Dynamics of a Human Heart Ch. 06

One of the last sketches caught Sam's eye: a detailed depiction of the bones in her leg depicting the different fractures.

"When did he get X-ray vision?"

"Your scars, sweetie," Miranda explained, "From your surgery. I imagine that that served as a pretty good indication where the damage was located."

Sam swallowed once and nodded as she reflexively covered the scars that marred the otherwise perfect form of her bronzed legs, "And all this from memory," Sam huffed, "If only he used his powers for good and wasn't such a sadistic fuck."

"I think this might be his attempt at that. The 'using powers for good', not the other thing."

"Gotcha. What's the rest?"

Putting aside the sketches, Miranda picked up another series of papers, bound together with a thin silk ribbon, violet that matched her eyes.

"Cute," Sam snorted, "Even now, after everything, you're still the only thing he thinks about."

"He's thinking about you too, Sam," Miranda whispered as she inverted the ribbon.

Baby blue.

"Asshole," Sam muttered.

"Handmade?"

"Probably, knowing him, you know just to brag, 'look I can work with silk too!'"

Miranda shook her head in semi-amusement and began to go through the documents.

"Not more drawings?"

"No, it's a list."

"Of?"

"Clinics and hospitals known for having top-notch genetics and orthopedic departments."

"The genetics to identify the disease and the orthopedics to treat?"

"Essentially," Miranda scanned the list, "A couple of old favorites here: Johns Hopkins, UC San Diego," she looked up with a smirk, "He included that one on top, I guess he figured we might not want a long commute."

"Fuck, if it gets me walking again, I'll go to Mars."

"Whoa!"

"What?"

"Well, not Mars lover, but how about Prague or Madrid?" she went through the rest of the list, "A lot of these are passport only."

Sam snorted, "Right, okay, I'll just go fuel up the private jet and we can go to the Czech Republic or Spain—"

"Or France, or the Netherlands, or Finland or Russia..." Miranda rattled off as she read the list.

"My point," Sam emphasized, "Is that we have no idea how to get there or who to talk to so that I can get admitted."

"Yes, we do," Miranda said quietly and held up a second sheet of paper.

"You gotta be fucking kidding..."

"Corresponding geneticists, including clinical geneticists, the whole nine yards, two or three different choices for each institution."

"And let me guess, they just all happen to be taking patients?"

"Actually no," Miranda indicated a portion of the information, "But these are their home addresses and numbers."

"Their what?!" Sam took a moment, "You're telling me he has the home address of some of the most renowned geneticists in Europe? How the hell did that happen, it can't be common knowledge."

"Apparently it's the opposite of common knowledge," Miranda chewed on her thumbnail contemplatively as she scrutinized the information before her, "But, for whatever reason, all we need to do is show up or call, give them this packet, and we are officially on their patient roster."

"And how did he manage that?"

"Knowing him? I'd say either they owe him or he has something on them."

"Wow, coerce and blackmail your way to a healthier you," Sam rolled her eyes, "That should be a book title."

Miranda held up more paper, "Ditto for the orthopedic departments, some domestic: New York Hospital for Special Surgery, the Cleveland Clinic, and The Mayo—"

"Oh, of course," Sam huffed, "We'll just walk into the Mayo clinic and get an appointment, after all, the waiting list can't be much longer than, twenty, thirty years?"

"Not if his notes are anything to go by."

"You cannot—"

"Names, dates, and private contact info."

"Ugh! This man is irritatingly thorough."

And I'm never going to see him again. Miranda felt the ache begin to tighten again inside her.

"Hey, you okay Miri?"

Miranda cleared her throat, "Yeah fine," she continued down the list, "Well, if we're in Europe anyways we have the—" Miranda squinted and sounded the name out slowly, "Rudolfinerhaus Hospital in Vienna, a private hospital no less."

"Here, give me that you linguistic oaf," Sam reached over and took the papers from her.

"And what exactly qualifies you as a master of the Teutonic languages?"

Sam gestured to her long, blonde hair.

"Fine, throw your shameful Aryan heritage in my face, that's fine."

Sam grinned and read off the list, "'Mediterranean Health Care', "The Corposalud Clinic' and the 'Xanit Hospital Internacional' all of them in Spain, the last of two are, naturally, private clinics."

"Of course, not that it matters to us, of course."

"Of course not. Not with Mr. 'I'm secretive and infuriatingly well-informed' and his handy-dandy contact list,"

Miranda consented the point, as Sam continued.

"Well, if you're in the mood for gyros, we've got the 'Hygeia hospital', in Greece."

