The Best Medicine (5 page)

My mother turned back to me. “Your father and I think we may have done you a disservice. That perhaps our animosity toward each other may have caused you to avoid forming a healthy relationship with someone special.”

“Someone special?” Fly ball. Left field. Clunk in the cranium. I smoothed my napkin in my lap. “I haven’t avoided relationships, Mom. I’m just very selective. And I haven’t had time.”

“Well, you should make time.” My mother reached out to pat my hand, and a flash of lightning caught my eye.

No.

Hang on a second.

That wasn’t lightning. It was the high-powered wattage of a giant diamond ring flashing from her finger. The glare was like the beam from a lighthouse.

“Wow!” A huff of surprised laughter escaped me, followed by the swirling sensation that life as I knew it was twirling off its axis. “That looks like an engagement ring, Mom.”

She squeezed my wrist and leaned closer still. “It
is
an engagement ring.”

Bungee jumping in the Grand Canyon could not have created a greater plummet in my gut.

“You’re engaged?” When did my mother have time to date, much less fall in love? I glanced over at my father. He must be as shocked as I was.

But he wasn’t. She must have told him on the drive. That’s why they rode together. He set down the menu and took a sip of scotch, as cool as Clint Eastwood had been before Clint Eastwood got old and curmudgeonly.

“Engaged to whom?” I asked. Was it that nice widower who lived next door to her in Ann Arbor? He’d always had a thing for her. Or was it her colleague, Dr. Bettner? That thin-lipped guy with the bad comb-over? Ack, I hated that guy. I hoped it wasn’t him. Or maybe it was someone brand-new? Someone I’d never even heard of.

My mother sat back, pulling her five-alarm rock with her. “This is where it gets a little unusual.”

Unusual? Really? Because my day had turned unusual right about the time I got confetti chucked into my face and then had my patient arrested right before my very eyes. And now this momentous news? I couldn’t imagine what she could say to make it
more
unusual.

“It’s your father,” she said.

Except for that.

The bungee cord snapped. “What?”

“Your father and I are getting remarried.”

My parents were not practical jokers, and if they were trying to be funny right here, right now, they were doing a piss-poor job of it. This wasn’t funny. And they weren’t laughing. What the hell? My father reached his arm around and draped it along the back of my mother’s chair.

“I’m sure this is a bit of a surprise, Evelyn, but it’s something Debra and I have been discussing for a few weeks.”

“A few weeks?”
My voice squeaked as if I’d been sucking on helium.
Vodka, vodka, vodka. Where was the vodka?
“Dad, it took two years for you to pick out a new car, but this? This you decide in a matter of days?”

I pressed my palms down on the table, trying to steady a world gone out of control. Could this be some kind of midlife crisis for them gone horribly awry? Or a dual break with reality? Once again, that alternate universe theory of mine started picking up steam.

“Well, it’s not as if we don’t already know each other. Isn’t that right, Garrett?” My mother’s voice was mellow as she turned and gazed toward my father’s lean face.

His hair was completely silver; not gray or white, but a crisp silver. And although my mother often commented on how she was aging so much better than him, the truth was, my father had only improved with time.

But all that was irrelevant at the moment, because I needed to fix this. I needed to set things back where they belonged. Sure, it had been a relentless horror listening to them bicker all these years, but at least in that scenario, I knew where I fit in. This was marshy, treacherous new territory.

“Yes, you know each other,” I said as calmly as I was able, given the fact that I could neither breathe nor blink. “You know each other, and you hate each other.”

“That’s not true.” My mother looked back at me and had the nerve to sound surprised. “I never hated your father. I just hated some of his terrible decisions.”

I let that statement dangle out there, but no, no, I was pretty sure she’d hated him. For two decades she’d called him Ferret instead of Garrett. And she once commented that his subsequent wives were nothing more than talking blow-up dolls, only dumber.

But my father’s nod was solemn. “Evelyn, I was careless, and short-sighted, and selfish, but the fact remains your mother is the only woman I’ve ever truly loved. All those countless others meant nothing.”

A telltale muscle twitched at the corner of my mother’s eye. I sank deeper into my chair as if someone had cranked up the gravity.

“Is one of you dying? Is that what this is really about?”

My mother chuckled. “Of course not. What would even make you ask that?”

“Because this is insanity. The last I heard, you two weren’t even on speaking terms. What the hell happened?”

They looked at each other like hormone-addled teenagers. My mother fluttered her lashes, and for the first time in my life, I saw my father blush. A serious case of the queasies mushroomed in my stomach. Apparently there is no age limit at which a child ceases to be nauseated by the gross reality of her parents being intimate.

