Medicine Men Read online

  “Are you afraid of it at all, the surgery?”

  “No, actually I’m not.”

  In the few days before her surgery, Molly was indeed both busy and cheerful rather than apprehensive. In a literal way she was getting her house in order. She had had so very little energy in the preceding months there was a lot that needed to be done. Now, though still feeling considerably less than well, she did quite a lot. She went through her closets and pulled out clothes to be given away, and packed them in boxes; she packed up some books (misguided presents, many of them, or duplicates from her library or Paul’s) for the Friends of the Library. She answered some letters.

  In the balmy drought-season fall weather, her mood was high—although her health sagged; her nose and her head felt weighted. But soon this would all be over, she thought. No more of this heaviness in her brain, these headaches, her intolerably runny nose. And she felt the freedom of no more Dave in her life. Quite soon, she thought, there would be no more doctors at all whom she had to see.

  She went to Dr. Stinger’s office for what she had thought was a preoperative examination and consultation with him; he was to explain the coming procedure. But instead she found, again, the two very polite Chinese residents. And in a jovial way, still feeling her elated sense that her trouble was almost over, Molly asked them, “Polyps still there?”

  “Oh yes,” they assured her, as though that were good news.

  “Well, let’s hope the surgery takes care of them. Next time I see you, I’ll be all well.”

  They smiled at her, encouraging, very polite.

  “You’ll see Dr. Stinger in the OR,” said his nurse, with a smile that added: Lucky you to see him at all.

  “I wonder why Dr. Stinger didn’t find the polyps on the MRI,” Molly later mused to someone. Or maybe only to herself, for no one answered.

  • • •

  “We didn’t like what we found up there,” said Dr. Douglas Macklin, at Molly’s bedside, after the operation, in the Recovery Room. He took her hand.

  How nice and kind of him, was what Molly thought. She felt warmed and comforted—for what she did not quite yet know. She was still very, very groggy, half-anesthetized. But pleasantly so. Nothing seemed very serious or important. Nothing hurt, or was even uncomfortable, and it was very nice just lying there, her hand firmly clasped in Dr. Macklin’s hand.

  In an idle, conversational way, and partly just to prolong their nice new connection, she asked him, “What did you find?”

  “Quite a large tumor. Unfortunately. A really big one.” He paused, and then came the words that Molly was to hear so often, repeated to her over and over and over, in the days and months to come, in tones of amazement and disbelief: “A tumor the size of a golf ball.”

  Why then and later did Molly envision this alleged golf ball, miraculously produced by herself, as green? She could never decide. Surely she had never in life seen a green golf ball.

  She asked Macklin then what seemed to her the obvious question. “Why didn’t he just take it out?” It had been clear from his voice that the golf ball was still there—and as things turned out there was no clear answer to her question.

  “Well, you see, it was, uh, not benign. And so there is some question of the appropriate procedure.”

  “Oh, not benign? You mean malignant?” Molly was still conversational, and somewhat distant. Most of her mind still peacefully floated somewhere else.

  “Uh, yes. Possibly radiation first, to shrink it. We just aren’t sure yet. Dr. Stinger isn’t sure …”

  Molly’s later reflections included thoughts on the extreme reluctance of doctors to use the word “cancer,” often referring to it, when they must refer to it at all, as simply “CA,” which in California is doubly confusing. But she only thought of all that later. For the moment she was only thinking, Oh, not benign. Malignant.

  They stayed in that pleasant posture, Macklin holding her hand, for quite some time. How nice of him, is what Molly was mostly thinking.

  It is possible that she even drifted back to sleep, for in her next interval of consciousness Dr. Macklin was gone, and it was Dr. Stinger who stood beside her bed. He was frowning and not, of course, holding her hand. He would never hold a patient’s hand, she knew, and maybe no one else’s hand either. Short, dark, handsome, and cross, he stared down at her.

  He addressed her, “Mrs. Bonner?” As though to say, Will you ever, ever wake up?

