13
Work had been a respite since I started.
Well, okay, not Right when I started, as I was still having heart palpitations every time I walked into the hospital for the first month.
But as that faded, it was a space where I was no longer a tragic widow.
And there were sometimes whole hours when I was too busy to think about Harry or my circumstances.
And so, four days a week, for five hours at a time, Ruth was the least of my concerns. And when you factored in sleeping, well, that was almost half of the week when I didn’t have to think about her. And by that second Tuesday after she had arrived, I needed that break.
Okay, maybe work wasn’t a complete respite anymore.
“I’m so sorry, Mrs. ...” I glanced at the chart on the wall. “O’Connor.” I normally remembered patients’ names better too. Ruth was seeping into every corner of my life. This wasn’t me. It was a byproduct of living with an unwanted guest who had no intention of leaving.
“Are you new or something?” she asked me grumpily as I tried to mop up the spill. She would need a new gown.
“I’m not, actually. But I don’t typically fill water cups anymore.”
“You’d think you’d have enough practice at that,” she said, looking pointedly at my wedding ring.
“Well,” I said with a cheerfulness I certainly didn’t feel, “my children are old enough now to fill their own water glasses. And my husband passed. So I’m terribly sorry that I’m out of practice.”
The annoyance dropped from the bedridden woman’s face. “I didn’t—I’m sorry—I—”
“It’s okay,” I said, cutting her off. I shouldn’t have brought up Harry. What was wrong with me? “Really. Let me just get you a new gown, and you’ll be right as rain. My head was in the clouds, that’s all.”
I left the room and flagged down a candy striper and asked her to grab the gown and help Mrs. O’Connor change. Knowing me right now, I would mess that up too.
“Barb?” Donna called from the nursing station. “There’s a call for you.”
I was there in a flash. The only calls I ever got while working were when the kids got sick or injured at school.
“Mrs. Feldman speaking,” I said, taking the receiver from the nurse’s hand. “What happened? I can be there in fifteen minutes.”
“Be where?” Ruth asked.
I held the receiver away from my ear for a few seconds, looking at it as if a snake were inside. Then I heard my name, far away, and brought it back to my ear.
“Ruth,” I said through clenched teeth. Then I realized—the school would likely call the house first. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong,” she said, drawing the word out in a way that told me something was, in fact, very wrong.
“Ruth?”
“Well, there was a fire—a small one. But the firemen were quite nice and put it out easily.”
“A fire?”
“A small one.”
“Are you okay?”
“If I weren’t, I think I’d be arriving at the hospital, not calling you there.”
If I could have reached through the phone and strangled her with the cord, I would have. “What caught on fire?”
“Well, I’m not used to this electric stove.”
I know it’s strange to say I loved that stove, but goodness did I love that stove.
I knew every one of its quirks, from running fifteen degrees hot to the different sized burners for different sized pots.
The double oven with the countertop space next to the burners.
It was the first appliance that I ever selected for myself.
Harry had surprised me by bringing me to Sears to pick out a new one.
Granted, that was before the kids were born, when cooking elaborate meals was a hobby.
Standing in the department store though, I told Harry I had just been complaining and we didn’t really need anything new. He pulled me into his arms and told me he’d give me the moon if I wanted it.
Now, all these years later, I was standing in a hospital with tears in my eyes over a General Electric appliance.
I blinked rapidly, and the moisture in my eyes dissipated. “How bad is it?”
“The fire department said it could have been worse.”
“That didn’t answer my question.”
“We will need a new stove,” she said. “And probably need to repaint the wall by it. And maybe some new curtains.”
My jaw tightened at her use of the word we , and I exhaled loudly, thinking of all the things I would say to her if I could.
“At least the children weren’t home,” I said finally. “The stove isn’t salvageable?”
“The firemen didn’t think so.”
“But the house is okay?”
“Perfectly.”
I took a deep breath. It was a small loss. Barely a blip compared to what we had been through. And nothing lasted forever. But it wouldn’t have been a loss at all if Ruth had stayed home.
“I’ll leave work early and go pick out a new one,” I said, more thinking out loud.
It was only twelve thirty. There was a decent chance that we could have it replaced by the following day.
I would probably have to be there for the installation—I didn’t trust Ruth to not have them redo our whole kitchen.
And there was a set of new curtains that I had been eyeing but hadn’t yet bought as the old ones had nothing wrong with them.
I didn’t remember whom we had used to paint the children’s bedrooms—it was someone Harry had hired—but I was pretty sure Janet had used him as well and would know.
We could have this fixed by the end of the week.
“I can do it,” Ruth said. “You stay.”
“No,” I said firmly. “This is for my house. I want to choose it.”
“But I’m doing a lot of the cooking—”
“Ruth,” I said warningly this time. “This is my house.”
There was a pregnant pause. “Best get something for supper while you’re downtown as well,” she said finally.
I said I would worry about that later and hung up. I hated leaving early for a nonemergency, but I also needed to be able to feed my kids and wanted to still be able to pick them up from school. I lifted the receiver and dialed Dr. Harper’s office number.