Home Again

Angel knew from experience that sooner or later, the news would get out. He hoped to hell it was later. “Okay. I’ll be a good boy, I’ll change my life and cut out the booze and drugs. Where do I go to wait?”

“You’re not going anywhere, Mr. DeMarco. You’re far too sick to leave the hospital. I’ll set up a meeting with your team cardiologist for early tomorrow morning—after we’ve run all the matching tests. She’ll fill you in on the rest of the details.”

“Oh, no,” he said. “No women doctors.”

Allenford laughed at him. “You’re not famous in here, Mr. DeMarco. I pick the players for your team.”

“Team.” Angel said the word with disgust. “No team is gonna get their heart cut out, is it, Doc? Just little ole me on life support.”

Dr. Allenford closed the chart and set it aside. “No, Mr. DeMarco, we’re not going to face the knife… or the extensive recovery.” He leaned forward. “But we will be the ones that find the heart, remove it, bring it here, and place it inside you. I, in particular, am the one who wields the knife.” A smile slowly crossed his face. “So I’d think about an attitude adjustment if I were you.”

They stared long and hard at each other, and Angel knew that neither one of them was used to losing. Finally he said,

“Consider it adjusted.”

Allenford grinned. “Good. I’ll let the social worker fill you in on all the details. I’ll speak with Dr. Hillyard tomorrow, and check on the results of your tests. After that, we’ll make all the necessary decisions.”

Angel got a queasy feeling in the pit of his stomach. He tried to ignore it, couldn’t. He was in Seattle, scene of the old crime, and Madelaine’s old man had always wanted her to be a doctor. “Dr. Hillyard?”

“Madelaine Hillyard is the best cardiologist on the team—and she doesn’t mind difficult patients.”

His ragged heart skipped a beat, maybe even stopped. It was the first time he’d heard her name spoken aloud in years, and it brought a sudden tide of memories. Fleeting images, remembered moments. Madelaine, her long brown hair tangled and dripping wet, her knees drawn up to her chest, her fingers plowing through the sand for hidden treasures, laughing, always laughing; the starlit night they’d huddled beneath a huge, old oak tree, burying bits and pieces of carnival glass amidst a shower of grown-up words. I’ll always love you, Angel … always.

Madelaine, his first love, had become a cardiologist.

Bitterness drew a thin smile from his lips. Just what her daddy wanted.

He stared at Dr. Allenford who was standing up, getting ready to leave. Angel wanted to say something, but his throat had seized up and nothing would come. At the doorway Allenford nodded, then left the room, closing the door behind him.

Angel lay motionless, breathing hard, feeling the catch and release of his stuttering heart, listening to the blip-blip-blip of the monitor. He’d run out of second chances, out of second opinions. His life came down to this moment, this instant in time when he was broken and alone.

What was he supposed to do now? Lie in this single metal-barred bed and wait for some poor sucker to die? Lie here and let them cut his chest open, rip his heart out, and throw it in the trash like so much garbage?

Heart transplant. The words were knives, tearing his guts open.

What they wanted to do to him was an abomination, an obscenity. And Madelaine would be the one to do it.

No way.

He threw the covers off his body and plucked the needles from his arms. He tossed his legs over the side of the bed and stood up. He was getting the hell out of this place. They weren’t gonna cut his heart out and sew in someone else’s. He couldn’t—wouldn’t—live that way. He’d die the way he’d always lived. Full tilt, taking no prisoners.

He took a single step, just that, and pain exploded in his chest. With a cry, he crashed to the floor. His arm flung out, caught a table and sent it sprawling. Water splashed the floor. Plastic cups and pitchers banged on the linoleum.

He lay there, unable to breathe, gasping for air like a mackerel. And hurting. Christ, even with the drugs, he was hurting like he’d never hurt before.

Suddenly he understood. He was dying. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon. Soon. It didn’t matter whether he wanted the surgery, didn’t matter that he’d be a freak when it was over. He had no choice.

He twisted around and crawled back to the bed. Grabbing the metal bed frame, he hauled himself upright and collapsed on the mattress.

He slid back under the covers and closed his eyes. It hurt so badly, he wanted to cry.

If only he had someone to talk to, someone real, who cared about him. Someone who was the kind of friend Francis and Madelaine had once been.

Madelaine.

How many nights had he lain awake in the dark, wondering how his brother was doing, what Madelaine had become? How many times had he picked up the phone to call them both, only to hang up before anyone answered?

He sighed heavily. Madelaine. Even now he could bring her face to mind, the thick brown hair that fell in waves to the middle of her back, the slashing eyebrows and Gypsy-tilted eyes, the rounded curves of her body. Most of all he could remember her laugh, throaty and soft.