A Clean Well Lighted Place

When I recovered enough sanity to think about her, I found her lying there limply, breathing gently. I looked into that beautiful Swedish face, with its exquisite high cheekbones, her perfect Scandinavian nose and those incredible full sculptured lips. It was the most insanely beautiful sight I had ever seen. Then she popped one eye open and surveyed me. It was like a Karelian Lake, deep blue and bottomless. She said, with a profound sense of emotion, "Thank you my dearest. Our love was the only reason I survived this."

We made love all weekend. I had told Eve that I was ready to talk about anything she wanted to talk about. But, she said that there was nothing to say. As far as she was concerned the whole dreadful thing was something that had happened in a universe long ago and far away. She was where she belonged now, where she always wanted to be, and that was all she cared about. Doris showed up with the normal Sunday feast and we spent the entire Sunday wrapped in a blanket of familial contentment.

As we were going to bed, I said, "Your mother told me about your problems with Williams." She looked grim and said, "I am going to take care of that bright and early tomorrow. He never really touched me. But, if I have my way that over-entitled bag of shit will never practice medicine again." I said meekly, "You should have told me." She looked genuinely disbelieving and said, "And WHAT??? Have you kill him??? I love you way too much to get you locked up for the rest of your life. And I knew that was exactly what would happen if I told you." She was right. It would NOT have been a pretty sight.

Then she turned serious and said, "When he dropped this trip on us I was gathering evidence to support my sexual harassment complaint. I knew that he was just trying to get me alone so he could work on me. The conceited prick really thinks that every woman he meets wants to fuck him." She laughed mockingly and added, "Like THAT was ever going to happen. He didn't even GUESS that my phone's recorder was on all the time he was propositioning me." Wow!! I would have sent a "Thank You" note to the guys who had administered the fucker's systematic and brutal beating. But, unregrettably they were all dead.

Then she smiled wickedly and said, "The fact that I ended up in harm's way thanks to his shenanigans is just the eye of the whole shitstorm. I am not going to simply file a complaint. I am ALSO going to sue Mayo for negligence, for letting a horn-dog like him supervise ANY woman. When I am done I can guarantee that our life will be like it was before HE came into it." I made a mental note to never mess with my loving wife. She is slightly more ferocious than a mama grizzly, at least where the people she loves are concerned. In fact, she was a whole a lot like her mother Doris.

I turned off the light and we lay under the covers spooned together, just the two of us. I had my arm around her supple waist and she snuggled her two sexy little buns into me. Of course THAT raised my interest. She said drowsily, "Again?" I said, "Again!" And we spent the night making sweet satisfying love in our tranquil little house in a happy little town in Wisconsin.

Epilogue

Mayo was so eager to settle Eve's complaint that they actually sent a platoon of high-powered suits to negotiate the terms. They knew how exposed they were. Apparently Doctor Douchebag had a record of those kind of incidents in Rochester, which is why they had shipped him to the wilds of Wisconsin in the first place.

The fact that Eve had recorded evidence of being harassed at the clinic was bad. But she also had proof that she had been exposed to assault, rape and potential death as a result of Doctor Dickhead's scheming. That had them desperate to make it all go away. So, they offered millions. We turned them down flat. All we wanted was to have our simple life back. So we settled for their iron-clad commitment to guarantee our professional independence, within the MINIMUM requirements of the law. Then, we went back to the practice of primary care medicine.

Needless to say, the AMA was not pleased with Dr. Dickhead. It takes a lot to get a license revoked but they took the process as far as they could. They also made it clear that any further missteps would guarantee that he would be practicing medicine in some place like Uruguay; because he wouldn't have a license in the U.S. Of course, Mayo fired him. They also made it a point to publicize their problems with him to the medical community. The last anybody heard he was working in a clinic; in Nome, Alaska. He didn't worry about freezing his dick off up there. The Mexicans had taken care of that!!

Seven months wore on. Every day was full of love and satisfying work. Then in January of her 39th year, Eve announced that she was pregnant. She was ecstatic. I reminded her about what the doctors had told us. She said that during the gynecological tests the doctors at Bethesda had diagnosed the cervical insufficiency and they had fixed it with some micro-surgical sutures. Eve told me that their chief worry was that the repair would prevent her from becoming pregnant. But since she already WAS pregnant, that was a moot point. We could expect a happy event in six months.

Eve wanted the baby so badly that she spent the last two months in bed. The entire town was following the events of those final weeks closer than they followed the happenings at Lambeau field; which should give you an idea how important the birth was to all those good-hearted people. Doris was omnipresent, feeding, coaching, and fluffing Eve's pillows. We were close enough to the natural delivery date that the doctors in Madison decided to induce. A parade of cars followed us down US 90 to the University of Wisconsin Hospital the night before. The whole town wanted to be present when the happy event occurred.

I was with Eve through the entire birth. She might be 39. But she has the strength and vigor of a much younger woman. Little Brooklyn entered the world at 2:19 PM on a gorgeous October day. The sun outside was literally bathing the delivery room in a golden light. It felt like the only thing missing were the celestial trumpets.

Brookie was loudly complaining about her treatment as they placed her on the table to clean her up. So, I wandered over to talk to her. I said, "I want to introduce myself, my little love-lump. I'm your daddy and your lifetime happiness is going to be my obsession." My little angel stopped caterwauling and focused her bright blue eyes on me; it was an eerily normal look for somebody who had been on this earth for a mere five minutes.

Then she reached for the finger that I was extending toward her. She took it in her tiny hand, held it and quietly stared at me. She might have recognized my voice from all of the time that I had spent talking to her in the womb, or it might have just been reflex. Nonetheless, that simple act cemented a bond between me, my wife and my child that only a husband and father would understand. I knew then and there, that it was all worthwhile.

*****

AUTHOR'S END NOTE

I know I said that I was done posting stuff until my latest book was finished. But technical writing is a lot like what the Coast Guard icebreakers do out here on the Great Lakes. You ram ahead for a depressingly short distance and then you back off and repeat the process. That will go on for the next six months. So, maybe you can see why I am compelled to sneak in a story once in a while, just to keep from gnawing my foot off. Then again, maybe I'm just an addict. I wonder if they have meetings for that sort of problem? "Hello, my name is DT and I'm a writer!!"