fic: The Cuckoo -- Chapter 24

[readingrat]

 

Part V

Chapter 24: Lifestyle Changes

May 2017

"There he is," Cuddy said when she spotted Pete, half a head taller than the other people leaving the baggage claim area.

"Where?" Rachel in her wheelchair wouldn't have been able to spot him had he been walking on stilts. "Where, Mom?"

"You'll see him in a moment," Cuddy said, standing on tiptoe and waving. He'd be looking for Wilson again, so she needed to catch his attention.

Finally he saw them and came over, her a puzzled frown and Rachel a nod. "What did Wilson do this time?"

Barely managing to refrain from hugging him, Cuddy squeezed his arm for a short moment instead. "Nothing," she said.

"Amy called and said he had to come to New York at once, so he asked us to pick you up," Rachel said importantly.

"Amy, huh?" Pete said, falling into step beside Cuddy. "Needed his help with a major medical crisis, like diaper rash?"

"I'm sure it was important," Cuddy said primly, not wanting to cast a slur on Amy's abilities, parenting or otherwise, in front of Rachel. Amy was supposedly engaged, but privately Cuddy wondered whether she wasn't angling to trade up, now that Wilson, far from standing with one foot in the grave, was well on the path to complete recovery. His cancer was in remission and his body had accepted Cuddy's liver with minimal unpleasant side effects. He'd been doing an increasing number of consults and he was due to ease back into a normal working life in the coming months. From a financial perspective he was definitely a more attractive candidate than Amy's fitness trainer.

She took a look at Pete's baggage, a suitcase that was large by his standards and his Ossur blade in its special case. "Are you planning on staying longer? Wilson said you were only staying for a few days."

"Conference on diagnostics in Seattle afterwards," he said briefly.

Seattle - that would be Foreman. She'd heard that Foreman was hosting a conference on diagnostic methods a mere four weeks before PPTH's annual Diagnostic Symposium, which was the medical equivalent of planting a big fat poop on Cameron's doorstep. Cameron would be fuming and getting all passive-aggressive about it; Cuddy was happy she didn't have to deal with her. She wished those two would grow up: Cameron needed to learn that work environments weren't junior high sleepovers; they were battlefields. Foreman for his part would do a lot better if he focused on cooperating with others instead of proving his superiority at every opportunity.

"You're speaking?" she asked with a strong hint of disbelief.

"Does that surprise you?"

She supposed it shouldn't. He'd never been a keen speaker, but he'd only gone into hiding after the infarction, a tendency that she had observed at the time with regret and misgivings. Nevertheless, when he so chose, he could speak brilliantly with little effort and even less preparation: he had all the facts and numbers at his fingertips and his amazing brain structured everything in a coherent manner.

What bothered her was that she'd had no idea that he was a speaker at the conference. A year ago she'd have kept a close eye on anything that any diagnostic department in the country was up to. She'd have known how big the conference was, who the keynote speakers were, who was attending, etc. This year, she'd barely registered the conference and she'd clean forgotten to check the details.

"Is Chase attending?" she asked.

Pete gave her an appraising look, the one where he cocked his head, pursed his lips and narrowed one eye. "You're thinking of giving him a job, and you don't know whether he's attending a conference that will be vital for making and maintaining contacts for that job? Woman, you're losing your touch."

She was well aware of it and she'd rather not have him remind her of it. "It turns out that donating seventy per cent of your liver affects not only your hepatic function, but your overall quality of life, including your powers of concentration and your memory," she said tartly.

"Blaming me?" he asked.

"No, just pointing out that there are topics that you might want to avoid."

He had the sense to keep his mouth shut during the remainder of the drive home, but she could feel him scrutinising her as she drove. Rachel, in the back seat, was uncharacteristically quiet. She'd been wildly excited about Pete's visit, but now that he was here she was overcome by shyness. Pete had that effect on many people; his sheer physical presence was overpowering and he did little to put people at their ease.

At the door to the downstairs apartment Cuddy paused. "Wilson left a key for you ...,"

"I should hope so," Pete muttered.

"... but I don't know when he'll be back. Why don't you come upstairs and have dinner with us?"

"Oh, yes!" Rachel piped up.

