Lovesick (37 page)

Lara and I push on.

By 4:00
A.M.
, Lara and I are both dragging. I grab us a couple of sodas from the fridge and we start going through my stack of “undecipherables.” Most of the scribbles are from about a year ago and appear to be written by the same mysterious doctor. We finally realize the name is Dr. Rodney Sutton, a pediatrician who retired shortly before I started with Day’s Pharmacy. Not unlike her sister, Lara takes immense pleasure in crossing off the dozen outstanding entries.

Lara cracks open her soda, takes a sip and a deep breath.

“We’re getting close,” she whispers to avoid waking Paige.

“We are,” I say, gulping mine down. “We’ve got two more boxes, but my instinct is the last ones won’t turn up.”

“Mills,” Lara says, reading my mind. “He must have called in most of those prescriptions over the phone, and for whatever reason, my father didn’t properly record them in the system.”

“Brandon Mills is an agreeable man. He and I are
grand friends.
He’ll only be too happy to provide us with the proper documentation,” I assure her.

Lara laughs quietly to herself.

“Sleeping Beauty over there may have more success. I did Mills’s taxes three years in a row, for free, because Dad asked me to, and to this day he still never thanked me. Should have got him audited,” she realizes. “But Mills loves Paige. Everyone does,” Lara boasts of her sister.

We both sip our drinks.

“That’s what really did me in, you know,” Lara admits. “I started this accounting business in L.A. and I kept giving all my first-time customers a break on their taxes. But I couldn’t cover the over-head
and I ended up taking out this massive loan for, oh, somewhere around $20,386 and 23 cents.”

“Twenty thousand three hundred eighty-six dollars and twenty-three cents?” I repeat back.

Lara nods her head with a smirk.

“My parents started saving when Mom got pregnant with me,” Lara explains. “A hundred bucks a month, split between two bank accounts: $70 in the college fund and $30 for our weddings. In all those years, they never missed a payment. Not even after Mom got sick. Or when Dad went into debt.”

Lara unlocks the file cabinet next to her computer and pulls out the thin brown bankbook I discovered in Gregory’s notebook.

“Paige and I cleaned out the college fund years ago,” she says, handing me the American Trust Company passbook. “But the interest kept compounding on our wedding account. By January of last year, Dad had just over $10,000 saved for each of us.”

Lara thinks about it. “I guess I shouldn’t have been all that shocked when Paige agreed to let Dad loan me the
entire
balance, but I was. I always figured it was all about the wedding for Paige, but I should have realized it was all about getting married. My sister is such a romantic.

“I have some sisterly advice for you, Andrew,” she continues. “Paige can be generous … to a fault. I remember testing her as a kid. She’d have a cookie or get a new doll for her birthday; I’d ask her for it right away, and Paige would just give it to me. I had to start telling her, ‘No, that’s yours. You want that. Don’t give it to me. Don’t give it to
anyone.
’”

I turn to the last page of the bankbook where it shows Lara’s massive withdrawal.

“After Dad loaned me the money, he stopped saving. It must have been too overwhelming to start over from scratch. Plus he probably figured Paige and I were old enough to take care of our own weddings, and as best as I can tell, he was superdeep in debt.”

Lara stops. She studies me and picks her next words carefully. “But then—go figure!—he started saving again.”

She hands me a crisp new Bank of the West passbook. Printed on the inside cover is the account holder, Gregory Day. The issue date is November of last year.

“There’s isn’t much in there. Only a few entries,” Lara says. “But I thought you might find the time stamps noteworthy.”

“Very,” I say, staring at them.

In the right-hand column there are seven $100 deposits, each one made at the end of the month. The last entry is dated May 31—the day after I proposed, the day before he died. I feel an ache deep within me—a bittersweet mixture of happiness and sorrow. Lara studies me as I pull the pieces together. He started saving for our wedding as far back as
November.
Gregory probably knew Paige and I were made for each other before we did.

“Never once did Paige hold that loan over my head. That money could have really helped us over the last month, but Paige never went there … I hope you won’t hold it against me, either. I’m sorry.”

“I apologize for poking my nose in your business,” I tell her.

