Silent Echo

~1~1

It all started when I lost my father. I don't mean he died, or he left us, or that he pulled away emotionally. I mean, I physically misplaced him. He had been right beside me and like ten seconds later he was gone. You wouldn't think that a guy with a cane, blind in one of his summer sky blue eyes and pushing ten years past when most doctors said he would be worm food could move, but Daddy was full of surprises. And piss and vinegar and ire; a thesaurus that basically meant that he was onary as hell. Which most people would chalk up to old age, and a hard life if he did it to everyone. However, since he was only really mean to me most of the time, I had a different theory.2

God hates me.3

Earlier that morning he, my father not God, told me that he wasn't going to waste another minute in another hospital with another bunch of quacks that wanted to run yet another test. When I hadn't done anything but calmly drive my Kia down the road, ignoring him as much as you could ignore a snapping dog that's three seconds from coming off it's leash and determined to run at you full tilt, his face had turned a molten shade with anger. I would have been worried about his heart, only he seemed to have misplaced it. Perhaps it was in his other pants. Dad had demanded that I turn the car around for nearly the entire hour drive, pointing out any flaw with my driving skills. He tempered that with groans and muttering about the safety of the road conditions versus my car, which he called TupperWare on Wheels. When that hadn't swayed me, he had protested that he'd walk the fifty odd miles back home if I would just pull over. Instead, I had locked the doors with a push of my finger so he wouldn't be tempted to pull that stunt at the next red light. With the quiet snick of the power locks engaging, his temper shot up a few more degrees.4

"Let me out, right now, this second, instantly!"5

Gee, I wondered where I got my habit of supplying the same phrase with synonyms. In response, I just turned up the radio that was playing a mixed cd that I loved, one that swung from Billy Idol to Michael Jackson to Pat Benatar. In my head, I ran through the lyrics about hell being for children, the irony not lost on me.6

Daddy had then started to curse the day I was born. Then, inevitably, he had turned to his favorite past time of damning my mother, the poisoned talk spewing forth like projectile word vomit. He cursed the weekend I was conceived, the day he married my mother, the night he met her, the bar they met the drink he was consuming when he spotted her and so on and so forth all the way back to his older brother Jimmy for introducing him to whiskey in the first place when he was ten.7

"You know if it wasn't for her, me and Jimmy would still be talking," he said with a heavy sigh.8

"Uncle Jimmy had just as much as to do with that night as mom did, Daddy ,and you know it."9

He growled in his throat, and narrowed his eyes as he watched the road in front of us being eaten up by my little car. "She seduced him. She was never good at anything that didn't involve her on her back."10

"Dad! God, way over the line on that one," I shrieked, really wishing I could blot out the mental image that he had planted in my brain. Why wasn't there a delete button in peoples' minds for this sort of thing?11

"Why I ever caught up with that woman," he muttered. "She took everything I was good at and made it pointless. I could have owned my own business by now if she hadn't stolen all my money!"12

"If she hadn't tricked you into falling in love with her in the first place, you could have gone to school for drafting instead of being stuck at the foundry like your brothers after you got out of the service," I finished, knowing the refrain by heart. It was a moldy oldie as far as I was concerned but one I was sure would repeat in a few weeks. I had heard the same rant on and off since I was eleven. That was the year that Daddy had found Uncle Jimmy and my mom snuggled up in bed when he had come home from work unexpectedly. She also had drained their checking account and had skipped out of town while Daddy and Uncle Jimmy were trading blows in the bar later that night. I wasn't exactly fond of her, but you could only hear the same song so many times before you started to really hate the13

DeeJay for playing it. "She's the devil incarnate and you wish that there is some way to erase her presence from your very mind."14

"That's right," he agreed, purposefully ignoring my tone. "She is the ruination of my entire life. If not for you kids, I would regret ever meeting her to the end of my days."15

