“Could be worse. He’s gonna need a few stitches, though. We’ll numb him, sew him up, give him a tetanus shot. He’ll be all right.” She looked at Mimi, then at Lily. “The sewing part’s not pretty, though.
You can wait outside if you’re squeamish.”
Lily reached out to pat Mordecai’s big head. “I’ll stay, if it’s okay. Just in case he wants me here.”
“Sure.” Dr. Jack opened the refrigerator in the corner, which was full of medicine bottles. She selected a bottle and closed the door. “So, if you don’t mind me asking, how come you’re the one bringing Mordecai in? Big Ben or Jeanie usually brings him.”
Lily realized she hadn’t introduced herself. “I kind of. . . inherited Mordecai. I married Big Ben and Jeanie’s son, Benny Jack.”
“Benny Jack McGilly finally got married?” She squinted at a syringe as she filled it with medicine. “Huh.” She slipped the needle into a fold of Mordecai’s flesh. He didn’t even flinch.
“You’re good at that,” Lily said.
“I practiced that a lot in vet school ... giving shots so they wouldn’t hurt so much.” She scratched one of Mordecai’s ears. “Poor feller’s already hurting, no need for me to make it worse. Actually, y’all are lucky I was in this afternoon. I got called out to the Weaver farm at four o’ clock this mornin’ to help a cow in calf. I was so beat at lunch today I thought about not coming back to the office this afternoon. I do large animal calls in the mornin’, small animals in the afternoon.” She gave Mordecai another affectionate scratch. “Not that you’d really call ole Mordy here a small animal.”
Dr. Jack’s grin was contagious, and Lily felt herself miling, too. “So do any of the local farmers act surprised when they see the vet’s a woman?”
“Aah, I reckon they’d be surprised if it was any other woman, but my daddy was the county vet before me, and I used to go out with him on farm calls when I wasn’t any bigger than a minute. Daddy raised me by himself, so he never wanted to leave me alone in the house when he took off in the middle of the night to help birth a colt or somethin’. So I always went with him. I was helping deliver farm babies when I was practically a baby myself. People just always figured I’d take over Daddy’s practice when he retired.” She lightly touched Mordecai’s wounded foot. “He’s numb. Time to sew him up. ’Scuse me if I don’t talk during this part.”
Dr. Jack’s big hands worked deftly, neatly stitching together Mordecai’s torn flesh. Mimi was getting restless, so Lily walked her around the exam room, pointing out the posters of puppies and kittens.
“Okay,” Dr. Jack said, “one more shot, and ole Mordy’ll be good to go.” She looked down at Mimi as she went to retrieve more medicine from the refrigerator. “Is little doll face there Benny Jack’s?”
“Uh-huh,” Lily said, reminding herself to preserve the myth.
“Well, whaddaya know?” Dr. Jack cackled. “I wouldn’ta thought he had it in him.” Her smile faded. “I didn’t mean anything by that. I just meant —”
Lily smiled. “I think I know what you meant.”
Their eyes locked for a moment, in the straight-forward way that only gay people look at each other. I know what she is, Lily thought, but she’s still trying to figure out what the hell I am ... trying to reconcile the gaydar with the husband and baby.
Dr. Jack broke her gaze, rifled through a drawer, and produced a roll of bandages. “You’ll need to change his bandage in the mornin’. Be sure to check that there’s not any unusual discharge from the wound. If there is, call the office right away. He’ll probably be in some pain today and tomorrow ... you can slip in an aspirin in some hamburger meat, and that oughta help. If he seems to be doing okay, call me at the end of the week just to let me know how he’s healing up. We can also set up an appointment to take out the stitches.”
Their facades were back in place: professional and appropriately distant. “Thank you, doctor.”
“I’ll walk you out.” Dr. Jack lifted Mordecai down from the table and gently held his collar as he bobbled, three-legged, down the hall.
“Okay,” Dr. Jack said, as she sorted things out at the front desk, “Mordecai, you get a Milk-Bone.
Mimi, you get a lollipop, and you, Mrs. McGilly”— she banded a computer printout to Lily — “get the bill.”
Lily smiled. “Gee, thanks.”
Dr. Jack returned her grin. “My pleasure, Mrs. McGilly.”
As she wrote the check, Lily marveled at the direction her life was taking. She never thought she’d live to hear a butch — or anyone — call her “Mrs.” anything.
After Lily finally agreed to let Mordecai in bed with her, he dropped off in a fitful sleep. Lying awake while Mordecai snored beside her and Ben snored in the next room, Lily had her first moment of enlightenment since Charlotte’s death.
She was thinking about the story Dr. Jack told, about going with her father on vet calls when she was a little girl. There was a picture book in that story —a picture book about farm animals, so simple that even very young children like Mimi could enjoy it. But the pictures of the farm animals could be framed by the story of the little girl and her father — and how the little girl wants to grow up to be a vet.
Lily had never written a book for such young children before, but she liked the idea of writing something for Mimi. It would be a lasting gift for her daughter — even if things in the courtroom didn’t work out.
She wanted to draw the animals in accurate detail, something along the lines of Garth Williams’
wonderful illustrations for Charlotte’s Web, but she hadn’t been to a farm since a field trip in first grade.
Lily wondered if Dr. Jack might agree to let her go along on a few farm calls, so she could sit back at a safe distance and sketch the animals. She would ask her on Friday, she decided, when she called about Mordecai.