The next morning, they were both waiting in a hospital corridor. None said anything, only looked at the tips of their feet.
"What will happen with Timothy?" She asked, without looking up.
"I was going to ask in Nonnatus if it is very inconvenient to have him there until the holidays, so he can go to school. Then he will go with his grandmother."
"We'll be..." She sighed, shaking her head. "They'll be happy to have him."
He gave a sad giggle.
"Would you like to be there with him too, would not you?"
"I can't lie, Tim is a charming little one. And so smart!"
And I could be his mother, she thought. But she bit her tongue before the words dared to come out.
A nurse said their names and immediately separated them, each one into a different room. When they met again, a couple of hours of exams and questions had passed. Both had their results in envelopes. Sister Bernadette was going to propose to see them together, like opening a fortune cookie, but the doctor opened his envelope, read quickly and put everything away again. She did not dare to ask, but fleetingly she saw that it was not so serious TB, but that it progressed quickly and insistently. She opened her own envelope and found that her was a little lighter. She immediately raised a prayer, asking him to recover as soon as possible, even at her expense.
She followed him, he was walking almost dragging his feet towards the hospital exit.
"Doctor..." He turned to see her. Poor girl, she had the living mark of anguish in her face. She must be terribly scared.
"Yes?"
"What should we do now?"
Get married. He laughed at his stupidity and she looked at him bewildered. Clearing his throat and looking back to the exit, he said:
"I'll drive you to Nonnatus to take whatever you need for the sanitarium, you must go as soon as possible. I…will go home."
"But you will not go to any sanatorium?"
He decided to ignore the question. If he said yes, that he would go to the same as her, she would simply run away. He still did not explain how she accepted being so close to him after what he had done.
Bernadette shrugged when he did not answer, just followed him to the car. He opened her door, and she sat next to him. Together they had been in many difficult situations, some that they could solve triumphantly and others in which everything got out of hand and they could do nothing, just try to accept it. However, she had never seen him so defeated. The man beside her did not look like Dr. Turner and he clung to the steering wheel and lowered his head in an attempt to contain tears. She extended her hand a little to rest it on his back, but closed it and put it back in its place.
"I must tell Tim." She heard him say. "How do I tell this to him?"
"Do you want me to do that? I can ... explain to him a little. Maybe he gets angry with you and thinks it's your fault to take care of the patients. Children have a great imagination and he can think of anything."
"The first thing he will do is get angry. No, no. "He shook his head, still low. Then he raised it and ran his hands over his face.
"No, I must tell him. I was the one who told him that his mother would die, and he claimed that I did nothing to cure her. This I must also say, and endure his complaints. God, he is only a child, how can he assimilate everything? Why does your God allow this?"
He said it without anger, with a terrible resignation. She would have preferred that he beat the car with his fists until he destroyed it, before this question without hope. Once she told him that she wanted that faith make a difference, and now she believed it too. Having faith was not serving her at all.
At last she dared to reach out and put her hand on his shoulder, immediately he seemed to relax.
"I'm sorry, I should not have said that. And I should not burden you with these things, you are in the same situation."
"I'm not. I don't have anyone who depends on me."
"That's what you believe."
Before she could process his response, the car was already on its way to Nonnatus. She clenched her lips to say nothing more and to keep them from shaking, but tears stung to come out. The doctor's question was true, why did God allow this?
/
"Tim?"
The boy ignored him completely, too busy to recreate a battle of airplanes. He called again, this time the boy looked at him but continued with his game. Exasperated, he took the toy from the boy's hand.
"Why you do that?!" He screamed indignantly. "I'm playing with this, give it to me!"
"I need to talk with you."
"Not now."
"Tim, enough. It is something serious."
The boy threw another of his planes to the ground and dropped into a chair, arms crossed. Patrick wondered when his son was so upset about being close to his father. Probably since he spent more time in the company of anyone, or on the street, than with him.
"There is one thing I must tell you. " The boy pretended to fall asleep. "Tim, stop, pay attention."
He settled himself better in the chair, but he still did not look at his father.
"You're going to...spend some time in Nonnatus."
"I'm there almost every afternoon."
"I know, but this will be a little more permanent. You are going to live there. It'll be until school ends, you know, just a couple of weeks and then you'll go with Granny Parker."
"Are you going to leave me for good?"
The words hurt him more than the diagnosis he had just received at the hospital. He swallowed.
"I never leave you, son. It's just ...I'm sick."
The boy raised his eyes.
"Like mom?"
"No, no so much."
"But you're going to die."
"Of course not." He tried a smile, but only left a grimace that Tim did not believe.
"Yes, you're going to die like her. " He tapped one of the table's legs. "Why do you spend the day outside curing everyone and you could not cure Mom and now neither can you? You are a fiasco!"
He stood up, but Patrick did too and took him by the elbow.
"Tim, listen to me." He knelt down and saw his son's angry tears. "I understand you're furious, but it will only be for a while. You know, doctors treat sick people and sometimes they get contagious. I will go to a place called sanatorium, I will be there until it heals me."
"And can I visit you?"
