59. Waking

The relief was so great, Bonnie's knees threatened to buckle. She reached out, and, clasping Bear's forearm, squeezed tight, whether in a show of support or to steady herself, she hardly knew. "Thank heaven!" she said. "Can we see him? Is that possible?"

"Ah…" Bear looked uncertainly from her to Eddie, and back again. Then, "Yeah… sure," he said, acquiescing. "This way."

In the large hospital bed, head half sunk in an oversized pillow and body heaped with a jumble of thin blankets, Danny looked pitifully small and delicate. His skin had barely more color than the white bedclothes, and his pixie face was barred across with the clear tubing of a nasal cannula. His arms rested limply on the covers, a sensor clamped on the tip of his right index. Bonnie lowered herself onto the chair by his bedside, and curled her fingers loosely around Danny's. They were reassuringly warm to the touch.

Eddie and Bear stood at the foot of the bed watching silently a few moments, and then, Bear motioned Eddie aside, and began speaking to him in a low tone, as if afraid to disturb Danny's sleep. Bonnie could not make out everything they said, but it was clear from the snippets she did catch that Bear was trying to learn all Eddie could tell him about the evening's events. Eddie's account was essentially the same as the one he'd given her, but stripped of almost all personal context. She was surprised to hear him report that Val had "passed out cold" on the drive to the police station, and had been taken to a detox facility rather than directly to jail. Apparently, one of the calls Eddie'd made while they waited had been to the police station for news of her. Under the circumstances, he explained, Val had not been booked, which meant her arraignment would be correspondingly delayed, maybe as much as eight to ten hours. He assured Bear he planned to stay on top of the situation, and would keep him apprised of all developments. "Is there anything else I can do, or get, for you before I go?" he asked, when Bear had run out of questions.

Bear shook his head. "You've done enough already. Thanks."

"Don't mention it." Eddie offered his hand in farewell, and turned to Bonnie. "How 'bout you, Tootsie Pop? Can I drop you back at Adele's?"

The query was her cousin's, but she addressed her answer to Bear. "I'd like to stay." She braced for the inevitable protest, but he held her gaze squarely, and did not object.

"Okay, then." Eddie brushed her shoulder on his way out. "Talk to you later."

He'd no sooner gone than Bear's lips twitched into a weary smile. "Tootsie Pop?"

She was glad of the hint of laughter in his eyes, though she pretended otherwise. "Family prerogative. Don't get any ideas."

She made to surrender the chair to him, but he stayed her, and rolled a heavy, padded recliner to the other side of the bed for himself. He sat, gently chafing Danny's hand, eyes tracing the features of his son's little face. At length, he said softly, "These last few hours, sitting here, watching him lie there still as a statue, all I've been able to think is 'how could she?' How could she be so selfish, so irresponsible? Her own child. All of six years old. Who she claims to love." He broke off, as if too appalled for words. "I just… I can't wrap my head around it."

Bonnie had worried the matter over, too, with just as little comprehension. "It seems, at least from the way she talked to the police, that she didn't think she'd done anything wrong. The only harm she thought Danny might've come to was waking up and being scared to find himself alone, and she'd taken steps to prevent that."

"As if his being unaware that his mother'd skipped out on him made everything all right! What rational adult thinks that way? Didn't it occur to her that she was leaving him defenseless? That someone could break into the apartment, or there could be a fire? Chances of things like that are small, okay, but not zero. And what if something'd happened to her while she was out, and she never made it home? Drunk as she was, she could've walked in front of a car, or blacked out on the street, or been mugged."

The last scenario was, perhaps, more likely than he knew. "That bar? Paradise Lost? Eddie warned me to stay away. He said it wasn't a safe neighborhood, especially for a woman on her own."

"And even knowing that, she went! In God's name, why? Did she take even a second to consider the consequences? Or think of Danny at all?" He wagged his head slowly several times, in disbelief, Bonnie thought, and maybe disgust. "Any illusions I may've had about her, I lost a long time ago. No one knows better how shallow, self-centered and devious she is, but I always thought if there was one person she cared about as much as herself, one person whose interests she could be relied on to put ahead of her own, it was Danny. But even he comes in a distant second."