“We ran into each other at a conference in La Jolla a few weeks ago,” my mother said. “And there was a little wine tasting, and, well, one thing just led to another, I guess.”

One drunken night of booze-soaked sex and my mother set aside twenty-plus years of resentment? This didn’t add up. “Fine, so you had a fling, but how did
that
get to
this
?” I pointed at the ring.

“It wasn’t a fling, Evelyn.” My father still had the stones to admonish me. “You know your mother is the only woman who has ever challenged me, personally or professionally. She’s the only one who has ever been my intellectual equal, and I’ve finally grown to realize that. The fact that she’s still stunning after all these years is just a bonus.”

It was my mother’s turn to blush.

I needed a Dramamine. This ride was spinning too fast.

“We’re getting married on our original anniversary,” my mother added, fully not appreciating how the roaring in my ears made it nearly impossible to hear her. “I’d like you to be my maid of honor, Evie.”

She squeezed my hand again.

“Maid of honor?” I choked out.

“Yes. The wedding will be a modest but tasteful event in Bloomfield Hills.”

“Bloomfield Hills?”

“Yes. There’s a lovely little bed-and-breakfast place there that does weddings. Your father and I have been spending our weekends in that area. We may even buy a house.”

“A house?” I couldn’t seem to stop repeating her words, like a foreigner trying to master a new language. But I could not wrap my head around any of this. I’d spent most of my life mediating communications between my parents, trying to keep that boat from rocking too violently, and suddenly here we all were, on a honeymooners’ sunset cruise. I put my head into my hands, resisting the urge to cover my ears.

Fortunately, they fell silent, letting me process these words like a meat grinder processed sausage. My emotions were getting all chopped up and mixed together until I couldn’t recognize any of them. My parents, remarried?

Finally, I looked up.

They peered back.

I shook my head.

“I don’t know what to say to you guys. Except . . . why do you always do this kind of shit on my birthday?”

Chapter 3

“SO, LET ME GET THIS
straight,” Gabby said as she poked her fork into a piece of spinach salad. “Your parents have been divorced for twenty-three years, and now they’re getting back together?”

We were having lunch at a new place that had recently opened near the hospital. I didn’t normally take a break during my office hours, but I needed to talk to someone about this absurd turn of events. I’d fretted over my parents’ announcement all night, and today, with Hilary in surgery, Gabby was the only other trustworthy person I knew.

Well, actually, I wasn’t sure I
could
trust her, but I needed to discuss this with an impartial third party since trying to talk sense into my parents had proven fruitless. All my father kept saying was “Trust us.” And all my mother kept saying was “It’s really time you found someone special.”

Found someone special? After a lifetime of her drilling me about the importance of independence,
now
she wanted me to find someone special? I had whiplash from last night’s dinner conversation. And I was beyond confused. I rested my spoon against the edge of my bowl. I should have ordered something less spicy than tortilla soup. Like a shot of Mylanta.

“Yes. They’re getting remarried,” I said. “At some little bed-and-breakfast they’ve been spending time at over in Bloomfield Hills.”

“A bed-and-breakfast?” For a grown woman, Gabby’s sigh was princess sweet. “That’s so adorable. Mike says if we ever get married, he wants his reception at the bowling alley. It’s the only reason I haven’t dragged him down the aisle yet. But a bed-and-breakfast is so romantic.”

“No. No. No. It isn’t romantic. It’s ridiculous. My mother has lost her mind.” My palm thumped on the table, making all the silverware rattle.

A diner at the table next to us turned to stare in our direction. I smiled apologetically. Sometimes I get a little shrill. People notice.

“Why do you think it’s ridiculous? I think it’s sweet. Imagine rediscovering love after all those years.” Gabby took another casual bite of salad, eating as if this were just some random, insignificant discussion about something random and insignificant.

“Ever since the day my parents split up, all I’ve heard from my mother is what an egotistical douche bag my father is. He’s been married three other times, you know.” I counted on my fingers. “One, two, three other times! So including my mother, this will be his fifth wedding. Fifth!” I pushed my splayed hand toward her face for emphasis.

Gabby dodged my hand, and a few more diners turned to gawk. Maybe we should have gone someplace with fewer people.

She shook her head again. “But didn’t he say he’d finally realized she was his . . . what was it? His
alma gêmea
?”

“Really? Portuguese? Is that necessary?” Impatience stretched my vocal cords.

Gabby smiled, unfazed by my distress. “His soul mate,” she answered.

