Winners (11 page)

“Not well,” Bill said with a deep sigh. “I started this trip thinking I could find someone to save her legs and her ability to walk, but it’s been bad news at every stop. I don’t think it will be much better in Boston tomorrow. We’re going back to Denver tomorrow night, and I have to put her in a rehab hospital there the next day. She’s going to be in rehab for three or four months.” Bill was looking seriously depressed, but happy to see his old friend, although he thought he looked considerably older than he had a year ago. Joe had been through enormous challenges, and it had been even harder than Bill realized. If he had known that his friend had been on the verge of suicide, he would have been shocked.

“Why don’t I come out and see you, while Lily is at rehab? I don’t have anything to do here. Maybe I can give you a hand with something out there, or just keep you company for a few days.” Bill looked relieved as soon as he said it, and loved the idea. He dreaded Lily being at the rehab hospital and not at home, and he knew he was going to be lonely without her, although he planned to visit her every day.

“I haven’t thought about it yet, and didn’t want to. But I may have to build some ramps and things to make life easier for Lily when she gets home. Our house really isn’t accessible for a wheelchair. I may have to put in an elevator too. I was hoping I wouldn’t have to, but it sounds like I will.” It was the least of their problems, but something he knew now that he’d have to do. It was the beginning of acceptance for him. “Maybe you can give me some ideas.” He was going to hire an architect if he had to, but he liked the idea of Joe visiting him while Lily was away, maybe even for a few weeks, since she would be at Craig for three or four months, which seemed interminable to him. He had never even let her go to sleep-away camp as a child.

“Just tell me when you want me to come out, and I’ll be on the next plane.” Bill looked pleased when Joe said it, and then they talked about Joe’s failed business and the embezzlement until dinnertime. They talked about Karen too, but there was less to say. She had told him she wanted a divorce, filed the papers, and left, with very little conversation about it. She said the marriage was over for her, and that was that. But he seemed to be dealing with it, and had made his peace with what she’d decided, although it was painful for him. Joe mentioned in passing while they talked that he had no desire to get involved with anyone else now. He felt too old, he said, to start again, or even have a relationship. He hadn’t dated in more than thirty years, and his marriage to Karen had ended in too much disappointment for him to want to try again. Bill said he understood. He wasn’t feeling particularly romantic these days either. All his thoughts were focused on Lily, and nothing else. And Joe knew he hadn’t had a serious woman in his life since Lily’s mother.

The three of them had dinner together in Bill’s suite. And when Lily went back to her own suite, she maneuvered the wheelchair deftly, and the two men watched her with a sorrowful expression. After she was gone, Joe gently patted his friend’s shoulder as Bill fought back tears.

When Joe left Bill that night, he promised to come to Denver in the next few weeks, as soon as Bill called him, and Bill assured him that he would. He was relieved to have seen his old friend. He had known him for twenty-six years, since business school, and Bill had known Karen for just as long, since Joe had already been married when Bill met him. It was strange to think how life turned out sometimes. Now he was widowed, Karen was living in Nepal and India with her guru, Joe’s business was in the tank, and he’d been the smartest guy Bill had known at Harvard, and Lily was paraplegic. Who could have imagined any of that? Nothing had happened as Bill had hoped, and he was exhausted when he went to bed that night, after the discouraging meeting with the neurosurgeon that morning. And they had one more the next day. They were getting up early to fly to Boston, and then home that night. All Bill could hope was that the doctor at Mass General would have something hopeful to say. If he didn’t, as far as Bill was concerned, Lily’s life had been destroyed when the chairlift fell in Squaw. He couldn’t see it any other way.

