Tales of the City 08 - Mary Ann in Autumn

and arranging them on the bed tray.
    “Hey, missy,” she said, realizing her charge was awake.
    “Hey, pretty lady.”
    “Oh, they did get you blitzed, didn’t they?”
    “What’s this?”
    “Don’t worry. It’s not from the hospital. D’or dropped it by a little while ago. We have a nice homemade fruit salad and a lovely boeuf bourguignon from Fleur de Lys. Also yogurt and cookies for dessert.”
    Just the sight of this fare made Mary Ann nauseous, but she did not have the heart to tell DeDe. “Look at you,” she said instead. “You’re like Grace Kelly in Rear Window .”
    DeDe snorted. “More like Thelma Ritter.”
    “Stop that. You’re beautiful. We have to work on your self-esteem.”
    A strained silence followed. DeDe looked misty-eyed, making Mary Ann wonder if catastrophic news was imminent.
    “Dig in,” DeDe said at last.
    Mary Ann took a bite of the fruit salad, and issued an appreciative “Yum.”
    “I’m so happy to be here with you,” said DeDe.
    Mary Ann set down her fork, no longer able to bear the suspense. “What have you heard?”
    “You haven’t talked to Ginny yet?”
    “No.” She had stopped breathing altogether.
    “Oh, Jesus … well … she said the cancer doesn’t seem to have spread to your lymph nodes and your tissues look really good …”
    “But?”
    DeDe shrugged and grinned. “No buts. None that I heard, anyway.”
    “Seriously?”
    DeDe took Mary Ann’s hand. “Would I lie to you, missy?”
    There was a cursory rap on the door before an orderly charged into the room with a rollaway bed. “Do you have a preference?” he asked DeDe.
    Finding that question hilarious, Mary Ann giggled.
    “Don’t mind her,” DeDe told the orderly. “She’s high as a kite. Over against that wall would be fine, thank you.”
    The orderly positioned the bed as directed. It was ridiculously narrow. The mattress was sheathed in a thick plastic cover that could easily repel any conceivable bodily fluid. Mary Ann heard it crackling as the orderly tucked in the sheets.
    “You can’t sleep on that,” she told DeDe as soon as the orderly was gone.
    “Shush.”
    “Well, at least get out of the damn Chanel and make yourself comfortable.”
    “Not yet. We have to take a little walk later on, and I’m not going out there in my jammies.”
    Mary Ann smiled at her knowingly. The Chanel was DeDe’s own suit of armor, and apparently she thought she might still have use for it.
    D R. G INNY STOPPED BY THAT afternoon and made DeDe’s report official. They wouldn’t be totally out of the woods, she said, until they got the lab reports, but things looked really good. As usual, Mary Ann found herself infatuated with the surgeon and her goddess-like aura of confidence. She envisioned her uterus resting in those strong, elegant hands, no longer capable of poisoning the rest of her body. She had not tried to picture what happened before that. She knew Dr. Ginny had made some very small incisions in her abdomen, but she wasn’t sure if her uterus had exited that way or through her vagina. She didn’t want to know, really. Not now. Not for a while. Maybe never.
    “Thank you for her,” Mary Ann told DeDe, as soon as the doctor had left.
    “My pleasure.”
    “It was sweet of her to stick around.”
    “Actually … I think she has another one here this afternoon.”
    “Another what?”
    “Hysterectomy.”
    “Oh.” Mary Ann remembered how many notches Dr. Ginny already had in her oncological gun and reminded herself that that was why she was so good at her job.
    “What’s the matter?” asked DeDe, catching her crestfallen expression. “You jealous or something?”
    She was, sort of. There was no denying it.

Chapter 29
The Way She Wanted It
    B en was back in his studio, still pleasantly buzzed from his long swim at the Y, when Michael called from a job in the Marina to say that Mary Ann’s surgery had gone very well. He had just heard the news from DeDe Halcyon-Wilson.
    “That’s great, baby.”
    “I know, isn’t it?”
    “So she’s getting out tomorrow?”
    “Yep.”
    “What do we need to do?”
    “Nothing, apparently. Just let her rest and help her walk around a little. But here’s the thing, sweetie … DeDe and D’or have offered to put her up for several days until she gets the lab results, and I was wondering how you’d feel about that.”
    This seemed like a trick question to Ben. He wondered if Michael was testing his devotion to Mary Ann. “How do