I sighed, but tried to cover it up by revving the engine of my car at the intersection where we had to pause while people paraded horizontally past us. "Daddy, you do remember that this whole tirade started because you were mad at me and not mom, right?"16

"Hmmmph," was the witty comeback.17

We sat in silence for a while, my fingers drumming against the fabric covered steering wheel and him shifting uneasily in his seat. Had he been a dog, I'm sure he would be whining in the floor boards by now. Something inside seemed to painfully shift and my irritation at him melted slightly. I reached over and patted his hand, gripping the dark tanned flesh in my own now pale hand, making my fingers grip his gently so as not to agitate his arthritis. "Dad, it's just a check up to see if the new meds are doing what they are supposed to be doing. There's no reason to be nervous."18

Instantly the shifting stopped and he had turned to glare at19

me. "I ain't nervous."20

"Well, of course not. I just meant, you know, some people might be. It's a lot going on. But I know, it's just a waste of time," I said, backpedaling a little before I flipped right over the handle bars. "I just meant that, you know, you could relax. Before something important inside of you snaps off and goes floating around in there."21

"Where you got that mouth ain't really a mystery is it? Your mother had a snotty mouth just like that, thinking she knew everything just because she had gone to college," he sneered, forgetting that he had just blamed her for his own lack of formal education. "Now, your brother knows better than to mouth off to me. But ,then again, he's a national war hero."22

I had snorted at that. My older brother, B.J., wasn't exactly fighting the good fight for truth, justice, and apple pie. With a large felony charge pending for drugs, his only choice was go to jail for a very long time or give up some of his buddies and join the military. I thought that they only did that in old black and white movies but luckily for B.J. it's a real deal, especially in a little town like ours. Dad had been so proud, as if B.J. was following in his shoes by joining the Army, that he told anyone who would stand still enough to listen about all the good his son was doing in that war the stupid Texan had gotten us into. That's how Dad always referred to the past president, as in "That stupid Texan upped the taxes again!" or "Three dollars and seventy-five cents for gas? What the hell is that stupid Texan doing!"23

As for B.J., he didn't care who was in the White House as long as he wasn't becoming someone's girlfriend in the Big House. I asked him what the difference between military and prison was. I mean, from my stand point, you're in a place you don't want to be and you can't leave. You eat three semi-crappy meals a day off hard plastic trays and you sit at tables with a bunch of guys wearing the same clothes as you. You get barely any tv, almost no contact with the outside world, and there are people all around you with guns watching your every move. He had been silent for a minute and he said the difference was he was getting paid. Now that's what I call the American way. Go Joe!24

face pouting at his reflection in the window.25

"And your sister would listen to me. At least she would listen and not back talk me. Or put me through all this strain.Your sister would -"26

"Why don't we call her and ask her what we should do now that you're still blacking out and they doctors can't seem to figure out why. Here, we can use my cell phone. Go ahead, Dad, call her and see. My purse is right there by your feet and my phone is laying right on top. Go on, call her." It felt mean to both of us, if his slight wince was any indication, but I didn't apologize. It wouldn't have mattered anyways, since this family was know to see any sort of apology as a weakness.27

"She's too busy-"28

"Yeah, busy. Also, she's not talking to you is she," I interjected flatly. "She hasn't spoken one word to or about you29

since the night you ran over her husband."30

"Now wait just a damned minute! That was-"31

"I know, I know, it was an accident," I said, holding up one hand to stall off the normal protest and then used that hand to wave at the Avenger that let me in front of him. "Still, she's not talking to you and BAJA. is still out of the country playing soldier and you won't tell your brothers that you're even sick. Who does that leave you with to take care of you? Oh, yeah, me. Since it is me and not my sister, or my brother, or your brothers, this is how we do things my way. So sit there and shut up, or you don't get any pancakes later."32

"I'm not a child, I don't need to be bribed."33

I snorted, uncontrollably. "Really, Daddy? So we don't have to stop off at Gus's for our usual breakfast? You'd be okay with oatmeal or something at home?"34

