“Ah, I suppose I am.” He checked the level in the bottle near his glass. Running toward empty from drinking on autopilot. That would never do. “I could use another flagon of this fine whiskey, though. When you get the time.”
The waitress nodded as she took his plate away. “All right. What about dessert?”
“Why not? Something chocolate. You pick.”
“I guess I can do that,” she said, not sounding very sure about it. “I’ll be back in a couple minutes.”
“No rush.” She hurried away, veering off to answer an imperious summons from another table.
He poured the dregs from the bottle into his glass, took a meditative sip. Not so many years ago remembering the last time he’d seen Ella would have torn him apart. Now he felt scarcely a quiver. Amazing what enough time—and nearly half a liter of 110 proof whiskey—could do.
Every year he felt less and less. Soon he would feel nothing at all. This was a state he alternately looked forward to and dreaded during those odd times he was sober enough to think about it.
Shei Sinclair had been a child of thirteen then. Now she probably had a husband and children, and retained only vague memories of her brush with death. Perhaps the odd nightmare. He hoped her life was a happy one.
Two days after his interrupted reunion dinner he’d joined the boarding queue and trudged up the ramp, his bag in his hand. As he stepped into the lock he turned and looked back. No one was there to see him off.
He hadn’t heard a single word from Ella. Nor had he tried to contact her. Some things were beyond the reach of his healing skills, and would always remain so.
Dr. Chang had sent two messages detailing Shei’s condition. Memory loss had been minimal. A slight hearing impairment was already fading. Her most severe aftereffect proved to be vivid recurrent nightmares of an armless monster pawing through her insides, nightmares terrible enough to make her wake up screaming in spite of sedation. The messages were very formal and quietly apologetic.
Just before leaving he had composed and sent a reply:
DEAR DR. CHANG. I AM GLAD THE CHILD IS DOING SO WELL. I WANT YOU TO KNOW THAT YOU ARE BLAMELESS FOR WHAT HAPPENED; YOU WOULD HAVE BEEN REMISS IF YOU HAD NOT ASKED FOR WHATEVER HELP WAS AVAILABLE, AND WHAT HAPPENED BETWEEN ELLA AND ME WAS PROBABLY INEVITABLE. AT LEAST A GOOD CAUSE WAS SERVED.
BUT PLEASE BE CAREFUL OF WHAT YOU WOULD ENVY. MY KIND ARE A FAILED EXPERIMENT. A PHYSICIAN MUST MINISTER TO PEOPLE, NOT JUST BE THE REPAIRER OF THEIR AFFLICTIONS. THAT IS MY LOT. FOR ALL I HAVE SEEMINGLY GAINED, I HAVE LOST EVEN MORE. NO LONGER DO I HAVE THE PRECIOUS CONNECTION WITH MY PATIENTS THAT MADE ME WHAT I ONCE WAS, NAMELY A GOOD DOCTOR. A HEALER.
I HEARD WHAT YOU SAID, AND YOU HAD IT WRONG. YOU REMAIN A HEALER, AND YOUR SKILLS WILL NEVER BE OBSOLETE.
IT IS I WHO HAVE BECOME THE MERE MECHANIC.
BELIEVE ME, IT IS NOT THE SAME THING AT ALL.
Once on the shuttle he’d slumped back in his seat, the red edges of a headache beginning to throb at his temples. While sorting through his beltpouch for one of the soporifics he had become increasingly dependent on, the shuttle’s steward approached him, a large foil-wrapped package in his arms.
“Dr. Marchey?”
“Yes?” Ah, there was one. He popped the pill out of its blister and put it in his mouth. It tasted bitter, but then again so did everything lately. He swallowed it dry.
“I was told to see that this package got to you.” The steward handed it over. “Careful sir, it’s heavy.”
So it was. Surprisingly heavy.
“Thanks.” He lowered it to his lap, dug into his pouch again and located a five-credit chip. “Here you go. When do you start serving drinks?”
“Soon as we debark, sir.” He touched his cap. “Thanks.”
The steward sidled down the aisle, slipping the chip into his pocket. Marchey put the package on the empty seat beside him, then picked it right up again, unable to contain his curiosity.
Under the foil was a carbon-fiber box, and inside the box—
Marchey sat in the commissary, glass of Mauna Loa in his hand, remembering the moment with an aching clarity. Like it had happened only yesterday, not nearly a decade ago.
Inside the box had been a bisque-fired clay sculpture, the ceramic the color of old ivory. The piece was exquisitely wrought and yet fairly throbbed with raw power and emotion, eloquent proof that her talent remained undiminished under all the hype.
The piece portrayed two sculptors who had begun work on a statue of two lovers embracing. But one sculptor stood helplessly by, gazing hopefully up at the unfinished lovers. His arms lay at his feet, arms crossed at the wrists and tools still clutched in his hands. He cradled a wounded child in the stumps of arms held up toward the sculpture as if in supplication.
The other sculptor, the tall thin woman, huddled on the ground near him, her averted face a mask of frustrated shame. Her posture was that of someone who could not muster the courage to pick up her scattered tools and stand, taking the first step in trying to help complete the work they had begun. Her face was turned away from fellow sculptor and work alike.
The lovers were rough-hewn and unfinished, yet there was no mistaking who they were.
Marchey recalled staring at it for a very long time, tears streaming down his face.
When the acceleration warning sounded he’d returned it to its box, then belted it into the seat beside him.
She understood. Not that it changed anything, but at least she understood.
Marchey stared into his empty glass, adrift between past and present, and finding comfort in neither.
The waitress returned. She placed a plate and fresh fork in front of him. “Here’s some chocolate cake, sir. I hope it’s all right.”
He gave her a fractured smile. “It looks delicious.”
She replaced the empty bottle of Mauna Loa with a fresh one. “And your drink. Can I get you anything else?”
“Nothing, thanks. I’ve got everything I need.”
She went away. He opened the bottle and filled his glass, then forked off a bite of cake, tasted it.
It was delicious.
But the whiskey was better.
“I want to talk to you, Doctor Marchey.” A peremptory tone and sarcastic emphasis on Doctor.
The swarthy, hawk-faced woman whom he’d saluted with his glass earlier had come to his table for a showdown. He’d remained vaguely aware of her presense all through his second bottle of Mauna Loa and memories of Ella. She and her companion had argued in harsh whispers for several minutes. Finally he left their table, looking angry.
She’d sat there for a while, drinking coffee and no doubt working herself up to a fine rage. At last she’d flung down her napkin and stood up, strode over, and planted herself at the other side of his table. Her arms were crossed before her formidable bosom, and she was radiating enough righteous wrath to make the whiskey in his glass begin to bubble and steam.
He peered at the name tag pinned to her dark blue jacket. Dr. Ismela Khan. That explained her splendid command of Arabic invective.
He met her tight-lipped glare squarely. “I doubt that.”
Her dark brows drew down. “Just what do you mean by that?”
“Just what I said,” he answered mildly. “You don’t want to talk to me. You don’t want to have anything to do with me. Nor do you want to talk. Harangue, maybe. Perhaps villify. Insult and condemn, almost certainly. You can save your breath, Dr. Khan. I’ve heard it all before.” He picked up his glass, took an unhurried sip. “If I’m not mistaken, I already heard a lot of it from you this very afternoon. Why repeat yourself?”