Come Back To Me (13 page)

Cara continued to attend her classes and work both jobs. In incremental steps, her mother resumed her management of the household, doing the cooking, the cleaning, the grocery shopping, and to Cara’s great relief, paying their bills. She and Cara shared the task of driving Cara’s grandmother to physical therapy sessions, and she helped Cara contract with a private home care agency. Mrs. Franklin also rejoined her bridge group at the country club and to all appearances, managed to have a sense of humor about the fact that her daughter regularly served the group lunch.

Cara was shocked to overhear her mother say, “There’s a lot to admire about Cara’s work ethic.”

At last Cara felt confident enough to make a late application to the University of Iowa. She received her Letter of Acceptance, and with her mother’s blessing, packed her things and moved to Iowa City as soon as her junior college semester ended. With the help of the Housing Office, she rented a furnished studio apartment in the attic of an old Victorian a block from campus.

∗    ∗    ∗

Cara loved her compact apartment, especially the dormer window in her bedroom. It overlooked a green common area, so she positioned her bed in the alcove where she could watch students jog, play Frisbee and touch football, meet for outdoor study groups, sunbathe and simply kick back. The mere existence of the window and the energetic scene below made her feel happier than she’d felt in ages.

Her bathroom was tiny and lacked a shower, but the short, deep, antique white porcelain claw-foot bathtub made up for that. She couldn’t wait to run the water for a long hot soak.

The kitchen consisted of a café table and a couple of chairs, a sink, a row of shelving and a two-burner stove. There was no oven, but Cara didn’t mind a bit. The place was all hers and she reveled in her freedom. And it was freedom, pure and simple, despite her appointment at the Office of Financial Aid in the morning to find out about work-study options. While Cara had saved enough money to pay for her own housing, tuition and books would be paid for by a combination of grants and work-study. Rent came to eighty-five dollars a month so it would be necessary to work only one part-time job. She’d have all the time she needed to study.

Cara twirled around her bedroom, scarcely feeling the wood floor beneath her bare feet. For the first time in years her heart felt light, as if the breeze blowing in through the open windows drifted clear through her chest, caressing her inside and out. She had already registered for classes, which left her nearly a week to unpack and organize her apartment to her satisfaction, arrange her work schedule, buy her books and learn her way around Iowa City. Never in a million years had she expected to feel this kind of excitement. Cara was starting fresh as she’d longed to do. It felt like heaven.

May 1976

“H
ow do you do it?”

“Do what?”

“Make every single man in this office stop whatever they’re doing and stare. Their tongues hang out when you pass by. Sheesh, they practically slobber all over their statistics.”

Cara laughed out loud. Jeanie, the administrative assistant and her boss, was quite a tease. “I don’t think it’s me.” She couldn’t resist a snort. “I think it’s the calfskin briefcase you loaned me.” Cara slapped it on her desk to emphasize the point.

Jeanie shook her head. “No, honey, it’s you. Believe me, it’s you.” She sifted through the paperwork on her desk. “How’s the schedule coming? Have you been able to set up the number of cholesterol screenings we need for this month?”

“Things are looking good,” said Cara. “I’ve got the VFW Hall lined up in Pella, the Lion’s Club in Newton, I’m waiting to hear back from our contact in Anita and I’m still working on Dubuque.”

“Who have you called in Dubuque?”

“The Chamber. Someone’s supposed to get back to me today about possible locations. Katie and I went out last week and contacted the local doctors. We’ve got our flyers all over Pella and Newton. We should be good for this Saturday and next.”

“Do we have nurses and the phlebotomists lined up?”

“Yes. Plus Dr. Marsh said he was going to send some of the residents along for the ride. He mentioned something about a field trip.”

“More like punishment,” Jeanie said.

“For whom?”

“You. You’ll have to hold their hands. Residents never leave the Med Center.”

“Yeah, well, I can send them out for coffee and doughnuts.”

Jeanie laughed. “How long has it been Cara? Two years?”

“Since I started?” Cara thought for a moment. “Almost two years. I think it will be two years on June first.”

“I remember when you first showed up here in your jeans and your little pink tee shirt. You were so skinny and so shy I thought you were one of the doctors’ kids.”

Cara blushed.

“Look at you. You still blush at the drop of a hat.” Jeanie walked over to Cara’s desk and dropped a pile of files onto it. “The results from last week. No one has had time to sort through them yet. Do you mind?”

“Not in the slightest.” Cara pulled the pile towards her.

“I don’t know how you do it,” Jeanie repeated.

“What now?” asked Cara, opening the top folder.

“Work so efficiently. Ever since you started here you’ve taken a full load of classes. You’re busy painting, doing research. And you still find time to do this. You were originally supposed to be half-time, you know.”

Cara glanced up at the older woman. “I like it.” She shrugged. “I’m accustomed to being busy. Besides, the money’s good. And I enjoy working with you and Dr. Marsh.”

“Dr. Marsh and I are old enough to be your parents. Well, I’m old enough to be your parent. Dr. Marsh could be your grandfather.” Jeanie laughed. “Don’t you want to hang out with young people?”

Cara smiled at her. “How do you know I don’t?”

Jeanie rolled her eyes. “In all the time you’ve worked here, you’ve never talked about a single
kegger
. You haven’t mentioned a single date. You’ve never come in hung over. You don’t call in sick. You’ve never once received a personal phone call. You bring an apple for lunch and you sit in the courtyard and read. I’ve worked with student assistants for a long time, my dear, and you are not the typical student assistant.”

“I don’t know whether to be flattered or insulted.”

“Neither,” said Jeanie. “You’re an enigma.”