"I just meant that I don't need you to baby me. No cause for you-"35

"I love you, Dad. That gives me all sorts of cause." He stayed silent. I sighed heavily, the habitual guilt hitting me." Maybe Olivia will be in today, hmm? You've always liked her," I said, trying to tease a smile out of but he turned away and remained quiet. When I next glanced over at him, he seemed to be near dozing in the passenger seat, and I heaved out a sigh of relief that he was done fighting already. With that one small battle done, I turned my mind to the zillion other things that I was worrying about and tuned out from him for the last ten minutes of the car ride.36

I pulled the red Rio up to the front doors of the hospital before turning on the hazards and leaning over to shake Dad's shoulder. "Daddy? C'mon, sunshine. We're here." He smacked his lips then blinked opened his eyes, cute as a month old kitten. "You okay to walk in?" I know that after that much inactivity he was probably stiff, especially with as chilly as the air was.37

"Yeah, of course." He opened the door, and tried to climb out but suddenly he went rigid, a gasp rushing out of his mouth.38

"Dad?" Our mild debate was forgotten in that instant, and I reached out with one slightly shakey hand. "Daddy, are you okay?"39

He winced, and dropped his eyes in embarrassment. One hand went to his left hip which had been worked on more than my slipping transmission. "Damnation," I heard him mutter, his hand rubbing at the joint.40

"Just wait here, and I'll get the wheel chair, okay? "41

He grunted, which I took as a resigned affirmative. I kissed his leathery cheek and hopped out of the car. After shivering in the brisk fall air that seemed to plague Wisconsin, I used my mediocre sized legs to get to the pneumatic doors with the frosted scroll work of Our Lady's Tears Hospital. It took me about a minute to distract the young girl at the counter from the intense conversation she was having that was peppered with the very intellectual comments of "No way!", "That's what I said!", "Well, you know how he is!" Finally she looked up, and relunctally put aside her cell phone so I could tell her what I needed. While the receptionist paged an orderly with a wheelchair, I stamped my booted feet against the gray marble floor in an effort to get some warmth to creep down to my poor toes. When she got confirmation over the phone that someone was on their way down, I nodded and headed back42

towards the front doors already muttering darkly about the cold.43

As soon as I spotted the opened passenger side door I mentally kicked myself for leaving the want to be Houdini44

alone in the car. I stood, standing within the large door way, staring at the unreliable sight in front of me. Suddenly, a red tinged wave crashed over me and soaked into my skin, making everything around me stand out in unbelievable detail. I tried to count to one hundred, but when I couldn't remember what came after forty three for the third time, I gave up. Instead, I turned and kicked a metal trashcan that was playing sentry near the front doors, cursing a blue streak under my breath for the most part.45

"By all that is green and leafy in Ireland, you stupid pig headed fool of a man, I'll kill you! I mean it this time, you're so dead!" A startled gasp made my head swing around and that's when I spotted the nun, full gear with rosary belt and all, staring wide eyed at me. "Oh give it a rest, sister. It's not like I said I was going to nail his crippled ass to something to stop from losing him. He's Prestiberian, so the analogy would be lost on him46

anyways. " I watched, only slightly amused when she crossed her self and walked away quickly enough for her beads to clatter together.47

I forced myself to take measured steps back to the counter where the receptionist was sitting, her mouth slightly hanging open. By the look of her pretty blond ponytail and thirty levels of make up over each lavender contacted eye, I guessed she was about twelve and therefore no real help in finding the old goat. Wondering if this was a dream, and knowing it wasn't, I sighed out heavily. "Could you page Dr. Patrowski to the front door, please?"48

"You want me to page a doctor from one of the private practices?" she squeaked, her mascara heavy lashes fluttering against her cheeks like butterfly wings. " Can't do that! I'll have to call his service and get him a message."49

