Robin Cook: Fever

He looked over at the clock; another twenty minutes before the alarm. Thankfully he lowered himself back into the warm nest made by the down coverlet and spooned against his wife, marveling at his sense of well-being. He even looked forward to his days at the institute. Work was progressing at an ever-increasing pace. He felt a twinge of excitement. What if he, Charles Martel, the boy from Teaneck, New Jersey, made the first real step in unraveling the mystery of cancer? Charles knew that it was becoming increasingly possible, and the irony was that he was not a formally trained research scientist. He’d been an internist specializing in allergy when Elizabeth, his first wife, had become ill. After she died he gave up his lucrative practice to become a full-time researcher at the Weinburger Research Institute. It had been a reaction against her death, and although some of his colleagues had told him that a career change was an unhealthy way to work out such a problem, he had flourished in the new environment.

Cathryn, sensing her husband was awake, turned over and found herself in an enveloping hug. Wiping the sleep from her eyes, she looked at Charles and laughed. He looked so uncharacteristically impish.

“What’s going on in that little mind of yours?” she asked, smiling.

“I’ve just been watching you.”

“Wonderful! I’m sure I look my best,” said Cathryn.

“You look devastating,” teased Charles, pushing her thick hair back from her forehead.

Cathryn, now more awake, realized the urgency of his arousal. Running her hand down her husband’s body, she encountered an erect penis. “And what is this?” she asked.

“I accept no responsibility,” said Charles. “That part of my anatomy has a mind of its own.”

“Our Polish Pope says a man should not lust after his wife.”

“I haven’t been. I’ve been thinking about work,” Charles teased.

As the first snowflakes settled on the gabled roofs, they came together with a depth of passion and tenderness that never failed to overwhelm Charles. Then the alarm went off. The day began.

Michelle could hear Cathryn calling from far away, interrupting her dream; she and her father were crossing a field. Michelle tried to ignore the call but it came again. She felt a hand on her shoulder, and when she turned over, she looked up into Cathryn’s smiling face.

“Time to get up,” her stepmother said brightly.

Michelle took a deep breath and nodded her head, acknowledging that she was awake. She’d had a bad night, full of disturbing dreams which left her soaked with perspiration. She’d felt hot beneath the covers and cold out of them. Several times during the night she thought about going in to Charles. She would have if her father had been alone.

“My goodness, you look flushed,” said Cathryn, as she opened the drapes. She reached down and touched Michelle’s forehead. It felt hot.

“I think you have a fever again,” said Cathryn sympathetically. “Do you feel sick?”

“No,” said Michelle quickly. She didn’t want to be sick again. She did not want to stay home from school. She wanted to get up and make the orange juice, which had always been her job.

“We’d better take your temperature anyway,” said Cathryn, going into the connecting bath. She reappeared, alternately flicking and examining the thermometer. “It will only take a minute, then we’ll know for sure.” She stuck the thermometer into Michelle’s mouth. “Under the tongue. I’ll be back after I get the boys up.”

The door closed and Michelle pulled the thermometer from her mouth. Even in that short a time, the mercury had risen to ninety-nine. She had a fever and she knew it. Her legs ached and there was a tenderness in the pit of her stomach. She put the thermometer back into her mouth. From where she lay she could look out the window and see her playhouse that Charles had made out of an ice shed. The roof was covered with new-fallen snow and she shivered at the cold scene. She longed for spring and those lazy days that she spent in that fantasy house. Just she and her father.

When the door opened, Jean Paul, age fifteen, was already awake, propped up in bed with his physics book. Behind his head the small clock radio played a soft rock and roll. He was wearing dark red flannel pajamas with blue piping, a Christmas gift from Cathryn.

“You’ve got twenty minutes,” Cathryn said cheerfully.

“Thanks, Mom,” said Jean Paul with a smile.

Cathryn paused, looking down at the boy, and her heart melted. She felt like rushing in and swooping him into her arms. But she resisted the temptation. She’d learned that all the Martels were somewhat chary about direct physical contact, a fact that initially had been a little hard for her to deal with. Cathryn came from Boston’s Italian North End where touching and hugging was a constant. Although her father had been Latvian, he’d left when Cathryn was twelve, and Cathryn had grown up without his influence. She felt 100 percent Italian. “See you at breakfast,” she said.

Jean Paul knew that Cathryn loved to hear him call her Mom and gladly obliged. It was such a low price to pay for the warmth and attention that she showered on him. Jean Paul had been conditioned by a very busy father and seen himself eclipsed by his older brother, Chuck, and his irresistible baby sister, Michelle. Then came Cathryn, and the excitement of the marriage, followed by Cathryn’s legal adoption of Chuck, Jean Paul, and Michelle. Jean Paul would have called her “grandmother” if she wanted. He thought he loved Cathryn as much as his real mother; at least what he could remember of her. He’d been six when she died.

Chuck’s eyes blinked open at the first touch of Cathryn’s hand but he pretended sleep, keeping his head under his pillow. He knew that if he waited she’d touch him again, only a little more forcibly. And he was right, only this time he felt two hands shake his shoulder before the pillow was lifted. Chuck was eighteen years old and in the middle of his first year at Northeastern University. He wasn’t doing that well and he dreaded his upcoming semester finals. It was going to be a disaster. At least for everything but psychology.

“Fifteen minutes,” said Cathryn. She tousled his long hair. “Your father wants to get to the lab early.”

“Shit,” said Chuck under his breath.

“Charles, Jr.!” said Cathryn, pretending to be shocked.

“I’m not getting up.” Chuck grabbed the pillow from Cathryn’s hands and buried himself.

“Oh, yes you are,” said Cathryn, as she yanked the covers back.

Chuck’s body, clad only in his undershorts, was exposed to the morning chill. He leaped up, pulling the blankets around him. “I told you never to do that,” he snapped.

“And I told you to leave your locker-room language in the locker room,” said Cathryn, ignoring the nastiness in Chuck’s voice. “Fifteen minutes!”

Cathryn spun on her heel and walked out. Chuck’s face flushed in frustration. He watched her go down the hall to Michelle’s room. She was wearing an antique silk nightgown that she’d bought at a flea market. It was a deep peach color, not too different from her skin. With very little difficulty, Chuck could imagine Cathryn naked. She wasn’t old enough to be his mother.

He reached out, hooked his hand around the edge of his door, and slammed it. Just because his father liked to get to his lab before eight, Chuck had to get up at the crack of dawn like some goddamn farmer. The big deal scientist! Chuck rubbed his face and noticed the open book at his beside. Crime and Punishment. He’d spent most of the previous evening reading it. It wasn’t for any of his courses, which was probably why he was enjoying it. He should have studied chemistry because he was in danger of flunking. God, what would Charles say if he did! There had already been a huge blowup when Chuck had not been able to get into Charles’s alma mater, Harvard. Now if he flunked chemistry… Chemistry had been Charles’s major.