Good Medicine (19 page)

“Dad's first car,” he said. The hand holding the photo was trembling, but Jordan tried not to notice. She studied the photo.

“God, Mom was so beautiful, I didn't know you had
this. Can I have a copy of it? I only have two pictures of Mom.” And one was her parents' wedding photo, which was pretty much destroyed. When Jordan was a teen, she'd used nail scissors and carefully eradicated her father from the picture.

“You look exactly like her,” Christina said, peering over Jordan's shoulder. “Same gorgeous bones, aristocratic nose, sexy mouth.”

“We've both got Dad's blue eyes, though,” Toby said. “Mom's were hazel, if I remember right.”

“I know your mother died really young,” Christina said. “What about your dad?”

There was an awkward silence.

“Dad's still alive,” Toby finally said. “He's not doing too well, though. He's in a care facility in Vancouver.”

“Sorry, I just assumed—” Christina glanced at Jordan's shuttered expression. She got up and grabbed her jacket from the peg by the door.

“It's time I headed home, got to get to work in the morning. My boss is a stickler for being on time.”

“The old bag will probably be late herself,” Jordan said. The last thing she wanted to think about tonight was Mike Burke.

After Christina left, Jordan opened the connecting door to the clinic and showed Toby where he'd be sleeping.

“Unless we have a major emergency, we won't be using the room,” she assured him. “So sleep as late as you like, we'll try to keep the noise level to a minimum.”

“I can't seem to manage more than three or four hours at a stretch these nights, so don't worry about me.” Toby wrapped his arms around her, pressing his lips to her hair. “Thanks, squirt. I feel at home already.”

Loving the feel of his arms around her, Jordan hugged him back hard. His ribs made her feel as though she were hugging a skeleton. Appalled, the fear she'd tried to subdue came rushing to the surface.

“How long can you stay, Toby?” She hadn't dared ask until now.

“No set time limit,” he said with a shuddering sigh. “I'm afraid I don't feel up to working at the moment, and even if I did, I'd have to find another kind of job. My days as a boatbuilder are over. But the good news is I've invested my money, so I can afford to retire young.”

He'd kept his voice steady, but Jordan could sense the desperation and sadness that underlined the words. “I can't think of a better gift than having you around for a very long while. You need time to just relax and heal, Toby.”

“I dunno, squirt.” He drew back, not meeting her eyes. “Maybe I'm not going to get over this.” He gave a ghost of a laugh. “You know, I'm glad I didn't get married or have kids. It's easier to die when nobody's depending on you.”

His words tore Jordan apart. “Don't you dare talk about dying.” Her voice was fierce and furious. “I'll murder you myself if I hear you say anything like that again.”

“Okay, Doc.” He grinned and bumped her chin gently with his fist. “See you in the morning.”

Jordan went back to her own bedroom, certain she wouldn't sleep. For an hour, she went over everything she knew about neurotoxic poisoning, which wasn't very much. She'd only seen two cases at St. Joe's. Both men had been admitted, and later died. But Toby would survive. He
had
to survive. She'd find a way, medical science
must
have developed something to treat the condition by now.

Toby's going to get over this. He's going to be fine.
She repeated it over and over in a sort of mantra until at last, worn out, she fell asleep.

S
HE OVERSLEPT THE NEXT
morning. When she finally stumbled into the kitchen, Toby had the woodstove going and a pot of coffee almost ready. There were eggs in the black iron frying pan, and bread sliced for toast.

“I lived in a shack in Mexico once and learned how to cook on stoves like this,” he announced proudly, pouring Jordan a mug of coffee. “How do you want your eggs?”

She thought of the blood tests she wanted to take. “Have you had coffee yet? Or any food?”

“Not yet.”

“Good. Come into the clinic with me, and I'll draw blood for those tests.” Most doctors weren't good at that particular procedure, but she'd improved her technique with the help of a tech at St. Joe's. He'd been an addict himself, and he was an expert.

“Ah, Jordan, I wish you'd just skip this. We already know what it is.” Muttering under his breath, he followed her, averting his eyes as she expertly poked him and filled vials with his dark blood.

“Done,” she announced after a few moments.

“Don't drink it all at once,” he growled as she carefully labeled the vials and then took him back to her apartment.