Pete looked at Rachel skeptically - for a long moment Cuddy feared he'd shoot her down - but then he nodded. "But no vegetarian grub," he stipulated.

"I got steak," Cuddy said.

Again a keen stare - he must have figured by now that red meat seldom featured on her meal plans - and then a short nod of approval.

She unlocked the door to Wilson's apartment for him and gave him the key. "We'll eat in about forty-five minutes. If Wilson turns up, just bring him with you."

He came upstairs half an hour later, and instead of slouching into the living room and turning on the television, he joined her in the kitchen. Of course, he immediately had to go through the papers that she'd placed on the far end of the kitchen counter for quick perusal while she cooked.

"You're moving out?" he asked, holding up a real estate brochure.

"I'm thinking about it. Rachel wants a dog, a big one, and there's no way we can keep a dog in this apartment. We'll need a yard. Besides, Wilson will be returning to New York soon. He wants to find a job in New York so as to be close to Amy and Joel. I figure the meeting today has something to do with it. The couple who own the apartment downstairs are due to return from Europe in three months anyway. So, this is as good a time as any to start something new."

"Thought you didn't like houses ever since I wrecked your last one."

She busied herself draining the vegetables, hoping he wouldn't see her uncertainty. The very thought of leaving the safe haven she'd built for herself on the top floor of this apartment block caused her heart rate to accelerate, but a house with a yard had undeniable advantages, not the least being that she wouldn't be dependent on the elevator. After the last storm, Rachel had been stuck upstairs for eighteen hours until power was restored.

"I think I'm ready to move on," she said amid clouds of steam.

"You're allowing your daughter's whining to dictate your life?"

She turned to face him. "She's about to lose Wilson, and all her friends are gaining independence while she's tied to her wheelchair. She's getting left behind. A dog is the least I can do." At the rate he was going she'd be impaling him with a knife before Wilson even got back. "Rachel, dinner is ready!"

Dinner was spent with Pete and Rachel trying to outdo each other at being disgusting: eating with their hands, chewing noisily and with mouths open, allowing meat juices to drip from their mouths. Cuddy put a stop to it when Rachel started spitting food across the table.

"If there's any more of this, you will do the dishes," she pointed to Pete with her fork, "and you will be clearing the table and cleaning up afterwards." That was something Rachel could manage despite her wheelchair, although Cuddy usually didn't have the patience to let Rachel help in the kitchen. It took three times as long as doing it herself, and while Rachel wheeled around the kitchen, no one else could get anything done in there. Pete and Rachel both pretended to be cowed by her threat, but Cuddy wasn't fooled. They continued to amuse themselves by sneaking the vegetables they didn't like onto each other's plates whenever they thought Cuddy wasn't looking.

"When is the conference in Seattle?" Cuddy finally asked.

"The opening event is on Thursday," Pete said.

"Thank God!" Cuddy breathed.

Pete stuck out his lower lip. "I'm hurt!" he proclaimed. "Especially since it's Wilson who'll have to deal with me till then. You only have to tolerate me for one evening. Besides, you volunteered."

That reminded her: "You're not getting Wilson tomorrow evening. He's accompanying me to our gala fundraiser."

Pete straightened and put down his fork. "A date?" he asked, one eyebrow raised.

"Just as a friend," Cuddy hurried to inform him with a quick glance at Rachel.

"There can be only two reasons why you'd drag Wilson there," Pete said with his best diagnostic voice.

Cuddy interrupted him before he said something she really didn't need Rachel to hear. "Yes, there are two reasons. One, I'm sick of the pitying glances I get from women who aren't single, and two, I'm tired of getting hit on by elderly creeps who think I must be desperate because I'm forty-plus and single."

"So you think the best way to show that you're a happy and independent spinster is by going there with a date," Pete said.

"I've spent thirty years trying to prove that I'm independent and strong by going to these events without a date. Now I've decided that I don't need to prove anything to anyone. I just want a quiet evening with no one staring at me, hitting on me, or feeling sorry for me." She slapped down her silverware, stood up and plonked her plate in the sink. "So, Wilson's blocked for tomorrow from six - no, make that four o'clock in the afternoon. Don't go out with him, don't try to abscond with him, don't ... do anything at all!"