Chapter 10

A pretty woman with shoulder-length dark hair was the center of a celebration at the breast cancer clinic at Mass General that morning. The doctors and nurses who had taken care of her for the past year were there, and her peer counselor who had guided her through the hardest year of her life. The woman being celebrated was Carole Anders. She had completed her treatment, and had been declared cancer free after a year of chemotherapy and radiation, a double mastectomy, and a hysterectomy. She hadn’t had breast reconstruction yet, and didn’t want to. She felt that for now she’d been through enough surgery, and she’d heard from others that there was a risk of infection or complications with implants, and she just didn’t want to take the chance. She wore prosthetics in her bra, and no one saw her undressed now anyway. Her husband had walked out on her six weeks after she’d been diagnosed with cancer, which she’d been told was not unusual, but it had been a hell of a blow. He just couldn’t deal with what she was going through, and had started an affair with a woman in his office. It had been Carole who ultimately filed for divorce. Carole had gotten through it with the support of the medical staff at the breast clinic, her counselor, and her friends. Her husband had been a no-show for the entire event. He hadn’t even called her when she had the hysterectomy and the mastectomy. He just couldn’t deal with it. But Carole had, and she had come through the whole experience with flying colors, emotionally and medically, and now she had a clean bill of health.

Carole’s mother and older sister had both died of breast cancer, so she had been at high risk. But she intended to survive what she’d been through. Her sister had refused to have a mastectomy, which Carole thought made a difference, and her mother had been diagnosed too late. Thanks to annual mammograms since she was thirty, because of her history, they had detected hers early, at thirty-seven. She had just turned thirty-eight, and the good-looking cut of her dark brown hair, in a shoulder-length pageboy, was a very expensive wig she had bought at a theatrical hairdresser in New York. It had been worth every penny she spent. Her own hair had only just begun growing again, and was peach fuzz all over her head under the wig. Her peer counselor had told her about the theatrical wig store in New York, and had been invaluable to her in countless ways, particularly during the breakup of her marriage, and then the divorce. Her peer counselor’s husband had left her after she was diagnosed too. As Carole said, it had reduced her to nothing more than a statistic, and made her husband of five years seem pathetic. And her treatment had been an issue for him too, because he wanted to have children, and Carole no longer could. The whole experience with him had left her so disillusioned that she had no desire to even date, let alone get involved in a relationship. She never wanted to go through anything like it again. Surviving cancer was enough.

Despite grueling treatments and two major surgeries, Carole had managed to miss almost no work. Her boss in neurosurgery, and another in orthopedics, had been incredibly supportive and had adjusted her schedule to fit her medical needs. She was a psychologist specializing in young people recovering from trauma involving spinal cord injuries. She had a Ph.D. from Stanford and had done her internship there, and then came to work at Mass General, and she loved what she did. The kids and young adults she worked with were terrific, and continuing to stay active and engaged had gotten her through her own illness, and now it was behind her. But she had never really stopped living in the last year. She had gone to cultural events, museums, and movies, continued her work, and seen friends whenever she could. Everyone who knew her was impressed at how well she had come through it, in spite of the additional challenge of the divorce. Carole was a strong, cheerful person, with a positive attitude about life. And it was contagious in her work. She was able to infuse her patients with excitement about their lives, and a will to live, in spite of what they’d been through. She was a woman who practiced what she preached. And everyone at the breast clinic was happy to be celebrating her.

She was in great spirits when she arrived at her office two hours later than usual. She had warned her secretary she’d be late, to allow for time for the celebration they had planned for her. And best of all, she was cancer free. Her last tests had been immaculate.

“How was the party?” Janys, her secretary, asked her. She knew where Carole had been and was thrilled for her. Everyone had been rooting for her all year. Everybody loved Carole, and it was easy to see why.

“It was great,” Carole said happily, and glanced at the copy of her schedule on Janys’s desk. Carole was extremely organized and liked to make full use of her time. “What have I got this morning?”

“You have a meeting with Dr. Hammerfeld, about three new patients he has coming. But he’s running late. He’s with some people now.”

“One of my new patients?” she asked with interest, but Janys shook her head.

“This is just a consultation. A family from Denver. They’re on their way back there and admitting her to Craig,” Janys explained.

“It doesn’t get better than that,” Carole said with an approving look. “Why are they here?”

“Looking for a miracle, I think. It’s a T10 injury.”

“Complete or incomplete?” Carole asked.

