Four days later, Robert and Erin drove to her house for what would be the
last time. She had the signed purchase agreement in her purse, and was
prepared to hand over the keys to the new tenants. Robert parked the car
at the end of the drive and followed her inside. He could see her eyes
misting over as she moved through the empty rooms. He moved quietly behind
her. "Feeling nostalgic?"
She nodded. "I can still remember how great it felt the first time I set foot in here." She murmured softly. "My own place."
Robert moved up behind her, resting his chin on her shoulder. She turned and looked up at him. "I need something from you," she whispered hoarsely. She gestured to the empty rooms. "This is all the space that I've ever had in the world. The only place where I was in control." she trailed off remembering so much at once: Carter and Carol and Doug and Mark at her house warming, bringing Sophie home as a puppy, hanging the curtains her mother had made in the kitchen, installing her own ceiling fans. A tear slid from each eye. "I'm giving that up because I want to be with you, to share a space with you, to build something new. And I'm terrified." Robert opened his mouth to soothe her, but she would not be interrupted. "Because I have lost almost everything I ever had to hold on to. So I need you to promise me, promise me, that I won't lose you, too." She buried her face in his neck as he wrapped his arms around her. He held her for a long moment, waiting for the tide of her emotion to ebb. When it did, he lifted her face and kissed her lips.
"Now you listen to me, gorgeous. I have no intention of going anywhere. And trust me, if I do, it's only because you're coming with me. It may sound sexist, and maybe I am, but as far as I'm concerned, your ass is mine. Literally. Just like my car, my house, my summer place in Cozumel. You belong to me now."
Erin giggled a little. "You have a summer place in Cozumel?" She asked.
"Shut up." She realized he was deadly serious. "You said you could handle living with me the way I am? Well, that's the way I am. We work together and we communicate as equals, and I will always treat you like one." She cocked an eyebrow and he clarified himself. "I'll always try to treat you like one. But when you break this thing down to its pure Darwinian essence, that's it. You are mine. And I keep what's mine." His brown eyes, so dark and smoky, bore into hers. "So tell me right now, are you in, or are you out?"
At that moment, the front door swung open, and the realtor stepped in the front door. "Well, the Archers are here. Are we ready to turn over the keys?
Never breaking the intense gaze she and Robert shared, Erin fished the keys out of her pocket and tossed them to the woman. Then she kissed him with a depth and a passion that made Doris and the Archers flush to the roots of their hair.
"Okay. Take me home."
The month of December blew into Chicago with a cold and icy force. Erin was thrilled when the almanac predicted snow flurries for their wedding day, an attitude that was lost on Robert completely. He was looking forward to escaping the "frozen tundra" (as he put it) and winging his new bride to Mexico for sun, sand, and deep sea diving.
About a week before the wedding, Erin made her way through the over- crowded waiting area of the ER. She had just started her shift an hour before, but could already tell the day was going to be hell on wheels. She was headed for triage to collect her next patient, when a skinny young woman grabbed her arm. "Hey, lady! How long you gonna make my girl here wait?" Erin glanced at her, and at the young woman seated in chairs next to her. Both women were ragged-looking, wearing tattered winter coats over short skirts and bare legs. It was quite obvious that both were hookers. The belligerent one seemed fine, but to her credit, the girl still seated looked washed out, and a bit dizzy. Drunk, drugged up, flu.Erin could see all were a possibility. She wrested her arm gently away from the first woman's grasp. "I'm very sorry; I'm sure that triage is doing their best. You'll just have to wait your turn."
She had only stepped a few feet away, when a cry pierced the air. Erin turned, and saw the second young woman slump from her chair to the floor, her body jerking and flailing. "I need a gurney!" She called out, falling to her knees and rolling the woman on to her back. "She's seizing!" She snapped her fingers at the girls' friend. "You."
"Marissa." she supplied, looking frightened.
"Marissa, what's her name?"
"Jacinda."
Malik and Chuney arrived with a gurney and helped Erin lift Jacinda onto it. "Trauma one is open," Malik said, and Erin moved quickly in that direction. Once in the trauma room, the team went to work, setting up IV's and drawing samples as Erin barked out orders for tests. The seizure stopped, and Erin checked the girl's vital signs. "Heartbeat's irregular, what's her BP?"
"150 over 95."
