The Light That Wraps You

My life began the day yours ended.

I remember that day as clear as anything. Rather than first kisses and personal records, that will be the one thing that I remember most, until the day that I would eventually die. It was May, a day on that sweet cusp between spring and summer. I had asked the nurses to leave the curtains open, so the bright sunshine could pour into my hospital room, and I could see exactly what it was that I was missing. The sky was an impeccable blue, and from my height on the fifth floor, I could see the sun sparkling off the waves of the ocean and gulls flying high on a breeze.

I had watched those birds fly with a lump in my throat. All I had wanted was to feel the sun on my face and the salty wind dancing through my hair, but I couldn’t even have that. I had been bedridden for the last six months, unable to even walk on my own. My body was wasting. The life that my parents had given me was fading, and there was nothing anybody could do to stop it.

Until you arrived.

I didn’t like to talk about it, but the facts were thus: you died instantly. This left a very, very small window of opportunity for the surgeons to procure healthy organs, but they managed a seemingly impossible feat. They rushed you to the nearest hospital, and--this is where it gets gruesome--harvested the vital pieces that had made you whole. I’m not sure where the rest of you went. I thought maybe I had heard something about your liver reaching the States, but since I wasn’t even supposed to know that, I never asked. The important thing was that I received your heart, six hours away from the place you had died, and the entire hospital was in a tizzy.

Your heart was just a little too big, they told me, but you would do all the same. Normally, they wouldn’t have overlooked that detail, but I was desperate. Heart surgeries require so much planning and precision that one tiny, miniscule thing can go wrong and kill the patient. But I didn’t care. I was going to die anyway, right? I jokingly told the nurses that I’d rather my new heart be too big than too small. Nobody likes a miser, I had said. They’d smiled kindly with tears in their eyes. They thought I was so sweet.

Truthfully, I just wanted a heart.

And I got one. Yours, specifically.

That was how we met, in a manner of speaking. Your death brought you to me and cemented you as a very permanent person in my life. What I didn’t know was how much you would mean to the rest of the world, as well.



The first real test of working in Pittsburgh came to me the morning after the Panthers game, in the guest dressing room of the Verizon Center in DC.

I looked up from my book, marking the page with my finger. “Did you ice it, like I told you?”

“Well, yeah,” Johnson grumbled, gingerly sitting down on the bench beside me. “But I think it’s worse than that. I didn’t want to say anything because everyone was so busy with Benny.”

I slid my bookmark into the book and set it down. “Johnny, I don’t care if Sid has been unanimously voted the King of Canada and it’s his coronation. If you have what you think is an injury, it is your duty to your team to come to me, no matter what is going on. Now--”

“Yeah, yeah, I know. Now if Fleury has a problem we’re fucked, right? Not really. They called up some kid from Scranton/Wilkes-Barre and he’s on his way. He should be here in time for practice.”

“You still should have said something. Did you tell Dan?”

“Of course.” He looked at me like I was an imbecile. “And yes, I already got my ass reamed, so I do not need to hear it from you, thank you very much.”

“I’m a physician,” I reminded him, standing and walking to the door. “It’s my job. Hang out here while I go look for some gloves and some ice.”

He grimaced. “More ice?”

“More ice.”

I had no idea how to navigate the Verizon Center, but the time that it took me to find Dr. Shaffer’s office would give me what I needed to try and navigate this situation. True, as I was a medical woman, I had dealt with all sorts of things. I had once amputated a foot, which had been a nightmare in and of itself. I had done rectal exams and physicals for men, and it does not get much worse than that. Naturally I had seen naked men, which of course I would have preferred not to. But as a healer, it was my job. I did it with no judgment, and certainly no emotions.

This was something entirely different.

By the time I returned, Arron Asham had appeared, and he too looked wildly uncomfortable. The two of them were talking quietly, but stopped the moment I stepped into the room.

“Is something wrong, Arron?”

“I was wondering if you could look at my thigh. It’s been giving me problems all morning, and I’m not feeling up to practice. Would you mind?”

“Not at all!” I smiled cheerfully. “If you would like, you can wait outside while I examine Brent. It shouldn’t take very long.”

Johnson frowned at that, but Asham did as I politely suggested and disappeared out the door, shutting it behind him. Johnson took the ice from me without a word, hissing as he settled it in his lap. I busied myself, setting aside my book, pulling up my hair into a neater bun, taking a drink of the Gatorade that Sidney had brought me, and snapping my gloves on. I was giving him time with the ice, but I was also trying to calm myself down. Stop it, I said forcefully in my head. You are a professional. Do not let your feelings for these men and this team get in the way of your ability to do your job.

Taking a deep breath, I spun around and gestured to Johnson to lay back on the bench. True, it was not an ideal setting. Not only were we in the stark guest dressing room of the Washington Capitals, but the Penguins gear had been set up overnight by the crew and it smelled awful. I had picked that place as my haven for the night, simply because I did not particularly agree with Dr. Shaffer in his methods, and because it allowed me to witness what the rest of the world was able to witness through the cameras of HBO, up front and personal. I had never done it before, and Dan had agreed to let me sit in before the game, so I had sat in there to read to familiarize myself with the surroundings.

