Part 48

David was outside of Kelly's waiting for Zander, looking at an EKG faxed to him from Pine Valley Hospital, talking to an intern there on the phone. When he hung up, he saw Cameron there.

"Still here," Cameron said.

"You too," David answered, hoping he could get rid of Cameron before Zander showed up. "What are you doing still here, Cam? Is there a plan? You really care about this kid, in some way. I hope it's a good way. But how are you helping? What good are you doing? Tell me, I have no experience in this area."

"That's partly because you left it to me."

"You make me regret it more every day. Anyway, I didn't know until Alexander was already 3 years old. But it was intended to be good for him. Give him all the advantages that the royal Peter has."

"You seem to resent Peter quite a bit!"

"You seem to favor him quite a bit."

"Yet the mother of your only child never chose for you to raise that child."

"That was because of Peter, of course."

"Why should Peter suffer for your benefit and hers?"

"Of what do you complain? Peter had everything you wanted him to have. Intact family. Constant reassurance he would be better than the competition. You had a little brother for him, whom you could use to show Peter how he could compare himself to someone else and see how he was faster and smarter and better."

"Everyone says Peter is a good kid. He was easy."

"Even you say he's a good kid. That makes it official. But it's because of his mother."

"She did nothing. Like you."

"What was such a headache, anyway? Didn't you get any happiness out of raising Zander?"

"Peter was easy, Alexander was difficult, and you'd have found it the same."

"What was easy? What was difficult?"

"Peter would listen, and Alexander would not."

"Peter's like his mother and Alexander's like his father?"

"And who would you be referring to? You, or me?"

"You."

"Now how did that happen, when he has none of my chromosomes?"

"Zander!" David suddenly realized he was there. He was uncomfortably close to them, too.

Cameron had never seen Alexander and Hayward together before and was thrown off balance. It was one thing to know about it in his mind, and another to see with his own eyes that they were clearly related.

"I'm sorry for whatever you heard, Zander," David said. "I get a little carried away."

"You get very carried away," Cameron said.

"Wow!" Zander said. "Haven't I heard that before! This is the first time it wasn't directed at me, though!"

"Alexander you really should not have this stress," Cameron said. He would have gone on, but Zander interrupted: "I'm standing between two cardiologists. What better place to have stress?"

"Hayward, take off," Cameron said.

"You must be out of your mind," said David.

"Yeah, Dad, now you're free to think I'm stupid. I don't have your intelligent chromosomes."

"If I thought you were stupid, which I don't, I could have said it came from your mother's side. Anyway Hayward isn't stupid. So if I thought it, I could say the same thing. I don't think you're stupid. Maybe you've done a stupid thing or two from time to time, but - "

"Oh, never mind, Dad. It must be my mother. She must be really dumb. Here, I have two bright fathers so she must be twice as dumb. You know, it's funny," he went on, his tone getting tenser, "A year ago I had no father; now I have two."

"You're getting wound up, Zander," David said.

"That was your choice, wasn't it, Alexander?" Cameron forgot all about Hayward and the Long Q-T Syndrome and Alexander's biological paternity and was mentally back in the past, "No father, no mother, no brother, and after what you'd done to him- "

Zander jumped a little, as if he were going to prepare to hit Cameron. David grabbed him, just as Zander reacted.

In the past, Zander had always continued to struggle against anyone holding him back from a fight. But this time, Zander relaxed. "Go ahead in, Zander," David said, pointing to Kelly's. "I'm going to talk to Cam, then I'll go in to you." He let go of Zander, with a slight push, as if to propel him to move in the direction he wanted him to go.

Glaring at Cameron, Zander said nothing, but walked away and went into Kelly's.

"Do you really have to bring up the hunting accident over and over?" David asked Cameron.

"No," Cameron said. "I shouldn't have. I momentarily forgot, and let him provoke me as usual. He never tried to hit me before. How did you manage to stop him?"

"I just knew he was going to," David said.

Brenda got back from class. She went to Donna's room and convinced her to come and sit by the pool.

"Do you have any childhood photos of Zander?" Brenda asked. "We were looking at David's family pictures, and it made me think of asking if there are any of Zander."

"There are some. In Florida. I'll send some or copy some for you."

"Thank you. I bet they are really cute."

"He was a cute little boy. If I can say so myself."

"I bet he was adorable. Not that he isn't still. In a different way. Getting more devilishly handsome. Like his father."

"Alexander's lucky he met you."

"Zander said it wasn't so bad talking to Cam," Brenda said. "Because of you and David calming him down afterward."

"It's a good thing he left when he did," Donna said. "A little while after he left, Cam came to the room. David was still there and we had a nice, big fight."

"What a nightmare! What did Cam do? Demand that you both be burned at the stake?"

"He wanted to know how long it went on with us. How long we fooled him."

"He's madder about being fooled than about losing his wife. How long did you fool him?"

Donna smiled at Brenda's enthusiasm for "fooling" Cam. "About a year."

"Oh, Zander might like to know that. Not as short as he might have been supposing. Who ended it?"

"He did."

"Why?"

"I don't remember exact words, but it boiled down to: I'm going to California, leave Cam or don't see me again."

"But in a way you ended it, by not leaving Cam."

"I guess you could say that."

"I believe from what Zander tells me that he got stuck in a sort of similar position with Carly, but don't tell him I said that. He vehemently denies she was married. She was separated, I guess, though, in some sort of official way. She lived apart from her husband. But later they got back together, and Sonny talked as if Zander had been fooling around with his wife."

"Cam talks like it just happened yesterday, but with his finding out now, I don't really blame him. He has to get used to it. Then David had to keep baiting him. Men!"

"I know Cam has you down on that gender."

"Well, he's good for it."

"You should get out more. Meet a guy or two."

"Typical woman who is happy with some man. Wants the same for everybody else."

"Yeah!"

Donna laughed. "Well, thank you. But there's no need. I've had it! I'm retired. Besides, anti-depressants kill your sex drive. And it's worth it, believe me. I hope you never have occasion to understand."

"It's a temporary side effect. If you are feeling that way, it's mostly from Cam and will go away in time."

"Alexander said the same thing, or sort of its opposite, about my feeling happier in general. He said the drugs don't do as much as getting rid of Dad!"

"I'm with him on that."

"I'm glad Alexander stayed on as father of Ginny."

"And even Sonny would make a better father than Cam did! That's saying a lot, coming from me, I can tell you! Sonny was once my fiancé, and – no, it's too long a story so I'll tell you some rainy day – but for all that Cam is a successful doctor and Sonny is an organized crime boss, Sonny would make a better father!"

"An organized crime boss! That is saying a lot! And this is the one who thinks Alex was fooling around with his wife?"

"The same one."

"Alexander, Alexander," Donna shook her head. "Boy, am I glad Cam found him!"

"Me too. I think he's way better off with you and his brother back, and his getting to know David, too."