Erin opened the patient's mouth. "No gag reflex. She's not protecting her airway." As she prepared to intubate, Chuney announced that the IV was in place. "30 of Topamax, IV push." Erin instructed as she withdrew the guide from the young woman's throat. "I'm in." She was about to give more instructions when the monitors began beeping wildly. "Dammit! She's seizing again!" She looked over the gurney to the young woman hovering by the door. "Marissa, is she using anything? Any kind of drug at all?"
"No way! Girlfriend's clean. She don't even take those pills no more."
"She used to take pills?" As Erin asked, Malik was already rummaging through the patient's purse. He pulled out a prescription bottle.
"Clorazepate," he announced.
"She's got epilepsy." Erin grimaced. "Get an EEG in here, page neuro, STAT!" She pressed her stethoscope to the girl's chest once more. "Come on, Jacinda, hang in there." To Marissa, she spoke as gently as possible. "Marissa, I need you to wait outside now."
"But."
"You've done everything you could to help her. Now you have to go so we can take care of her." Chuney broke away long enough to escort the shaking woman back to the waiting area.
They continued to work on the young woman for the next forty-five minutes, administering medication, even shocking her heart to keep it beating. But, when her body finally stopped it's twitching and jerking, the news was not good. The EEG was not registering any meaningful brain activity. "She's gone," Erin sighed heavily. "The part that made her human anyway." She snapped off her gloves and checked the life-support machines that were keeping the young woman's body viable and picked up the chart that held the results of her lab work. She flipped the pages as Malik headed for the door. "Her driver's license says she's an organ donor. I'll go call UNOS." Erin nodded, until something on the chart caught her eye.
"Hang on a second, Malik." She looked closer. "Oh, damn," she sighed heavily. "Hold off on making that call, and bring me a portable ultrasound." Malik looked at her curiously.
"Icon is positive." Erin sighed again. "She's pregnant."
The ultrasound confirmed it. "Looks like about nine weeks," Erin mused sadly, listening to the whoosh of the tiny heartbeat. Chuney shook her head. "So now what do we do?"
Erin looked utterly flummoxed. "I have no idea." She switched off the sonogram and straightened Jacinda's drape. "Her girlfriend still out there?" Chuney nodded. Erin pressed her fingers to her temples. "Give me a few minutes. I'll be right back." She walked out to the waiting room and found the young woman who had come in with her patient. "Marissa, I'm Dr. Windsor. Sorry I didn't tell you that earlier." The girl stared up at her blankly. Erin sat down next to her. "I need to ask you a couple of questions. Jacinda.well.she wasn't married, was she?" Marissa shook her head. "Did she have a steady boyfriend?"
"Does it look to you like we do a lot of going steady?" The girl snapped.
Erin continued gently. "So.she was a prostitute." Marissa nodded. "Well, did she have a favorite client? Someone she may have seen more of than the others?"
Marissa shook her head. "Naw, nothin' like that."
"Okay," Erin exhaled slowly. "What about family?"
"Her mom and dad's in Philly. Sent her money a couple of times."
"Do you have any idea how I could get in touch with them?"
Marissa's face suddenly changed. "When you gonna let her out of there?"
Erin bowed her head. "Marissa, did you know Jacinda had epilepsy?" The girl shook her head once more. "Well, she did. Those pills she quit taking? They were meant to prevent her from having seizures. When she stopped taking them, the seizures broke through. We were unable to stop them before." she took a breath. "Before Jacinda suffered irreparable, permanent brain damage."
"She dead?" The young woman's face paled.
"Her brain is, yes. There are some decisions to be made, and I really need to speak with Jacinda's parents. Can you help me please?"
Marissa nodded numbly, and Erin helped her to her feet. They moved into the lounge and closed the door.
When Erin returned to the trauma room, she was surprised to find Robert, standing over the gurney and making notes on the chart. "What are you doing here?" She was glad to see him, and stood close to him, letting her shoulder brush his.
"Oh, just wondering why you've got this wonderfully preserved organ farm here and neither UNOS or the transplant coordinator have been notified. We should be preparing for the harvest, my love."
Erin slipped her hands into her pockets. "I just spent fifteen minutes trying to get her parents on the phone in Philadelphia, with no luck. I figured they needed to be informed of the situation. I'm guessing I'll hear from them after five."
