A/N: Thank you all so much, especially those who have not failed to write to me and keep asking me to go on. It seems things in my life never stop but I realized if they won't stop for me I sometimes have to stop them and do what I love and that is certainly JAG fanfiction. I will try very hard to keep a regular update schedule.
A few days later Harm sat with Lucy at her pediatrician's office. He's had to take a Saturday appointment with a different doctor than her regular one so that they could get the forms back to the Ladybugs director on time for Lucy to start with the rest of the new players. Lucy smiled the whole way into the office that morning. Since Harm and Mac had agreed it would be okay for Lucy to join the junior soccer league she'd been very enthusiastic about starting it and delighted that her father had volunteered to be an assistant coach for her team.
Lucy sat reading a magazine for children and Harm Reader's Digest when the nurse stepped out and called them back, twenty minutes after their originally scheduled time. "Lucy Rabb," she announced. When Lucy slid off her chair she instructed, "Come on back, Sweetheart."
Harm held Lucy's hand and watched as she was weighed and measured, "Lucy," the nurse explained. "Your regular doctor is off today so you will be seeing Dr. Hill. You've seen Dr. Hill before right?"
"Yes," Lucy replied. "She gives out raisins instead of lollipops."
The nurse smiled, "That's right, Lucy." Then to Harm, "She'll be in shortly."
A few moments later Dr. Hill walked in. "Hi, Lucy," she greeted. "Commander Rabb, it is nice to see you again. We're used to seeing Colonel Rabb in here. So what brings you in today?" she asked. She turned to Lucy, "Are you feeling sick, Sweetie?"
Lucy answered, "No. I need you to sign so I can play soccer."
Dr. Hill smiled, "Okay, well let's get you checked over."
The doctor checked Lucy's pulse, blood pressure, temperature, and found all but the last were normal and that just slightly elevated. She checked Lucy's ears, and throat and found neither infected. Finally she check her reflexes to which Lucy whimpered slightly, "Did that hurt, Lucy?" the doctor asked.
Lucy nodded, "Yes, I have some boo-boos on my knees."
"You do?" Harm asked. "Did you fall down?"
"Commander…" Dr. Hill began before Lucy said. "No, I just get them."
Harm felt his stomach fall when she said that. "Can I see them Lucy?" Dr. Hill asked.
Lucy rolled up her purple jeans to above her knees to reveal to Dr. Hill calves and knees in a mass of purple to greenish bruises. The doctor began to lean down to look at Lucy's legs but Harm stepped in front of her. The bottom of Lucy's legs were a mottles mess of purple, blue, and green bruises, "Lucy? Baby? How did you get these?" he asked fear dripping from his voice. He had feared this sight; in a hundred nightmares he'd feared it and he'd kill him. He might rot in Leavenworth but before that he'd kill the son of a…
"Commander Rabb!" Dr. Hill repeated loudly. She had been saying his name for nearly a minute.
Harm turned to her. "I'm sorry, Dr. Hill. Forgive me?"
"Could we speak outside please?" she asked. When Harm nodded she smiled at Lucy, "Your Dad and I will be right outside the door." She took out the small packages of raisins she kept in her coat. "I'll give you these now so you can snack on them, okay sweetie pie?"
Lucy nodded and thanked the doctor for her treat.
"What the…" Harm began once he and Dr. Hill were outside of Lucy's earshot. "Commander, please," she practically pleaded for him to calm down.
"I don't know how that happened yet, but one thing I can do know is that it stops. Today!" Without realizing it Harm's voice had climbed another few decibels.
Once again Dr. Hill tried reason, "Commander Rabb, I'm not sure what you are expecting me to say here, but I think we are finally finding some of the answers to the large numbers of questions marks that are flagged in Lucy's file."
"She's been in here like that before and no one told me or called the police?" he asked.
"Commander, if what I suspect is true there's not much you can do about it, and there's nothing the police can do about it," Dr. Hill replied. "In fact, I think what you are suspecting and my concerns tie Lucy's situation to two entirely different causes."
"I can't imagine anything being worse than what I'm imagining, Dr Hill so let's just have it straight out," Harm told her silently thanking God that Lucy's doctor did not think the bruising was caused by physical harm, and silently praying that he could attribute it to just some childhood play or something like that.