See, I scolded myself. This is your karma for cracking wise with the nun. God don't like ugly, my grandmother's voice chimed in my head. Taking a slow, steady breath, I leaned against the counter in the most unthreatening pose I could manage and did my best to smile sweetly, though I could feel the sneer battling it's way to the surface. "Yes, I need you to page him because we have a small problem. And when he calls down here to ask you why you are wasting his time, let him know that his patient is outside in the cold, wet air and already has a three minute head start at least. And since the patient is on the property that he will be held liable, okay?"50

In true hospital fashion the word liable made her blink, her glittery mouth forming a perfect O. Still, she paused and her hesitation made an eternity pass in thirty seconds. After looking at her name badge, I snapped my fingers in front of her nonblinking eyes. "Raquel, right?" At her pony tail whipping nod, I smiled with no real warmth or humor. I just pointed to the large multi lined phone on her desk past the lip of the counter. "The phone. Page Patrowski. Get him down here. Yes?" I said impatiently, nodding in an exaggerated manner. Soon her head was bobbing in time with mine, and she reached over one manicured hand to the phone. Hoping she could handle that part, I ran outside the doors.51

Think, think where the hell would he go? I closed my eyes, and tried to get my heart down out of my throat and at least headed in the right direction. He'd want to be warm, but in public so that he could get as much sympathy as possible. Perhaps the coffee house across the street? No, to far. As often as he claimed he didn't need the cane his right hip would be causing him tons of discomfort in this weather. So, where? He would have to still be on the grounds. I felt my eyes, lasers cutting through the parking lot and the outlying buildings, start to ache from searching. In no time, the wind had caused enough of misty rain to thoroughly soak the top most layers of me despite the long metal canopy. I was as angry, I was miserable, I was about three seconds from leaving his troublesome self to the elements and getting some coffee. And even as the idea hit and wanted to take hold, I crushed it with all the force of my will. I would not treat him as he treated me. I would not give up on him. A small voice wanted to tell me that I was being a little dramatical, making this much bigger than it needed to be but Anger and Defiance didn't really like Logic so we all told Logic to keep his mouth shut.52

"A.P.?"53

Hearing my name startled me from trying to see through the buildings. I blew into my hands, remembering that they were cold, and turned to see Olivia stepping away from the frosted doors, a home made cardigan the color of robin's eggs adding protection along with her kitten covered scrubs. "Hey, Liv. The old bastard slipped the chain," I added, unnecessarily.54

"We'll find him. We always do. You let your hair grow out. This mist makes it look like there are diamonds laying against velvet."55

"What would your husband say with your flirting with me?" One hand floated up to my curls before I could squash the girly move. Darting my eyes from her face, I nodded. " It's been awhile. How'd you know I was out here?"56

"You mean, how did I even know you were bringing him in today?" she asked, her tone almost to bland. "Since you didn't call and tell me, in the off chance that I would want to talk to my best friend?"57

"No, I meant how did fluff head over there know to call you?" I said, my own tone matching hers as I gestured to the girl behind the counter who was still on the phone.58

Liv, never one to really like to fight, dropped her arms, and a small smile started to bloom. "Oh, that. Well, I was walking by the chaplain my way to grab some food from the caf when I heard someone woman being hysterical about some girl who had talked about nailing her dad to the cross. I took a chance."59

I cracked a grin, and dropped an exaggerated wink. "Well, you know us heathens. Can't take us out in public ever. But hey, how's the baby?"60

"Oh, Ape, you should see her!" Liv gushed, reverting back to an old nick name from middle school. She fumbled for her phone, pulling it out to show me pictures of her toddler. "Matter of fact, we were just beginning to think you had become allergic to us. We miss you."61

I strangled the jealousy that was roaring through me, and managed to coo like I was supposed to at the dimpled elbows or the yawning mouth. I did my best to hide the turmoil that I knew Liv was aware of. She, and this is one of the reasons I loved her, knew that I was acting tough and so she was acting like she didn't know that this was killing me. After being my best, and usually only, friend since the time her dad and my dad realized that they could borrow tools without a time limit, that they both thought Brett Farve was the second best thing to happen to the Packers, and that fried curds were the only snack food a bar should serve, Liv new me better than anyone.62