“Did you sleep at all, Toby?” There were dark shadows under his eyes, and in the morning light he looked gray and fragile.

“As much as I ever do. I got up around five when it stopped raining. Two little guys, Michael and Eli, came by just after six. Neat kids. They brought some kindling for the stove and that loaf of fresh bread, and they offered to give me a guided tour of the village.”

“Eli is Christina's son.”

Jordan saw the expression on his face change and added, “She's a single mom. She and Eli live with her mom and dad.”

“She's doing a great job, he's a nice kid.”

Jordan swallowed the coffee he'd poured and sighed with pleasure. “They're both great kids. They bring me kindling to light this monster of a stove. I buy fresh bread from Michael's mother, and they run errands whenever I need them.” She thought of them outside the window, making sure Garry wasn't going to turn violent, and had to swallow hard. “They're sweet and thoughtful, and what they don't know isn't worth knowing. They have ears like small elephants.”

“Apparently. They asked me if I knew the bad man called Garry who was here the other day visiting you. They said he was a junkie. Is that true, Jordan?”

“Yes, it is. He turned up without any warning.” She should have known that absolutely nothing stayed secret around here.
And haven't I learned that secrets are dangerous?

“He won't be back,” she added. “He's in a jail cell in Tofino. He ransacked my medical bag and stole drugs and prescription pads. I had him arrested when he got off the water taxi.”

“Too bad I didn't get here a little sooner.” Toby clenched his teeth, his voice cold.

Jordan looked at her frail brother and was endlessly grateful he hadn't been there. Toby's spirit might be that of a mountain lion, but he wasn't strong physically.

“You didn't tell me about the drugs, squirt.”

“No. I—I didn't tell anyone for a long time. I was ashamed. I guess I felt that in some way it was my fault. It started with that accident he had.”

She outlined the sequence of events, holding nothing back, not even the breakdown she'd had, or her short stay on the psych ward. Talking about it was cathartic, and she wondered again why she hadn't been just as honest with Silas.

“I kept thinking he'd get over it. I guess doctors are the worst at facing up to sickness when it's someone they love.”

Oh, God. Toby.

For a moment she could hardly get her breath.

Toby took her hand. “Are you legally free of him now?”

“Not quite. He's been stonewalling, but this latest prank will give my lawyer leverage. I can't wait for the divorce to go through. I made such a bad mistake, marrying him.” She expected Toby to agree.

Instead, he shook his head. “I think whatever happens, happens for a reason,” he said slowly. “When I look back on everything, I can see how much I learned from it, even the time I spent in jail. It was all an opportunity.”

Aghast, she stared at him. “You can't really believe that. What about your health, Toby? How can this possibly be an opportunity?”

He shrugged. “Maybe it's time for me to make a change. I had this girlfriend in Mexico, she made me think about a lot of stuff like that.”

“How come you broke up with her?”

“I have this problem with commitment. At least, that's what she claimed when she walked out.” He poured more coffee. “You think you'll ever get married again, Jordan?”

“Not likely.” But for some reason, Silas popped into her head, which was ridiculous. “There's a theory that people attract what's familiar to them, and for me that's obviously guys with substance abuse problems, like Garry.”

“Because of Dad.” Toby stirred sugar into his cup.

“Because of Dad.”

“Well, he doesn't drink at all anymore, hasn't for
quite a while.” Toby's voice became urgent. “Take a couple days off and come with me to Vancouver, Jordan. I talked to the doctor at the nursing home, he says Dad's liver is shot and his kidneys are failing. It might be the last time we get to see him.”

She didn't even have to think about it. “I've got nothing to say to him. He
abandoned
us, Toby. You're a better person than I am, forgiving him for that.”

“It's easier than holding on to bad feelings, squirt. I just don't have the energy.”

She didn't want to hear any more about Mike. “Are you going to make me those eggs you promised? Because you won't like the way they turn out when I fry them. Christina's mom has been trying her best to teach me how to cook but it looks like a lost cause.”

“Christina's a babe.” He broke eggs into the pan and added salt and pepper. “Can she cook?”

“Absolutely. Everybody around here can. Except me.”

“I think I'll ask her to marry me.”

“I'll tell her you said that.”

“Maybe hold off a day or so, I don't want to seem too eager.”