"No I don´t think so." He sighed. "They're not going to let kids come in. "But you can write to me. Look, I'll write the address and you can write as many times as you want. You will not remember me, you know that in Nonnatus nobody gets bored, there is always fun."
"I never get bored with Sister Bernadette."
And there was the last thing. Again he tried to smile, but his son was very observant, sometimes for his own evil.
"What's wrong with her?" He asked, distrustful.
"She will not be there. She is also sick."
"You could not cure her either? Not herself? Medicine stinks!"
"Don´t say that. Thanks to the Medicine, we will both be cured and we will be here soon, you will not notice that we left. Also, soon Chummy and Sgt. Noakes will come, and they will live in Nonnatus as well. You will not be the only man in the house."
Tim seemed unconvinced, but nodded.
"Can I visit Sister Bernadette?"
Patrick stood up, looked at the ceiling for answers. His son loved that woman, and that made things twice as painful.
"No, son. She will be in the same place as me."
"Great, so she will not feel alone." Tim began to gather his airplanes, as if nothing had happened.
"You care more about her than about me, do not you?"
"Sure, she's better."
He laughed for the first time in those two days. Tim played again, occasionally asking when he should move, if he would be forced to spend time with Trixie and his boyfriends stories, or if Sister Evangelina would punish him for everything. Once, Sister Bernadette had told him that children were resilient. Of course, she had not been wrong. His son was the living image of that.
/
She carefully closed her suitcase and sat on the bed. She looked at the wooden cross on the wall, but no prayer or request came out of her mouth. Her mind was too blurry and she could not put it in order.
She heard taps on the door and the kind face of Sister Julienne appeared.
"Do you have everything?"
"Yes. I don't have so many things to carry."
Sister Julienne smiled and sat next to her.
"Fred insisted on taking you, but Dr. Turner refused. If you write to us, I would like you to tell me how he is doing."
"Of course I will write, but how can I know how he is?"
"I thought so, you will be in the same place..."
"We will be in the same sanatorium?"
"It is the only hospital with free places. You will not be surrounded by men, stay calm." She smiled at her, but Sister Bernadette could not calm down. Not only were they sick but they would spend months together in the same place. She looked at the wooden cross and it seemed that even the Christ mocked her.
"I didn't know it." She said at last.
"Everything will be fine, do you want us to pray together?" Sister Julienne took her hands, but she gently withdrew them.
"I don't know, I can't even say a word"
"I understand. I'll leave you alone, when Dr. Turner is here I'll call you."
/
It was a short farewell, short enough for no one to shed a tear. She did not want it, she did not want pity or compassion from anyone.
She sat next to him, felt he was looking at her, but kept her eyes straight ahead. She wanted to slap him for not telling her they would go to the same sanatorium.
The trip through the countryside reassured her. It had been a long time since she saw other things that were dirty buildings with clothes drying everywhere, and garbage in the streets mixed with children running.
She spent an hour of absolute silence and saw a very well-kept park, and in the background an elegant building. It did not look like a hospital.
Soon they got out of the car and he handed her the suitcase. She felt a slight touch of his fingers.
"The triple treatment can be miraculous."
Of course she knew it. She had seen it many times operate in almost extreme cases, but like any treatment, it also failed.
He only said it for saying something and she knew it. She felt a little proud to know him quite well. A small smile escaped her when she looked at him and confirmed her theory.
"Thank you Doctor. You've been …more than kind."
And that was it. She would also have liked to say something more, but she could not, and she did not dare.
/
They walked quickly towards the entrance. She was ahead, he could see that she had squared shoulders and faced this with integrity. What had happened when he said that stupidity about triple treatment? He did not know, but he wanted to say something more than that obviousness she already knew because she was one of the best nurses in all of England.
And yet, she gave him that strange little smile and he knew that she had realized everything. He was too fool to hide it.
Bernadette was received by a nurse full of smiles, he, on the other hand, by a doctor who had not seen for a long time and with whom he did not have the best of relationships. She had to go to the west wing, and he, to the east. Before they were separated, who knows for how long, he looked back and saw only one last flash of the blue habit and the door closing behind her.
The doctor accompanied him to his room, explaining things he already knew. He tried not to roll his eyes, a habit that Tim had to express boredom.
He stayed in a small but cozy room. He opened his suitcase and began to store the clothes in the closet. Carefully he put a drawing of Tim on the wall and on the bedside table he arranged some books and a picture of his son.
Then he lay down on the bed, with his arms behind his head looking at the ceiling, and began to think about her. Would her room also be like that? Today it was cloudy, but on better days and according to his calculations, the sun would give the whole afternoon in the west part of the building. That would do her good, helping her improve soon. Sighing, he thought of his colleague and apathetic doctor. Would she also be cared for by that specimen, or would she always have the kind nurse who received her? At this time, would she also be arranging her clothes in the closet? Did she have more clothes than her habit? Would she have books, pictures, drawings? Would she also be in bed, thinking about him, or would she be praying? He ran his hands over his face and grabbed a pillow from the bed to toss it across the room. Of course she would be praying. There was no place in her mind for him.