Dexter by Design

TWELVE

There were so many pieces of machinery around Deborah that it took me a moment before I saw her in the middle of the whirring, chirping clutter. She lay there in the bed without moving, tubes going in and out of her, her face half covered by a respirator mask and nearly as pale as the sheets. I stood and looked for a minute, not sure what I was supposed to do. I had bent all my concentration on getting in to see her, and now here I was, and I could not remember ever reading anywhere what the proper procedure was for visiting nearest and dearest in the ICU.

Was I supposed to hold her hand? It seemed likely, but I wasn't sure, and there was an IV attached to the hand nearest me; it didn't seem like a good idea to risk dislodging it.

So instead I found a chair, tucked away under one of the life support machines. I moved it as close to the bed as seemed proper, and I settled down to wait.

After only a couple of minutes there was a sound at the door and I looked up to see a thin black cop I knew slightly, Wilkins. He stuck his head in the door and said, “Hey, Dexter, right?” I nodded and held up my credentials. Wilkins nodded his head at Deborah.

“How is she?”

“Too soon to tell” I said.

“Sorry, man” he said, and shrugged. “Captain wants somebody watching, so I'll be out here.”

“Thank you” I said, and he turned away to take up his post at the door.

I tried to imagine what life would be like without Deborah. The very idea was disturbing, although I could not say why. I could not think of any huge and obvious differences, and that made me feel slightly embarrassed, so I worked at it a little harder. I would probably get to eat the coq au vin warm next time. I would not have as many bruises on my arms without her world-famous vicious arm punches. And I would not have to worry about her arresting me, either. It was all good —why was I worried?

Still, the logic was not terribly convincing. And what if she lived but suffered brain damage? That could very well affect her career in law enforcement. She might need full-time care, spoonfeeding, adult diapers —none of these things would go over well on the job. And who would do all the endless tedious drudgery of looking after her? I didn't know a great deal about medical insurance, but I knew enough to know that full-time care was not something they offered cheerfully. What if I had to take care of her? It would certainly put a large dent in my free time. But who else was there? In all the world, she had no other family. There was only Dear Dutiful Dexter; no one else to push her wheelchair and cook her pablum and tenderly wipe the corners of her mouth as she drooled. I would have to tend to her for the rest of her life, far into the sunset years, the two of us sitting and watching game shows while the rest of the world went on its merry way, killing and brutalizing each other without me.

Just before I sank under a huge wave of wet self-pity I remembered Kyle Chutsky. To call him Deborah's boyfriend was not quite accurate, since they had been living together for over a year, and that made it seem like a bit more. Besides, he was hardly a boy. He was at least ten years older than Debs, very large and beat-up, and missing his left hand and foot as the result of an encounter with the same amateur surgeon who had modified Sergeant Doakes.

To be perfectly fair to me, which I think is very important, I did not think of him merely because I wanted someone else to take care of a hypothetically brain-damaged Deborah. Rather, it occurred to me that the fact she was in the ICU was something he might want to know.

So I took my cell phone from its holster and called him. He answered almost immediately.

“Hello?”

“Kyle, this is Dexter” I said.

“Hey, buddy” he said in his artificially cheerful voice. “What's up?”

“I'm with Deborah” I said. “In the ICU at Jackson.”

“What happened?” he asked after a slight pause.

“She's been stabbed” I replied. “She lost a lot of blood.”

“I'm on my way” he announced, and hung up.

It was nice that Chutsky cared enough to come right away.

Maybe he would help me with Deborah's pablum, take turns pushing the wheelchair. It's good to have someone.

That reminded me that I had someone —or perhaps I was had.

In any case, Rita would want to know I would be late, before she cooked a pheasant souffle for me. I called her at work, told her quickly what was up, and hung up again as she was just getting started on a chorus of Oh-My-Gods.

Chutsky came into the room about fifteen minutes later, trailed by a nurse who was apparently trying to make sure he was perfectly happy with everything from the location of the room to the arrangement of IVs. “This is her,” the nurse said.

“Thanks, Gloria” Chutsky said without looking at anything but Deborah. The nurse hovered anxiously for a few more moments, and then vanished uncertainly.

Meanwhile, Chutsky moved over to the bed and took Deborah's hand —good to know I had been right about that; holding her hand was, indeed, the correct thing to do.

“What happened, buddy?” he said, staring down at Deborah.

I gave him a brief rundown, and he listened without looking at me, pausing in his hand-holding briefly to wipe a lock of hair away from Deborah's forehead. When I had finished talking he nodded absently and said, “What did the doctors say?”

“It's too soon to tell” I said.

He waved that away impatiently, using the gleaming silver hook that had replaced his left hand. “They always say that” he said. “What else?”

“There's a chance of permanent damage” I said. “Even brain damage.”

He nodded. “She lost a lot of blood” he said, not a question, but I answered anyway. “That's right,” I said.

I have a guy coming down from Bethesda” Chutsky said. “He'll be here in a couple of hours.” I couldn't think of very much to say to that. A guy? From Bethesda? Was this good news of some kind, and if so, why?

I could not come up with a single thing to distinguish Bethesda from Cleveland, except that it was in Maryland instead of Ohio.

What kind of guy would come down from there? And to what end? But I also couldn't think of any way to frame a question on the subject. For some reason, my brain was not running with its usual icy efficiency. So I just watched as Chutsky pulled another chair around to the far side of the bed, where he could sit and hold Deborah's hand. And after he got settled, he finally looked directly at me. “Dexter” he said.