There was no defending Val, Bonnie knew; she'd behaved abominably, in a manner unworthy not only of a mother but of a decent human being. Bonnie's own sense of the woman, though, was that Val was not so much a bad person as fatally weak and immature. "She didn't mean to give him an overdose, you know. There's no question she shouldn't have sedated him in the first place," she added hastily, as Bear shot her an accusing look, "but, that being said, she thought she'd given him the right amount. She told the police she'd done it before, and knew it was safe."

"That's small enough consolation," he grumbled, "but, yeah, the doctor said they see this kind of thing a lot. Even conscientious parents make mistakes doling out medicine. They misread the label, or don't measure correctly, or give doses too close together. Based on Danny's test results, the doctor's best guess is Val gave him the recommended dosage for six-to-twelve year olds, not taking into account that he's well under the average weight for a child his age. She might've used a regular tablespoon, too, instead of the measuring cup that came with the bottle. That would've increased the dose as well."

Honest mistake aside, there still remained the question of why Val had resorted to drugging Danny at all. "What I don't get is, if she absolutely had to go out, why didn't she just call you? Did she, maybe, try and not get through?"

"I thought of that, too, but there're no missed calls in my phone history. No," he went on, after a pause, "I think what you're going to find is she got some last minute invitation she couldn't resist, something she had to act on right away, or lose out on. Maybe she had a little time to call around for a sitter, maybe not. Either way, she had no one to cover for her, and a really tempting offer on the table. At that point, there shouldn't even have been a question — any normal person would've resigned themselves to a lost opportunity and stayed home. But Val's never been good at denying herself, so, instead, she convinced herself Danny would be all right for a few hours without her, and snuck out the moment he dropped off to sleep."

Bear's theory struck Bonnie as all too plausible, and, if he was right, she mused, then, the irony was that Val had probably missed out on her treat anyway, or been otherwise grossly disappointed, else why had she wound up on a bar stool at Paradise Lost drinking herself blind? A botched or unsatisfying rendezvous would go a long way to explaining her disgruntled, combative mood.

Bear was saying, in a low, determined voice, "He's not going to live with her again if I can help it, that's for damn sure. As long as there are charges pending against her, I'll have custody anyway, but, even once that's all resolved, now way she's getting him back. I'm going to take her to court, and get the custody order reversed. She'll have her work cut out for her, this time, convincing the judge Danny's better off with her."

It flashed on Bonnie then that, what with Danny's convalescence and the legal proceedings he meant to institute, Bear would, of necessity, be taking time off from work. Their timetable for finishing La Coupe d'amour had allowed for his being away a week in August, but it was to have been after the painting had been revarnished and set in its refurbished frame, not before. Bonnie suspected meeting Cummings' deadline was, at that moment, the furthest thing from Bear's mind, but he surprised her by saying, "I guess I'll move my vacation up a week. It won't be day trips to the beach like we talked about, but the important thing now is to get Danny settled."

Outside the hospital window, the night faded by imperceptible degrees from black to murky gray to half light. They passed the time discussing the blessedly neutral topic of what Bonnie might accomplish during Bear's absence from the Jeff, all the while keeping an eye on Danny for any indication of change. Just as the day dawned, they noticed a few fleeting expressions cross his face, and a short time later, he began to move restlessly, at one point turning completely over on one side, and curling up, knees to chest. When, in the course of his rounds, the doctor looked in, he was encouraged enough by this progress to recommend trying, once again, to wake Danny up. "Just do what you normally would when you need to rouse him," he instructed Bear. It took a number of gentle shakes and repeated exhortations, but Danny was eventually sufficiently conscious to bat at the insistent hand on his shoulder and mumble a cranky "No! Go 'way!" before burrowing more deeply under the covers. This was pronounced an excellent sign; the doctor decreed Danny could now sleep until he woke naturally, at which time he would be given a light breakfast, and, provided he managed to keep the food down, he would be released an hour or so afterward. It was entirely possible he could be on his way home as soon as early afternoon.

It was nearly ten before Danny opened his eyes and took in his unfamiliar surroundings, but Bonnie wasn't there to see it. The danger past, Bear had taken advantage of Adele's stopping in at the end of her shift to urge Bonnie to go home with her cousin and catch up on her rest. She might have resisted, but for his saying he'd try to grab a few winks, himself, while he could. He phoned, as promised, later in the day to report that Danny was safely tucked up on their living room couch watching his favorite videos. He was still drifting in and out of sleep, and inclined to be grouchy, but apart from that, he seemed to have suffered no lasting ill-effects. They'd had a bad scare — maybe the worst of Bear's life — but thankfully it had been only that, no more.