Relieved that she'd gotten him away from talking about Mike, Jordan popped bread into the toaster.

He set her plate of eggs on the table, and Jordan noticed that he had to use both hands to keep from dropping it. Sitting across from her, his hand shook violently as he tried to get eggs into his mouth. He finally set the fork down and with some difficulty, got to his feet. “I
think I'll find my guides and do the tourist thing. See you later, Jordan.” He grabbed his jacket and fumbled his way into it.

Watching him limp out the door, Jordan lost her appetite. She scraped the remains of their food into the garbage.

The blood she'd drawn that morning would determine whether or not she needed to worry. Until the results came back, she'd try her best to put her fears on hold.

“S
O THERE'S NO REAL
treatment that you know about?” Christina was putting the vials of Toby's blood into special protective containers and then sealing them into a Purolator express envelope. Louie would take them to the dispatch office in Tofino, and they'd be in the lab at St. Joe's by that afternoon.

“No. All I'm hoping is that the diagnosis the other doctors made left some room for doubt.” Jordan had been struggling to stay optimistic, but it was difficult.

“When will you get the results?”

“Maybe tomorrow. The head tech, Beryl Frazier, is a friend of mine—she'll work them up fast. I gave her my cell number and asked her to call the moment she knows.”

“I really hope those other guys were wrong. I like your brother a lot.”

“God, so do I,” Jordan sighed. “On both counts.”

Christina waited a beat and then said, “Speaking of brothers, what's up with you and Silas? Things seemed to be going like hotcakes. But when he came by the house this morning to talk to Patwin and I told him Toby
was visiting, Silas got his wooden-totem-pole look. He'll never tell me, so what's up?”

The old Jordan might not have told, either. The new, revised edition stopped the chart work and took a deep breath.

“As far as I can tell, he'd avoiding me like I've got the Ebola virus. And this is what I did to earn it,” she said, and told Christina in detail, not sparing herself. “He hasn't spoken to me since Garry was here, when Eli and Michael spilled the beans.”

“Damn that kid of mine. I should have sent him to summer camp rather than let him run wild around here with Michael.”

“Don't shoot the messenger. It was my fault, not theirs.”

“Silas is obviously being a bonehead about this,” Christina said. “So you didn't tell him the entire truth the moment you two met, and you were a little generous with the facts about your divorce. Nobody's perfect, not even my sainted bro.”

“Yes—that environmental thing with the toilet.”

“Yeah, that scares the hell out of me, too,” Christina agreed. “No water, his toilet freaks me out, how can that possibly work? But seriously. In my opinion, the guy has major issues with abandonment, which makes him one of those modern breed of guys who can't seem to commit. Notice how well I picked up on the jargon in that course I took on psych nursing?”

“I'm more impressed with the wine thing.” Jordan thought over what Christina had just said. “So let me
get this straight, you don't think it's my lying to him that's at the root of this awful silence?”

Christina shook her head. “Nope. Think about it. Silas was only a baby when Mom left him. How was he to know she loved him and wanted him? It took her years to get that asshole of a Keefer to agree to visiting rights. By then, Silas must have felt she didn't care. And then when he did start coming here, we gave him a rough time because he was so different. And Keefer never remarried, so there was no home life there, for sure. He lived in some mausoleum with only hired help for company, and get this, his dad packed Silas off to boarding school when he was five, even though Keefer was living only a couple of miles away from the place. Then when Silas decided to come and live here, Keefer excommunicated him. Abandonment in spades, honey.”

“And you know this—how?”

Christina gave her a baffled look. “Silas told Sandrine, Sandrine told Mom, and Mom told me, of course.”

“Of course,” Jordan said in a weak voice. The Canadian military could benefit from studying communication systems in Ahousaht. “I really have to talk to him. The longer I put it off, the harder it gets.”

“So go right now. You're clear for a couple hours.”

Jordan hesitated. “I wanted to get these charts—”

“Go. They'll wait. Stop procrastinating.”

Jordan went. The woods were wet and heavy with the recent rain. She hadn't thought to bring an umbrella or a hat, and water dripped onto her hair and trickled
under her collar. But the air was warm, so the atmosphere felt almost tropical.