"Well, that's awful considerate of you, but this girl is twenty-two years old and a signed donor. I don't see what her parents have to do with that at all."
Erin's face clouded. "Robert, you are aware that she's pregnant."
"Ye-eah, and?"
"If you take her upstairs for harvest, the fetus will abort from the trauma."
"That's how it works, yes." His voice was not unkind.
"Don't you think her parents should be given an opportunity to weigh in with their opinion?" Erin was stunned.
"Not really, no."
"Robert!" Erin was taken aback. "This is their grandchild we're talking about."
"No, this is the fetus implanted in their runaway daughter by some Anonymous John who probably only gave her twenty bucks in return for serving as his sperm receptacle."
"That's not the point!" She insisted hotly.
"That is the point. This girl was living on the streets, selling her body to strangers. How can you even be sure that she knew she was pregnant?"
"Look at her lab report, Robert." She flipped angrily through the papers.
"Yeah, yeah, I know. No crack, no heroine."
"No drugs at all! Not clorazepate, not diazepam, not Dilantin, no AED's at all!" Erin took a breath. "She quit taking her meds because she thought they would hurt the baby. Which says to me that she intended to keep it."
"Oh, you know that for a fact, do you?" Robert crossed his arms over his chest. "What, did she sit up in the middle of her brain frying and say, 'Oh, by the way, please don't give me any drugs or shoot any x-rays because there's a stork in my future'?"
"I think it's a safe assumption." Erin insisted.
"No, here's a safe assumption." Robert's voice went deadly soft. "You try and drag her parents into this and you are going to be making a tragic mistake. They already had to live through their child taking off and destroying her life. Now you want them to entertain the idea of allowing a reminder of their daughter's reckless behavior into their lives for the next eighteen years?"
Erin glared at him angrily. "It's a chance for them to hold on to a living, breathing piece of her."
"You don't know that. You don't even know if that's a viable fetus."
"It has a strong, steady heartbeat." Erin spat.
"Yeah, and maybe brain damage or birth defects, maybe even FAS. Your little 'Clean Queen' had a BAL of .12. Even if the fetus were healthy now, it could still abort from the trauma of what just happened anytime within the next thirty-six hours."
"And you don't even think we should wait and see?" Erin was furious.
"No, I don't think we should turn this girl into a human incubator. And if we do things my way, her parents get to live with her legacy being the saved lives of the people who received her organs, not the bastard child of some cheap and meaningless fifteen-minute romp in the back seat of a car." At that moment, two members of the transplant team walked briskly into the room. "Here she is, boys." Robert greeted them "Let's roll."
Erin suddenly grabbed the bedrail. "I'm not signing her out to you."
Robert looked at her, tight lipped. "I don't need you to. You have lost all professional perspective in regards to this patient and I am relieving you of her care."
"You arrogant bastard," Erin began angrily.
"And if you don't watch that mouth of yours, I'll relieve you of the rest of your duties as well!" Robert roared, cutting her off. "Last I checked, I was still Chief of Staff, and your boss!"
"Oh, yes," Erin hissed. "God forbid anyone disagree with the Great Rocket Romano."
"Sign over your patients and get the hell out of here." Robert commanded. Incensed, but not surprised, Erin threw Jacinda's chart at him. It landed at his feet with a clatter, and she stalked angrily from the room. Robert watched her go, his jaw clenched in fury. Then he noticed the two men flanking the bed, watching him in muted disbelief. "What the hell are you staring at? Get your asses upstairs!"
Robert supervised the harvesting of Jacinda's organs with quiet authority, pacing the room and casting glances over the other surgeon's shoulders. He was still reeling a bit from his argument with Erin, but his anger was tempered considerably when he heard a nurse announce softly that the fetus had indeed aborted. He took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. "All right, people. Let's keep our heads in the game." He left the OR four hours later, exhausted, his left arm throbbing with fatigue. He showered in the locker room and dressed slowly. Finally, he collected his things and headed home.
Her car was in the driveway, but the house was dark when he arrived. He trudged slowly up the walk and entered, closing and locking the door behind him. He made his way to his study, where he dropped his valise and poured himself a drink. He savored the burn in his throat for a moment, then walked out into the hall. He could hear movement from upstairs, and he began the climb.
The bed was empty, but the sheets were tousled, as if she'd tried to sleep but couldn't. The door to the master bathroom was open a crack, and he could smell steaming lilac. He crossed the room and nudged the door open wider.