Bear could tell her nothing about Val, and, indeed, it wasn't until the next day that Eddie called with the news that Val had had her preliminary hearing, and been charged with misdemeanor child endangerment. Eddie had called in a favor, and obtained pro bono legal counsel for her, and had even posted her bail so she wouldn't have to spend the night behind bars. On her lawyer's advice, she had entered a plea of "not guilty," the plan being to bargain the prosecutor down to the lightest possible sentence. If no agreement could be reached, she'd have to take her chances with a judge. The court date was set for late September, and until the case was settled, she was to have no contact with Danny or Bear.

"You really went to bat for her," Bonnie couldn't help but remark to her cousin. "You realize she could be drawing the entirely wrong conclusion?"

"No, I sat her down, and spelled it out for her. I was clear that I've never felt more than kindly toward her, and that helping her out of the jam she's in is my way of making amends for not being as straight with her about that as she deserved."

A subdued Val had responded to Eddie's candor with an openness of her own, and, over the course of a long conversation, had confided a number of things to him, including, most notably, what had led to her eruption at Paradise Lost. Bear's supposition, it turned out, had been perfectly on point: Val had, indeed, received a phone call right around Danny's bedtime from a man she'd been involved with in the spring. Handsome and charismatic, Nick had, at times, been annoyingly full of himself, but he was such exciting company and so lavish in his spending, that Val had been willing to overlook this minor character flaw. Indeed, she'd nursed hopes that their hot-and-cold affair would evolve into a long-term relationship, and had been crushed when, after a fabulous weekend together in Atlantic City, he'd neither called nor texted again. She'd been thrilled to hear from him out of the blue, to be told he'd been traveling round the country on business, and had only just blown back into town. He'd missed her, he said, couldn't wait to see her, all of which was music to her love-starved ears. She'd had her misgivings when he insisted she come to him at the Ritz-Carlton or forget the whole thing, but she'd tamped them down, and gotten dressed as if for a big night out. At the hotel, Nick, opening the door to his suite wearing only sweats, a t-shirt and a roguish smile, had goggled at her finery, and not just in admiration. She saw the stark truth, then, of what she was to him: a booty call, pure and simple. In his defense, he'd not been such a thorough cad as to dispense with the preliminaries: he'd mixed her a good, stiff drink, and even a second when she requested it. The third she'd poured herself, and tossed with a few choice words into his face before walking out the door. "She was too angry and upset to go right home. She needed someone to vent to, someone who'd sympathize, and she thought of me. She didn't go to Paradise Lost meaning to get into it with Deena. She was hoping to find me there."

Bonnie was not above pitying Val's desperation and cruel disappointment but, even so, she didn't think her behavior any less deplorable, and doubted anyone familiar with the facts would take a more tolerant view. In this, however, she was proved wrong. Val did garner support, and from a most unexpected quarter: Rosalie Vincent.

Rosa had phoned Bonnie the Thursday after the incident, ostensibly to assure her that all supporting material having been received, her application for the Louvre Fellowship was now complete. It did not take much prompting, however, for Rosa to admit that was not the real reason for her call. "I anticipate that Rudolph will learn before too long that I've arranged for a highly-distinguished defense attorney of my acquaintance to take over Valeria's representation. He will accuse me, no doubt, of taking her side against him out of spite for his rejecting me, but that is not the case, je t'assure! I am not his enemy! It is only that Valeria has no friends at the moment, no one to speak for, or listen to, her. I have been in that unenviable position, moi. I must do what I can for her."

"But Rosa…!" Bonnie was flabbergasted almost to speechlessness. "She drugged your grandchild! She left him alone and unconscious for hours on end!"

"Yes, yes," she said, sadly. "But it is not for me, you see, to cast the first stone. She did not come nearly as close to killing her son as I did my Dolphin."

Bonnie's breath caught in her throat. "Bear almost died?"

"Through my fault, yes. Can you stand to hear the story? I would like for you to know it."