  Forced, or so she felt it, to make conversation, Molly responded, “Oh, hello.” And then, “You found a golf ball inside my nose?”

  No smile. “It’s not a nice tumor.”

  “Some are nicer than others?”

  There was the smallest twitch at the corners of his mouth. “You could put it that way.”

  They were getting nowhere at all. Obviously, she thought, Molly had to take charge of the conversation—if that is what they were having.

  She asked him, “In that case, what are my chances?”

  For the first time he spoke up clearly. “About twenty-five percent, I’d say.”

  “You mean, a seventy-five-percent chance that I’ll die?”

  He hesitated for the tiniest moment before he repeated himself. “Yes. You could put it that way.”

  “Oh.”

  Curiously, Molly was not especially upset by this news. It was not that she was depressed; in no sense did she long for death, as perhaps a very old or a very ill person might. It was simply a peaceful acceptance of what she was told was coming next, by these authorities, the doctors. She even thought, Well, in that case I won’t even have to think about getting a job. And she also thought, It’s too bad I’m not religious, I could look forward to seeing Paul in an afterlife, really telling him off, at last. But alas, she was not, and so she could not. But there did seem a sort of logic in it: Paul dead and then her too.

  Still, she felt very peaceful.

  She must have dozed off then, again, with peaceful thoughts, for when she opened her eyes again Dr. Stinger was gone and standing by her bed there was, of all people, Dave Jacobs.

  And that is what she said as she felt herself smile: “Well, of all people.”

  He was very serious. Dead serious. “I think it’s good that I’m here.”

  He looked strong and wise. Slightly angry, even, and so Molly said to him, “I guess so.”

  Even more seriously, frowning, he said, “I saw Stinger.”

  “Oh.”

  He said, “I’ll be by to take you home tomorrow morning.” He added, “Your friend Felicia was here but I told her to come to your place in a couple of days.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  Never mind that she would very much have liked to see Felicia right then. At that point Molly felt herself given over to the care of doctors, and Dave was a doctor. He was one of them.

  NINE

  For the next three weeks, a period that Molly later saw simply as the time between surgeries, she became another person, a woman hitherto unknown to herself or to anyone who knew her: she was quiet and passive, docile, mildly depressed. She did not suffer the acute panic, the dread that might reasonably be expected with a golf-ball-sized tumor, a cancer, behind her nose. She was in truth somewhat numb, not fully conscious. At night she took heavy sleeping pills; in the long afternoons, when they did not have appointments with doctors, she read long trashy books that dulled and preoccupied her mind.

  “They” of course meant Molly and Dave. Dave made the appointments with doctors, and together they trundled around to a wide variety, with various specialties. More ENT people, radiologists, surgeons, internists, cardiologists, even a dentist. “But I already have a dentist,” Molly feebly argued.

  “This man has a specialty in radiology.”

  “Oh.” So much for Dr. Gold, who was only a dentist, with no fancy specialty.

  “It’s a wonder he didn’t drum up a new shrink for you” was Felicia’s comment—or one of her comments.

  “You know he doesn’t hold with
that. He’s got endless anti-shrink stories.”

  “So does Sandy. Did Sandy. So boring.”

  “I think they don’t like people smarter than they are.”

  “Sandy would never admit that anyone else was smarter.”

  “Neither would Dave, actually. And certainly not my shrink. And Shapiro is smarter.”

  But that conversation took place considerably later; at the time, even behind Dave’s back, Molly was not rebellious. She was quiet, and grateful, and not quite all there.

  Dave, by contrast, seemed more himself than ever. His large eyes were brighter, his step more quick and lively, even his voice was deeper and more firm. In between doctors, when he was not explaining what had been said (there were rather few explanations, since Molly was felt not to understand much, medically speaking), he joked and laughed a lot. Molly came to see that he was having a very good time; he was truly in his element.

  Molly was in a sort of protective cocoon of blurred half-consciousness for most of the time. Not quite all the time, though: occasionally she would emerge, her old intelligent, somewhat fearful, questioning self.