Erin was in the huge garden tub, buried in bubbles up to her ears. Her auburn hair was piled on top of her head, save for a few damp tendrils that clung to her temples and neck. She was leaning against the porcelain, eyes closed. Robert leaned quietly against the sink, watching her. After a moment, she sensed his presence and opened her eyes. They were red- rimmed, but dry. "Hey, gorgeous," Robert breathed softly. "You still talking to me?"
"Am I still suspended?"
"Look, if you're expecting me to apologize."
"No," she shook her head, to his surprise. "You were right. I did lose perspective." Tears welled up in her eyes, and she blinked them away. "I just thought, if they could have something, some piece of her to hold on to.that they wouldn't be left with nothing. That they would have something that could make them, I don't know, not so alone." Robert knelt next to the tub and put his arms around her, never minding the water that soaked into his shirt. He held her for a moment before speaking. "This isn't about that girl, or her parents, is it? This is about you."
She pulled away from him gently and wiped her eyes. "All this wedding and honeymoon planning, selling the house, moving in here.I've been so happy. But I guess it never hit me until tonight that I've been doing it all alone."
"What am I chopped liver?" Robert groused gently.
Erin giggled a little. "Sorry, honey, but in this case, you don't count."
"I know, I know." He rested his chin on the edge of the tub. "I'm just the groom."
"All I could think about were the things that her folks would never see, never be a part of. Like mine." She sobbed a little. Robert took her face in his hands, forcing her eyes to meet his.
"You think they aren't a part of all this?" He asked gently. "You think they aren't here right now, in this room? You think I can't see them, looking out at me through your eyes? Telling me to get the hell away from their naked, wet daughter until after the wedding?" Erin laughed and he kissed her forehead. "Trust me, baby, they're here." He brushed his fingers over the flesh above her heart. "They're right here." She kissed him warmly and hugged him once more.
"I'm sorry for the way I spoke to you," she said quietly.
"You should be," he replied simply . She raised an eyebrow. "I can't guarantee it won't happen again."
"Then I'll just suspend you again." He leaned in and slipped his tongue between her lips. Erin giggled against his mouth as she realized he was quickly shedding his clothing. "Watch this, dad," he mumbled as he slipped into the water with her.
She nodded. "I can still remember how great it felt the first time I set foot in here." She murmured softly. "My own place."
Robert moved up behind her, resting his chin on her shoulder. She turned and looked up at him. "I need something from you," she whispered hoarsely. She gestured to the empty rooms. "This is all the space that I've ever had in the world. The only place where I was in control." she trailed off remembering so much at once: Carter and Carol and Doug and Mark at her house warming, bringing Sophie home as a puppy, hanging the curtains her mother had made in the kitchen, installing her own ceiling fans. A tear slid from each eye. "I'm giving that up because I want to be with you, to share a space with you, to build something new. And I'm terrified." Robert opened his mouth to soothe her, but she would not be interrupted. "Because I have lost almost everything I ever had to hold on to. So I need you to promise me, promise me, that I won't lose you, too." She buried her face in his neck as he wrapped his arms around her. He held her for a long moment, waiting for the tide of her emotion to ebb. When it did, he lifted her face and kissed her lips.
"Now you listen to me, gorgeous. I have no intention of going anywhere. And trust me, if I do, it's only because you're coming with me. It may sound sexist, and maybe I am, but as far as I'm concerned, your ass is mine. Literally. Just like my car, my house, my summer place in Cozumel. You belong to me now."
Erin giggled a little. "You have a summer place in Cozumel?" She asked.
"Shut up." She realized he was deadly serious. "You said you could handle living with me the way I am? Well, that's the way I am. We work together and we communicate as equals, and I will always treat you like one." She cocked an eyebrow and he clarified himself. "I'll always try to treat you like one. But when you break this thing down to its pure Darwinian essence, that's it. You are mine. And I keep what's mine." His brown eyes, so dark and smoky, bore into hers. "So tell me right now, are you in, or are you out?"
At that moment, the front door swung open, and the realtor stepped in the front door. "Well, the Archers are here. Are we ready to turn over the keys?
Never breaking the intense gaze she and Robert shared, Erin fished the keys out of her pocket and tossed them to the woman. Then she kissed him with a depth and a passion that made Doris and the Archers flush to the roots of their hair.