“It’s your business,” Lara says, referencing the aisles. “At least until we sell this place or go to jail.”

Paige stirs in Aisle Nine and we temporarily cut off conversation.

“Did you get a chance to read the Rite Aid contract?” she whispers.

“Skimmed it. Almost vomited on it. We took Paige’s car.”

“That car,” she groans.

“So there’s a section in the contract that talks about
you.
Not by name, but by role,” Lara continues. “Part of the deal is that we agree to ‘transition the records.’ I can try to help, but the truth is no one knows our customers like you do. Rite Aid will pay you for your time. I told them that you make about 50 percent more than Dad was paying you.”

“Thanks, and of course, yeah, that’s not a problem.”

“There’s also an option in there if you or Belinda want to stay on full-time. They’re going to need people to work the register, plus a few good pharm techs, and I’m pretty sure you’d get seniority
since you’re the only one who can translate Dad’s notebook and instruct their pharmacists,” she says.

“Thanks, but those Lemon Lollies were a total catastrophe. It makes you appreciate what a genius your father was with medication,” I tell her. “I’m still working on cracking a few more of the codes in that notebook.”

“It’s your notebook now. As executrix of his will, I’m officially bequeathing it to you,” Lara says, flapping her hands. “Do what you will with it. But if you don’t pass along that knowledge, the truth is, some of our patrons may die along with Dad’s formulas.”

The words linger.

“I’ll help with the books, but can I think about the full-time gig?” I ask.

“Take all the time you need,” she says with a smile. “But they need an answer the day after tomorrow.”

THE outgoing message on Brandon Mills’s voice mail wishes me a happy Fourth of July and informs me that the doctor will return in two weeks. For emergencies, patients may try his answering service.

Paige is in the back room brushing her teeth. Lara is fast asleep in Aisle Nine. The clock on the wall says 8:01
A.M.
I grab the receiver and dial. The woman at the other end picks up on no rings.

“I’m calling for Dr. Mills. This is an emergency,” I maintain.

“Are you one of his patients?”

Like that should make a difference if it’s an emergency.

“What problem are you experiencing?” she asks, losing patience.

“I’m bleeding.”

I want this woman to start taking me seriously, but I instantly regret saying this. “Not internally” I explain. “Just on the outside … a little.”

“Sir, if you’re bleeding, you need to go to the nearest hospital.”

From the other room, I hear Paige tighten close the squeaky faucet.

“My phone is about to die,” I pretend. “Please have Dr. Mills meet me at his Crockett office in the next half hour. Again, it’s definitely an emer—”

For dramatic effect, I hang up the phone midword. I hope she has caller ID.
A frantic, bleeding person called from a pharmacy.
He even managed to get the word
die
in there.
Maybe this is one message the service will find worth passing along.

Paige walks out from the back room and helps herself to a new hairbrush from the rack. She pats down her long, sopping hair with paper towels.

“Did you manage to reach him?” she says casually, tearing the plastic packaging off the brush with her teeth.

“If he doesn’t meet us at his office, we’ll pay him a visit at home.”

We need Mills to complete our files. The clock is ticking. It may already be too late, but the sooner we can get Blue Cross the records they need, the better our chances of reversing the damage, as well as selling the pharmacy.

Dr. Mills’s office is right around the block from Day’s Pharmacy. Seated on the toasty stoop, I page through Lara’s color-coded list. On every page, pink highlights represent all the unaccounted-for medication that Mills prescribed customers and that we filed with Blue Cross. Brandon Mills probably called most of these scripts in over the telephone and Gregory never bothered to record them; and even if that wasn’t what happened, we need Mills to provide us with paperwork saying it was. Mills helped Gregory and our indigent patrons with one more loophole: whenever possible, Mills stocked his patients up with twice as much medication as necessary.

To help get them through. It didn’t affect the price Gregory’s customers paid, but it did allow Gregory to receive double the reimbursement from insurance. Any one of these schemes could have tipped off Blue Cross.

Brandon Mills turns the corner in his black Jaguar. When he spots me, he hits the gas. Paige jumps to her feet and waves him down and Mills parks.