"Okay, okay, we get it!"

"Oh, just one more!"

"Why are you enjoying this so much?"

Sam shrugged, "I guess it's nice to be able to pretend that I could afford to jet to all these exotic places and get better," her face took on a look of grudging respect, "Besides, he vetted the hell out of these places, might as well take the time to read it at least."

Miranda sighed, "Okay Sammy, one more."

Sam scanned the list and began to snicker.

"What?"

The snicker became barely suppressed laughter.

"What?!"

And Sam nearly fell off her chair howling with laughter. Miranda reached over and took the paper scanning it until she found...

'University of Kyoto. Kyoto, Japan'

"That...that--" Miranda sputtered attempting to find the correct word in English

"--Kuso kurae no shin!!" she screamed. Eat shit and die.

"Oh come on sweetie," Sam gasped, "Maybe he figured, after hearing how much you enjoyed being around your ultra-conservative and tradition-bound mother than you'd appreciate a trip back to your childhood home for the chance to relive it all over again in the 'land of the rising sun'!" she finished in an awful mock Japanese accent.

Miranda glared plum-colored daggers at her lover.

"I'm not certain which one of you I hate more right now."

Still laughing, Sam reached over and took her lover's hand, kissing it gently, "Come on, Miri, it was a jab, that's all, a last gasp of being a prick. We won't have to deal with him or his shit ever again, I promise."

Miranda's hands tightened on the list and the paper began to crumple.

"Whoa, look sweetie," Sam consoled, "It was just a petty insult from a petty man, nothing to get worked up about."

It took every ounce of self-control that Miranda possessed to conform to the mistaken impression Sam had and she nodded.

"Right, not worth it."

"Good girl," Sam gave her hand a squeeze and started to roll away, "Besides, it's all wish fulfillment, it's not like we can afford any of this."

"Why not? We make decent money," Miranda countered.

"Sweetie, the air fare alone would be financially problematic," Sam explained. Sam had a head for money and finances, which she attributed to having been raised without any, in contrast to Miranda's more troubled, but prosperous, upbringing.

"I can deal with 'problematic'; I've got some cash stashed for a rainy day."

Sam smiled at her lover's determination not to give up, "This is not a "rainy day' situation; this is more a 'torrential downpour of sulfur day."

"Gripping visual."

"Then there's the hospital fees," Sam continued.

"But Grey's list--?"

"Suggests we could get me admitted, not, that it would be a free ride. The cost of the biopsy and genetics testing, orthopedic surgery, all the post-op treatment, half a dozen different medications I'd probably be on, physical therapy, and, no one said that the doctor's listed would even give us a consultation for free," she wheeled away towards the kitchen. "All in all, the whole package would probably run us thousands and thousands of dollars, we could never afford it," Sam began to go through the fridge, "Hey, are you in the mood for omelets?"

"Sam?"

"Yeah Miri, hey, I'm thinking bacon or ham...or maybe both."

"You said 'thousands and thousands', right? It would take thousands and thousands of dollars to make this work?"

Sam frowned, Miranda's voice sounded strained, "Afraid so," she replied as she began to pull out eggs, bacon, and ham.

"How much would you say?"

Sam put down the eggs and bacon and wheeled back towards her.

"Okay Miri, the term 'dead horse' is beginning to apply here—"

"Would thirty-five thousand dollars do it?"

"Well, that's a random number, what made you..." Sam wheeled to a stop: Miranda was standing unnaturally stiff; both of her hands were shaking as they gripped a small piece of paper.

"What the..?"

Wordlessly, Miranda handed Samantha a check made out to them for thirty-five thousand dollars.

"But..?" was all Sam managed.

"Look at the memo line," Miranda said quietly. Sam did so.

All debts paid.

"I...," Sam opened and closed her mouth several times.

"He kept his word, Sam. Despite all the shit and craziness, he kept his word that you would walk again," she looked back at the documents, "Even if he forced his way out of our lives," she barked out a bitter laugh, "We hate his guts and he probably hates ours, but he did...this."

"I'm having a tough time hating him right now," Sam whispered as she wiped away tears, "I mean, I thought after the other night, I was fucked, you know?"

"I thought so too."

"Don't get me wrong, if it's a toss-up between walking or keeping my woman safe from a very toxic individual, then, you know, so be it, but this..."

"Was that part of the reason you were angry?" Miranda asked, "Because you felt that it'd cost you your chance at walking again? And that a lot of that was my fault?"

Sam opened her mouth to deny it then closed it.

