Page 75 of When I'm Gone
He entered the lobby through the front sliding doors with a dead cell phone and no idea where Jessie might be. A friendly-looking woman with a plump face sat behind the information desk. She’d know where Luke should go, but what would he find when he got there? What would he say to Neal? His child was lying in bed, terminally ill. This might not be the right time for a confrontation. He’d play dumb—for Jessie’s sake he’d pretend he’d never heard of Dr. Neal Townsend, that he wasn’t the reason Luke’s daughter was buried in some shallow grave somewhere.
CHAPTER 33
The info desk lady turned out to be just as helpful as she looked. Jessie was on the fourth floor in room 482. After a short elevator ride and some helpful nurses directing the way, Luke stared at the maroon plaque with white lettering:482. This was the room. He’d hoped to hear voices on the other side of the door, maybe May’s bubbly laugh or Terry’s monotone, letting him know he’d found the right place.
Instead, there was nothing but the soft whir of an automatic blood-pressure machine, the chugging of a hulking piece of machinery in the corner, and silence. He’d just have to be brave and go in, not knowing what he might walk into. Luke grasped the cold brushed-nickel handle and forced the door open wide into a tidy, neatly furnished hospital room with one bed. In the bed was what seemed to be a sleeping, swollen version of the Jessie he knew. Her skin was stretched so taut, Luke was afraid to touch her in case any gentle pressure in the wrong spot could make her explode.
In a chair at the end of the bed sat Dr. Neal, eyes closed, hands pressed together. His lips moved ever so slightly, maybe praying. Neal looked a lot like his faculty picture from the Eastern Michigan University website—neatly trimmed salt-and-pepper beard, full head of graying hair. Dark circles under his eyes, skin a sallow color almost like he was as ill as his daughter. Luke wanted to hate him, but at that moment he couldn’t see Neal as the man who’d given his child to a mentally unstable adoptive mother who hurt her, maybe killed her. He didn’t even see a man who’d planned and carried out a complex and at times painful plan as Natalie’s confidant and companion. He saw a father with a sick child. Any confrontation with Neal would wait until Jessie was well.
With Jessie asleep and May and Terry nowhere to be seen, Luke started to back out of the room, hoping someone at the nurses’ station could help him locate the pair. He took one step back and then another until he bumped hard into the wall. Luke flinched, muffling a gasp, his elbow throbbing. Ignoring the shot of pain, Luke reached for the door handle.
“Ahem.” Neal cleared his voice across the room and rubbed his eyes. “Hello?”
Luke swore silently. Small talk with the man he’d been consumed with for the past several months would be difficult. But, standing in the same room with him meant there was no turning back now. All he could hope for was Terry and May to show up and provide a diversion.
“Hi, uh, you must be Jessie’s dad.” Luke dropped his bag by the door and forced his feet to move him back into the hospital room. “I’m Luke Richardson.”
“Oh, yes.” Neal sat up in his chair and smoothed his hair. “You called 9-1-1, correct? Your mother just took May down to the cafeteria for a snack.”
“My mother?” It was strange to hear anyone labeled as his mother, much less Terry. “Oh, you mean Terry.” Luke took two more steps toward Neal. “She’s my wife’s mother. Was my wife’s mother ... she’s my mother-in-law.” Forming coherent sentences was turning out to be a problem. Whether it was from the lack of sleep, the emotional trauma of the past twenty-four hours, or the pure fact of who Neal really was, Luke knew he must seem out of it.
“Well, it’s nice to meet you, Luke. I’m Neal.” He half stood and reached a hand out. Luke took it and gave one firm pump and then backed away, wondering how long he had to stay in the room with an unconscious Jessie and friendly Dr. Neal. “Please, take a seat.” Luke glanced around the room. A flimsy gray chair sat on the other side of Jessie’s bed. Neal jumped out of his chair and shifted over to Jessie’s bedside.
Luke sat in the chair, still unnervingly warm from Neal’s body heat. From this angle Jessie’s condition came into focus. He couldn’t even count the tubes and machines running in and out of her body. It was almost worse than seeing her passed out on the floor in his home. Now the reality of her illness was painfully obvious.
“So, how is she doing?” Luke felt stupid asking. Clearly she wasn’t doing great.
Neal rubbed his temples. “Not well.” The answer hitched in his throat. “She needs a transplant. She has a few weeks, maybe a month. I never thought ... I never thought it could happen this fast.”
“I’m so sorry.” Luke struggled to continue. Neal, who’d already lost his wife, could now lose his only child. “She’s a wonderful young woman. I ... my children ... we all have come to care for Jessie.” Then Luke found himself saying the sentence he’d heard more times than he could count. Perhaps the least helpful sentence he’d ever heard. “If there isanythingI can do to help, please, let me know.”
When Natalie’s school acquaintances or the administrative assistant at work said those words, they always sounded empty, like a halfhearted attempt to care. Now he knew—it’s what you say when there’s nothing you can do to help besideswantto.
Luke expected to hear an approximation of the answer he always gave in return, something like “I’ll let you know” or “We’re okay for now, thanks,” but Neal didn’t say ... anything. He just nodded and rubbed his beard, like he was thinking of some errand for Luke to run.
“Luke, I ... uh ... I wasn’t supposed to tell you this way.”
There was heaviness to his words that made Luke feel like he always did in Pentwater when he could see thunder and rain clouds developing offshore over Lake Michigan. Something was coming; he could see it, hear it, feel it in the air. He had few choices; he could take shelter, or he could meet the storm head-on.
“Neal.” Luke stopped him. “I know.”
“Hmm?” He sat up slowly, like a man just woken up from a deep sleep.
“Iknow.” He gave Neal a meaningful look, but he didn’t seem to catch on so Luke continued. “The letters—I know you sent them. I know you were Natalie’s teacher. I know about Maranatha House. I know about ...” He didn’t want to have to say the name—he hadn’t said it out loud since finding the scrapbook—but he’d already said too much to go back. “I know about Mallory.”
“You know about Mallory?” Neal glanced at Jessie like he wanted to make sure she was still asleep. He tangled his fingers into the neatly tucked sheet on the corner of her mattress. “How did you find out?”
The pity that had been keeping Luke calm and understanding was starting to dissolve. Even with the letters, the order from the florist, even the giant scrapbook detailing the life and death of his first child, Natalie’s deception didn’t become real until Neal confirmed it with that simple question.
“Not from Natalie, that’s for sure,” Luke said gruffly, the bitterness starting to escape. “I found a letter from your old boss, Ms. Stephani. It made things pretty clear.”
Neal released the sheet and spread his fingers wide, smoothing the wrinkles on the bed. “Ah, yes, Christina and her conscience. Natalie told me about that letter, but I didn’t know she’d kept it.”
“Well, she did, and I found it. So, what about you, Neal? And your wife? From what I can tell, without you two, my daughter would still be alive.” Luke’s anger, the anger he worked so hard at tamping down, was building.
“All right, I deserve that.” Neal nodded with his whole body and then looked up, meeting Luke’s gaze. “You’re right: we made a lousy choice. Eva Witling was a very ill woman, and we didn’t see that. But to be fair, doctors, nurses, detectives, friends, family—no one suspected. No one.”
“Fine,” Luke acquiesced. “Fine; you didn’t know. But now that we are revealing secrets, maybe you should tell me a little more about your relationship with my wife.”
