Liberty Loomis

“It’s not your fault, Jim. There wasn’t anything you could have done to prevent this, not a blessed thing.”

In all the years she’s worked with Dr. Whitlow, Betty Hastings can count the times she’s called him by his first name on one hand. She watches him pacing back and forth in the break room off the ER, running his fingers through his hair and shaking his head. He stops to answer her, emphasizing his words by pounding his fist into his hand.

“You are wrong, Betty. You are so wrong. I should have insisted the Olsons go see that marriage counselor down in Middletown. And when Annie wouldn’t hear of it, I should have called the sheriff’s office myself. I should have realized things were getting way out of hand last Thursday night—their pattern was changing, and Sam was on a collision course with disaster. He was probably suicidal even then, and I should have seen this coming.” Dr. Whitlow grabs a chair near the table and practically falls into it. He leans his elbows onto the green Formica tabletop and buries his face in his hands.

Betty puts in a heaping tablespoon of instant Maxwell House coffee in a Styrofoam cup and fills it halfway with hot tap water. She uses a fork that was lying on the bottom of the sink to stir the slurry and gives the cup to Dr. Whitlow. He swallows it down like a shot of whiskey.

She sits beside him, puts her hand on his forearm and says, “Listen to me, Jim. You’re a great doctor, and I’ve seen you do some pretty amazing things. But you can’t be all things to all people, and you couldn’t have stopped Sam. He was beyond anyone’s reach, beyond the point of no return. But at least he didn’t kill Annie too—we can thank God for that.”
Dr. Whitlow acknowledges this with a small nod, lifting his face toward Betty. He says, “I almost forgot about Annie. What are we gonna do about her?”

Betty smiles to herself despite the situation. This is where she comes in, picking up the pieces one by one, helping everyone get through the endless minutes that immediately follow their tragedies. She helps them take off their bloody clothing or torn shirts. She reminds them to call home. She listens as they tell and retell their stories about how that deer jumped out of nowhere in front of the station wagon or what grandma said right before she dropped dead onto the kitchen floor. And she keeps herself busy by calling the County Coroner’s office and by fixing the doctor a cup of instant coffee that looks and tastes like mud.

Betty answers him, “Well, I got hold of Stella Farley. Mayzie thinks she’s as close to Annie as anyone. The Olsons both worked at Farleys’ Lakeside for years you know. Mayzie also mentioned Donna Dempsey’s mom—Annie and she went to high school together and are still in touch with each other. Apparently Annie told Mrs. Dempsey about last Thursday night. But she’s not listed in the phone book so I haven’t been able to reach her.”

Betty gets up from the table to toss Dr. Whitlow’s empty cup into the trashcan under the sink. She turns around and leans back against the edge of the counter, crossing her arms in front of her. She adds, “Annie’s stunned at the moment…understandably…and she isn’t asking us to contact anybody. Sam was all she cared about; he was her whole life. They didn’t have any kids, and there’s no other family that I know of…” she pauses.

It’s hard for Betty to imagine having no family since she comes from such a huge crowd herself—six brothers, two sisters, more nieces and nephews than she can name, three of her own children—and then there’s her husband Gordon’s side of the family, too numerous to count. And almost everybody, except for cousin Leonard who had to work overtime at the Esso station, and Gordon’s mother who’s in the Roscoe Nursing Home, was at his Sunday afternoon birthday picnic today…a few short hours ago in fact. Yet that celebration couldn’t feel farther removed from tonight.

Betty picks up where she left off with a quiet sigh, “Annie will need a sedative at some point, I guess, but the coroner will want to speak with her, and we don’t want her sleeping through that. So it’s best to wait—unless she gets hysterical that is. Mayzie is sitting with her until Stella arrives, and I’ll be checking on them in a few minutes.”

“That kid’s sure seeing a helluva lot tonight…is she the one Sean told me about—the one who’s thinking about going to medical school?” Dr. Whitlow asks.

“Yup, that’s Mayzie, all right, Charlie and Emma Jenkins’ daughter—she’s their youngest.” Betty is pleased that he’s even noticed Mayzie, since he’s been so focused on working with Sean Cavanaugh all summer.

Dr. Whitlow washes his hands at the sink, preparing to get back to the patients who’ve been waiting in the emergency room all night to see him. “Well, I don’t know about her being a doctor, but she could always go to nursing school. She might be able to handle that.”

Betty sighs audibly this time. It seems that the resilient Dr. Whitlow is back to his old self.