Cara just smiled in answer and sifted through her files. She needed to double-check the results before she called the test subjects.

Those subjects whose cholesterol level fell within normal limits or was just slightly elevated would receive a form letter explaining their results and informing them that they did not qualify for the project. Those whose cholesterol was significantly elevated would receive a phone call inviting them to enroll in the program and if they were willing, Cara would make an appointment for them with the intake staff. She’d always follow up the phone call with a packet of information explaining the program in detail, along with a form for their personal physician to fill out regarding their health history.

The job had nothing whatsoever to do with art or art history. That was one of the things she enjoyed about it. Another was the fact that the staff was like one large extended family and she’d grown comfortable with them over the past couple years. Cara felt comfortable with very few people. So what if she didn’t have a social life? She was better off.

The past two years had been the most uneventful of Cara’s entire life. She performed well in her classes, receiving praise from her professors for her work. She’d already presented a series of watercolors in two exhibits. Even though Jeanie didn’t think school work could be considered
fun
by any stretch of the imagination, Cara had taken electives like ballet and ballroom dancing, fencing, canoeing and riflery. She had her favorite running routes along the Iowa River and every Friday night she allowed herself some time off to hit the basketball court in the gym for a pick-up game with some of the guys.

Sure, she got asked out but she preferred to study, paint and read in her apartment or in the sunny park beneath her bedroom window, alone. The anxiety attacks were under control for the most part. If they did occur, it seemed to be when she went home or when she was thinking about going home, so she limited her visits to the holidays. She’d lived two summers now in Iowa City and this coming summer would be her third. She and her mother had a much easier time keeping their relationship cordial if they didn’t live together.

Cara would actually graduate in January with a double major in Art and Art History, but she hoped to continue working with the project while she attended grad school. She shared a nice clean office in the Med Center with professionals who behaved like professionals despite Jeanie’s claims to the contrary. And as Cara said, the money was good. It helped pay her expenses and she’d managed to put some aside for grad school. Asking her mother was for financial assistance was out of the question. Her mother still struggled at times with depression and Cara felt guilty enough as it was about leaving her alone to care for her grandmother. She didn’t want money to become an issue too.

Cara smiled as she thought about Jeanie’s comment. She had worn jeans and a pink tee shirt the first day on the job.

Jeanie had sized up Cara’s deficiencies and taken her under her wing. She taught her how to dress like a professional. Even though Cara was merely a student assistant, a large portion of her job involved meeting with city officials to arrange for cholesterol screenings and with physicians to try to recruit their high-risk patients. The shops in Iowa City didn’t have much in terms of business attire, so Jeanie had taken Cara up the road to Cedar Rapids. They even made an occasional weekend foray into Des Moines just for fun.

Jeanie showed her how and where to look for bargains, how to mix and match her clothes so she appeared to have far more outfits than she actually did, and she taught Cara about the judicious use of makeup. She also helped her find the right styling products to control her unruly hair. Cara learned how to straighten her curls and for work she kept it pulled back in a neat French twist.

The one area Cara refused to compromise was comfort—she would not under any circumstances wear pantyhose. Cara detested the suffocating feel of them against her skin.

Jeanie had winked at her and said, “Well, your legs are long enough and pretty enough and tan enough that I’m guessing no one will care.”

Cara had been grateful to Jeanie for taking an interest in her. She imagined this was the kind of thing normal mothers and daughters did together. They shopped, they went to lunch, they gossiped. Cara couldn’t place all the blame on her own mother. Maybe if she had been a normal daughter, the kind of child her mother had hoped for, the two of them could have had some fun together.

“Cara,” Jeanie’s voice interrupted her musings. “Cara, Dr. Marsh is in the conference room with our new volunteers. Do you want to go fill them in on the screening?”

“The doctors are here already? Sure.”

Cara rose from her desk, automatically smoothing down her form-fitting knee-length gray skirt and straightening her crisp white blouse. Her heels clicked against the tiled floor as she proceeded down the long corridor to the conference room. Volunteers came and went. Usually they were medical students. Residents rarely volunteered, they were too busy. Because of that, she was certain the group would be small. It shouldn’t take long to give them the details. All they had to do was show up for the van on time, stethoscope in hand and have a decent bedside manner.

The worst thing they might have to deal with would be a patient with a fear of needles or blood. Cara had seen an occasional subject faint when the tech stuck him. Once in a great while a medical student might be asked to do a tough stick, but most of the time the techs and the nurses could handle it. It was a plus though, if they could field some questions about cholesterol testing and heart disease. Cara had observed that middle-aged men seemed to trust any information they received from a physician far more so than they did the same information received from a nurse.

Cara walked through the doorway. The director of the program, Dr. Marsh, rose from his seat. He stepped forward to take her arm and introduce her. There were three other men in the room. Cara glanced at the two standing next to the coffee-maker, cups cradled in their hands. One wore standard issue green scrubs, the other dark trousers and a blue button-down shirt covered with a white lab coat. Then Cara turned her gaze to the third man where he leaned against the edge of a table, dressed in faded jeans and a dark brown long-sleeved Henley. She looked up from the leather sandals on his bare feet, took in his lean, muscular legs, his narrow hips and waist, his broad chest and the arms crossed in front of it. She met his eyes. He was staring at her, faint amusement evident in his half smile. Cara blinked in surprise. It was James Mackie.

“Gentlemen, thank you for coming,” said Dr. Marsh. “This is Cara Franklin, one of our assistants. She works directly with the program coordinator and she schedules all our test sites, our community outreach and our patient intake. She’ll explain what you can expect on Saturday. Cara, they’re all yours.”