“I’m not hungry,” Peter said.
“I don’t want oatmeal,” Julie said. “I hate oatmeal. I want eggs.”
“You had eggs yesterday. Today’s oatmeal day.”
“Nah hah. It’s Wednesday.” Julie cackled at her joke. “It’s not oatmeal day Mommy, it’s Wednesday.”
Catherine turned from the stove to smile at her daughter. A little girl in a Big Bird nightie and a gap where just two days ago she’d lost the first of her baby teeth. God, it had to get easier than this. Thinking about work when she was home with the kids, thinking about the kids when she should be focused on work. Wanting to be there for everyone, but never quite being there for anyone. Peter, still in his pajamas, hadn’t touched his oatmeal.
“Peter, eat your breakfast and get dressed. And please use your inhaler. I can hear you wheezing.” She made a mental note to call his allergist when she got to work. Call the allergist then go find Connaughton. A niggling feeling told her he might be difficult. He was new on staff and Catherine had never met him, but a nurse on the unit had rolled her eyes at the mention of his name.
“How come we never have the kind of cereal I like?” Julie asked, scowling at her bowl of oatmeal. “I like the kind of cereal Nadia gets. Nadia gets good cereal. Nadia lets us have Little Debbies for breakfast.”
Nadia. Catherine held her breath and counted to ten. Slowly. Nadia—her onetime best friend and, as of a month ago, her ex-husband’s new wife. Just hearing Nadia’s name was enough to ruin Catherine’s day. Sometimes she entertained herself by picturing Nadia ballooned up to two hundred and twenty pounds with a bad case of cellulite. Nadia could eat a case of Little Debbies and never gain an ounce. To hell with Nadia. She didn’t want to think about Nadia. “Okay, guys, let’s get this show on the road.” Arms folded, she looked at Julie. “If you’re finished, go get dressed.”
“I want some juice. Please.” Julie grinned. “See, I said please.”
“I noticed that,” Catherine poured apple juice into a Big Bird glass. Her daughter was a big Big Bird fan. “That’s very good.” As she dropped a kiss on the top of Julie’s head, she heard Peter’s asthmatic rattle, louder now. She watched him for a moment. Never a robust child, his drawn face and laboring chest reflected the effort of each breath. “Not feeling so good, huh? Where’s your puffer?”
He shrugged, and she pulled a pale blue inhaler from the cabinet drawer and waited while he used it. She had them stashed everywhere. Without intervention, mild wheezing had a frightening way of developing into a full-fledged attack. Like the last time he’d stayed at his father’s. She’d blamed the rain and the dog Gary had bought—even though he knew Peter was allergic to dogs. Gary had blamed her for upsetting Peter by making a big deal about a missing homework assignment. And forgetting to pack an extra inhaler. Which she was absolutely certain she’d done. But Gary, a trial attorney, was a master at verbal self-defence…and attack. She glanced at the clock and wondered whether she should try and make an appointment for Peter this morning and risk going into work late again.
“Daddy said Peter wheezes because you don’t dust enough.” Julie had returned to the kitchen after dressing herself in the clothes Catherine had set out the night before. Yellow leggings and a bright red woolen sweater. “Daddy said Nadia likes to clean house because it’s good for Peter’s asthma.”
Catherine opened her mouth to speak. Closed it. Let it go. She saw with relief that the inhaler was working. Peter’s breathing looked less labored, the wheeze not so audible. She poured more juice for both kids, stuck a piece of bread in the toaster for her own breakfast. Doesn’t dust enough. The words branded into her brain. Maybe Daddy should keep his lame-brained opinions to himself. Okay, she had to let it go. She spent far too much time obsessing over what an incredible jerk Gary could be. She spread a smear of peanut butter on the toast and resisted the urge to dip the spoon into the jar for a soothing mouthful.
“Daddy said he’s the luckiest man in the world to have Nadia.” Julie’s legs dangled from the chair. “I like Nadia, she’s pretty.”
Catherine looked at the spoon in her hand, still poised over the open peanut butter jar. She is only six, she reminded herself. She isn’t trying to hurt you. You can kill Gary later. Nadia too, just on general principle. Angry, she dug the spoon into the peanut butter, brought it to her mouth. And didn’t taste a damn thing. Which further incensed her.
“Daddy said when we come to live with him and Nadia, I can pick my own bedroom in the new house,” Julie said. “And I’m going to get twin beds so if you get lonely you can come and sleep in my room.”
Catherine slowly replaced the lid. “If I get lonely?”
“When we go to live with Daddy.”
“Jeez, Julie, you’re so lame.” Peter reached across the table to push her shoulder. “Dad told you not to say anything.”
“Owww,” Julie squealed. “Peter pushed me, Mommy.”
THE DAY CONTINUED on a steady downhill drift. In the office, Catherine discovered a stack of news releases that should have gone out yesterday, managed to spill a cup of coffee over the top one and splash it down the front of her cream wool skirt. And Martin Connaughton continued to play hard to get. At noon, on her way down to the lobby to meet her boss, she paid another visit to the unit.
As she pushed open the double doors to the NICU, a rush of green scrub-suited figures flew past her wheeling a Plexiglas case. She watched as they pushed it to an empty spot in the row of bassinets, watched as a nurse reached inside and lifted out a red, wizened baby, watched, transfixed, as the nurse applied sensors to the baby’s skin then threaded a tube into its tiny mouth. And then she couldn’t watch anymore. Heart racing, she turned away and stared hard at a bunch of pink Mylar balloons, but they dissolved in a blur of tears.
Peter had spent six weeks in an NICU. Even ten years later, she could vividly recall it all. The hot lights and machinery, the alarms that shrieked like police sirens when babies forgot to breathe, the nurses sitting vigil. Frantic suddenly to be somewhere else, Catherine hurried to the nurses’ station and forced herself to smile at the clerk behind the desk.
“I’m looking for Dr. Connaughton,” she said. “Is he around?”
“He was a while ago.” The clerk had white-blond hair and burgundy lips. Half a dozen small gold earrings ran up the side of her left ear. She peered out at the rows of bassinets, shrugged. “I don’t see him now. Did you try paging him?”
“Three times.”
“And he didn’t answer.” She smiled knowingly. “Yeah, well, he’s kind of famous for ignoring pages. That and being late for everything. It drives Dr. Grossman up the wall. They don’t get along,” she whispered. “At all.”
The knowledge didn’t do much for Catherine’s mood, nor did the fact that she was now five minutes late to meet her boss. Breathless from running down five flights of stairs, she pushed her way through the crowd of visitors and employees in the lobby. She found Derek in front of a makeshift stage watching Western’s employee choir singing “Winter Wonderland” under a canopy of stylized snowflakes. He wore a leather bomber jacket opened to show a pale cream shirt, a lavender tie patterned with mathematical equations and an expression of barely concealed impatience.
“You’re late.” He handed her a paper cup. “Libations. Hot apple cider, I think. Courtesy of the auxiliary. Too bad it’s nonalcoholic.”
Catherine smiled, not sure how to respond. Derek Petrelli was a puzzle she hadn’t quite solved. While administration clearly respected his ability to court the media, he made a virtual art