Better than I really wanted her to.63

But even she didn't know everything.64

I was happy for Liv and Ben, they were the best people I knew. They met while we were all in third grade, and hated each other instantly. Something about stolen pencils or something, I can't really remember. The animosity turned to snipping and insults in middle school and to straight competitions in debate or between the boys and girls tennis teams. It looked like they would never unbend. That is until cheating on her and she dumped him, loudly and in public during lunch the night of the dance. There was mashed potatoes and two large bottles of birch beer involved, mixed in with her screeching and most everyone else laughing. Had the principal not been a woman who had recently found out about her own lover being a somewhat less than pristine person with morals, Liv probably would have been banned from the dance. And had she been me, she wouldn't have had the guts to still go. I offered to dump the best friend and stay at home with her watching something bloody and sci-fi but she wouldn't hear65

of it. Neither would her mother, who raised Liv and her four sisters after Mr. Hale decided that his sectary was more interesting than the woman he had shared vows with.66

So we went to her place, got dressed and made up, our hair fixed and glued in place with enough hairspray to start a new hole in the ozone layer, and were ready about an hour before we needed to be. At the last minute, nerves started to set in and Liv paced, second guessing the smarts of going alone loudly. I snuck into her mother's room and called Ben, who I knew wasn't planning on going, and asked him for a favor. And it's been the two of them intertwined ever since. I loved them, separately and together, and I was happy to be made god mother to their first67

child.68

However, after the last three years I couldn't ignore the jealousy, I could only contain it. Contain it and be happy for my most favorite people. I spoiled my goddaughter with gifts and a small trust fund, but I had only held her once. Liv and I used to talk religiously every two days unless something worthy of a call happened, like I spotted a new pair of Nine West boots on sale at the mall or she found a new recipe for pork chops on Rachel Ray but lately it would go weeks without me calling her or returning her calls or texts. We were still best friends, but now there was a small gap between us and I didn't know how to bridge it. And it hurt. Hurt really bad.69

"So, when do I get to babysit?" I asked, knowing it's what I was supposed to say. I tried to make the smile less forced while handing her back the phone.70

"Well, I think Ben will be sick of her in about three years. I hardly get to hold her when I get home from a shift," Liv joked, rubbing her hands together. "But you can come over any time you want and see her. I know Ben would love to get a chance to play some Tekken 4."71

I laughed, a real one that seemed to close the gap a little. It faded, but the smile on Liv gave me some courage.72

"Okay, then. How about dinner tomorrow? I'll bring dessert." It was a rash decision, but one that shouldn't have taken me so long to make.73

Liv's eyes light up and she actually moved one hand to her mouth, rubbing her lips in anticipation. "Butterscotch74

crisscrosses?"75

"Sure, I could whip some of those up tonight. You know, as long as I find Dad by then. I swear I turned my back for eight seconds." Although she only cleared her throat, I felt the accusation like a steel rod slamming against my legs, turning my already churning stomach into a wash machine with a belt loose. "I had only walked inside. I didn't even get a cup of coffee. Not even a sugar packet. But he's still gone. The bastard. The old hemroidal pain in my ass." I would have kept complaining except for I realized that we were starting to gather attention from people coming and going.76

"Whoa, slow down, A.P." Liv held up her hands, showing me that she wasn't attacking me. "I didn't say anything."77

"Yeah, well, you sure didn't say anything pretty loudly," I said, the irritation that was never really far settling back over my features. I wasn't really mad at Liv, or even Daddy. I was just mad. I had a real problem with being reactionary, where I would do or say something that came from some place dark in me without consulting my commons sense or conscious. It's what got in the trouble the most and it was something I struggled with, and always lost against. I felt like everyone was saying something critical about everything I did, no matter how much I knew they loved me. It was something that tied into my past from three years ago, something that I forced from my mind daily, hourly, minute by minute. Instead of letting the thought take an actual hold on me, I turned back to the parking lot, trying to come up with a plan.78

