Life After Perfect Read Online Free Page A

under his arm, he walked down the hall and gave the door to Room 7 a quick double-knock. “Good morning, Mrs. Keefer.”
    “Hi.” The dark, bruised-looking rings under Mrs. Keefer’s translucent skin made her look fifteen years older than her thirty-one years.
    “Dr. Hansen is off today so I’ll be seeing you. I’m his son, Dr. Derek Hansen.” Derek’s being back allowed his mother to spirit his father away from the clinic on any number of couples’ trips.
    “Nice to meet you.” Even her smile took an effort.
    “You’re new in town?” he asked.
    “Staying with my Great-Aunt Naomi. She lives down at the creek.”
    “Mrs. Laumann is your aunt? I’m surprised you and I never met. I grew up around here. All of us used to hang out at the falls down near her place. Good lady.”
    “She is,” Kelly Jo said. “I only spent a couple of summers here. She speaks quite fondly of you, and your dad, of course. He’s been great.” She fidgeted, seeming to be as uncomfortable as he was.
    “Thank you. I think he’s pretty amazing. Now let’s take a listen to that heart.” He placed the ear tips of his stethoscope in his ears and pressed the diaphragm to her chest. “Good. Now a deep breath in.” He moved his stethoscope and closed his eyes, listening. “Another.
    “Lie back for me,” he said.
    He pressed his hands along her abdomen. “Any pain or discomfort?”
    She shook her head. “Just the normal stuff.”
    “The new medication helping with the nausea?” he asked, seeing his dad had switched medications for her after her previous visit.
    “Yes. Pretty much.” She showed hardly any emotion as he went through the examination and asked a few more questions.
    “Good.” He stepped back, and then sat down in the rolling chair; for a split second he felt like he was back in Raleigh with Laney at the point of no return. No more hope. Just waiting. That feeling, fear wrapped up in helplessness, surged like electricity through him. Making him want to run for safer ground. He took a moment to pull himself together as he checked off the updates on the report. “You can sit on up.” He forced what he hoped was at least half of a smile, and scanned the list to be sure he covered all that was expected in today’s visit. “Okay, I’m going to write your refills for you, and we’ll get those labs done today.”
    “Thank you.”
    “Any other complaints today?”
    She sucked in a long breath. “Wouldn’t do to complain.” She laughed, but it lacked joy. He recognized the look of exhaustion. “I know your wife had cancer.”
    He tried to recover from the stab those words had delivered.
    “I’m sorry for your loss,” she added.
    “Thank you.” He didn’t even recognize his own voice when he uttered the words.
    “I’m done with the treatments. I’m just coasting. It’s not better, but it’s not worse, and for a while . . . every day was worse than the last.”
    “I understand.” He already knew the details from the chart. And he did understand, more than she could ever imagine, but damn if that didn’t make it only harder to talk about. “Only you can make the right decisions for yourself,” he said, as if that might somehow comfort her. “We have a lot of new things we can prescribe to help make you more comfortable. If something’s not working, we can try something new. I see you’ve refused hospice help so far—if you want to talk about that . . . let me know.”
    “I’m not ready for people hovering. I just want to be alone.” She laced her fingers. “Quite honestly, I keep praying I won’t wake up.”
    He’d heard Laney say the same thing. Seen the look of disappointment in her face when she opened her eyes and saw him looking at her. Sometimes the most helpful thing to say was nothing.
    She swallowed, and then said, “Thank you for not pushing. I was worried when I realized Dr. Hansen, your dad, wasn’t in today.” She paused, catching her breath. “He’s been so