The You I Never Knew Part 8

"I bet you'd say that if I was painting Elvis on velvet."

"Maybe." With the frank l.u.s.t only teenage boys exhibit, he lifted her sweatshirt and unhooked her bra.

Mich.e.l.le still remembered the way he kissed her neck, her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, her stomach. Trusting him, she relaxed and let it happen. Since the very first time they'd made love, he had created a world of sensation for her. Colors glowed brighter. Edges appeared sharper. When they struggled out of their clothes and came together, she saw a million glinting stars behind her squeezed-shut eyelids.

Later as they lay spent in each other's arms, she had listened to the beat of his heart, drifting, dreaming. She'd done a lot of pictures in the summer and autumn-landscapes and wildlife, abstracts with bold splashes of color and subtle shadows hiding in the hollows of s.p.a.ce.

"I want to be an artist," she said.

"You already are."

"No, I mean I want my paintings to hang in exhibits where anyone who wants to can see them, even buy them."

"So go for it." His belief in her was unshakable and straightforward.

She had loved that about him, how he never doubted her. But what did he believe about himself? It used to worry her sometimes, how quiet he was about his own life, so she asked, "What about you? What do you want?"

He'd chuckled without a great deal of humor. "For my mother to quit f.u.c.king up."

Mich.e.l.le hadn't known what to say. Tammi Lee Gilmer was holding down a waitressing job at the Truxtop, yet she knew Sam was concerned. If Tammi Lee's pattern held true, she'd go on a binge, miss work, lose her job, then collect unemployment until it ran out and she drifted to another town, dragging Sam along with her.

It was the only life he had ever known, and thinking about it made Mich.e.l.le's heart ache.

"That's not what I meant, Sam. I meant you. What do you want for you?"

"For me?" He hesitated.

"Come on, you can tell me. What, do you think I'd laugh at you? I'm the one who wants to make a living as an artist."

"At least you know what you want."

"So do you. But you have to tell me." She figured he was headed for the rodeo circuit. Already, he'd placed in a lot of the local shows, riding her father's bucking stock, competing in team-roping and bulld.o.g.g.i.ng. "Come on. Truth or dare."

He wiggled his eyebrows comically. "I'll take the dare."

"I want the truth."

Another hesitation. Finally, without looking at her, he said, "Would you believe medical school?"

Mich.e.l.le had pulled back, studied him. The s.h.a.ggy light hair, serious eyes, and a mouth that made her melt inside were all so blissfully familiar. But this was a stranger speaking. It was the first she'd heard of medical school. "Since when?"

"Since forever, I guess." He began getting dressed. The ranch hands were riding fence, and he was an hour behind because of their diversion. "I've never told anyone."

"I'm glad you spilled the beans. You should go for it, Sam."

He shook his head, flashing a self-deprecating smile. "I'm a high school dropout."

"You can get a G.E.D."

"I can't afford college."

"My dad could help with-"

"He wouldn't, and I wouldn't ask him."

"Then I'll ask him."

"In case you haven't noticed, I'm your dad's best roper. Why would he want to lose that? And why would I beg some rich guy's help? Believe me, I wouldn't be worth a bucket of spoiled oats if your dad ever found out how I've been spending my lunch hour."

"We're consenting adults."

"Right. You think that would make a difference to your old man?"

"He's been a hound dog for years. He's got no call to talk. I don't know why you insist on keeping this a secret. I love you, Sam."

He paused, touched her cheek. "Aw, honey. That's why we can't let him catch on. He'd try his d.a.m.nedest to keep us apart."

"He can't keep us apart. It's a free country."

Sam had laughed at that. "Is that what they taught you in that fancy-a.s.s girls' school in Cal-if-orny?" His smile was tinged with a weary tolerance that made him seem infinitely older and wiser than Mich.e.l.le. "That's not the way the real world works. In the real world, the daughter of a rich movie star doesn't go out with a waitress's son. Believe me, your dad wants you to fall for some guy with a golf handicap, not a PRCA rating."

"That's dumb. Besides, I've fallen for you. And that's not going to change. Not ever." As they finished dressing, she had considered telling him that she was alarmingly late with her period. But she'd said nothing. If it was a false alarm, there was no need to worry him.