"I'd like to run a panel on Lucy's blood," Dr. Hill continued. "I looked over her chart this morning and now with the bruising that I can't attribute to anything physical, and you are certainly welcome to another opinion, some things that I would consider question marks are looking more like red flags."
"Doctor, I don't normally consider myself a slow man, but I'm struggling with this one here, what, if not some sort of mistreatment caused those marks?" Harm asked.
"I hesitate to say anything other than childhood at this point but based more on a hunch and previous personal experience run a CBC and a few other tests on Lucy's blood. I'd also like to go a little farther in her exam today and poke are around for a few more things that may or may not confirm my suspicions," Dr Hill explained. "Regardless of that finding though, I'd also like to set up a consultation between Mrs. Rabb, you and I to discuss my suspicions."
"You're the doctor, I mean whatever you think we need to do, but really…you have me more than a bit concerned now. I'd really like to know what you are trying to find," Harm told Dr. Hill.
"Believe me, Commander, I'm not trying to find anything, I'm trying not to," she replied. "Please let me perform a more complete exam on Lucy and then we'll set up a meeting so I can ask my question and explain myself to both you and Mrs. Rabb."
Harm nodded, "Do what you feel you need to. I don't want to tell you not to check something you think needs to be checked."
Dr. Hill smiled, "Why don't you go to reception, give Mrs. Rabb a call and see if she can't come by later today so we can get everything squared away. I'll finish up with Lucy with Nurse Miller."
Harm wanted to stay with his baby, he wanted to insist on it, but something in Dr. Hill's manner told him that he'd rather be on the phone with Mac than behind the closed door watching Dr. Hill find or maybe not find something she was looking for and not understand what that something was.
Mac was concerned as well when Harm told her about the bruises and that Dr. Hill wanted her to try to come down that afternoon for a talk and out of that concern she hastily agreed. "What should I do about DJ? She asked Harm. "Mic is over in Norfolk today until probably Monday and if something serious is going on I don't want either of them exposed to it if we can help it."
"I agree," Harm sighed. "Its kind of hard isn't it. Neither of us has really needed a babysitter in a while usually one of the other is available."
"I'll call Harriet, Lucy's going to realize something is us. Playing with AJ and Jimmy may help her calm down on that front, keep her distracted," Mac suggested.
"Good idea," Harm replied. "Call her, I'll call you when we're leaving her and let you know exactly what time Dr. Hill wants us back. You okay to drive?"
"I'm not that big yet Harm," Mac replied. "I'll be fine. And Lucy will be too."
"Is that positive thinking or mother's intuition?" Harm asked.
"Some of the latter and a lot of hope," she replied. "Thank you for calling so quickly."
"Dr. Hill spoke very cryptically and with a lot of urgency, but she didn't say anything one way or another for certain," he replied. "Still, she did say the bruises on Lucy's legs make question marks turn to red flags and I didn't like how I felt when she said that."
"Well, hopefully, we'll know what we're dealing with by this evening," Mac replied. "I'll get Harriet on the phone and I'll see you later."
Harm ended the call and walked back to wait outside Lucy's exam room. A few moments after her arrived back there Dr. Hill emerged with her nurse and Lucy.
"Look Daddy!" Lucy exclaimed showing her father her arm. "I got a Mickey Mouse band aid."
Dr. Hill smiled at the child, "She was a very brave girl for her blood test. Where you able to get a hold of Mrs. Rabb?"
"She can be here anytime after noon," Harm replied. "She has to drop our son off."
Dr. Hill nodded, "Okay, let's make it 1:30. My last appointment is at 1 o'clock. We'll have plenty of time to talk then."
Harm nodded and agreed that he and Mac would meet Dr. Hill at 1:30 that afternoon. He called Mac and she had arranged to meet him at the Roberts' home about 1 o'clock and they'd drive to Lucy's doctor's office together. Harm took Lucy for lunch and she ate her burger but left most of her fries behind. He picked at his salad, his stomach knotting with nerves in spite of his brave front for his daughter, his ex wife and for himself.
Lucy was happy to be going to play with her friends and DJ was of course delighted. He loved Jimmy and AJ just as much as Lucy, if not more as he said sometimes because AJ and Jimmy were boys.
"Thank you so much Harriet," Harm said smiling at his friend and Mac's as well. Neither Bud or Harriet had wavered in their support of either one of their friend's during their divorce or any of the things that had gone on before or since.
