You left my sister a ring and a note. In a dish."

Nobody on the team looked at anyone.

"That's between my wife and me," Damian said.

"Your wife sat at the table when you won your plaque. You thanked her in front of the chief."

Bea took a step closer.

"Then you walked out and left the plaque."

"Bea," I said.

"I'm not finished. Three years she's fed you and covered for your pager, and sat alone at every dinner."

"The first time she misses one thing, you pack your closet."

"The first time?" Damian said.

He said it quietly, and every person in that half circle heard it.

Bea's mouth opened and nothing came out.

I stepped through the doors and put the envelope on top of his tablet.

"I'm not signing."

Damian looked at the envelope, then at me.

His eyes were red at the edges.

"You didn't read it."

"I read the part with my name on it. I'm not signing."

"Jo, there are only nine wishes left." He lowered his voice. "Tell me what the ninety-ninth is, and I'll tear it up myself."

"I don't know what the ninety-ninth is."

"Then tell me why you can't say no to him."

Eight people were studying the floor.

"I can't," I said. "Not here."

"Then not anywhere," he said.

He turned to his team. "Bed twelve first. Dr. Cushman, with me."

Bea followed him. She looked back at me over her shoulder, asking with her whole face if she had made it better or worse.

He took the envelope with him, tucked under his tablet, and I went to open the shop.

By ten I had three bouquets to build for a funeral.

I was trimming ranunculus, and my hands shook enough that I cut one stem too short.

The bell on the door rang at eleven.

Perry stood on the mat in his gray cardigan with one hand on the doorframe.

In the other hand he held a paper bag of my mother's rolls.

"Bea texted me," he said. "I'm so sorry, Jo."

"It isn't your fault."

"It is, though. Isn't it?"

He tried to smile, and it didn't hold.

"I'll cancel the next one," he said. "The ferry for wish ninety-one. I'll tell them it was my mistake."

"Perry, there's no ferry. You used wish ninety."

"Right," he said. "Right. Sorry."

He was swaying.

I put down the shears. "Sit down."

"I'm fine. I only skipped breakfast. And my morning session, I guess. I wanted to see you."

"You skipped dialysis?"

"One session."

He stepped toward the stool and his knee gave.

The bag of rolls hit the floor first.

Then his shoulder hit a bucket of white tulips, and the whole bucket went over.

Water ran across the tile.

"Perry!"

His eyes were open but he did not answer me.

His lips had gone the color of paper.

I dialed 911 on my knees in the water, with tulips under my hands.

"He's on dialysis," I told the operator. "He missed a session. His breathing is wrong."

She told me to keep his head turned, and I kept it turned.

The ambulance came in six minutes.

I rode in the back and held his hand.

The paramedic asked which hospital his transplant team used.

"St. Brendan's," I said.

The paramedic spoke into his radio and listened.

Then he looked at me.

"They've got a trauma surgeon on call who'll meet us at the bay," he said. "Dr. Rowe."

My husband would be the first doctor to touch Perry.

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