Chapter 54

Jack and Charlie looked at me like I'd grown another head when I came out of the bedroom.

"What?"

Jack said, "Did you just say twat?"

"Oh, come on, Jack. Don't tell me you've never heard the word."

"I've heard it. I'm just surprised to hear it from you."

"Girl talk, Jack. Girl talk."

Charlie decided it was time to check in with Mary and Jack needed to finish copying his notes.

"I'm going to take Bozo out and then I'll probably spend some time with Laurie."

"How are you getting to your father's?"

"I'm not. Laurie spent the day with Mary. You know that."

"Oh, yeah. I forgot."

"When are you going to want to eat?"

"I guess maybe an hour."

"OK. I'll see what's happening downstairs. We'll either eat there or I'll figure something out for up here."

"Good. I've got to get going on this before I have more pile up on me. Are you going to be able to work out a form for it tonight?"

"I should have time to play around with it later. What's the file name you're using?"

"Photo."

"That should be easy enough to remember. OK, I'll see you later. Come on, Bozo."

I opened the door and he took off down the stairs. By the time I got down there, he was deep in the back yard, paying attention to a bush. I went to the kitchen door and pulled it open, as I'd done a hundred times before. This time, Dino looked ready to attack for a split second before he recognized me. Laurie was standing just on the other side of him, her arm around his neck.

He settled down as she let go and said, "Hi, Jill!"

"Hi, Laurie. You playing with Dino?"

"Yeah. I like him."

"That's good. Bozo's in the back yard if you want to see him. You can take Dino out there if you want."

She ran out the door, tugging on Dino's collar as she left. She called for Bozo and sort of pounded on the top of his head with the palm of her hand a few times.

"Hey, Laurie, take it easy. If you hit him too hard, it hurts. You don't like to get hit, do you?"

"No."

"Good. Just be a bit more gentle. Here. Give me your hand."

I took her wrist and moved it so that her fingers were behind his ear. "Now, just scratch it gently with your fingertips. Most dogs like that. Right Dino?"

Of course, Dino was right there, making sure that Bozo didn't do anything to hurt his new friend so I had no problem scratching behind his ears.

"If you're nice to a dog, he'll be nice to you. Just make sure it's a dog you know. If you ever have any questions, you can always ask Mama Wanda or Daddy John or any of us here. OK?"

"Uh huh."

"Good. Tell you what. Let's go sit down on the picnic bench and talk while they play together for a while."

"OK."

We went over to the old picnic table near the house. It had a couple of long benches, one on either side. The table had definitely been around for a long time. Jack had told me that they used to have picnics on that table back when his father was still alive. The dog exploring the back yard back then was Sparky, Mom's super dog.

"So, Laurie, did you have fun today?"

"Uh Huh."

Did you do anything special?"

"Well. Mary let me listen to her radio. It's like a radio but it's round. Kinda like a flying saucer. And it has these things you put over your ears so you can hear."

"Oh, I bet it was her CD player. Those things you put over your ears are called headphones."

"Yeah."

"So, what did you listen to?"

"Mickey Mouse songs."

"All right. Do you like Mickey Mouse?"

"Uh huh. But I like the duck better."

"Which one? Donald or Daffy?"

"Daffy. He's funny."

"Yeah, he is. Anything else you did?"

"Mary read one of her books to me Only we didn't finish. She said we'd finish it some other time."

"What book was that?"

"I don't remember the name of it. It was a big book. It had this girl in it named Nancy."

"Nancy Drew?"

"Yeah, I think so."

"A lot of girls like her stories. There are a lot of books with her in them, too. I think there are a few of them on the bookshelves in your room that I read when I was little. You should ask Mama Wanda."

"OK."

"What else did you do?"

"Daddy John came over and we ate lunch. And then he took me to see a doctor."

"What did you guys have for lunch?"

"We had red soup and cooked sandwiches with cheese inside."

"Oh. I bet it was tomato soup and grilled cheese sandwiches."

"Uh huh."

"How was your visit with the doctor?"