  One day she asked Dave, “If this tumor’s the size of a golf ball—you doctors keep saying that—how come Dr. Stinger didn’t see it on the MRI?”

  They had not been back to see Dr. Stinger since Molly’s operation—a curious fact, if one gave it any thought, which Molly had so far not done.

  Dave scowled. “That’s a good question. Frankly, I wonder if he even saw it. The MRI.”

  “What? He didn’t see it?”

  The scowl deepened to heavy lines of Dave’s high bald-domed brow. “Ask your pal Macklin. He admits that he didn’t see it. He just talked to the radiologist about it.”

  “But—”

  “You’re right. This may be a malpractice issue. I’m honestly trying to decide what you should do.”

  “But I didn’t—” Molly had not meant that she even thought of suing; being a relatively reasonable, non-litigious person, she had simply asked what seemed to her an obvious question: How come the tumor was not seen on the MRI? Golf-ball-sized. (Green.)

  However, even if she had had no intention of suing, should not this decision be up to her—and perhaps a competent lawyer?

  But she went back into her cocoon; it was safer there.

  At another time, she came out to ask, “How come all the doctors we see are men?”

  “It just happens that way. Believe me, we’re seeing the best in town. None of them so far have happened to be women. But that could happen. I certainly have nothing against competent women doctors, nothing whatsoever.”

  “Oh.”

  Different, widely differing (male) doctors were visited, but the format was much the same. First, a long wait in the doctor’s waiting room, followed by a nurse’s summons to an examining room. At last, the doctor’s entrance, followed closely by Dave, who somehow managed always to be present. An examination, and then Molly was sent back to the waiting room, while Dave and the doctor talked. Consulted. This last was by far the longest phase of the visit.

  One day, during a more than usually lengthy session between Dave and the visited doctor, Molly became aware of her old (former) habitual intense impatience. The nurse was occupied on the phone, and so Molly got up and walked over to the door, left half-open, of the doctor’s private office.

  “… interesting, very common in Japan,” she heard the doctor say to Dave. “Statistically—”

  And then they both looked up at Molly, who had timidly tapped on the door.

  Dave frowned, but mildly, before standing up to shake hands with the other doctor. “Well, this has been very interesting.”

  “Very interesting,” the other one echoed.

  In the elevator: “It was interesting,” Molly complained. “Why couldn’t I have been there? They have these tumors in Japan all the time?”

  “Not all the time, but statistically—oh, you don’t understand. And I have to confer with these doctors. It’s essential. Essential for you, I mean. You’ll just have to learn some patience.”

  And Molly, rebuked, absorbed the familiar admonition, and returned, more depressed, to her semiconscious retreat.

  At night they drank quite a lot. Dave was a two-martini man, and so that is what they had, plus a bottle of wine with dinner. Dave liked steak and potatoes, and they had a lot of both. Sometimes chicken. Not very hungry, Molly nibbled as Dave scolded: “You’ve got to keep your strength up. You’re bound to lose some weight with surgery, and probably radiation, so the more you go in with …”

  But I don’t much like steak, Molly did not say.

  All the wine made her sleepy, and if she woke in the night she took a pill. She had no dreams.

  Respecting what he referred to as her “illness”—he did not say “cancer,” ever, nor even “CA”—Dave did not touch her much in bed. A blurry good night kiss, some vague reachings in the direction of her breasts, hands from which Molly groggily moved away.

  One morning at breakfast Dave told her, “Today you get your wish. We’re going to a woman doctor. A radiologist. And not only a woman, she’s Japanese. Now, is that politically correct enough for you?”

  PC or not, the Japanese woman doctor was very pretty, small and daintily featured, with short feathered black hair and large sexy eyes.

  More alert than was usual for her these days, Molly understood that the issue was whether to radiate and possibly shrink her tumor, her golf ball, her CA before or after surgery. An interesting issue, obviously.

  “… of course a great deal would depend on the wishes and opinion of Dr. Stinger” was what Dr. Tanamini at last murmured to Dave, in her very soft voice.