As she walked along the now familiar trail, she thought about Christina's abandonment observations. They'd made her feel uncomfortable, because they applied to her and Toby just as much as Silas. They'd each chosen different ways of dealing with the fear, but it was a common thread, all right. Trust Christina to pinpoint it.

When she reached the cabin and Silas answered her hesitant knock, she realized by the closed expression on his face that this was going to be even more difficult than she'd anticipated. Her heart sank.

“Hello, Jordan. Come in.” He stood aside as she slipped past him. He didn't ask her to sit, so she turned to face him.

She'd planned a dozen different openers. Taking a deep breath, she scrapped them all for the most direct approach.

“Silas, you know about Garry coming here to see me.”

“Michael and Eli filled me in.”

“Well. I should have told you more about him, I'm really sorry I didn't. I should have been up-front about the fact that he's an addict and that we haven't been separated very long. We're not divorced, but I'm working on it. Or rather, my lawyer is.”

His eyes pinned her, cold and green. “Why didn't you tell me?”

“I—I was ashamed.” Her heart was thundering and her palms were wet. It was hard to admit how she felt.
“I didn't want you to know how dumb I'd been. See, I—I supplied Garry for a while with morphine. I feel really stupid about having done it. I believed him when he said he was still in pain.” She described the horrible night when Garry had overdosed and shown up in the E.R. “That's when I had a breakdown and checked myself into the psych ward. A psychiatrist helped me face up to the fact that I couldn't do anything for him and that I didn't love him. But I should have smartened up a lot faster than I did, and I feel like an idiot about that.”

Instead of disagreeing, Silas nodded, which Jordan didn't think was a good sign at all. And then it got worse. In a voice cold enough to freeze her heart, he said, “So you gave him morphine again when he came here?”

Jordan felt as if he'd struck her. “
No.
I did not, absolutely not.” She took a breath to explain what had happened, but he beat her to it.

“Then where did he get the vials he sold to Johnny Swann?”

“Johnny Swann?” She couldn't stand up anymore. She sank onto the sofa. “I didn't know about that. Garry stole all the drugs out of my medical bag before he left. I didn't know he'd sold any, but it makes sense. When the RCMP picked him up in Tofino, some of the morphine was missing. I just assumed he'd used it himself.”

Silas shook his head. “No. Your
husband
sold it to Swann who then sold it to Patwin. And he used it.” He told her about finding Patwin high, and finding the morphine and syringes. “No one knows about it, and Patwin doesn't want anyone to know. I gave him my word.”

“I won't tell anyone.” Shock made her feel sick. “Oh, Silas. I'm so sorry, I didn't know. Is he—is Patwin okay?” This went much deeper than she'd thought. He must have felt totally betrayed by her.

“He's okay. I walked him until the stuff wore off. He says he's ashamed and won't do it again. Which, of course, he's said plenty of times before.”

There was cynicism in his voice she hadn't heard before.

“And—and you blame me for what Garry did. You actually thought I'd given him the morphine. Why didn't you come and talk to me about it? Or were you planning to just avoid me for the rest of the year?”

Silas shook his head. “I don't blame you for what anyone else did. And I'm not avoiding you. I just need some time to think, Jordan.”

“That sounds like don't call me, I'll call you.” She was getting really mad at him now. It helped her not to feel hurt. “So what happened with us was the equivalent of a one-night stand, and now you'd rather pretend it didn't happen at all.”

“What we had was good, Jordan, I'm not denying that. But it was pretty much based on fantasy, wouldn't you say?”

“No, I wouldn't say that. Sure, I made a serious mistake not telling you about Garry, but I've apologized for it. Didn't you tell me that communication is the basis for your healing practice?”

“Yes, but you're not my patient.”

“So what am I, then?” She lost her temper. “Just
somebody who was convenient and willing when you needed a roll in the hay?” And wasn't that pretty much how she'd viewed it, as well? She knew she was being unreasonable. She knew she wasn't helping things by pushing him, but she couldn't stop herself. He was dumping her, and it hurt. She wanted to hurt him back. She wanted to dump him first.

“Jordan, you know that's not true. You're jumping to conclusions. Let's just give ourselves a little time.”

“There's no point, because this is
so
over.” She turned and headed for the door, even more furious—and hurt—because he didn't make a move to stop her. “Goodbye, Silas. It's lucky we didn't let this go any further, at least neither of us had much invested.” She stormed out, slamming the door behind her, not caring that it was a childish thing to do.