"Yes. If you had left well enough alone, then we wouldn't have had that huge blow-up and I would have remained on the path towards someday being vertical," she looked up at her lover, "I'm sorry, Miri."

Miri smiled and leaned over to kiss her golden hair.

"Me too, Sammy."

"Don't call me Sammy."

The girls both laughed and then looked at the table of papers.

"So," Sam began, "I mean, are we actually going to do this? Deposit that check and start calling these people?"

"Not right away, we need to lay down some ground work," Miranda began to count off her fingers, "We need to schedule some away time from the university so Luke and Isabel don't have a stroke when their treasured T.A.'s take off with the first round of exams looming ominously..."

"Have you ever known something to 'loom benignly'?"

"I'm going to ignore that comment and thus preserve my respect for you," Miranda said stiffly as Sam chortled.

"Okay, okay, what else?"

"We'll need to arrange for transportation, lodging, and we need to do a ton of research before we go jetting off anywhere. This is a lot of money, but not so much that we're going to 'window shop' until we find the right one," she frowned at the list. "We can stay in the states if you like, that'll seriously cut expenses and getting into Hopkins or the Mayo clinic would be outstanding."

"But I wanna go see Europe!" Sam whined.

Miranda couldn't repress a grin, "Okay, okay, why don't we see where the research takes us," she gestured at the paperwork, "He's done the bulk of the heavy lifting."

"Yeah, no shit," Sam replied gesturing at the check.

"Well, yes, that too, but I meant the data. He's managed to narrow down out of thousands of schools, hospitals, clinics, and research centers into a list of roughly ten for each, genetics and orthopedic surgery respectively. Considering it looks like he combed the U.S. and a pretty good chunk of Euro--" her voice trailed off.

"What's wrong?"

"There are...gaps."

"Beg pardon?"

"Look here," Miranda grabbed a map and folded it until Europe and the U.S. was displayed. "Okay, now he's pretty free with his recommendations for anything within the States," she took a moment to recall some of his notes, "although it's clear he doesn't have a tremendous respect for the majority of American medicine: Hopkins and Mayo are the only that he actually recommended, the rest are kind of 'eh' in his estimation."

"Snob."

"And then some, but look," she pointed to the other end of the map, "He lists nothing in the United Kingdom," she traced her finger towards the center of the map, "Or Germany," her finger traveled southwards, "Or Italy."

"So?"

"So I know for a fact that there at least two very qualified hospitals in London and Cardiff alone for this kind of procedure. The same in Germany, there's a hospital in Heidelberg that has a genetics team that possesses a reputation for focus and efficiency that's downright--."

"Prussian?"

"That works," Miranda frowned, "But what about Italy?"

Sam was beginning to get uncomfortable; Miranda's voice had taken a very familiar and entirely unwelcome tone.

"Okay...." Sam drawled, "...what about Italy?"

"So the Universities of Verona and Siena both have published volumes on their work in the fields of genetics. For crying out loud, the University of Siena even has a "Medicinal Genetics" department."

Miranda began to consult her notes as Sam witnessed her going into 'turbo-research mode'.

"Okay, so, you're NOT going to feed your intellectual vanity by trying to figure out whatever this is," Sam jerked her thumb towards the kitchen, "And meanwhile, those of us in "Sanityland" are going to go make breakfast."

Miranda looked up and smiled a little, "Yeah, you're right, sorry Sam," she looked at the papers, "It's just a puzzle."

"Yeah, yeah, and I know you and puzzles. Now get your ass in the kitchen woman and make me some eggs!"

Miranda laughed, "Oh, yes ma'am, I shall do so!"

The girls prepared breakfast amidst laughter and the occasional verbal jab in their traditional fashion. Omelets filled with bacon and ham, smothered in Munster cheese and topped with tomatoes, red peppers and onions. Grilled English muffins (in tribute to Grey, Sam declared) with marmalade. Fresh pomegranates and black tea rounded out the meal.

"What? No mimosas?" Sam demanded.

"Not on a school day," Miranda countered.

"But alcohol is a magical thing! It keeps one from, you know, becoming a howling neurotic!"

"Uh-huh, finish your tea and then we need to head to class."

"Kill joy."

Miranda shook her head in amusement and headed back out into the living room where she stood over the papers.

"What's your game, Grey?" she whispered to herself, "Why do this? Is it just you keeping your word?" she wanted—a great deal more than she was comfortable with—to believe that that was the case, that, at his core, he was a decent man, as she had believed him to be the night of the party.