  After a pause, “We are no longer connected with Dr. Stinger,” said Dave, in his loud stiff voice.

  “But I—I most highly respect—” began Dr. Tanamini, with what sounded like real alarm.

  “I understand your respect,” Dave told her firmly, as though giving an order, and then he did give an order, to Molly. “Molly, I’ll meet you in the waiting room.”

  The next conversation, between Dave and Dr. Tanamini, seemed to take even longer than most of Dave’s conferences did, and Molly gathered from his face and his tone when at last he joined her in the waiting room that it had not gone very well.

  “She’s terrified of Stinger,” Dave muttered, out in the corridor. “So annoying—she’s probably the best in the business.”

  “She learned a lot about these tumors in Japan?”

  “What?” Dave gave her an are-you-crazy? look, familiar to Molly from somewhere—and then she remembered Henry Starck, who thought most of her ideas were crazy.

  She was about to remind Dave about the tumor statistics when he seemed to remember on his own.

  “Oh, Japan,” he said, dismissing Japan. “No, she’s just generally good on rare tumors of the head and neck. But she’s totally intimidated by Stinger. Won’t make a move.”

  “Maybe they’re lovers.”

  “Oh, Molly, for God’s sake—”

  “But they could be—doctors too—”

  “Molly, please. This is serious. Anyway, so much for her. Tomorrow we see Bill Donovan, at Mount Watson. You remember?”

  • • •

  During this strange interim period of Molly’s life, her friend Felicia was mostly in Seattle—with her new friend, her lover, the professor. She was also between jobs, and, more important, keeping away from Dr. Raleigh Sanderson. “It may sound silly but I’m really scared of him. Doctors can go just as ballistic as anyone—after all, you don’t have to be a dope like O.J. He was saying wild things, like I’d ruined his life.

  “But Seattle is really the greatest—you’d love it. Maybe you should think about moving up here? Or maybe I should?” Felicia laughed, her old rich careless sexy laugh. “I don’t know, you see more water there. Somehow in San Francisco there’s water all around, you don’t see it as much. Of course his apartment is right up above the waterfront, and nea
r the market, so wonderful, the most voluptuous fish, and vegetables—every night I make something wonderful. But dear Molly, how are you? Is Dave a help or just a bully? Of course at this point I’m so anti-doctor—”

  “So am I, and he’s both,” Molly told her. “I long to get rid of him but I can’t right now. I just want to be well, and never see a doctor again. He makes me feel guilty and ungrateful.”

  “Like a parent.”

  “Exactly,” Molly told her.

  “There’s a wonderful sort of garden here built up above the freeways. The plants absorb all the noise and the smells, so it’s really peaceful, it seems magic, enchanted.”

  “I think you’re in love with Seattle. And the professor?” asked Molly. “You like him too?”

  Felicia laughed again—at herself, from the sound of it. “It’s all so hard to sort out, you know? Relief at his not being Sandy, plus my feelings about this city. Plus he’s a very nice man. And at least I know I’m not madly in love this time—that’s probably the best sign of all. Listen, do you want me to come down when you have this surgery? Honestly, just say so and I’ll be there in a flash.”

  “Oh no, it’s still so goddam uncertain. When and where, and who’s the lucky doctor who gets to do it. Who gets the green-golf-ball prize.”

  “So lucky I could get this appointment.” Dave said this many more times than twice when they drove south, down the Peninsula toward Mt. Watson Hospital, and the famous, marvelous Dr. William Donovan. Molly, repeating those words back to herself, became interested in their order, which clearly put the emphasis on “I could get.” On “I.” Dave was to be the hero of this episode in her life, Molly clearly saw, and in a blurry way she wondered just what her own role was to be; she felt that if Dave was to be heroic she was not. At best she could be the rescued maiden, a markedly non-heroic part. At worst, she supposed, she would die of surgery, some strange unprecedented slip of the knife, or just a bad reaction to being anesthetized. Curiously the idea did not bother her a great deal. I won’t feel a thing, she thought, and she further thought, That might teach all these medical hotshots a thing or two.