"Okay. Take me home."
The month of December blew into Chicago with a cold and icy force. Erin was thrilled when the almanac predicted snow flurries for their wedding day, an attitude that was lost on Robert completely. He was looking forward to escaping the "frozen tundra" (as he put it) and winging his new bride to Mexico for sun, sand, and deep sea diving.
About a week before the wedding, Erin made her way through the over- crowded waiting area of the ER. She had just started her shift an hour before, but could already tell the day was going to be hell on wheels. She was headed for triage to collect her next patient, when a skinny young woman grabbed her arm. "Hey, lady! How long you gonna make my girl here wait?" Erin glanced at her, and at the young woman seated in chairs next to her. Both women were ragged-looking, wearing tattered winter coats over short skirts and bare legs. It was quite obvious that both were hookers. The belligerent one seemed fine, but to her credit, the girl still seated looked washed out, and a bit dizzy. Drunk, drugged up, flu.Erin could see all were a possibility. She wrested her arm gently away from the first woman's grasp. "I'm very sorry; I'm sure that triage is doing their best. You'll just have to wait your turn."
She had only stepped a few feet away, when a cry pierced the air. Erin turned, and saw the second young woman slump from her chair to the floor, her body jerking and flailing. "I need a gurney!" She called out, falling to her knees and rolling the woman on to her back. "She's seizing!" She snapped her fingers at the girls' friend. "You."
"Marissa." she supplied, looking frightened.
"Marissa, what's her name?"
"Jacinda."
Malik and Chuney arrived with a gurney and helped Erin lift Jacinda onto it. "Trauma one is open," Malik said, and Erin moved quickly in that direction. Once in the trauma room, the team went to work, setting up IV's and drawing samples as Erin barked out orders for tests. The seizure stopped, and Erin checked the girl's vital signs. "Heartbeat's irregular, what's her BP?"
"150 over 95."
Erin opened the patient's mouth. "No gag reflex. She's not protecting her airway." As she prepared to intubate, Chuney announced that the IV was in place. "30 of Topamax, IV push." Erin instructed as she withdrew the guide from the young woman's throat. "I'm in." She was about to give more instructions when the monitors began beeping wildly. "Dammit! She's seizing again!" She looked over the gurney to the young woman hovering by the door. "Marissa, is she using anything? Any kind of drug at all?"
"No way! Girlfriend's clean. She don't even take those pills no more."
"She used to take pills?" As Erin asked, Malik was already rummaging through the patient's purse. He pulled out a prescription bottle.
"Clorazepate," he announced.
"She's got epilepsy." Erin grimaced. "Get an EEG in here, page neuro, STAT!" She pressed her stethoscope to the girl's chest once more. "Come on, Jacinda, hang in there." To Marissa, she spoke as gently as possible. "Marissa, I need you to wait outside now."
"But."
"You've done everything you could to help her. Now you have to go so we can take care of her." Chuney broke away long enough to escort the shaking woman back to the waiting area.
They continued to work on the young woman for the next forty-five minutes, administering medication, even shocking her heart to keep it beating. But, when her body finally stopped it's twitching and jerking, the news was not good. The EEG was not registering any meaningful brain activity. "She's gone," Erin sighed heavily. "The part that made her human anyway." She snapped off her gloves and checked the life-support machines that were keeping the young woman's body viable and picked up the chart that held the results of her lab work. She flipped the pages as Malik headed for the door. "Her driver's license says she's an organ donor. I'll go call UNOS." Erin nodded, until something on the chart caught her eye.
"Hang on a second, Malik." She looked closer. "Oh, damn," she sighed heavily. "Hold off on making that call, and bring me a portable ultrasound." Malik looked at her curiously.
"Icon is positive." Erin sighed again. "She's pregnant."
The ultrasound confirmed it. "Looks like about nine weeks," Erin mused sadly, listening to the whoosh of the tiny heartbeat. Chuney shook her head. "So now what do we do?"
Erin looked utterly flummoxed. "I have no idea." She switched off the sonogram and straightened Jacinda's drape. "Her girlfriend still out there?" Chuney nodded. Erin pressed her fingers to her temples. "Give me a few minutes. I'll be right back." She walked out to the waiting room and found the young woman who had come in with her patient. "Marissa, I'm Dr. Windsor. Sorry I didn't tell you that earlier." The girl stared up at her blankly. Erin sat down next to her. "I need to ask you a couple of questions. Jacinda.well.she wasn't married, was she?" Marissa shook her head. "Did she have a steady boyfriend?"