"My pleasure," she replied. "Take your time and don't worry."
Harm smiled at that before taking Mac by the arm and leading her out the Roberts' door, assisting her automatically in negotiating the steps as he would have if the baby she carried had been their third child.
"You're worried, aren't you?" Mac asked. "I can see it all around your eyes."
"I wouldn't be if she wasn't so mysterious," Harm replied. "I have to admit I was angry when I saw all of the bruises on Lucy's legs…"
"Harm, do not even go there with me," Mac said knowing precisely where her former husband's mind had gone.
"I won't, I did for a minute, but I know better than that," he replied. "Though something is telling me that we'd be lucky if those bruises were from let us say an over zealous disciplinarian."
"You know I'd never…" Mac began again.
"I know," Harm replied and turned the radio on. "Let's just relax until we know what's going on."
Harm always pondered music on the car radio. It always seemed to speak to him, to strike a nerve in his heart or in his mind that connected a moment in his life with the lyric of the song. This one was no different. It was a country song, Reba McEntire and someone else he couldn't remember. It talked about the heart, about a heart that wouldn't lie. He scoffed at that belief. His heart had lied, it had lied many times over, and so had Mac's. He knew that. Still as he looked over at his ex-wife, the mother of his daughter and his son, he still felt the pull of love, the pull of protection, and the pull of the words he had spoken to join them together. Those words had been a lie as well, for better or for worse, in sickness and in health…He shook his head and sighed. There was only one set of truth and perhaps it was that line in the song that made it so clear…"Sometime life gets in the way."
"What?" Mac asked. Harm had murmured something as he drove she couldn't quite make out.
"Nothing," he replied.
"Harm?" Mac said in a questioning voice. It asked just enough to pass as a question but said so much more, invited so much more than a mere query.
"I said sometimes life gets in the way," he replied.
Mac nodded, "Sometimes I think no matter what plans we make, what decisions, this thing called 'life' will do as it sees fit regardless. I think sometimes all we can do is act accordingly to the script written way before any of us were even thought about."
"Like God's will?" Harm asked, neither had even been particularly religious, though they had both prayed fervently at times in their life when law, science, and force of will had betrayed them or worse, handicapped them.
"God's will, Shakespeare's stage…We can only act in the roles we're given," she sighed. "Sometimes I think our entire lives are one long road with constant forks, nothing straight, just constant choices, left or right…I go back and forth between believing that once you go wrong you can never correct that one mistake, just keep making more of them and thinking that one wrong turn can eventually at least lead you back to where you started, full circle,' she sighed. "So to speak."
Harm could do nothing with that besides smile and nod. He'd made a mistake, one huge mistake and from there on out kept making turns, negotiating, and he'd hadn't ended up anywhere close to where he'd been before, neither or them had. They both pondered their strange compulsion to have that discussion the rest of the way until Harm pulled into the pediatrician's parking lot at just before 1:30PM."
Dr. Hill was still a bit behind, so he and Mac had to wait close to 45 minutes before she invited the worried parents back to her office. "I really appreciate you giving me this time Commander and Mrs. Rabb. Like I told the Commander, I'm working more on a hunch and on instinct right now than proven fact but so far my exam seems to be pointing to my hunch being correct."
"I've never been one to shrug off second sight or hunches," Mac replied. "We appreciate you're attentiveness."
"I'll come right to it," Dr. Hill began. "After Lucy left I reread her file just to confirm, she has had numerous frequent and long lasting illnesses in that last few years, is that right?"
Mac nodded, "Since she was five. We had her checked repeatedly, her doctors told us it was childhood, bad tonsils, probably stress…"
"Stress?" Dr. Hill asked, interest peaked.
"Mac and I divorced, but the year before and a good part after was very hard on Lucy, things were messy," Harm highlighted.
"That certainly would contribute. How are things now?" she asked.
"Good I think," Harm replied. "Mac is in a steady relationship, I'm in a steady relationship, Lucy for the most part gets along with my friend, no so much with Mic but…"
"And you attributed Mic as the cause of the bruises on Lucy's legs?" Dr Hill asked, just to confirm.