But what about the U.K., Germany, Italy? Why omit institutions from those countries.

"What are you hiding? Why Greece, but not Italy? Why Austria and the Czech Republic, but not Germany?"

"Whatever it is," Sam interrupted Miranda's reverie causing the other girl to jump, "It's going to STAY hidden, right, Miri?"

Miranda took a deep breath and then...let it go.

"Yes."

"Good girl."

They gathered up the papers and tucked them back into the folder. Sam affixed the check beneath a refrigerator magnet and they got ready to go when Miranda caught something out of the corner of her eye. It was a small, velvet bag, the same color as the table, which might have accounted as to why, it had been overlooked until now.

"Sam?" Miranda called out.

"Yeah?"

"Could you come out here please?"

"Oh God, did he send another, larger check? 'Cause I'm okay with that."

"Not...precisely."

Sam wheeled in and both the girls scrutinized the bag: it bore no logo or any kind of describable markings or design.

"What is it?" Sam asked.

Miranda licked her lips, "When he was here, last night, he told me something."

Sam frowned in consternation, "You failed to mention that you two had a little chat?"

"It was hardly a 'chat' Sam," Miranda assured her, "He just told me something and left."

"Okay, don't keep me in suspense."

Miranda took a deep breath, for some reason speaking Grey's words was causing her throat to constrict.

Because they'll be the last words of his I'll ever hear again.

"'February fourteenth, nineteen ninety eight'," she answered with a slight catch in her voice.

Sam frowned, "What the hell does that mean?"

"I have no idea."

"Well, what did you say back?"

"I told him...," she swallowed around a dry throat, "I told him to get the fuck out of our flat."

"Oh, he must have loved that," Sam cackled.

"Maybe, I don't know. However, after I said that, I heard him put something down on the table, and this was after he'd already put the smokes and the packet on the table.

"Wait a second, you heard him? Was it too dark to see?"

Miranda exhaled slowly, "I never actually saw him. I spent the entire night curled into a ball on the couch facing away from the door."

"So instead, you've got your back to him the entire time he breaks into our house in the dead of night? You're more trusting than I would be."

"I don't think..." but Miranda's resolve crumbled, there were a lot of things she didn't think Grey was capable of. Recent events, however, had forced her to reassess.

"I don't think he wanted to come here to hurt us or cause problems," Miranda explained, "My back to him meant nothing; all he wanted was to 'pay off his debt to us', as he no doubt saw it."

"Psycho, good riddance," Sam muttered.

"Still planning on depositing that check?" The words were out of Miranda's mouth before she could stop them and her eyes went as wide as dinner plates.

"Wow, okay then," Sam did her best to hide a hurt expression and failed.

"I'm sorry," Miranda knelt down by Sam's side, "This whole thing; him showing up last night, the doctors, the money, all of it; it's just a lot to take in all at once."

Sam smiled and relaxed a little, "Okay, Miri, no problem," she gestured at the bag, "So you told him to get the fuck out and he responded by leaving you a little gag gift?"

"It would seem," Miranda reached over and gingerly picked up the bag. Whatever it was, it was small, but with a heft that defied its size, and possessing an entirely irregular shape and form.

"Well?" Sam insisted.

Carefully, and with a level of caution usually reserved for handling plutonium sans safety equipment, she placed the object on the table and removed the bag.

Revealing a small orange statue made of amber.

"What the hell?" Sam scrutinized it: it was roughly as large as her thumb and exquisitely worked in what was indeed Baltic amber. It was translucent and it shone dully under the house lights.

"Here, hang on," Miranda took the figurine over to her desk and quickly swept it clear of clutter. Reaching up she activated a light attached to a large magnifying lens mounted on a swivel arm. Under the light and lens, the figurine's appearance burst into clarity and Miranda couldn't restrain a gasp of awe.

"What?" Sam demanded as she wheeled over to the desk. Numbly, Miranda simply moved over and let Sam examine the piece herself:

Another Miranda in a miniature study of orange.

"Holy fuck," Sam whispered. The detailing was unbelievable, it WAS Miranda: her head was tilted down and away. Her hair was done up in an elaborate coif that formed a golden crown upon her head that should have been impossible with such short hair. Her arms were crossed; one covered her breasts whilst the other clutched some sort of cloth that draped over her like a gown. In the crook of one arm, there was a small book. Her feet were bare with one slightly higher than the other, as if she perched upon something and she was clearly leaning backwards, resting against the remaining portion of amber. The overall impression was a study in demureness, grace, and quiet dignity.