I gave an unladylike snort. “He said she was his
intellectual equal
.” I finger quoted in midair . . . with my middle finger. “But that’s bull. He’s just getting too old to attract younger women, so he figures being with my mom is the easiest way to still get laid.”

A woman from the booth next to ours glared at me, and I finally noticed her three little kids staring at me with big, round Cindy Lou Who eyes as if I were the foul-mouthed Grinch.

Shit.

I mean . . . phooey.

I lowered my voice to a whisper. “It’s bad enough my mother’s offering him a little Frito penis now and then, but does she have to marry him?”

Gabby smiled.
“Foda pena
.
”

“Whatever.” I picked up my spoon. Then dropped it back into the bowl again. “I just don’t understand how she’s had this complete reversal of opinion. She couldn’t tolerate him before, so why now? What’s changed? It just makes me so worried for her.”

“Your mom sounds like a pretty smart woman,” Gabby said. “Maybe she’s just decided he’s what she wants. Warts and all.”

I looked out the window into the glorious sunshine. People were strolling down the brick-paved sidewalk, enjoying their day. I wanted to be one of them. Carefree. Unburdened. But I knew better. I knew how relationships could turn sour, how following your emotions could lead to disaster.

“That’s the part I really don’t understand, Gabby. She’s got love goggles on. It’s like she’s forgotten all the rotten things he did. She was no saint, either, of course, but all of a sudden she’s full of forgiveness. Maybe it’s a menopause thing. Like a hormonal imbalance.”

Gabby laughed and tipped her head to the side, making her pink-tipped hair catch the sunlight. “Evie, my mother is in the clutches of menopause. The other day she threw a six-pound raw chicken at my father because he asked what was for dinner. So I’m thinking forgiveness is not a side effect of menopausal hormones.”

I looked out the window again. I knew she was right about that. I also knew it was unlikely I could explain to anyone the concern I felt over my mother’s journey back to the dark side of unholy matrimony with my father. Maybe she’d forgiven him, but the truth was, he’d left me too. Without so much as a backward glance. And started playing house with some other woman. And some other woman’s kids. I’d always found it the height of hypocrisy that a man who fixed broken hearts for a living could be so incredibly careless with mine.

Gabby sipped her iced tea. “You know, the fact that he actually married those other women does say something nice about him.”

“What? That he loves to pay alimony?” Other than my mother, who earned every bit as much as he did, his other wives had all been utterly dependent on his income for their daily expenditures. Being Mrs. Dr. Garrett Rhoades required a certain amount of upkeep.

“No,” said Gabby. “I think it means deep down he’s a romantic at heart. He believes in true love and happily ever after. And maybe so does your mother. Maybe all this time they’ve just been looking for their happily ever after and realized they can find it together.”

She was giving both of them way too much credit. My parents were not that self-actualized. “They cannot possibly be each other’s happily ever after. This isn’t some TV movie of the week where enemies become lovers. You don’t know what these two have done to each other.”

“Like what?”

I rarely shared these details. No one knew the level of passive-aggressive behavior my parents had displayed over the years. I guess I’d gotten used to it, but it was still embarrassing to talk about.

“Stupid stuff. Childish stuff. Like every time my mom finds a magazine subscription card, she fills it out with his address. I got his mail once. He had fifty-seven magazines. Even the mail carrier started complaining.”

Gabby giggled behind her hand. “That’s actually kind of funny. It doesn’t seem that mean. Except to the mailman.”

“OK then, how about the fact that she’d pick up his dry cleaning and donate the clothes to Goodwill?”

Gabby laughed harder, and I began to wonder if the rest of the world would see this as more funny than cruel. “OK, so somewhere in Ann Arbor is a homeless man wearing an Armani tuxedo.” I smiled and took my first spoonful of soup.

“What else?” Gabby prompted. She was enjoying this. “Did he retaliate?”

“Oh, absolutely.” I actually chuckled. Maybe it
was
kind of funny. “He sent a gorilla-gram to her office to celebrate the ten-year anniversary of their divorce.”

“A gorilla-gram?”

“Yeah, you know. A guy dressed up like a gorilla who shows up and sings to you. She was furious. She had his car towed from the hospital parking for that one. My mother does not like to be humiliated.”

Gabby shook her head slowly. “No one does. But it seems to me that if they kept pulling these pranks on each other, they never really did let go. Love ends when you stop thinking about each other, not when you’re still trying to get a rise from one another.”

Hmm. Maybe there was a molecule of truth to that. Or half a molecule, but it seemed unlikely. “These are two very competitive people, Gabby. I think it’s more about getting in the last word.”