"Are you sleeping?" Liv asked, the misty air causing her coffee with cream skin to shimmer under the weak sun.79

I shivered off her question, and started to move to the right. I remembered from some book that people almost always start off in the direction of their dominate hand, it was a subtle natural compass that people didn't even realize they were following. "Where do you think he went?"80

"A.P, it wasn't your fault. Just like this isn't your fault. You can't lay the blame of everything that goes wrong in your family's life at your feet."81

Although a part of me was screaming for her to shut up, just shut up already all I did was snort, still not looking back at her. "I don't have to. They do that really good on their own."82

She made a concerned noise in her throat, and reached out one hand to lay it on my arm. "Are you at least-"83

"That your car, Miss?"84

We both turned to see a god with blue black curls that hung almost into the clearest, greenest eyes ever given to anyone towering over us from behind. I not only heard, but felt, Liv's intake of breath and I wanted to tease her about it but was too busy trying to remember how to breathe myself. We both blinked as his presence dazzled us; this Narcissus in orderly whites that didn't cover the black ink on his left bicep, this Adonis with a nose that had seen at least one bar fight, this Gerald Butler who didn't exist just up on the screen but walked among us normal people as if he belonged there. Irritation rode high in his eyes and he leaned towards me, filling more of my vision with a voluptuous mouth , stained bright pink because of the cold.85

"Ma'am? Your car? You can't leave it parked in the drop off zone." When all I did was stare, he gestured with his large hands with the tapered fingers of a piano player. "Because it's illegal to block the entrance to a hospital? And there might be someone who needs to get as close as the door as possible for their loved one?"86

"Well, of course I'm not parking it here," I snapped, my tone brittle to cover up the embarrassing fact that I had turned let my hormones run the show for a few seconds. I breathed long and deep, ignoring the pull of this man had on my body. I used my best scowl. "As it so happens, I am in the process of dropping someone off but he has Houdini-ed out of here . I was just getting my bearings so that I could go on the search since his highness, Patrowski, isn't interested in our money anymore enough to come down here and help."87

"Actually," Nar-Adon-Butler returned, sheepish to the point I expected him to rub the back of his neck and stub one white sneaker against the concrete," Dr. Patrowski sent he down here to help you. You're...Ahpee?"88

"A.P.," Olivia and I harmonized. With a shared look we broke into identical grins and then I turned back to him. "The letter a, the letter p. A.P. Windsor, and you?"89

"Sean O'Leary," he said, the devil smiling out of his eyes as he reached out one of his heavenly crafted hands.90

Gerald, indeed. "Your parents Russian?" At his blank stare, I could feel hope dying like Tinkerbell in the third act. It was good to know that at least God wasn't a sexist; he could make anyone pretty but dumb. "Have you met Olivia Richardson?"91

They shook hands, Liv giving a girlish giggle that was fairly amusing and then Sean got down to business. "First, you really do need to move your car, Ms. Windsor. Then we can start the search for your father. Does he do this often?"92

"Run away from the doctor? Yeah, but usually once we're inside the hospital. Took us, how long last time, Liv?"93

"Hmm, about an hour? Maybe a little longer. We have most of his favorite places mapped out and so the searches are becoming shorter. But this is the first time that he decided to not bother coming in."94

"Well, it's pretty cold out here. I doubt he got far, if he's as bad off as Dr. Pee stated." Those green eyes turned to me, full of probable questions and assumed accusations.95

"He's got his cane. And he left his jacket behind," I stated, my own eyes shooting of glares. "But he can do just about anything that he puts his mind to. And right now, what is on his mind is irritating me and getting out of this appointment. So, he could be anywhere."96

"Well, we could split up and start looking in the out lying buildings. What does he look like so I can spot him?"97