“Yes,” I said.

“Think you could scare up some coffee? And maybe a doughnut or something?”

The question took me completely by surprise —not because it was such a bizarre notion, but because it seemed like one to me, and it really should have been as natural as breathing. It was well past my lunchtime, and I had not eaten, and I had not thought of eating.

But now, when Chutsky suggested it, the idea seemed wrong, like singing the real words to “Barnacle Bill” in church.

Still, to object would seem even stranger. So I stood up and said, “I'll see what I can do” and headed out and down the hall.

When I came back a few minutes later I had two cups of coffee and four doughnuts. I paused in the hallway, I don't know why, and looked in. Chutsky was leaning forward, eyes closed, with Deborah's hand pressed to his forehead. His lips were moving, although I could hear no sound over the clatter of the life support machinery. Was he praying? It seemed like the oddest thing yet. I suppose I really didn't know him very well, but what I did know about him did not fit with the image of a man who prayed. And in any case, it was embarrassing, something you didn't really want to see, like watching somebody clean their nostrils with a fingertip. I cleared my throat as I came over to my chair, but he didn't look up.

Aside from saying something loud and cheerful, and possibly interrupting his fit of religious fervor, there was nothing really constructive for me to do. So I sat down and started on the doughnuts. I had almost finished the first one when Chutsky finally looked up.

“Hey” he said. “What'd you get?” I passed him a coffee and two of the doughnuts. He grabbed the coffee with his right hand and passed his hook through the holes in the doughnuts. “Thanks,” he said. He held the coffee between his knees and flipped the lid off with a finger, dangling the doughnuts from his hook and taking a bite out of one of them. “Mmp” he said.

“Didn't get any lunch. I was waiting to hear from Deborah, and I was going to maybe come eat with you guys. But...” he said, and trailed off, taking another bite of the doughnut.

He ate his doughnuts in silence, except for the occasional slurp of coffee, and I took advantage of the time to finish mine. When we were both done we simply sat and stared at Deborah as if she was our favorite TV show. Now and again one of the machines would make some sort of odd noise and we would both glance up at it. But nothing actually changed. Deborah continued to lay with her eyes closed, breathing slowly and raggedly and with the Darth Vader sound of the respirator as an accompaniment.

I sat for at least an hour, and my thoughts didn't suddenly turn bright and sunny. As far as I could tell, neither did Chutsky's.

He did not burst into tears, but he looked tired and a little grey, worse than I had ever seen him except for when I rescued him from the man who cut off his hand and foot. And I suppose I did not look a great deal better, although it was not the thing I worried about the most, now or at any other time. In truth, I did not spend a great deal of my time worrying about anything —planning, yes, making sure that things went just right on my Special Nights Out. But worrying truly seemed to be an emotional activity rather than a rational one, and until now it had never furrowed my forehead.

But now? Dexter worried; it was a surprisingly easy pastime to pick up. I got the hang of it right away, and it was all I could do to keep from chewing my fingernails.

Of course she would be all right. Wouldn't she? “Too soon to tell” began to seem more ominous. Could I even trust that statement?

Wasn't there a protocol, a standard medical procedure for informing next of kin that their loved ones were either dying or about to become vegetables? Start out by warning them that all may not be right “too soon to tell” —and then gradually break it to them that all is forever unwell.

But wasn't there some law somewhere that required doctors to tell the truth about these things? Or was that just auto mechanics?

Was there such a thing as truth, medically speaking? I had no idea this was a new world for me, and I didn't like it, but whatever else might be true, it really was too soon to tell, and I would just have to wait, and shockingly, I was not nearly as good at that as I had expected.

When my stomach began to growl again I decided it must be evening, but a glance at my watch told me that it was still only a few minutes short of four o'clock.

Twenty minutes later Chutsky's Guy From Bethesda arrived.

I hadn't really known what to expect, but it was nothing like what I got. The guy was about five foot six, bald and pot-bellied, with thick gold-framed glasses, and he came in with two of the doctors who had worked on Deborah. They followed him like high school freshmen trailing the prom queen, eager to point out things that would make him happy. Chutsky leapt to his feet when the guy came in.

“Doctor Teidel!” he said.

Teidel nodded at Chutsky and said, “Out” with a head motion that included me.

Chustky nodded and grabbed my arm, and as he pulled me out of the room Teidel and his two satellites were already pulling back the sheet to examine Deborah.

“The guy is the best” Chutsky said, and although he still didn't say the best what, I was now assuming it was something medical.

“What is he going to do?” I asked, and Chutsky shrugged.

“Whatever it takes” he said. “Come on, let's get something to eat. We don't want to see this.” That did not sound terribly reassuring, but Chutsky obviously felt better about things with Teidel in charge, so I followed along to a small and crowded cafe on the ground floor of the parking garage. We wedged ourselves in at a small table in the corner and ate indifferent sandwiches and, although I didn't think to ask him, Chutsky told me a little about the doctor from Bethesda.

“Guy's amazing” he said. “Ten years ago? He put me back together. I was in a lot worse shape than Deborah, believe me, and he got all the pieces back in the right place and in working order.”

“Which is almost as important” I said, and Chutsky nodded as if he was listening to me.

“Honest to God” he said, “Teidel is the best there is. You saw how those other doctors were treating him?”

“Like they wanted to wash his feet and peel him grapes” I said.

Chutsky gave one syllable of polite laugh, “Huh” and an equally brief smile. “She's gonna be okay now” he said. “Just fine.” But whether he was trying to convince me or himself, I couldn't say.