John nodded, though he didn’t understand.
“Municipalities,” Osbourne said cagily. “Coffee?” John shook his head no. “Universities. Charitable organizations. Political campaigns. Jury consultants — I had a jury consultant call me the other day; frankly I’m not totally sure what they even do. Governmental agencies. So that where I find myself needing help just now is more in the area of long-term planning, and also in the area of people skills. Meeting people, potential clients, charming them, learning from them, heading off their complaints, forming relationships. This is an area where I think you’d excel. So, John, I’d like to offer you a promotion. I don’t know what to call it, vice president, senior executive vice president, rear admiral, we can call it whatever the hell you like. The point is I want you working more closely with me. I have a vision, and I think you share that vision. I want you by my right hand, so to speak: my liaison to the outside world.”
John collected himself and accepted the offer with all the gratitude he could display. When he went down to the pool room, and told the others the news about how he had just been kicked upstairs, there was no resentment at all — the happiness was unanimous. Everyone liked John, for one thing; and ever since the first partnership benefits had kicked in, two months earlier, everyone was getting so rich that there was no inclination to care if one of them might suddenly start getting a little richer than the others.
ON MONDAY, ROGER Howe’s doctor — who spoke only to Molly now, since Kay never came to the hospital or returned phone messages, and who had begun to look at Molly, even as he diagnosed her father’s mental state, with a father’s furrowed brow and posture of concern — told her that there was no longer any compelling reason to keep Roger in the hospital, a fact his insurance company had called to the hospital’s attention. Roger’s physical recovery was complete; his emotional status was shaky but not so unstable that he could be held against his will, and he had lately been expressing his desire to return home to his family. Dr Kotlovitz thought he could be released as early as the weekend.
On Tuesday, Molly stood beside the phone in her parents’ bedroom and listened impassively as John left this message: “I’m coming out there. I don’t know if you’re still there. I don’t know your address, but I know what town, it’s a small town, everyone’s bound to know where you are. I don’t know whether to be angry or worried or what, but I can’t stand not knowing anymore. I’ll be there this weekend.”
That afternoon Molly sat on her childhood bed with the county Yellow Pages. After trying unsuccessfully to guess the pertinent euphemism — Child Services; Pregnancy Counseling; Family Planning — she called the local chapter of Planned Parenthood and got a list of abortionists in the greater Albany area. Later, when she made the short drive into town, she went to the bank — they were used to seeing her now — and withdrew, with one of the blank slips her mother had signed for her, two thousand dollars.
She opted for a smaller clinic, forty miles away in Canajoharie, thinking there would be no protesters there, and she was right. It wasn’t that she feared the protesters or the remorse they might try to fan in her over what she was doing; her only desire was to clear her own path of other people to as great a degree as possible. If she could have performed the procedure on herself, rather than have to endure the benign looks and remarks of a doctor and a nurse, she would have done it. She told the woman at the desk she had called yesterday to schedule a D and C. Without a word the woman passed through the window a clipboard with a form attached and a capless pen dangling from a string.
“Do I have to fill all this out?” Molly asked. Stout, unsurprisable, the woman in the window said, “Yes,” flatly, without looking up. Molly took a seat.
There was no one else in the waiting room. Molly filled out both sides of the form, giving a false name and address but otherwise answering truthfully. She checked the box to decline counseling. She checked the “Cash” box next to “Form of Payment.”
The first thing the woman did, when Molly handed the form back, was to ask for the cash in advance; Molly then waited for half an hour. On the table was an old issue of Glamour; she ignored it. The time passed slowly, with no distractions, and Molly struggled to make her mind a blank.
Finally she was shown to a changing room, just large enough to turn around in, and given a surgical gown. The room had two doors, one on each side; on one tiny wall was a Monet print, and on the wall across from it a sign read “Not Responsible for Personal Property.” That reminded her that she was carrying nearly eighteen hundred dollars in the pocket of her fatigues; she put it in the toe of her shoe and pushed the socks in after it. When she opened the door opposite the one she had entered, she was face to face with a nurse, and over her shoulder, sitting on a stool, was the doctor. The doctor held a clipboard in his hand. He smiled at her as if crossing the word “smile” off a list.
“Okay, Ms Wheelwright,” he said. “If you’ll lie down on the table, please.”
Molly saw where her feet were intended to go. The doctor sat on a small stool between her knees. At his feet was a small metal garbage can with a lid.
“Just to double-check, Ms Wheelwright, you’re here for a D and C, is that right?”
“Yes.”
“Your last period was when?”
“About nine weeks ago.”
“And you’ve declined an offer of counseling on the alternatives to abortion, is that right?”
“That’s right.”
“Okay then.” He signed something on the clipboard and handed it to the nurse, who placed it on the metal table behind her. She handed him a pair of rubber gloves.
It took about twenty minutes. The nurse had no duties to perform; it dawned on Molly that she was there because she was a woman, simply to bridge the gap in some mysterious way between Molly and the man who squinted as he scraped the inside of her uterus with what looked like some sort of sewing tool. The silence was broken only a few times by his saying, “Now you’ll feel a dull ache,” or “Now you may feel a sensation like cramping.” He was never wrong about it. Molly wasn’t aware of any particular look on her own face, but at one point, without warning, about halfway through the procedure, the nurse reached out and took her hand.
Jesus, thought Molly, struggling not to lose it; what a terrible idea. Let go of me.
She could hear the opening and closing of the garbage-can lid. “Garbage can” must not be the right term, she thought; but that’s what the opening and closing sounded like.
She had no idea how long such a thing should take, five minutes, an hour, so she was surprised when she heard the snapping sound as he removed his gloves. “And we’re through,” he said, not unkindly. Molly propped herself up on her elbows. “If you have any questions, Renee here can answer them, but if you need to talk to me for any reason, of course I’ll still be around.”
Renee took Molly’s elbow as they walked the few feet back to the changing room. “Now you may feel some cramping-type pain in the next few days,” Renee said intimately. “That’s normal. A little bleeding is also nothing to worry about. If you get a heavier flow, call us here, or go straight to the emergency room if you feel it’s necessary. Use a pad for the bleeding — no tampons. You may want to take it easy today and tomorrow.”
At the door, Renee handed Molly a piece of paper. “This is a prescription for some Tylenol with codeine. I’d advise you to fill it on the way home. With most people, especially as young as you, the pain isn’t that severe. But sometimes it is. Now,” she said as she closed the door, “you just take as long as you need to in here, to collect yourself. Nobody’s going to hurry you.” She closed the door.