Page 40 of The Fault Between Us
Claire’s eyes stung from the sulfur-filled air billowing from the hot springs. She laid her cheek against Jenny’s soft head. Red wouldn’t leave. He loved them.
When he told her he was leaving, she wanted to pull him closer but something inside her pushed him away.We don’t need you. We’re fine without you.
Those caustic words had scalded her throat even as she said them. Was it too late to cross that distance between them? The distance not only between Riverside and Libby, but the rift between Red’s heart and her own? She gazed at the brilliant turquoise water, the steam billowing into the azure sky.Lord, let it not be too late.
Jenny was almost asleep. Claire rocked gently. Red had kept secrets from her, but she kept one from him as well. A painful secret buried so deep it had never healed. He’d asked about her mother when they started dating. “She’s not with us anymore,” Claire had said. “I’m sorry,” Red had answered, like people do when you tell them someone has died. She didn’t correct him. It didn’t seem like a lie then, but now that deeply buried wound had broken open and the pain of it was hurting them both.
Claire’s breath came easier as a conviction grew in her mind. She had to tell him about Mother. She’d tell him Bridget was wrong, too. That Claire didn’t care if they didn’t have a dollar to their name, or what her Dad thought of their home or their life together. Red was all she wanted, with Jenny and the sky and the river.
Claire walked back to the truck and drove home with a certainty thrumming through her veins. She’d fix this. She would write Red a letter. She’d tell him the truth about her mother. She’d ask him to come home, and tell him she loved him. She needed him.
She wasn’t fine without him.
chapter 25:BRIDGET
“Reilly, why aren’t these follow-up calls completed?”
Bridget startled at Larkin’s sharp tone. Her eyes were gritty and her head ached. She’d tossed and turned for three solid nights—sick about Claire and furious with Frannie, not to mention the insults she’d been forced to endure from Dr. Sampson.
He drove her back to Mammoth in his mint-green Thunderbird and refused to mind his own business. First, he asked about her sisters. “What was going on back there?” He jerked his thumb behind them as he tore around a curve at an alarming speed.
“Nothing to concern you,” she’d snapped. “Can we talk about something else?”
“Sure,” he’d said, as if he were going to be a gentleman and make pleasant small talk. “So you want to work at the Mayo Clinic?” Another subject that was none of his business. “I’m sure you’ll get an excellent recommendation from the Crow.”
She frowned at his tone. He didn’t sound like he was giving her a compliment. “What do you mean by that?”
He veered around a truck camper parked on the side of the road. “She’s impressed with you, is all I’m saying.”
She bristled. “You don’t like her, I presume?”
He shrugged.
“Larkin is a superb nurse,” Bridget pointed out. And so was she. In fact, she’d wanted to be a nurse since she was eight years old, but she wasn’t going to tell that to this arrogant doctor.
He blew out a sharp sound of disagreement. “She takes care of the patients,” he said. “But she doesn’t care for them.”
Bridget felt her temperature rise. “I have no idea what you mean.”
The engine of the convertible rumbled as the infuriating man sped up on a straight stretch. “You ever hear the old saw that a caring heart is the best medicine?”
Just who did Dr. Sampson think he was? “Just because Larkin doesn’t appreciate you clowning around, doesn’t mean she doesn’t care about the patients.” Why did her defense of the Crow feel like she was defending herself?
Sampson came alarmingly close to the tailgate of the truck in front of them before he put on the brakes. “I’m just saying if you want to be a good nurse, don’t take notes from Larkin.”
“If I wanted advice, Doctor, I’d write to Ann Landers, thank you very much.” It was a terribly disrespectful thing to say to a doctor, but Bridget couldn’t help it. The rest of the drive was accomplished in absolute silence and at terrifying speed.
When she got back to Mammoth with her heart in her throat, Bridget tried calling Claire. No answer. She tried again on Friday after working a double shift. Claire picked up, but claimed she was busy with Jenny and couldn’t talk. Saturday was the same story. Bridget wasn’t going to give up. She just couldn’t stand Claire being angry at her.
When she saw Dr. Sampson on her shifts, she treated him just like any other doctor—with a professional coolness—but she didn’t stop thinking about his unwelcome advice.
On Sunday, Bridget got up early to go to Mass—at a campground, no less. The outdoor amphitheater smelled of campfire smoke androtten eggs, but the Mass was the same as at home. She asked forgiveness for her argument with Claire, her simmering anger toward Frannie, and even the outrage she’d directed at Dr. Sampson.
A caring heart is the best medicine.
She looked at Jesus on the cross above the altar. She hadn’t told Dr. Sampson the real reason she wanted to become a nurse. As a child, she’d loved the Bible stories about Jesus healing the sick—the paralyzed man picking up his mat and walking, the blind man given his sight. Every time she heard about Jesus healing someone who was hurting, she felt a tug at her heart. She wanted to heal people, to ease people’s pain like Jesus.
That didn’t sound like someone who didn’t care, did it?