"Ooooh," Pete stage-whispered to Rachel. "Someone's on a roll!"

Rachel put on her cool I-know-it-all act. "She's been that way ever since that horrible man Ryan took away her job," she whispered back.

Rachel must have understood more of Arlene Cuddy's latest rant on her daughter's work life than was good for her. "One: I am not 'that way', whatever that may mean. Two, Ryan is not a horrible person. I don't know where you got the idea that he's horrible; you don't even know him! Three, he didn't take away 'my' job. He applied like everyone else did and he was chosen to be Dean, because he was the best applicant. I was just a stand-in for a few months, so now I'm back to doing my real job. It's like you getting a substitute teacher when your teacher is sick. As soon as your teacher is back on her feet, she comes back to teach you and the substitute goes back to whatever she was doing before. I'm back to doing 'Family and Community Healthcare', which is what I did before I stood in for Arthur Rubinstein."

"And that sucks," Pete said.

She looked into his eyes and saw understanding, compassion, and possibly some guilt. "It's the way it is," she said, hoping to end the discussion.

A year ago she'd have laughed outright if someone had suggested that she'd spend the rest of her working life figuring out how to get drug-addicted teens to care for their unwanted babies, but now it appeared that she wouldn't have much of a choice. Prior to the liver donation she'd been at the top of the shortlist for the post of dean, but now, half a year later, she was stuck in a rut, with not a chance of landing a major administrative post. She'd been on sick leave for ten whole weeks, during which time not only her own department but the entire hospital, weakened already by losing its previous dean at short notice, had sunk into chaos. She wasn't young and dynamic anymore, she had taken two long personal breaks during the past five years, and she'd been rejected as dean by her own hospital; she had no illusions as to what kind of job she could land if she opted to leave Philadelphia Central.

"But," she added, "I'm not facing an entire evening among people who witnessed my fall without some kind of moral support. So, Wilson is taboo tomorrow evening."

Pete looked down at his plate, speared a bean that Rachel had just deposited there, and demonstratively ate it. "See, Mom?" he said. "I can be a good boy."

Cuddy raised her eyes to the ceiling, but couldn't help smiling. "Both of you get out of here before I make you clean the pans and the oven. Rachel, you still need to do your homework, I believe."

They obeyed, Rachel moaning about her homework, Pete with alacrity. His guilt and compassion stopped short of volunteering to help in the kitchen, but that wasn't exactly news. After she'd finished tidying the kitchen she made coffee for Pete and herbal tea for herself and took the mugs to the living room, along with a stack of papers from her realtor. Pete was settled on the couch watching a baseball game. She sat down in an armchair and started sorting the brochures into three piles: 'suitable', 'with potential', and 'totally unsuitable'.

Pete sat up and took out his reading glasses. Recognising at one glance how her sorting system functioned, he grabbed the 'suitable' pile and began shooting down one house after another. "Seriously, a house with steps up front for a cripple?"

"Ever heard of a ramp?" she asked, not taking her eyes off the leaflet she was studying. Five bedrooms spread over two floors was way more than they needed, but the house was in an excellent location, had a big downstairs bathroom that she could convert to Rachel's needs, and the yard was a dream. Furthermore it had recently been modernised, so she wouldn't need to invest much money. The downside: the buying price exceeded her budget by thirty per cent. She'd have to bargain with the owner ... .

"The kitchen is too small," Pete said, chucking another of her 'suitables' onto the 'unsuitable' pile. She leaned forward and sorted it back again without a word. He'd always disliked change, so he'd fight her moving to another place tooth and nail simply because he associated her with an apartment in Germantown. Well, he'd just have to learn to associate her with the ultimate suburban cliché.

She heard a key being inserted in the front door lock - Wilson had a spare - and the door being opened. There was a long pause before she heard Wilson puttering around in the entryway, taking off his shoes and coat. Normally, he'd give her a shout from the hall so she knew it was him, but today he didn't do so. And he was slow, very slow. She stopped reading and concentrated on listening to his movements. There wasn't much to listen to: Wilson seemed to have stopped moving altogether.

"Wilson?" she said. Pete looked up from his reading.

