The Queen of Hearts(56)
“Delaney, we do not throw food,” I said. “Ever. You need to help wipe this up, and then you will get a new bowl from the drawer.”
“No! I won’t!” Delaney screamed.
Zero tolerance.
Still pleasantly, “Then I’m afraid you will have to stand in the corner.”
“I will not! I will not stand in the corner!”
With a desperately pleasant smile plastered on my face, I wrestled the shrieking, spitting Delaney into the corner and tried to hold her in place. Zero tolerance; you had to train them the first time it happened that intolerable behavior would be addressed promptly and without negative emotion. For a person three feet tall, Delaney was shockingly strong. I felt a stream of sweat snake its way down my temple.
Delaney got an arm free and smacked me in the face, still screaming. It actually hurt quite a bit. I was still processing this, fighting the overwhelming temptation to smack back, when Rowan said snippily, “You bring this on yourself, Mom. I bet she’d be better if you fed her something more good.”
I let go of Delaney. “WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU UNGRATEFUL, HORRIBLE CHILDREN?” I screamed, loud enough to hurt my throat. “I HAVE SPENT THE LAST HOUR TENDING TO YOUR EVERY NEED, AND ALL YOU DO IS ENDLESSLY COMPLAIN.”
The children stared at me, shocked. It felt good to yell, but I really was hurting my throat, so I continued at slightly lower volume: “You have no idea what it is like to be hungry; you think everything you have appears magically and your slave of a mother will get you more and more and more. Well, I’m done! I’m done! I can’t take it anymore. I’m done!”
The children’s eyes were so wide they looked like they were in the grip of a hyperthyroid storm. There was silence.
Finally: “I’m so sorry, Mommy. I love turkey and pretzels in my lunch. I won’t complain anymore.”
I looked at Rowan with gratitude. Eli and Finn were still silent, but they were nodding metronomically, their eyes locked on me. Delaney, her big eyes still dripping tears, padded over and began stroking my leg, repeating, “It’s okay. It’s okay, sweetie babe,” over and over.
Hmmm. So much for calm parenting. Maybe I could write a book called Volcanic Parenting: The Explosive Method of Intermittent Control. It would probably be a best seller.
“Hello.” Betsy Packard walked into the kitchen, followed by her son, Will. “Everybody ready to go?”
Horrified, I glanced at the clock. “Betsy!” I said, rushing out from behind the counter. “Yes! Give us five minutes.” I motioned to the children with a furtive, frantic hand wave behind Betsy’s back. “Rowan, please help the boys tie their shoes.”
“But we haven’t had—”
“Thank you, honey!” I trilled. “Don’t forget your backpacks!” I pulled Betsy aside and gave her a hug, trying to strike a balance between the kind of welcome that dwells too much on someone’s bereavement and one that ignores it altogether. This was Betsy’s first day back driving the carpool. Naturally, I’d told her not to worry about it, even though I’d been twisting my schedule into hellish knots and calling in every favor from every person I knew in order to make it work over the last few months. But she insisted she was ready to return, saying she couldn’t stand another morning alone in bed after everyone left the house.
“How are you?” I asked after a moment’s awkward pause. I’d expected her to look wraithlike and frail—she’d had the ropy thinness common to wealthy women even before Eleanor’s death—but the only change in her appearance was her expression, which seemed vague.
“I’m functioning,” she said, her gaze landing on the boys after sweeping past Delaney. “I guess it’s good to be out of the house.”
“Okay, but don’t push it,” I said. “I’m happy to keep driving.”
“Zadie,” she said, gripping my wrist. Now I noticed her nails were ragged and yellowish. “I came in because I need to tell you something.”
Chapter Twenty-three
EMERGENCY CHOCOLATE
Zadie, Present Day
I tensed, certain I would not want to hear whatever Betsy was about to say. “Of course,” I said.
“I’m not in favor of it, but he’s . . . latched onto the idea that it will bring him some kind of relief. I know you’re close to her, but he thinks he’s protecting other people from the same kind of tragedy, or he’s forcing a closer look at hospital policies, or something like that. He thinks it’s the only thing to do.”
“Are you . . . talking about Boyd?”
Her neck jerked in a small, tight nod. “He’s going to sue your friend, and he’s leaning on Nestor”—she meant Nestor Connolly, the CEO of Charlotte’s immense hospital complex—“to take some action against her.”
Most physicians dread lawsuits, and it’s not because they think they’ll lose. Every doctor has a colleague who’s been sued. Or maybe they’ve been sued themselves. It lurks over everyone like a ten-foot-tall grizzly, waiting for you to stumble, poised to sink its fangs into your helplessly exposed neck.
Or maybe that’s not an accurate metaphor. One of my partners, a bright-eyed, white-bearded older guy named Charles Frank, known for his consistently terrible jokes and his unflagging enthusiasm for getting to know his little patients, had been sued after one of his teenage patients died. The kid, who had structural problems in his heart, had bled profusely during his last surgery, nearly dying on the OR table. He needed a defibrillator but couldn’t have another immediate surgery. In the meantime, he had taken off the external defibrillator he was supposed to be wearing and gone to a friend’s house to lift weights, defying both his parents and his doctors. Watching Charles negotiate the lawsuit was more like watching the slow agony of someone with an intestinal parasite than like watching someone get his head chomped by a bear. Every month he bled a little more. I began to dread the hangdog look he wore to the office, especially each time he had to ask the rest of us to cover his patients because of a court date or disposition, which were held according to the schedules of the lawyers. People who knew nothing of the details of his defense rushed to censure him on social media. Patients left the practice. To save money, his insurer forced him to settle, even though, like the overwhelming majority of doctors who are sued, he’d have likely won his case.