Sara Tancredi unlocked the door to her apartment and slipped inside, closing it behind her with desperate relief. She tossed her purse absentmindedly onto the desk in the foyer and kicked off her shoes. With a nervous look through the transom glass to make sure she hadn't been followed, she limped wearily into her living room and fell into the easy chair by the fireplace. Closing her eyes, she sighed deeply.
Ever since the escape, she'd been frightened nearly out of her mind. Five of the seven prisoners who had been reported missing were men she had feared even when they were behind bars; now they were freely roaming the countryside. She had been mentally reviewing every moment she'd spent with them. She had been alone with all of them at one time or another in the infirmary while performing her duties as prison doctor. Had they ever been close enough to her purse or her desk to see the address on her license? Her checkbook? A stray letter? Sara shuddered and restlessly rose from the chair to check her front door locks. She knew she was being paranoid, but after the past week's events she couldn't stop herself.
The other two escaped prisoners were men who, if she could admit it to herself, she would sorely miss. The two brothers, one of them on death row, had captured her attention from the minute she'd met them. They were different. She found herself believing in them in spite of every instinct she'd carefully cultivated in her soul to protect herself from the trickery they appeared to practice. How many times had she caught Michael in a lie? How many times had he refused to answer a direct question? And Lincoln, his brother- she'd seen Lincoln committing murder on videotape and still she could not bring herself to believe it.
Sara began to pace the small, dark foyer of her apartment, unable to relax or stop the thoughts swirling in her mind, begging for answers. The last time she'd seen Michael had been almost a week ago, the night before the escape. Once again, the scene popped uninvited into her mind.
He'd come to the infirmary for his shot. The routine was second nature to them both; Michael jumped agilely onto the edge of the exam table and waited with that infuriating, totally gorgeous grin on his full lips. She brought the testing equipment and insulin to him on a tray. With deliberate professionalism and a forced air of detachment, she had begun swabbing his finger for the required blood test when he had begun talking in a low voice, almost a whisper.
"Sara, I need to tell you the truth." She froze and fastened her full attention on him. Intuitively she knew that this was the truth she'd been waiting to learn ever since she'd met him. Something akin to pain gripped her stomach and clutched at her heart.
"Lincoln and I, and others, are breaking out of here tomorrow night."
His look was incredible. Half fright, half audacious dare, it was both horrible and beautiful. Michael had just laid it all on the line. He was offering her everything: his trust, himself, his brother's future, even their lives. He sat waiting, not breathing, for her response.
Sara slowly sat down next to him on the gurney, very close to his side, and put a hand on his knee. She felt the bunched muscles under her fingers relax as the knowledge that she was still with him, still on his side, seeped into his consciousness.
"I don't want to know the details. But I'm afraid for you. They'll kill you all when you try. It can't be done."
"Yes, it can. Please, don't worry. Sara, the only reason I'm here is to break out my brother before he is executed. He's everything. He can't die. I won't let it happen. There's more, though, and I don't think you're going to like it."
"Dr. Tancredi, can we get this line moving please?" boomed out the voice of Sara's very efficient nurse who was suddenly standing in the doorway. Sara and Michael jumped apart and Sara fumbled with the syringe holding his insulin.
"I have so much to explain to you. I'll get in touch with you. Remember the corner of Rose and Jackson, at 5 P.M. Sara. Remember."
Within a few seconds, Michael was gone.
Of course Sara remembered. How could she forget? But that had been days ago. She got ready for bed and climbed in under the covers, willing herself to feel sleepy. But as she lay in bed wide awake, she realized it was going to be another long night.
The next day, and the next, followed the predictable pattern she had grown so accustomed to, with the exception of the continued fear she felt outside the prison walls. As she waited for something, anything, to happen, she had time to go over every second she'd ever spent with Michael Scofield. Sara came to two conclusions.
One, that he'd lied to her, and used her, a lot. She wasn't sure what to do with that.
"He's everything," Michael had blurted out in the infirmary that day. The only thing that mattered to Michael Scofield, she saw it now, was his mission to bust his brother out of jail. In his self-sacrificing world, it was his everything. She'd been a willing, albeit unaware, part of his master plan.
Two, that in spite of how he had apparently used her, in spite of how she couldn't be of any consequence to him, she was desperate to see him again. The thought of him being out of her life forever was too painful to face.
Hope remained regardless of the case against it. There were the little things that didn't fit his prime objective and made her wonder if he could, possibly, care for her in spite of the damning evidence against such sentiment. He'd given her sweet hand-made gifts; he'd asked her penetrating questions about herself and her life that nobody else had ever cared to ask. Maybe he was just really good at schmoozing her, but she just couldn't quite believe that all those soulful looks, all those whispered comments had been contrived. She'd patched up too many of his 'accidental' injuries not to have noticed how completely he'd leaned on her. He'd put himself at risk and come to rescue her during the riots. It all added up to something more than a man bent simply on springing his brother.
He had said he wanted to explain things to her. Was that just a way to soften the blow? He hadn't called yet, and it had been two weeks now. Why would he say that? And what did the corner of Rose and Jackson at 5 P.M. have to do with anything?
The looks, those intense blue eyes that made her feel weak- did he charm every female that came his way or was she right in thinking he'd been looking at her in particular- really looking?
Why couldn't she forget him? How she wished she could forget him! Sara looked up at the clock. It was quitting time, finally. She glanced over at the nurse's desk and stood up.
"I'm out of here," she announced tiredly.
"You sure you're okay? You seem burned out," the nurse responded. The woman reached for her own purse so the two could walk out to their cars together like they always did.
"I'm tired," Sara admitted, "after everything that's happened these last few weeks."
"You miss him," Katie observed.
"No! Well, yeah, I suppose. I'm just worried about him, that's all," Sara admitted quietly to her friend. They both had no illusions as to who they were talking about.
"Me too," the nurse admitted. "He had a way of growing on a person." Katie pointed at her car.
"There's me. See you Monday."
Sara nodded and waved goodbye. The drive home seemed long and grey. Sara decided to stop in front of her favorite coffee place to cheer herself with a latte. It only took a few minutes to get the hot drink and return to her car at the curb, but Sara instantly noticed the crumpled piece of paper under the windshield which hadn't been there when she'd entered the coffee shop. Hope, and its companion, worry, instantly engulfed her as she snatched the tiny rag from its spot.
It said "Tuesday."
Sara looked frantically up and down the busy street for anyone who might have left the note. They had to be close by. But she saw nothing out of the ordinary. Eventually giving up, she climbed into her car and drove home, unsatisfied, unsettled, and yet filled with irrepressible giddiness, at this new twist.
Tomorrow was Tuesday.