“Only if I move too much,” I said.
“I’m so sorry.”
I looked at her and wondered why she was s
o sorry. “Are you with Social services?” I asked, and she widened her eyes.
“Hardly,” she said. She hesitated, and then she said, “I’m Jordan March. Mrs. Donald March.”
The way she told me her name—announced it, I should say—caused me to scan my brain, searching for something in my memory that would tell me who she was. Had I seen her on a magazine cover? Was she really a movie star or on television, someone who visited patients in hospitals as an act of charity? Why would she think I would know who she was?
“It’s your right leg that was broken?” she asked.
I pulled back the blanket to show her the cast. “My femur,” I said, remembering Dr. Decker’s description. “At the head.”
“Yes, I know.”
How did she know? Was she a special nurse? Or maybe she was a doctor. But she didn’t call herself Dr. March. Would a doctor talk like that?
“You don’t have any other broken bones, right?”
“No.” If she were a doctor, she would have known that, I thought.
“But you’re badly banged up,” she concluded, her gaze fixed on my black-and-blue arms.
“I have a slight concussion, too. And my neck hurts, so it’s hard to raise my head.” I don’t know why I wanted to tell her everything. Maybe it was because there was no one else really asking me.
“Oh, dear, you poor, poor child.”
Poor is right, I thought.
I watched her look around the ward. Some of the others were looking our way and listening. She didn’t smile at anyone. She pulled herself back a little and blew a small breath through her nearly closed lips.
“Well, this won’t do,” she said. It seemed to be something she was saying more to herself than to me. “It won’t do at all.” She turned and walked out quickly.
“That your mother?” the woman nearest to me asked.
“No way,” I said. “My mother is prettier.” Was prettier, I thought, and then argued with myself. This woman was beautiful, there was no denying that, but Mama had that exotic look, and she was natural. She wasn’t just beautiful; she was different. In Los Angeles, women like the one who had just been to see me were not unusual. Mama used to say, “It’s the only place where women don’t care that beauty is only skin-deep. Few want to go any deeper.”
Mrs. March didn’t return for nearly half an hour, and when she did, the ward nurse and a male nurse’s aide accompanied her. The aide pushed a gurney right up to my bed. Mrs. March stood back to watch.
“We’re moving you,” the nurse said.
“To where?”
“A room. A private room,” she added, the corners of her lips dipping.
She and the aide guided me carefully onto the gurney.
“Does she have any possessions?” Mrs. March asked the nurse when they turned to roll me out.
“Possessions? No, nothing,” the nurse said. “What would she have?”
Mrs. March smirked. “A watch, maybe? Any jewelry? These people carry everything they own on them.”
“She had nothing I know of, and there’s nothing listed anywhere.”
“I hope not,” Mrs. March said. “Anyone who would steal from this child should be shot.”