"Does it look to you like we do a lot of going steady?" The girl snapped.
Erin continued gently. "So.she was a prostitute." Marissa nodded. "Well, did she have a favorite client? Someone she may have seen more of than the others?"
Marissa shook her head. "Naw, nothin' like that."
"Okay," Erin exhaled slowly. "What about family?"
"Her mom and dad's in Philly. Sent her money a couple of times."
"Do you have any idea how I could get in touch with them?"
Marissa's face suddenly changed. "When you gonna let her out of there?"
Erin bowed her head. "Marissa, did you know Jacinda had epilepsy?" The girl shook her head once more. "Well, she did. Those pills she quit taking? They were meant to prevent her from having seizures. When she stopped taking them, the seizures broke through. We were unable to stop them before." she took a breath. "Before Jacinda suffered irreparable, permanent brain damage."
"She dead?" The young woman's face paled.
"Her brain is, yes. There are some decisions to be made, and I really need to speak with Jacinda's parents. Can you help me please?"
Marissa nodded numbly, and Erin helped her to her feet. They moved into the lounge and closed the door.
When Erin returned to the trauma room, she was surprised to find Robert, standing over the gurney and making notes on the chart. "What are you doing here?" She was glad to see him, and stood close to him, letting her shoulder brush his.
"Oh, just wondering why you've got this wonderfully preserved organ farm here and neither UNOS or the transplant coordinator have been notified. We should be preparing for the harvest, my love."
Erin slipped her hands into her pockets. "I just spent fifteen minutes trying to get her parents on the phone in Philadelphia, with no luck. I figured they needed to be informed of the situation. I'm guessing I'll hear from them after five."
"Well, that's awful considerate of you, but this girl is twenty-two years old and a signed donor. I don't see what her parents have to do with that at all."
Erin's face clouded. "Robert, you are aware that she's pregnant."
"Ye-eah, and?"
"If you take her upstairs for harvest, the fetus will abort from the trauma."
"That's how it works, yes." His voice was not unkind.
"Don't you think her parents should be given an opportunity to weigh in with their opinion?" Erin was stunned.
"Not really, no."
"Robert!" Erin was taken aback. "This is their grandchild we're talking about."
"No, this is the fetus implanted in their runaway daughter by some Anonymous John who probably only gave her twenty bucks in return for serving as his sperm receptacle."
"That's not the point!" She insisted hotly.
"That is the point. This girl was living on the streets, selling her body to strangers. How can you even be sure that she knew she was pregnant?"
"Look at her lab report, Robert." She flipped angrily through the papers.
"Yeah, yeah, I know. No crack, no heroine."
"No drugs at all! Not clorazepate, not diazepam, not Dilantin, no AED's at all!" Erin took a breath. "She quit taking her meds because she thought they would hurt the baby. Which says to me that she intended to keep it."
"Oh, you know that for a fact, do you?" Robert crossed his arms over his chest. "What, did she sit up in the middle of her brain frying and say, 'Oh, by the way, please don't give me any drugs or shoot any x-rays because there's a stork in my future'?"
"I think it's a safe assumption." Erin insisted.
"No, here's a safe assumption." Robert's voice went deadly soft. "You try and drag her parents into this and you are going to be making a tragic mistake. They already had to live through their child taking off and destroying her life. Now you want them to entertain the idea of allowing a reminder of their daughter's reckless behavior into their lives for the next eighteen years?"
Erin glared at him angrily. "It's a chance for them to hold on to a living, breathing piece of her."
"You don't know that. You don't even know if that's a viable fetus."
"It has a strong, steady heartbeat." Erin spat.
"Yeah, and maybe brain damage or birth defects, maybe even FAS. Your little 'Clean Queen' had a BAL of .12. Even if the fetus were healthy now, it could still abort from the trauma of what just happened anytime within the next thirty-six hours."
"And you don't even think we should wait and see?" Erin was furious.