“You had better be bleeding,” he tells me as he exits the car.

He looks disheveled; the flimsy white collar on his polo shirt is sticking up on one side.

“I appreciate you coming,” Paige begins.

“Like I had a choice!” he hollers. “It’s against the law what you did.”

“I’m sorry, but this
is
an emergency,” Paige insists. “Can we step inside?”

“Say whatever it is you have to say right here. I can’t stay.”

Paige is appalled. “So that’s how it’s going to be?” she cries, snatching the worksheet from me. “Our insurance company is demanding some records, and you’re going to help us find them or we’re all going to prison. We need to see your files on about sixty prescriptions you phoned into our pharmacy over the last two years,” she says, paging through Lara’s list.

“I don’t have time for this,” he informs us coolly.

“What entitles you to be so inconvenienced all the time?” Paige demands. “The fact that you provided our pharmacy with
free
samples after my father gave you thousands of dollars’ worth of stuff?”

“Again with this absurdity! I don’t know what sort of lies this guy is filling your head with, Paige. But if anyone owes anyone anything …”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah, Andy told me. We owe you a fortune for all that priceless medical advice of yours.”

Remembering something, I whisper it in Paige’s ear.

“I have a legal right to see my father’s medical records,” she insists.

“You’ve got to be kidding me.”

“You want us to pay all these medical invoices; well, I want to know exactly what I’m being charged for,” she informs him.

“Paige, your father was seventy-five, with chronic emphysema,” Mills reminds her. “What more is there to know?”

Paige doesn’t move a muscle. Mills is uncharacteristically speechless.

I whisper again in her ear. Mills is getting sick of this game.

“I need to know
exactly
what his cholesterol levels were right before he died,” she says, repeating my words verbatim.

The three of us stare at one another.

“Fine!” he yells, jamming his key in the top lock to his office. “But I already know what it’s going to say: between the damage to his lung tissue and the lack of exercise, Gregory was a high risk patient for a coronary—it’s not brain surgery.”

“Don’t you mean heart surgery?” I ask Mills.

“Shut up,” he says, flipping on the lights and marching into the back room.

Two minutes later, Mills comes charging out.

“Told you!” he screams. “Gregory’s HDL was 35! His LDL 160!”

“I wouldn’t be too proud of yourself,” I remind him. “Those cholesterol numbers are awful, especially considering you were his primary physician.”

“You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink,” he insists.

Mills waits for a response, but clearly we don’t understand.

“I gave him good medical advice and prescribed him the best drugs,” he says, defensively. “That’s all you can do as a doctor. You can’t blame me because he smoked for fifty years or because he didn’t get regular checkups or because he never took his cholesterol meds.”

That stops Paige cold in her tracks. “Is that what you think?” she says suddenly. “You think he was skipping pills?”

I take Paige’s hand. Mills flips through Gregory’s records some more.

“It’s highly plausible,” he concludes, studying Gregory’s chart
again. “He was prescribed a high-dosage statin. Statins are as close to miracle drugs as they come, and yet his cholesterol readings were way too high. These are not the numbers we associate with someone who is religiously taking their medication.”

I study Paige. She stares blankly at the carpet. Mills slowly closes his file.

“Sweetheart, maybe your dad didn’t feel like taking the pills,” I suggest.

“Or maybe he thought someone else might benefit from them more,” Paige responds softly.

“Listen, the files I have on-site don’t go back two years, and I’m not pulling that crap out of deep storage,” Mills says, reaching for Lara’s list lying on the neighboring chair. “Not this week, not with my assistant out.”

He flips back and forth between the pages of Lara’s packet, grunting in agreement here and there. “These all seem accurate to me,” he tells us. “I’ll summarize it on letterhead. If the insurance company insists on seeing something more, let them send me a subpoena.”

WHILE Paige and I were busy schmoozing Mills, Lara was at Mindy’s Stationery Shop copying, collating, and binding the rest of the Blue Cross paperwork. When the three of us get back to the pharmacy, Paige gets directions while Lara and I load the Vomit Mobile.

“You’re a creative fellow,” Lara says, handing me another box. “Get creative this afternoon.”