Saving Jessica (12 page)

If only Jeremy could go with her … but
he was about to meet with his father. She grinned and, feeling like a child playing hooky, eased the car into traffic and drove toward the expressway and Virginia Beach. She headed toward the ocean and a few precious hours of freedom.

“H
ow are you, son?”

Jeremy stood awkwardly in the small conference room, looking at his father’s lined face, unsure whether he should shake his hand. Frank Travino looked tired and thinner than he had when Jeremy had moved out.

“I’m doing fine,” Jeremy answered, then crossed to the oval conference table and took a seat. “How’s Mom?”

His father sat across from him. “Physically, she’s fine, but emotionally …” His voice trailed off.

Jeremy gritted his teeth, not wanting to rise to the bait. “This has been hard on all of us
emotionally,” he said. “I never intended to hurt anybody—especially Mom.”

“She—um—she wanted me to tell you that she misses you and to ask you to please come home.”

“I don’t think I can do that yet.”

“I want you to come home too. We both miss you.”

Jeremy knew the admission wasn’t easy for his father, but he also knew he couldn’t give in to emotional blackmail. “Jessica still needs my kidney,” he said quietly.

“You lost in court.”

“I lost in one court. There are others.”

“Yes, your attorney told me you will appeal.”

Jeremy nodded, not wanting to reveal any more information than necessary. He knew enough to let Jake handle any legal discussion of the case.

“You’ll lose again,” his father said matter-of-factly.

Jeremy felt his anger rising. “If I do, I’ll try again.”

“The process can take a long time.”

He was telling Jeremy much the same thing Jessica had. But coming from her, it hadn’t sounded so threatening.

“Is that what you’re hoping? That the process will take so long that Jessica will die?”

“Of course not—”

“Or that her doctors will find another donor?” he added, interrupting his father.

“Would that bother you? Would it matter if she ended up with another person’s kidney?”

“Why should it matter? Just so long as she’s okay.”

His father drummed his fingers on the tabletop. “Because then you couldn’t be the hero.”

Shocked, Jeremy bolted to his feet. “Is that what you think I’m trying to be? A hero? Let me explain it to you one more time—in case you don’t remember.” He felt hot. “Jessica doesn’t tolerate dialysis very well. She needs a transplant. No one in her family can be a donor. She’s not a candidate for a cadaver kidney. I was willing to be a noncompatible donor, but wonder of wonders, the tests showed me to be a good match. Therefore, she has less of a chance of rejecting my kidney. Which means that she
can return to a more normal life. Go to college. Get a job. Maybe even grow old.”

His father rose too. “Calm down. I didn’t come here to fight with you. Can’t you sit down and listen to what I came to say?”

Jeremy didn’t want to calm down. He wanted to get out of the room and slam the door behind him. But he kept hearing Jessica’s voice telling him to make peace. And Jake’s plea to hear his father out and avoid litigation if possible. But if he gave in now, it would be as if he were a little kid heeding Dad’s decree. Still standing, he asked, “So why did you come?”

“I wanted to see you.”

“You saw me in Judge Monsanto’s office.”

“And you never even spoke to me.” His father sounded wounded.

“I didn’t know what to say. I couldn’t very well have congratulated you on winning, now could I?” He shook his head in disgust. “That’s all you ever care about anyway—winning. It’s the most important thing. The only thing.”

“No!” his father said sharply. “This isn’t about winning.” Jeremy saw that tears had
Sprung to his father’s eyes. He waited while his father reined in his emotions. “It’s about losing, Jeremy. It’s about losing you.”

Slowly Jeremy sat down.

His father continued, “I’ve already lost one son. I can’t lose another.”

“Tom,” Jeremy whispered.

“He was alive. Then in an instant he was dead. Nothing in all my years of living prepared me for that. I only know I can’t go through it again.”

“I’m not going to die, Dad.”

“I know it’s an irrational fear,” his father said, raking his hand through his hair. “I know that thousands of people undergo surgery every day and come out just fine. I know that in my head. But in my heart—” He shook his head. “I can’t stand to think about you dying on the table. Or suffering irreversible damage. Of you ending up like Tom. And if any of those things happened, I would be responsible because I agreed to let you do it. In short, it would be my fault if something bad happened to you.”

Stunned by the fervor in his father’s voice, astounded by the scenario his fears had written,
Jeremy found it difficult to respond. Finally he said, “I’m not Tom.”

“That’s what the psychiatrist at the hospital told me.”

“You spoke to her? When? Why?”

His father rubbed his eyes and let out his breath. “I stormed into her office after you passed all the hospital tests. I went to fight with her, to castigate her for saying a sixteen-year-old boy was competent to make the decision to give away an organ.”

“That’s what her report said,” Jeremy declared. He barely recalled that part of the testing process.

“I didn’t think a woman who’d seen you for a couple of hours could know you as well as your own parents. I called her names, I yelled and told her she was a puppet of the hospital, doing their bidding because they wanted to perform another transplant.”

“You didn’t!” Jeremy cried, appalled.

His father shrugged. “I told her you’d lost a brother—how could you be rational? You know what she said?”

Jeremy shook his head, fascinated by the story.

“She said, ‘Mr. Travino, Jeremy’s dealt amazingly well with his brother’s death. I suspect that’s because he’s talked about it so much with Jessica and traveled through so many aspects of the grieving process. You, sir, however, haven’t even begun to deal with it.”‘

Jeremy’s jaw dropped. His father? He was always so much in control. He was brilliant, tenacious, unflappable. And yet he hadn’t fully dealt with Tom’s death?