He took her hand. "Honey, I don't want it to change. That's why we're better off keeping this quiet."

His words made her feel hopelessly naive. There were differences between them, cla.s.s differences she didn't want to see. Looking back, she realized that had been apparent to Sam right from the start. That was probably why he didn't think anything of simply disappearing one November night.

She had walked outside with him, into the dry cold and sunshine, bringing along the finished winter landscape.

"d.a.m.n." He squinted in the direction of the training arena.

"What's wrong?"

"Jake Dollarhide. I think he saw us."

The foreman's son. She saw the gangly young man standing in the distance, and he was staring directly at them. "So what?" she'd said with breezy disregard. "Let Jake Dollarhide stare all he wants." She put the finished painting behind the seat of the truck.

"I can't take that, Mich.e.l.le-"

"Yes you can. I'll paint a hundred more for you."

"Believe me, honey, this is enough."

She hadn't known back then that those would be his last words to her. That his last kiss would be a quick, furtive brush of his lips over hers. But after that moment, she had never seen him again.

"Ms. Turner, we're ready for you in Dr. Kehr's office."

Goose b.u.mps rose on Mich.e.l.le's arms as she entered a comfortable office with a generic but good-quality Robyn Bloss serigraph print on the wall behind the desk. Mich.e.l.le studied it for a moment, remembering that she used to paint freely, in intense colors of her choosing, not in hues to match the burgundy wing chairs in doctors' offices where people waited for the bad news.

The Bloss print was supposed to be pacifying. To some it might have been. But to Mich.e.l.le it was profoundly disturbing. Seeing that print was like looking into a mirror.

She seated herself in a leather armchair beside her father. A large window behind the desk afforded a view of the city, gray and bleak in midwinter, the river a colorless vein through the middle of town. Dr. Kehr, the nephrologist, sat opposite them, her ultraclean hands folded atop a stack of files and charts. She had a bland but pleasant smile, no discernible personality, and somehow meeting her for the first time made the whole situation starkly real.

They were going to cut out one of her kidneys and sew it into her father.

Sucking in a deep breath, Mich.e.l.le shifted in her chair and waited for the rest of the team to arrive. They met Donna Roberts, the transplant coordinator, who was a registered nurse specializing in organ transplantation. Donna did a lot of touching and hand-holding, which Mich.e.l.le didn't particularly need at that moment, but she figured she'd be grateful for later. Then there was Willard T. Temple, the psychologist and social worker. He could scuttle the whole thing if he didn't think her father and she were mentally prepared for it.

They would each have their own surgeons. They showed up in scrubs, alike as Tweedledee and Tweedledum but with firmer handshakes. Neither of them could stay long because, after all, they were surgeons and they spent all day cutting people, not talking to fading movie stars and their neurotic daughters.

To Mich.e.l.le's surprise, one of the surgeons held the door open. "This way, Mr. Slade."

Gavin got up. Briefly, he rested his hand on her shoulder. "I'll be back shortly, okay?"

"You're not staying?" Panic pounded in her chest.

"I think they need to draw lines on me or something."

After the door closed, she scowled at Dr. Kehr. "He should be here."

Temple, who held a clipboard with a yellow legal pad, said, "Your father's been drilled on this procedure for months. We wanted a private meeting with you."

"Why?" Oh my G.o.d. Are they going to tell me he won't make it?

"Because if you have any uncertainty whatsoever about the transplant, we need to determine that. Living kidney donation is an emotional decision. It's natural to feel anxiety about the procedure, even though you want to help. You can speak freely to us. If you decide against the surgery, your father will be told you're not a good match. Our hope is to maintain the relationship between patient and donor, regardless of donation decision."

"I've made my decision," Mich.e.l.le snapped, stung because she knew she and Gavin didn't have any relationship to maintain. "I already pa.s.sed all the tests."

"We still have to do the renal angiogram," Dr. Kehr reminded her. "Chances are, you'll be a near-perfect donor. But there could be other issues that make you less than an ideal candidate."

"I'm here, aren't I?" she said fiercely.

