Part 56
Alexis told Zander to go home in the mid-afternoon. He walked through the park, then decided to go see Elizabeth.
"This place looks different after you get out of it," Zander told Elizabeth. She was sitting up, looking a lot better, and drawing on a pad of paper.
"Does it look better, or worse?"
"Better, I guess. Because you know you can leave."
"How is work going? You look nice and professional. I like that green tie."
"Oh," he said. "Thank you. It's going fine. My boss is so kind. She is more worried about my health than about the work. Oh, and there's no gun violence in that office."
"That's always a good thing in a job," Elizabeth agreed with a smile. "Sit still. I'm drawing you now."
He sat still for a minute or two. He folded his hands. He twiddled his thumbs.
"No nurses bugging you," he said, looking around the room.
Elizabeth looked around the room. "Doesn't look like it," she said. "Here," she took another pad from the side of her bed. "This will make you realize how long you were here."
Zander opened this sketch pad. Elizabeth had drawn sketches of people. He didn't know the first two, but then recognized Lucky.
"There must be more drawings of Lucky Spencer than of any other being in the universe," Zander said.
"I've got him down. I'm branching out," she answered.
The next was Nicholas Cassidine; then Jason Quartermaine; Dr. Jones; Terri Hayes. "You're good," he complimented Elizabeth, "I recognize all of them." He turned a page. "Joe Quinn!" he smiled. "Really looks like him!"
"Thanks," she said. "Keep looking, you have one more page."
"Huh?" he turned the next. This sketch was of Quinn standing at the edge of the bed, reading a chart, with a braid of hair falling forward.
"This is very life-like," he said, looking at it. "It is a sight you see over and over while you're here."
"You won't see it now," Elizabeth said, looking at him as a subject, drawing. "Quinn's on the midnight shift."
"Then you better be a good little patient. Quinn hates midnights."
In the morning, toward the end of midnight shift, Quinn checked on Elizabeth. Before leaving, she stopped at minute to look at Elizabeth's sketches.
"You're getting Dr. Jones down better and better all the time," Quinn observed. "Your Joe Quinn was good from the start."
"There's some newer ones at the back," Elizabeth said.
Quinn looked. "Zander Smith, in a tie," she said. "This is good – just out of your head?"
"Not entirely. He was here this afternoon."
"I thought it had to be from your imagination, with a tie," Quinn laughed.
"Nope. He had it on."
"You've captured something here," Quinn said. "Some sort of attitude."
"He liked yours. The one from at the end of the bed, reading the chart."
Quinn was still looking at Zander's. She looked up. "You ought to have an art show, someday," she said.
Elizabeth smiled. "Thank you. It'll be worth your coming, Quinn. I'll put my Zander sketch in it."
Quinn made a face, and went out.
Zander felt nervous, walking along the edge of the bleachers at the speedway. He watched a car that was out, waiting for the roar of the engine each time it came around the nearest curve. He had come with Alexis, and she had worked it out – asked Joe Quinn to meet up with Sergei in the pits and keep track of him, so he didn't just run into Zander, and to give Alexis a chance to lecture him first. She was on that mission now, and Zander waited.
The car was slowing into the pit at the end. The driver got out and took off a helmet, then shook out a head of long hair. She wore jeans and a T-shirt and he had only ever seen her wearing scrubs. And her hair was always up or in a braid. But he recognized her at once. "Quinn," he called to her.
She smiled. "You look good in real clothes!" She laughed as she walked across the track.
"I just thought the same about you."
"You learned my name."
"From Joe, when we were looking at that car the other day. He told me the story. He's here."
"He is? I didn't see him. I just came down on my way home from work."
"Elizabeth said you were on midnights."
"How's work going?"
"Good."
"Must be a great job if you can hang out here."
"No, Quinn, this is another crisis."
"What's that?"
"You're probably tired of this stuff."
"No, I'm not. What crisis?"
"I agreed to talk to Sergei. Alexis wants me to wait while she goes and gets him. She wants to read him a riot act first. Make rules about what he can't say. Joe's here because she wanted him to help. I don't know what he's supposed to do. Pick me up if I fall apart or head off some sort of Sergei-induced disaster."
"You're making light of it," she said. "But it's not."
"I almost feel sick," he admitted.
"I'll stay," she said.
"It's your time off, Quinn. Don't do that."
"Not up to you." She sat next to him on the bleacher.