“Is it true? How about Mom?”

“I’m afraid she isn’t coping with it either. And that’s my fault too. I never let her talk about it to me. And I never even guessed how badly she needed to. You brought it all to a head when you packed your bags and walked out.”

“But I never meant to hurt you or Mom. I just wanted to help Jessica. I didn’t know how else to do it.”

For the first time, his father offered a wry smile. “You’re too much like me, Jeremy. You even used my own ploy from my college days against me by getting law students to defend you. You settled on a course of action, and you
took it. Do you know how hard it’s been for me to have to sit back and let other forces control my life? Emancipation …” He shook his head. “That took guts. I’ve been torn between wanting to be proud of you and wanting to choke you.”

“You wouldn’t listen to anything I had to say and we were running out of time. We still are,” Jeremy added.

His father laced his fingers together and stared at Jeremy across the table. Jeremy held his gaze without flinching. At last his father said, “Your mother and I will sign the consent form. We don’t want to lose you, son, and if we don’t say yes, you’ll hate us. Please be part of our family. We need you.”

Jeremy leaped to his feet again. “Dad, you’ll really sign?”

“Only if you promise not to die on us.”

A slow smile spread across Jeremy’s face. “You got it.”

“So let’s call in your attorney and break the news that he’s out of work.”

Jeremy hurried to the door and yanked it open. A startled Jake, who’d been sitting on a
chair near the door, jumped to his feet. “We’re dropping the suit!” Jeremy exclaimed. “My parents are going to allow me to donate.”

Jake stepped into the room and regarded Jeremy’s father cautiously. “Is that true, sir?”

“It’s true.”

Jake’s face broke into a grin. “I think that’s great news.” He held out his hand, and Frank Travino took it.

“Can I ask you on what grounds you were planning to appeal?” Frank asked. “Just for the record.”

“Constitutional grounds.”

“Federal court?” Jeremy’s father asked, sounding surprised.

“You know—what rights a minor has over his own body,” Jake said. “It’s a constitutional issue.”

“I guess you could plead that,” Frank said, looking impressed.

“It was Jeremy’s idea.”

Frank turned and looked Jeremy full in the face. In his eyes Jeremy could have sworn that he saw astonishment. And pride.

The next thing Jeremy did was head for the phone to call Jessica. Her mother answered on the first ring. “Mrs. McMillan—,” he started.

“Is Jessica with you?” Her voice sounded high and thin, edgy, near hysteria.

His heart thudded. “No, she’s not.”

Her mother let out a strangled cry. “Oh, Jeremy, she’s missing. She never came home from dialysis today.”

T
raffic on U.S. Highway 17 was at a standstill in both directions and had been for over an hour. Jessica had sat in the car with the engine running until she realized she wasn’t going anywhere. She turned off the engine, got out of the car and paced the shoulder of the road with other stranded motorists. She heard them talking about the tie-up.

“A semi overturned.”

“According to my CB, it was carrying hazardous chemicals and spilled the stuff over both sides of the road.”

“The cleanup could take hours!”

“How far to the next exit?”

“Maybe ten miles.”

“Then we’re stuck?”

“Guess so.”

Jessica climbed back into her car and turned on the air-conditioning for a few minutes. The summer sun was broiling, her head was throbbing and she felt sick to her stomach. She realized too late that her mother had taken the car phone with her in their older, less reliable car so that Jessica could have the newer vehicle. She was out of communication with everyone.

The clock on the dashboard read 3:00 p.m. She also realized the trip to the beach was out. She had to wait until she could get to an exit so that she could turn around and head back to the Washington area. “This is the pits,” she mumbled. She laid her head against the back of the seat and shut her eyes.

    Jeremy had gone straight to Jessica’s house from the campus. Because of daylight saving time, it was still light at seven o’clock, but the fading sun only made him feel more anxious. Her parents were beside themselves with worry. “The dialysis unit said she left at
eleven-thirty,” her mother said tearfully. “I called the police, but they can’t begin an official search until she’s been missing longer.”

“But she’s got medical problems,” Jeremy blurted. “And this isn’t like her. I’d called to tell you good news. This can’t be happening just when it’s all going to work out.”

Jeremy paced the floor, his heart thudding with fear. Something was wrong. Jessica always came home after dialysis. Often she got sick, and he knew she would want to be in familiar surroundings. “I think I know a way to speed up the police,” he said.

“Do it,” Ruth pleaded.

Jeremy dialed his home number, telling Jessica’s mother, “My father will help.”

    When traffic finally began to creep forward, Jessica inched along with it, willing her car to the nearest exit. Once there, she’d find a phone and call home. It was just five; her parents wouldn’t even be home yet and wouldn’t have missed her. She’d leave a message on the answering machine telling them she was on her way and not to worry.

It was almost six when she finally made it to the exit, but it took another twenty minutes to get off the ramp. Traffic at the two gas stations near the exit was backed up for a mile in either direction and the lines for the phone seemed just as long.

She heard one motorist tell another, “Can’t return on Seventeen because it’s a snarl with everybody trying to get back to Washington. Right now we’re just hoping to find a place to spend the night.”

Dismayed, she decided to go home by another route. She studied the map, but felt confusion spreading over her like a thick fog. I should eat something, she told herself. She found an old granola bar and a bag of pretzels in the glove compartment. She’d worry about her special diet later.

She drove, allowing the air-conditioning to blast in her face. The coolness made her feel better. When she saw a country side road, her heart leaped. Quickly she turned onto it. Surely there’d be a farmhouse somewhere along the old road where she could stop and call home for help.