"I'm certain he probably did," Mac replied. "Mic's discipline methods and attitude are not something either of us encourage around out children but Lucy is with me when Mic is around and I'd never allow…"
"I know that," Harm replied. "It was a knee jerk reaction…"
"Commander," Dr. Hill intercepted. "Regardless, of why you reacted as you did there really is not way that Lucy's bruised can have a physical cause. They are not the size or shape they would be, they are spread unevenly, occur over 45 of her body, in places such as the bottoms of her feet that you'd not see any mark of child abuse for the pure inaccessibility of the area. Add to that several other factors, the frequent illnesses, the nosebleeds that are flagged in her file, the enlarged spleen and lymph glands I found when I continued my exam of Lucy after you and I spoke, those factors alone are very suggestive of diagnosis on their own."
"What diagnosis, Dr. Hill?" Harm asked. "I think we've been patient, you've been very cryptic since you found those bruises this morning."
"I apologize," she replied. "I do but I find that parents get very upset and rightfully so when presented with these facts and I like to try to get as clear a picture as I can before alarming anyone, though just on physical exam I feel confident I didn't find this or alarm you a moment too soon."
"What exactly do you think is wrong with her?" Mac asked feeling all ready as the doctor painted a picture for her that she all ready knew.
"The frequent illnesses, the nosebleeds, the bruising, the enlarged glands…are very suggestive of cancer, Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia," Dr. Hill replied. "I did a blood test today, a CBC with differential, enzyme analysis, a few other things, but the stick took way longer to clot and bruised almost on contact, another sign. I suspected when I saw the bruising…" She trailed off and let the shocked parents absorb what they had just been told.
Neither of them moved, it seemed that neither was even breathing. As if by magnetism they both reached out Harm to his right, Mac to her left and locked hands as if by that motion they could unite again this thing that was threatening their daughter. After a few moments of silence Dr. Hill spoke again, "I have some questions I'd like to ask, so I can have a better idea and of course I have a pediatric oncologist and hematologist I can recommend for consultation."
Mac nodded, "What questions?" she asked. She sounded winded, out of breath as if she'd run carrying a full Marine pack in a desert, though she'd only just been sitting.
"I can see from her charts Lucy's weight has not fluctuated much from the normal, that is encouraging. What about lethargy?" She asked. "Does she nap more than she used to? Does she sleep but seem tired?"
"Sometimes," Mac replied. "Other times she's a bundle of energy, especially since she got this soccer idea in her head."
The doctor made a note, "Okay, what about pain. Does she have pain in her back, legs, other joints?"
"Sometimes she does," Mac replied. "She has a little brother, they play a lot."
Again Dr. Hill noted Mac's response and asked a few more questions, to help her draw a picture of Lucy's health in her mind. "Commander and Mrs. Rabb," she sighed and leaned back in her chair. "What you've told me is very suggestive of a childhood cancer. Lucy has more than 50 of the symptoms you see in children with this disease. We cannot confirm anything of course without first the blood panel and then of course other tests, but erring on the side of caution with your permission I'd like to have the results sent not only to me here but to my colleague, the Pediatric Oncologist."
"Absolutely," Harm replied without even considering it and Mac fervently nodded in agreement.
Dr. Hill gave Harm and Mac release forms to sign for Lucy's blood work and promised that since she'd but a rush on the test they'd have the results before close of business on Monday. "I'll call you personally of course when they come in and if they are as I expect they will be I will with your permission of course set up a consultation appointment with Dr. Jabobsen."
Again both parents nodded and squeezed the hand they each held onto, "Thank you for your time and for your concern," Harm managed after a moment of silence. "We are very grateful you brought your suspicions to us, we hope you are wrong, but we are glad that you told us."
"That's my job, Commander," Dr. Hill replied. "I'll speak with you on Monday."
Again two heads nodded as Harm and Mac led each other out of the office and back towards the waiting room. Once they'd gotten outside the office into the fresh air, they both turned to each other, a pair of moist blue eyes seeking a pair of equally moist and terrified brown ones, "The past…that's past now," Mac said to Harm. "I know I more than even you have to realize that."
Harm leaned forward tentatively and pulled Mac to him, enveloping her in a strong hug, one that whispered of safety, of strength, of dependability, all things they once had been to each other, all things they had both failed to be for a very long time. "We came out standing through worse, didn't seem it, but we did. We can again. We have to."
Harm wasn't sure who those words were meant to comfort, Mac or himself, either way, even as well intentioned as they were, they fell…as did so many other normal platitudes did in this situation…hopelessly short.