"I feel like I'm calling you by your last name."
She laughed. "You can still use Question if you want."
"No, I'll get used to it. It's a really nice name. The best kind."
Alexis summed up the things Zander was worried about, and told Sergei that she wouldn't tolerate his aggravating any of those issues. Sergei agreed. "I'm not gonna go after Pete," he said, waiving his hands as if the idea were the greatest bore in the world.
"Don't bring it up," Alexis said. "And nothing against his mother. No trying to persuade him to do anything regarding his brother. In fact, you'd be better off listening rather than talking."
"I'm not gonna do anything like that," Sergei said. "I get it, OK?"
"There's a reason he's so stuck on it," Alexis said.
"Yeah, I know it. I don't wanna do anything of all that past. No past. Not the same old stuff. I know he's not gonna believe that 'til he sees it."
Alexis went back to Zander. She smiled when she saw Quinn. "Hi! How did you come to be here?"
"I just came to run one of the cars. I saw Zander, now I'm staying here for moral support. To help head off Sergei-induced disasters."
"What more could you ask?" Alexis put a hand on Zander's shoulder. "Your experienced nurse. Experienced in parent-induced disasters."
"One Oksana-induced one under my belt."
"I'm trying to laugh," he said, but he put a hand over Alexis' She took this hand and walked him down to the pit. They didn't talk. The track was eerily quiet. Quinn followed, hanging back a little.
"Here," Joe was saying, loudly, so Zander would have a warning, "watch all that stuff."
Sergei stopped, and looked at Zander. "Hey," he said. "I'm glad you come, my boy. I'm not gonna do anything dumb, I promised Alexis. I promise you. Don't worry."
"Dad?" Zander said. His eyes were wide open, and he looked about 9 years old, like a kid choking back tears. Not angry. Like he was a small boy caught doing something he wasn't supposed to do.
Alexis wanted to go to him, but had a hunch she would do better to let it be, long enough to see if Sergei would be able to comfort him.
Sergei went over to Zander and hugged him. Zander didn't move away or make any defiant gesture.
"You're gonna be all right," Sergei said. "I'm only gonna help you, now on. See? Sit down. Tell me what happened while you were gone. I won't say things, you talk, I listen." He went on in this soothing tone, but he switched over to Russian.
Alexis panicked a moment, but Zander was just nodding, and looking down, miserably but not angrily. Alexis didn't trust her high school and college Russian to be able to follow a conversation between native speakers. She was on edge, ready to protest, only able to rely on the tone of voice, and wondering if Sergei had tricked her or had only fallen back on his native language under the stress of the moment.
Sergei walked with Zander back to the bench at the back of the pit. Alexis and Joe and Quinn stayed; Alexis' plan to monitor every word of Sergei's crashed.
Sergei had his arm around Zander, who just sat there looking down, rubbing his eyes with the back of his hand or just nodding at Sergei's words.
"I was expecting something different," Quinn said in a low voice.
"Me too," Alexis said. "I'm stumped. I don't know whether to demand he speak English or just interrupt, but I don't want to interrupt if he's getting anywhere towards healing the breach."
"He seems to have the same attitude toward both parents when he talks about them. Yet his reaction is so different!"
"I think it's OK," Joe said. "And a good thing he doesn't have to yell at this one."
"You said he and Oksana were alike, Alexis," Quinn said.
"That's probably it," Alexis said. "Yeah, it's harder to deal with someone who is like you."
"What would Oksana think?"
"Oh boy," Alexis answered her, "I don't think she'd like this scene one little bit."
Eventually, Zander seemed to be doing some of the talking. Sergei's demeanor didn't change. He listened, he said something brief, put his arm around Zander again, and sounded conciliatory or soothing. He pointed out a car that had started going by on the track. Zander looked up at the car. Sergei said something else, seeing the strange little observer-trio standing a little way off, and they both got up and came over.
"You messed me up," Alexis said. "My Russian is too rusty."
"Uh, oh," said Sergei. "You're not mad at me?"
"That depends," she said, looking sidewise at Zander.
"It's ok," Zander said, breathing a sigh.
"Let's go over to the Outback," Alexis said. "I want to get you a long, tall whiskey and soda," she said to Zander. "Come on, no declining allowed. Sergei, come along."
"You want me to come along?" Sergei said to his son. "I can stay put and come back later if you want."
"No, Dad, come along," Zander said.