“Complete,” Janys said with a serious look. She had seen Lily go into the doctor’s office, with Jennifer and her father. And Janys and Carole both knew that with a complete spinal cord injury, there would be no miracle. Dr. Hammerfeld was delivering the news at that moment, and Carole went to her office to return some calls. Dr. Hammerfeld hadn’t asked her to join them, as he wouldn’t be following the case. It was just a one-time meeting. And while Lily dressed in the examining room, he dealt the final blow to her father in his office.

“There’s nothing we can do,” he said solemnly, and Bill nodded, with a look of despair. He was used to hearing it by now. “What made you come here?” The tests were so conclusive that Bill’s visit didn’t make a lot of sense.

“To be honest, I really wasn’t sure about the neurosurgeon who did the surgery, and her diagnosis. I thought it was possible that she was wrong and made a mistake.” With that, the doctor looked at Lily’s chart again to see the surgeon’s name, frowned, and then looked back at Bill.

“You had one of the best neurosurgeons I know. In fact”—he said, with a small wintry smile—“she trained with me, although she didn’t do her residency here. She’s a very fine surgeon, and I’ve referred cases to her over the years.” Bill nodded—everyone had had high praise for Jessie. But the bottom line was that Lily was paraplegic and would never walk again. He would have gone to the devil himself if that could have helped. And the doctor could see how desperate Bill was, but reiterated that there was nothing they could do to help, and their focus had to be on rehabilitation now. Bill tried not to look as heartbroken as he was, when he left the doctor’s office. Hammerfeld had been his last hope, for now anyway. Now they had to go home, and start the long road to rehabilitation. Bill pretended to be cheerful, and got Lily into the car.

They went back to the hotel to check out, picked up their luggage, and he called Joe because he had promised he would, and told him what the doctor had said. Joe felt badly for him and he could hear how emotionally wrung-out Bill was. The surgeons they had consulted had destroyed his hope of Lily walking again. Joe gently reminded him how lucky they were that Lily was alive.

And two hours later they left for the airport, and took off for the four-hour flight to Denver. It was the end of a long, discouraging trip. It hadn’t gone the way he hoped, and Lily was tired of being examined and poked and prodded. All she wanted now was to go home, even though it was only for one night. And then she had to face a whole new environment again, and a hospital of a different kind. She was so tired after the day in Boston, and all the traveling they’d done before, that she fell asleep as soon as they took off, and Jennifer woke her as they were about to land. Lily opened her eyes with a start, smiled at her, and as soon as they were in the car, she texted Veronica. She had promised to come by that night. She texted Jeremy too, but he hadn’t answered her in several days. It was only eight o’clock in Denver when they landed, and Lily couldn’t wait to see Veronica, after two horrible months away.

They were almost at the house when Veronica answered Lily’s text and said she was having dinner with her parents, studying for midterms, and they wouldn’t let her go out, since her grades sucked, as usual. All she cared about was training for the Olympics, and she had never done well in school, unlike Lily, who had successfully managed both. Lily was disappointed when she got the message—she hadn’t seen Veronica for so long. She promised to come by the next day, but Lily answered that she would be at Craig the next day, which was why she had hoped she would come by that night, like old times. She had no idea what it would be like to have visitors at Craig, if she would have a roommate or not, and what the rules about visitors were. Veronica texted back that she’d come to see her at Craig soon, she just couldn’t get out tonight.

She still hadn’t heard from Jeremy—his texts had become more and more infrequent in recent weeks, and he had cooled off noticeably since the accident. And Veronica had hinted a couple of times that he was interested in someone else. She didn’t want Lily to be shocked when she got home. It hadn’t been a serious romance with Lily, but they’d had fun for the last six months, before the accident in Squaw. And Lily didn’t have many illusions that he’d be faithful to her while she was in rehab for four months, but he hadn’t broken up with her, so as far as she knew they were still dating, whatever that meant now. He was one of the best-looking and most popular boys on the Olympic downhill team, so she realized there was a possibility he might not stick around, but she hoped he would. She texted him again from the car but got no response.