"No, I don't think we should turn this girl into a human incubator. And if we do things my way, her parents get to live with her legacy being the saved lives of the people who received her organs, not the bastard child of some cheap and meaningless fifteen-minute romp in the back seat of a car." At that moment, two members of the transplant team walked briskly into the room. "Here she is, boys." Robert greeted them "Let's roll."
Erin suddenly grabbed the bedrail. "I'm not signing her out to you."
Robert looked at her, tight lipped. "I don't need you to. You have lost all professional perspective in regards to this patient and I am relieving you of her care."
"You arrogant bastard," Erin began angrily.
"And if you don't watch that mouth of yours, I'll relieve you of the rest of your duties as well!" Robert roared, cutting her off. "Last I checked, I was still Chief of Staff, and your boss!"
"Oh, yes," Erin hissed. "God forbid anyone disagree with the Great Rocket Romano."
"Sign over your patients and get the hell out of here." Robert commanded. Incensed, but not surprised, Erin threw Jacinda's chart at him. It landed at his feet with a clatter, and she stalked angrily from the room. Robert watched her go, his jaw clenched in fury. Then he noticed the two men flanking the bed, watching him in muted disbelief. "What the hell are you staring at? Get your asses upstairs!"
Robert supervised the harvesting of Jacinda's organs with quiet authority, pacing the room and casting glances over the other surgeon's shoulders. He was still reeling a bit from his argument with Erin, but his anger was tempered considerably when he heard a nurse announce softly that the fetus had indeed aborted. He took a deep breath and squared his shoulders. "All right, people. Let's keep our heads in the game." He left the OR four hours later, exhausted, his left arm throbbing with fatigue. He showered in the locker room and dressed slowly. Finally, he collected his things and headed home.
Her car was in the driveway, but the house was dark when he arrived. He trudged slowly up the walk and entered, closing and locking the door behind him. He made his way to his study, where he dropped his valise and poured himself a drink. He savored the burn in his throat for a moment, then walked out into the hall. He could hear movement from upstairs, and he began the climb.
The bed was empty, but the sheets were tousled, as if she'd tried to sleep but couldn't. The door to the master bathroom was open a crack, and he could smell steaming lilac. He crossed the room and nudged the door open wider.
Erin was in the huge garden tub, buried in bubbles up to her ears. Her auburn hair was piled on top of her head, save for a few damp tendrils that clung to her temples and neck. She was leaning against the porcelain, eyes closed. Robert leaned quietly against the sink, watching her. After a moment, she sensed his presence and opened her eyes. They were red- rimmed, but dry. "Hey, gorgeous," Robert breathed softly. "You still talking to me?"
"Am I still suspended?"
"Look, if you're expecting me to apologize."
"No," she shook her head, to his surprise. "You were right. I did lose perspective." Tears welled up in her eyes, and she blinked them away. "I just thought, if they could have something, some piece of her to hold on to.that they wouldn't be left with nothing. That they would have something that could make them, I don't know, not so alone." Robert knelt next to the tub and put his arms around her, never minding the water that soaked into his shirt. He held her for a moment before speaking. "This isn't about that girl, or her parents, is it? This is about you."
She pulled away from him gently and wiped her eyes. "All this wedding and honeymoon planning, selling the house, moving in here.I've been so happy. But I guess it never hit me until tonight that I've been doing it all alone."
"What am I chopped liver?" Robert groused gently.
Erin giggled a little. "Sorry, honey, but in this case, you don't count."
"I know, I know." He rested his chin on the edge of the tub. "I'm just the groom."
"All I could think about were the things that her folks would never see, never be a part of. Like mine." She sobbed a little. Robert took her face in his hands, forcing her eyes to meet his.
"You think they aren't a part of all this?" He asked gently. "You think they aren't here right now, in this room? You think I can't see them, looking out at me through your eyes? Telling me to get the hell away from their naked, wet daughter until after the wedding?" Erin laughed and he kissed her forehead. "Trust me, baby, they're here." He brushed his fingers over the flesh above her heart. "They're right here." She kissed him warmly and hugged him once more.
"I'm sorry for the way I spoke to you," she said quietly.
"You should be," he replied simply . She raised an eyebrow. "I can't guarantee it won't happen again."
"Then I'll just suspend you again." He leaned in and slipped his tongue between her lips. Erin giggled against his mouth as she realized he was quickly shedding his clothing. "Watch this, dad," he mumbled as he slipped into the water with her.