"Sometimes there are emotional issues," Temple said in his low-key voice. "Your father indicated you've been estranged for many years. This decision-"

"Don't you get it?" Her voice rose. "There was never any decision to be made. You're welcome to explore my feelings all you want, but you're not going to get me to change my mind." She forced herself to glare straight into his eyes. "My father is dying. My kidney can save him. That's the issue, Dr. Temple."

He nodded briefly, and annoyingly made a note on his legal pad. "You should be aware that this procedure alone won't mend the estrangement between you and your father. Flesh and blood alone can't accomplish that."

"I just want him well again," Mich.e.l.le said, painfully close to tears. "The rest... we'll deal with."

When Dr. Kehr started speaking, she was thorough, encouragingly so. She explained what everyone's role would be. She talked about recovery periods, follow-up care, side effects of the meds, and long-term prognosis. She took out badly drawn charts-medical ill.u.s.tration was not terribly lucrative-to show what would happen in the procedure.

That's what she called it. The Procedure.

"Unless the renal angiogram indicates otherwise, the surgeon will take the left kidney." The doctor pointed to the chart.

"I had no idea there was a difference." A heaviness weighted the atmosphere. Though he had left the room, her father's need pressed at Mich.e.l.le, smothering her. Her hands in her lap ripped a Kleenex to shreds. Guiltily, she balled up the evidence and tucked it into her palm. Too late. Temple had seen. He made a note on his clipboard.

"Using the left kidney is standard," the doctor continued. "The connecting vessels are longer, so we've got more material to work with."

Mich.e.l.le's hand, out of control now, stole back to press against her left side.

"You have a couple of options for entry." The chart was propped up again. "Later, we'll discuss whether it'll be the front or the back." Her finger traced incision lines on the chart. "Generally, we advise against the back entry, because although it's a more direct route, the recovery is quite painful due to the splitting of the rib cage."

Mich.e.l.le wished she hadn't said anything about splitting her rib cage. It was hard to keep from looking terrified when the doctor talked like this.

"Also, an incision scar on the back might be troublesome," Donna added.

"What do you mean, troublesome?"

"In the fashion sense. If you like wearing dresses cut low in the back, the scar might show."

"That's not important."

"It doesn't seem like it now. But it's a consideration. A team in Seattle pioneered a harvesting technique that only requires a four-inch incision in the donor."

Harvesting. "That's good to know," Mich.e.l.le said wryly.

"The long-term effects of having only one kidney are minimal. But there are long-term effects." Donna smiled pleasantly. She had honest eyes; Mich.e.l.le liked her.

"You mean I should avoid cliff diving and logrolling?"

"That would be advisable, yes."

"Suppose I were to get pregnant." She had no idea where that came from; it just slipped out.

"You'd be at a higher than normal risk, but pregnancy isn't prohibited."

"Just asking." Quickly, to cover up her embarra.s.sment, Mich.e.l.le said, "Here's the big one. Will I be able to play the violin after the surgery?"

"Of course," the nurse a.s.sured her, though Mich.e.l.le could tell from the smile in her eyes she knew this joke.

"Great," Mich.e.l.le said. "I never could before."

"Just use good sense. Protect that one kidney."

By the time the meeting ended, Mich.e.l.le was feeling both exhilarated and frightened. Her father came back as everyone was filing out. Dr. Kehr shook hands with her, and she held on to her longer than she should have. Her life and that of her father would quite literally be in this woman's hands.

"Any more questions?" Dr. Kehr asked.

Her father stood still and upright, looking heartbreakingly stoic. It was one of the things that distinguished him as an actor. He had a way of touching people's hearts without moving a muscle.

"Not at the moment," Mich.e.l.le said. "You were really thorough. Dad?"

"No questions either. I've been doing my homework on this for months, so I guess I'm as prepared as I'll ever be." He sent the doctor a grin. Mich.e.l.le could see her visibly falling for him. "Can we call you if any questions come up?"

"Of course." She held out a pale blue business card. "You have my home, office, pager, and cell phone. Call anytime." She walked them to the door. "Until next Sat.u.r.day, then? If Mich.e.l.le's final tests check out, Monday's our day."