"I didn't like it. She made me sit still and she put this stick in my mouth and then she put this thing in my ears and then shined a light in my eyes. And she put this cold thing on me and stuck the other end in her ears."

"I bet that was a stethoscope. Doctors use that so they can listen to your heart and make sure you're breathing right."

"Yeah. Then she stuck a needle in me and all this blood came out."

"Yeah, that's yucky. Did it hurt?"

"A little bit. But I didn't cry."

"That's good. Do you know why they took some of your blood?"

"Uh uh."

"Well, they look it under a microscope. Do you know what that is?"

"Uh uh."

"Well, it's got this tube you can look through, sort of like the tube the toilet paper's around only it's got glass at both ends. So, you look through the tube at some of the blood and you can see inside it, only the tube makes it all look bigger. And you can see what they call blood cells, which are little round things that swim around. They look and see if you have the right kind of blood cells. There are two kinds and it's not good if you have too many of one and not enough of the other. Or sometimes the blood cells may be sick and they can tell that. And if you're sick but don't know it, there may be some of the sickness swimming around in the blood, too. The sooner they find out you're sick, the faster and easier they can make you better. So it may hurt a little to get that needle stuck in your arm but it could save you from being real sick later."

"Oh."

"If you want to see what it looks like, Daddy John has some books with pictures of things in the microscope. You can look at lots of things in the microscope, not only blood."

"OK. Jill?"

"What is it, Laurie?"

"How come Daddy John didn't do that to me? He's a doctor, right?"

"Yeah, he is. There are a couple of reasons. First, it's kind of a rule that doctors don't examine anyone in their family."

"How come?"

"You know, I have no idea. They let doctors get away with all kinds of things but that's one rule they have. The other thing is, he isn't that kind of doctor."

"What kind of doctor is he?"

"He's what they call a specialist. That means he works on one thing. Actually, Daddy works on two things. First, he takes care of girls my age and older as well as women. He's called a gynecologist. He only looks at the parts of a woman that are for having babies. He's also an obstetrician. That's a doctor who takes care of women who are going to have babies. He also takes care of the babies after they're born along with their mothers."

"Oh. So what kind of doctor did I see?"

"I don't know. Probably a general practitioner or what they call a GP. That's a doctor who knows a little about everything. These days, they find out what's wrong with you and then send you to a specialist. If you have something wrong with your stomach, they send you to a doctor who works on stomachs. And there are heart doctors and lung doctors and all kinds of doctors. Your mother saw a cancer specialist but she hadn't found the cancer early enough and she didn't have them do anything to her."

"Should she have had them stick a needle in her and take blood?"

"I don't know, honey. A blood test doesn't find everything that could be wrong with you. There are lots of other tests they do to find cancer. If she'd gone to a doctor as soon as she felt sick, they could have done whatever tests they needed to and it might have made a difference."

"Mommy didn't like doctors."

"There are a lot of people who don't. I think they have their place, though."

"What does that mean? Have their place."

"It means that there are some things they are good for but they aren't as important as a lot of people make them out to be."

"Oh."

"Don't worry, Laurie. You'll understand soon enough."

"OK."

"So. Are you hungry?"

"Uh huh."

"Let's go inside and see where we're going to eat dinner tonight."

"OK."

We started walking and I felt a tiny hand grab onto mine. I smiled at her and got a big grin back in return.

The dogs saw us heading towards the house and rushed to see who could block the doorway first. I think it was a tie. Bozo was the first one in after I opened the door but that's only because Dino stopped to watch me and Laurie go inside.

Mom was at the counter, working on a salad.

"Oh, Jill. Glad I saw you. Would you and Jack like to eat with us tonight? I'm making lasagna and there's plenty for everybody."

"That sounds good. The only thing is he has some more interviews tonight. They start in a little over an hour."

"Well, the lasagna should be ready in about twenty minutes. That should give him plenty of time."

"Good. That will save me from cooking. By the way, I told Wanda I'd make sure Laurie got fed."