Helen had told her that she needed to get in touch with her emotions, figure out how she felt about things rather than what she thought.

Well, Jordan fumed as she stomped along the path back to the village, she'd sure as hell mastered that little exercise. She was a sad, sorry bundle of feelings at the moment, with not a rational thought in her head.

She was sick with worry about Toby, heartsore and furious over Silas, disgusted with Garry.

Men.
The world would be a simpler place if there were only women in it.

F
OR THE REST OF THAT DAY
, anger buoyed her up. The clinic was busy, and then Toby invited Christina and
Jordan out for dinner to Mabel's, which meant there was no privacy to talk to Christina about the disastrous meeting with Silas.

Jordan managed to hold her center until the call about Toby's blood tests came early the following morning.

When the phone rang, she was alone in the clinic, again working on charts, and as Beryl read out the results to her, Jordan had to struggle to maintain control. The blood work was a veritable death sentence.

The levels of toxins in Toby's system were even worse than she'd feared.

Shaking, Jordan managed to thank Beryl and hang up the phone. She was grateful that Toby had gone out fishing with Michael's father early that morning. She'd be able to pull herself together by the time he got back, she told herself, and they could talk about treatment.

Treatment?
Jordan smashed both fists down on the table. Who was she kidding? There wasn't any treatment. The only alternative therapy she'd heard of was chelation therapy, an IV procedure that claimed to improve circulation and remove harmful toxins from the blood. Jordan hadn't found any conclusive scientific studies that proved it worked on neurotoxic poisoning.

Which left diet and B vitamins, a pitiful arsenal that might prolong her brother's life by a few weeks or months, but she couldn't make herself believe they'd affect the inevitable outcome.

The clinic door opened and Christina came breezing in. She set a small bag on the desk. “This is rose-hip tea, concentrated vitamin C, for strengthening the
immune system. I thought it might be good for Toby. Brew it up and add honey, it's pretty bitter without it.”

Jordan was staring at the charts like a zombie. Toby was her only family. If she lost him, she didn't know how she could survive.

“Hey, earth to Jordan. What's up?”

Jordan looked up at her friend. In a shaky voice, she said, “They just phoned me about Toby's blood tests.” She cleared her throat and gave Christina a fast, concise rundown.

The other woman pulled a chair over and sat down hard. “Shit. That's some bad news, eh?”

“Really bad.”

“You know, I've been thinking about it, and maybe Silas could help.”

Jordan felt Silas wouldn't help her across the road at the moment, but she didn't say so. She raised an eyebrow and waited.

“Mom had a rare blood disease before I was born— TTP. Sandrine cured her.”

Jordan nodded. “He told me about that. He said it convinced him he should study native healing.”

“Yeah, well, if Sandrine knew how to heal Mom, and Silas learned from her, maybe there's a chance he can help Toby.”

Jordan thought about it. “I'd try anything, and I'm pretty sure Toby would, too. The problem is, Silas and I aren't speaking at the moment.”

“He's so damned stubborn,” Christina groaned. “But he'll get over it. Just give him time.”

“No.” Jordan shook her head. “We had a couple dates, but that's as far as it goes.”

Christina frowned. “I thought you two were good together. I'm sorry it didn't work out.”

“Me, too. Do you think he'll refuse to treat Toby? He's pretty mad at me.”

“Silas is a healer. Being mad at you won't matter. When it comes to healing, there's no personal baggage involved. And anyway, you don't have to even talk to him about it. Toby has to go to Silas himself and ask for healing.”

“Toby has to do it himself?” Jordan had envisioned begging on bended knee.

“Yeah, that's the way it works,” Christina explained. “The sick person has to make the decision to ask for help. Motivation, the shrinks would call it.”

“I'll talk to Toby. He's pretty stubborn, too, but you never know. He might just go for it. He doesn't have a lot of options.”

“Yeah, well, if he does, there's a sort of ceremony involved. He has to formally ask Silas for a healing and give him something in return. At the initial meeting, it's usually tobacco—not the commercial kind—a raw, wild version that's reserved for ceremonial use. If Toby decides to go for it, let me know and I'll take him to see Auntie Lena. She can supply him with the tobacco.”