The Shadow Wife

“Everything was fine at first. But as things progressed, Mara suddenly started screaming that her head hurt. She was grabbing her head.” Joelle’s tears started again at the horrific memory, and she removed one of her hands from Carlynn’s to pull another tissue from the box. “It was terrible,” she said, not bothering to raise the tissue to her eyes. “She had a convulsion, and then she was unconscious. Liam and I didn’t know what was going on. They rushed her into the operating room and performed a C-section, then they took her upstairs to X ray to get an MRI or a CAT scan, I don’t remember which. We were hoping, Liam and I, that she had just passed out from the pain, but deep down we knew it was something more. Something terrible. I think we both knew that Mara’s worst fears were coming true.”

“How terrible for all of you.” Carlynn clutched her hand, her smile completely gone.

“I feel guilty,” Joelle said. “And Liam feels even worse. He’s lost a wife, her son has no mother. I’ve lost my dearest friend, and her patients have lost their doctor. One of them committed suicide when she learned that Mara was never coming back to her practice.”

“Were you ever able to get pregnant yourself?” Carlynn asked. “Do you have children?”

Joelle shook her head. “No, and it finally split my husband and me up. We were divorced two years ago.”

“I’m sorry,” Carlynn said.

Joelle waved away her sympathy with her free hand. “We were never a good match,” she said. “The infertility just brought us to the end of our marriage sooner than we would have reached it otherwise, but I don’t think children would have saved our marriage.”

“And do you have a boyfriend now?”

The question seemed far off the subject, but she shook her head, anyway. “No.” She smiled weakly. “I’m just taking things one day at a time.”

“And now Mara is…what sort of condition is she in?” Carlynn asked.

“She’s in a nursing home because they gave up on her in rehab. She can’t do anything, really, and they never expect her to be able to. She can use one arm and move her head, but that’s about it. The thing is, she smiles a lot. She smiles more than she did when she was…” She almost said alive, but caught herself. “Than she did before. Sometimes, when someone has brain damage, it can cause them to feel unnaturally high—”

“Euphoric.” Carlynn nodded, and Joelle remembered that she was talking to a doctor.

“Right. And that’s what’s happened in her case. Which is both a blessing and a curse. At least she’s not suffering. But we want her back. Liam and I. And her little boy, Sam, who is such a doll.” She pressed the tissue to her nose, afraid she was going to start crying once again.

“I’ll see her,” Carlynn said.

“You will?” Joelle was surprised. “Thank you!”

Carlynn squeezed her hand again, then let go and stood up. “I don’t know my schedule yet for the next few weeks, but if you could call me in a couple of days, I should be able to set up a date to see her. And you’ll go with me, of course, all right?”

“Yes, that would be—”

They both turned at the sound of footsteps entering the room. A tall, elderly man with a wild shock of white hair stood in the doorway.

“Hi, dear,” Carlynn said. “Joelle, this is my husband, Alan.” She walked over to the armchair and picked up her cane, then started toward the man.

Joelle stood up and walked to the doorway to shake Alan Shire’s hand. He was unsmiling, staring at her with frank curiosity. He looked as though he was in his eighties, at least a decade older than Carlynn.

“Hello,” she said. “I was just about to leave. I came to ask Carlynn if she would see a friend of mine.”

Alan raised his eyebrows at his wife. “And you said?” he asked her.

“It’s a very special case,” Carlynn said. “Especially since Joelle was the baby born at that commune down in Big Sur. Remember?”

He looked at his wife stupidly, as though not understanding her words, and his lips were turned down in a scowl. Then he shifted his gaze to Joelle, forcing her to look away in discomfort. He was odd, she thought. Perhaps he suffered from Alzheimer’s. Whatever his problem, he was hardly a good advertisement for Carlynn’s ability to heal someone with brain damage.

Carlynn walked her out to her car, where she shook Joelle’s hand, pressing it between her own.

“You call me in a few days, honey,” she said.

“I will.” Joelle got into her car and turned it around in the wide driveway, catching sight of Alan Shire’s stern face at the front window as she passed. She waved at him, but received no response. Surely he was suffering from dementia. But whatever the cause of his reaction to her visit, she quickly forgot about it as she left the driveway and pulled onto the Seventeen Mile Drive. She could still feel the warmth of Carlynn’s hands.

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