Mean Streak(42)

Pauline Floyd was skinny to the point that her shoulder bones poked up like drawer pulls against her faded dress. Her hair was so thin that scalp showed through the frizzy gray tuft on top. Her face said that she’d seen plenty of hard times, and that this was another of them.

“Pauline,” he said, “this is Dr. Smith. Dr. Smith, Mrs. Floyd.”

Emory murmured an acknowledgment to the introduction.

Pauline addressed her anxiously, “Can you help my girl? She’s carrying on something awful. Says her belly hurts, and she’s bleedin’.”

Emory looked into the room toward the bed, where the small mound beneath the frayed bedspread lay perfectly still. “I hope to help her. Where can I wash my hands?”

The old woman tilted her head quizzically. “The bathroom, I guess.” She hitched her thumb.

Emory excused herself and followed the direction Pauline had indicated.

The old woman watched her until she disappeared through a doorway, then came back around to her neighbor. “How long you been living down the road from us?”

“A while.”

“By yourself?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

She glanced toward the bathroom. “She a real doctor?”

“She’s an excellent doctor.”

“I don’t know of any lady doctors ’round here. Where’d you get her at?”

“In town,” he said, hoping that would be all the explanation required.

Emory emerged from the bathroom looking pale but full of resolve. She walked past him and Pauline into the bedroom. They followed her over to the bed. Lisa lay on her side, knees to chest.

Emory took a box of latex gloves from the trash can liner she’d carried in with her, pulled on a pair, then touched the girl’s shoulder. “Lisa? I’m Dr. Char—Smith.” She applied gentle but insistent pressure until the girl rolled onto her back.

She was very pretty, with delicate features and silky blond hair. By contrast, her eyes were so dark, the irises were indistinguishable from the pupils. Looking beyond Emory toward him, she smiled shyly. “You came back?”

“I promised you I would. I brought the doctor.”

She shifted her gaze to Emory. “It hurts.”

Emory patted the girl’s slender hand. “I hope to relieve that soon, but first I’ll have to examine you. All right?”

Lisa glanced at her mother, then tentatively nodded.

Emory straightened and turned. “We’ll need privacy.”

He said, “I’ll be right outside the door.” But when he motioned for Pauline to go ahead of him, she protested.

“She’s my daughter. I’ve saw everything.”

“Dr. Smith will call us as soon as she’s completed her examination. Right, Dr. Smith?”

“Certainly,” Emory replied.

Silently she telegraphed to him the urgency of the situation. No longer giving Pauline a choice, he took her arm and propelled her toward the door. When he looked back, Emory was bending over the bed, talking softly to her patient.

He closed the door and put his back to it. Pauline told him that she would be in the kitchen and headed in that direction. She walked with the skittishness of a mouse, keeping close to the wall as though afraid of being seen and raising ire. She disappeared through an open doorway.

Will hadn’t moved from his place on the sofa. On the TV, two women wrestlers were throwing each other against the ropes, but the volume had been lowered. Norman sat in an upholstered chair that at one time had matched the sofa, but it was now haphazardly striped with silver duct tape that held together rips in the stained fabric.

He had their undivided attention.

Norman said, “Sit down and take a load off.”

“I’d rather stand, thanks.”

“What’s your name, anyhow?”

“What difference does it make?”

Norman copped some attitude. “You’re messing in our business, that’s what difference it makes.”

“All I’m doing is getting medical treatment for a sick girl.”

“Sick my ass.” Will rolled off his spine, picked up a can of beer from the scratched and rickety coffee table, and took a swig. “She should’ve known better than to get herself knocked up.”

Earlier, when he’d first seen her in the wrecked truck, he’d noticed that Lisa’s lips were white with pain, but when he’d asked her the nature of her ailment, she hadn’t been forthcoming with an answer.

Since her brothers had seemed indifferent to her condition, he’d consented to drive them home. He’d helped Lisa into the house and, after making a hasty explanation to Pauline as to why he was there, he and the old woman got Lisa into the bedroom.

Sensing the girl’s reluctance to discuss her problem with members of her family, he sent Pauline out of the room to get Lisa a glass of water. Only then had she told him in confidence that she had miscarried. Shamed, she begged him not to tell her mother.

“You shouldn’t go through this alone. Have you told anyone?” he’d asked.

“My aunt and uncle—I live with them in Drakeland—or did. They kicked me out of the house when I told them what was happening. I had to tell my brothers so they would come get me. But I don’t want my mama to know.”