"He's the exact opposite of me. Tall and thin, dark black hair like yours only super straight and really fine. Bluer than blue eyes, tanned face. He's got a black lacquered cane with a cheese head knob at the top and he's in jeans and a green Packer sweatshirt." His look was probing, taking in my short chubbiness, thick red curls and muddy green eyes before nodding. It took everything in me to not grab Olivia's sweater off her back and wrap myself in it to cover my flaws.98

"Oh, Sean!" We all turned to see Raquel, her of the slow to understanding basics of phone use, posed at the door. She stood model straight with her chest reaching out to us, or actually probably just Mickey Green Eyes there, her mouth hanging open slightly. Soon she was going to start rubbing her self against the door and groaning. "Dr. Pee said to come back up. He said not to waste any more of your time."99

"Waste!" I screamed out on a raspy breath, the cloud of my anger hanging in the frigid air for a few moments. "My father is out here, freezing, and alone. He could be hurt. He could have had a heart attack! He could be dead, for all you know!"100

"But he's not dead! Maybe if you paid better attention to him and stopped trying to boss everyone around!" She blinked, then let her eyes fill with tears as she looked to Sean for some sympathy. "Mr. Windsor is upstairs in the waiting room of Dr. Patrowski's office. He said he doesn't need you down here searching for a patient that's watching C-Span upstairs. It's not my fault that she didn't see him come in."101

Sean gave me a short glare before helping Raquel back inside, there-thereing her back as he escorted her back to the desk. I could hear her telling him how I had been so mean to her earlier when she suggested calling Dr Patrowski. That little snot!102

"Little brat," Liv said softly to me, her thoughts echoing my own. "Well, at least the search is over, right?"103

"Yeah, but how?" I went to the open door of the car and rummaged for my purse. Pulling out a cheap pink BIC and a cigarette seemed to help with the shaking. I used my foot to kick the door closed, before walking back under the precious wind shielded walk way. I lit up, despite Liv's deliberate step away from me and her pointed look above my head. I looked up and snorted at the sign. It's my belief that if people really wanted you to not do something, they wouldn't say please in front of it. That's just giving you a choice. Happily, I took a long drag and blew the smoke right at the sign, aiming for the red circle with the slash through it. Bingo!104

"Well, maybe he snuck in while you were talking to Receptionist Barbie over there?" she asked, one shoulder up in a half shrug.105

I shook my head. Then nodded, and ended up shrugging helplessly. There was no way. Was there? I mean, I stood right there. My back was mostly to the door, true but he couldn't have turned ninja and scooted by me. I used the thumb and first finger of my free hand to rub my aching eyes. I just couldn't seem to piece it together. Maybe I should start sleeping again. As if I had said something out loud, Liv nodded and leaned over to hug me.106

Before I could retort anything, Sean was back at the door, being trailed by Raquel. "Ms. Windsor. You're really going to have to move your car, okay?" Sean said, his tone less cold than the last look he had given me had been. Perhaps a few minutes alone with bubble brain there had thawed him a little to my plight.107

Then Raquel must have noticed the blue smoke trailing up from one of my hands and she made a face that spoke a million forms of disgust. "And put that out! This is a non-smoking environment. Do you know how many people die from second hand smoke a year? Just because you don't seem to care about your health, don't you think you could show a little courtesy for other's? Speaking of, your father is wondering if you're ever going to come in." As she pulled in her head, I could hear her muttering about the lack of common decency of certain people all the while pushing her boobs as close to Sean as she could.108

Liv turned to me with a laugh, then used two fingers to push my unhinged jaw back into place. "Good thing you're no longer unstable, huh? Poor thing doesn't know how close she came to becoming a stain on the concrete. Thanks for showing some restraint. I really wouldn't want to help her back up but, well, you know," Liv said, sliding one hand over her hospital badge. She walked in after patting my shoulder, leaving me to stand in109

the fine mist.