I removed the ice and set it aside, for now. Keeping my eyes on his face to test his reaction, I gently yet firmly probed his hips and pelvis with my fingers. I had seen his file the night before, when he had initially complained of pain, and I knew he hadn’t had much of any other disturbances that weren’t hockey-related. It seemed to me that it was nothing but a strained muscle, and I told him such when I pressed down on the inside of his left thigh and his face twisted.

“Last night, you made that incredible save. It happened then.”

It wasn’t a question. He nodded, wincing again as I pressed the same spot. “Yeah. I thought maybe I had just tweaked it, and I could walk it off. It was Flower’s night off, and I wanted to give him that, but…” He shrugged, appearing indifferent. “I’m not as young as I used to be.”

“Johnny, you are certainly not old. Things happen, even when we don’t mean for them to. So what if you could not return for the third period? You certainly went out with one hell of a save.” I winked at him when he stared, unabashed, at my use of profanity. “From what I can tell, nothing is broken. The muscle is strained, nothing more. Mark would be glad to help you work out some of the stress, I’m sure. Beyond that, I am going to prescribe rest, ice, and gradual return to athletics.” I held a finger up in warning. “Gradual.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Johnson grumbled, but he smiled. “Ah well, this gives the kid time to sharpen his game. After that, I’ll be back in net in no time.”

“Of course you will! What would we do without our man in black?” I helped him sit up, before pulling off my gloves. “Send Arron in here when you leave.”

“I’ll do that, if you promise never to tell my wife what just happened here. You might have sworn a Hippocratic oath, but that won’t stop her from wanting to kill you.”

I laughed breezily, though I had to admit the idea of finding a very upset Danielle Johnson in my exam room back in Pittsburgh frightened me. “I swear on my honor that I will not tell a living soul. Except perhaps Coach Bylsma.”

Johnson thanked me before limping out of the room, clutching the ice pack against him like his life depended on. Asham swept into the room a moment later, his long hair held away from his face with a stretchy hair band. I wonder what Kris would look like with one of those. The thought was there, etched in my mind, before I even realized I had thought it. I blushed.

Asham too was nothing to worry about, just a strained hamstring. I told him to rest and ice it, like I had with Johnson, certain that he would be back on the ice within a few days. He could still practice but I told him to take it slow. After that, I hunted down Dan to inform him that Asham would need to be scratched. He complied.

The Penguins won that night, but just barely. The shootout seemed to drag on forever, and none of Dan’s top picks could break the tie. He ended up going almost all the way down the line, but luckily, Dupuis clinched the nail-biter and we all went home happy.

Before we left the airport, driving home in separate directions, I met Kris by his Range Rover. “You don’t have to come with me tomorrow.” I glanced down at the watch on my wrist. “Today, actually. It’s past midnight.” I laughed suddenly. “It’s Christmas Eve! The holidays certainly creep up on you in this profession.”

Kris smiled half-heartedly, before frowning quizzically. “Are you saying you don’t want me to come with you?”

“Oh, no!” I shook my head fervently. “Not at all! I am just saying, if you had plans--I didn’t even think to ask you!”

“If I had plans, I would not have said yes.” His smile was full and complete this time. His words burst into the air in a cloud of frigid air. “I am looking forward to it, actually. As you said, it has crept up on me. I too have gifts that I need to buy.”

“Lovely! Here.” I reached into his pocket of my own volition, pulling forth his expensive cell phone. I programmed my phone number into it, handing it back to him. “I do not know where to shop here, so you will have to be my guide.”

“I can do that.” His eyes were like melted chocolate, and they made me feel just as warm and gooey.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Kris.” I walked backwards away from him, my bag slung over my shoulder.

“Bonne nuit, Lux.”

His words warmed me the entire way home. I knew it was silly of me to think of him in the ways that I was, but I couldn’t help myself. His smile made my stomach flutter and he was truly beautiful, not just in the physical sense, though he was strong, powerful, and heavenly to look at. No, he was beautiful in the mental sense, in the emotional sense. He did not talk often, but when he did, the depth and force of feeling in those few words made me feel special, as though I were truly lucky to be the one hearing them.

It was more than silly, it was stupid. As Johnson had reminded me earlier that night, I had sworn a Hippocratic oath to remain ethical. Carrying on in the way that I was, with my lopsided grin and my off-key singing of Christmas carols the entire way home, was not ethical. Imagining how my fingers would feel in that hair, or my lips on his, was not ethical. It violated the sacred trust between physician and patient, and it would surely end with my one-way ticket back home to Boston before my time had come.

Your heart was too big for me by just a millimeter, a tiny impossible fraction of a measurement. Was it because you had so much love for those around you? I had always imagined that to be true. I had also always imagined that because your heart was not mine, it was not mine to give. Therefore I had come to terms with the fact that I was not meant for love.

But for one, infinitesimal moment, driving home in the dark and grinning like a fool, I hoped that love was why you had led me to Pittsburgh.