“Well, whatever the reason, they need each other. You may as well embrace it, because you can’t do anything about it.” She stuffed another bite of salad into her mouth.

Embrace it? This conversation had not gone as I intended. Gabby was supposed to nod, and agree, and validate my feelings of irritation. I guess I should have explained the rules. I mean, what good did it do me if her only advice was to
embrace it
?

I’d left my parents at Arno’s last night right after we’d finished our entrées. I’d said no thanks to dessert, claiming to be too full. But the real truth was that two hours of watching them canoodle had given me a stomachache. Too much sugar.

“Call me tomorrow, darling,” my mother had said as I got up to leave the table, but when I turned to wave good-bye, they were already locked in each other’s gazes as if I wasn’t even there. It was spooky.

“Oh,” Gabby said, pulling me back to the moment, “there’s Jasper.”

A tall, slender man in chef’s whites had been moving around the small dining room, stopping to chat with this patron and that patron, until he reached our table.

“Hey, Gabby. I thought that was you. Love the pink hair.” He gave her shoulder a quick squeeze.

“Hi, Jasper. Congratulations on your new restaurant. This place is
adorável
.” She gestured to the room in general.

“
Adora
what?” He cocked his head to the side.

Gabby nodded and spoke slowly. “
Adorável. Minha salada é deliciosa.
That’s Portuguese for this place is adorable and my salad is delicious.”

“Portuguese, huh? Interesting. I think my mom speaks a little of that.” He turned my way and smiled, extending his long arm. “Hi, I’m Jasper.”

I shook his hand.

“Jasper, meet Dr. Evelyn Rhoades,” Gabby said. “We work together.”

“It’s nice to meet you, Jasper. This is your restaurant?”

The place was
adorável
, just as Gabby said. It was cozy and quaint, with big windows and dark wood accents. Every table had a different-colored cloth on it, and all the chairs were strategically mismatched. It felt like the kind of restaurant that had been there forever, a place where the locals spent every Saturday night.

“It’s mine for now.” Jasper nodded. “If business stays good, I might even get to keep it.” His smile was as bright as the gold wedding ring gleaming from his finger. It was so shiny I guessed it was nearly as new as this restaurant.

“Business looks good.” Gabby looked around at all the tables. Nearly each one was occupied.

Jasper nodded. “It’s been really busy. I actually need to hire more waitresses soon.”

“Is Beth working here? I haven’t caught up with her in ages.” Gabby turned to me. “I went to high school with Jasper’s wife.”

Crimson splashed across his cheeks, and he looked over his shoulder as if someone might be eavesdropping. “She’s sort of helping, but the smell of food makes her queasy. She’s kind of a liability in the kitchen right now.”

Gabby’s eyes went wide. “Is she pregnant?”

Jasper looked around again, but his smile proclaimed his answer loud and clear. “I can neither confirm nor deny those rumors for at least another week. I’ve been forbidden.”

“Oh, I can’t wait to see her.” Gabby’s own cheeks flushed. “Tell her to call me, will you?”

Jasper nodded. “I will. I have to get back to the kitchen. I just wanted to say hi.”

He left us with a wave, and Gabby gave up a forlorn little sigh. “I want a baby. Right now. I want Mike to marry me first, but I really want the baby. I’m almost twenty-eight. My eggs are deteriorating exponentially, and Mike is dragging his feet.”

My ovaries waved at my uterus as if to say
are you hearing this?
If
she
was getting too old, what the hell did that make me?

“Babies are a lot of work,” I said, speaking as much to my reproductive organs as to Gabby.

She gazed back at me, her expression earnest. “Is that why you’re never having any?”

My hand paused, holding the spoon over my soup bowl. Never having any? Wasn’t I?

“Who said I was never having any?”

Her cheeks flushed cherry red and she began to stammer. “Um, well, no one. But you’re not interested in dating. And you’re thirty-five years old. I just kind of assumed . . . I mean, no offense. I guess lots of single women have kids now and that’s great. I just . . . well . . . do you want to have any?”

That was a very thought-provoking question. One I’d never been asked, even by my own self. Did I want children?

Kind of.

Sort of.

Maybe. I sure liked Hilary’s kids, but truthfully I was a little afraid of babies. They were so tiny and fragile. Other than my pediatrics rotation, I had never been responsible for one. Maybe subconsciously I’d made that decision by postponing marriage until it was too late. I knew the statistics. Getting pregnant after thirty-five put me into the high-risk category. And without a man anywhere on the horizon, I wasn’t likely to be married and pregnant anytime soon.