"Yeah," came the muted reply. Pete's eyebrows rose.

"Are you okay?" Cuddy called. "Is everything fine with Joel and Amy?"

Wilson appeared in the doorway. He looked shell-shocked. "She asked me whether I wanted to take Joel."

Cuddy smiled bracingly. "That's nice. Overnight or for the whole weekend?"

He'd be fine, she told herself. Any reasonably intelligent and resourceful guy could deal with a baby, no matter what her mother insinuated about members of the male sex and their parenting abilities.

"Forever," Wilson mouthed hollowly. He tugged at the spot where his tie usually sat, nearly pulling off a shirt button in the process, and messed up his hair with the other hand.

"She's dumping the vermin on you?" Pete asked, his eyes narrowing skeptically.

"Yes, goddam it!" Wilson exploded.

Pete started chuckling.

"It's not funny!" Cuddy told him as she strode over to Wilson. Putting a soothing hand on his arm she said, "Don't worry, she's just trying to put pressure on you."

"She sure succeeded," Wilson said.

"Figure out what she wants - money, matrimony, emotional support - and talk her out of it," Cuddy advised.

Pete interlaced his fingers behind his head and leaned back, twinkling at them over the top of his reading glasses. "Female solidarity - I love it!"

Cuddy glared at him; if they didn't watch out, Amy would be Mrs Wilson IV. This time there was more at stake than divorce costs and alimony: Wilson looked to get his heart broken if Amy departed in a few years with the child in tow.

Wilson sank down helplessly on the couch next to Pete. "I proposed; she shot me down. I'm already paying child support, and I told her I was prepared to up it if the problem was a financial one; she said that money wasn't an issue. I offered to move back to New York and share childcare with her - I wanted to do that anyway. But she said she'd thought it through: she wanted to place Joel for adoption. She insisted she'd been manipulated into this by emotional blackmail and now she wanted out. Said she was too young to raise a child that should never have been conceived."

He looked at them, consternation in his eyes. "I swear, I never pressured her into keeping the kid. I knew that my survival was a long shot; I never demanded that she keep Joel on the off chance of my living long enough to see him born."

"Post-partum depression," Cuddy diagnosed.

"You proposed and she refused? Interesting. That means the boyfriend's still around," Pete surmised. "Chances are that her boyfriend doesn't like nights of hot sex disrupted by a bawling poop machine."

"She'll miss him so much that she'll be standing on your doorstep in two days - three at the most - demanding him back," Cuddy predicted.

"I don't think so," Wilson said wearily. "Apparently she made the decision during the last month of her pregnancy. Her gynaecologist told her to sit it out and see whether she'd feel differently after the child was born, but Joel is two months old now and she hasn't changed her mind. She gave me a choice: I could either sign the papers terminating my rights as birth father, allowing her to place him for adoption, or I could take him myself. So, I took him."

Pete looked around demonstratively. "Took him," he repeated. "And where did you leave him? At the next rest stop?"

"No. I left him out in the entryway." Wilson gestured towards the doorway through which he'd just come.

Rolling her eyes, Cuddy strode out into the entryway. There, next to the shoe storage rack, stood an infant car seat with a sleeping baby strapped into it. As Cuddy looked down at him, he brought up a tiny hand and pulled the back of it over his face, making a little mewling sound in his sleep. It was all Cuddy could do to stop herself from tugging him out of the seat and cuddling him close to her heart. Instead, she picked up the seat and carried it into the living room.

"Wilson, he's adorable!" she said.

Wilson grimaced. "Maybe he is, but he yelled all the way from New York to Philly. I nearly ran the car off the freeway."

Pete sat up, took off his reading glasses, and stared at the infant. As though sensing his critical stare, Joel opened his eyes and yawned. Pete tipped his head, his tongue peeping out of the corner of his mouth. Joel moved restlessly, whimpering.

"He must be hungry," Wilson said. "Amy said he'd need a bottle around this time."

"Have you got bottles and formula?" Cuddy asked

"I've got everything," Wilson said heavily, getting up. "I've got the whole car full of baby paraphernalia. Amy had everything sorted and packed already; all we had to do was load it into my car."

Cuddy unfastened the seat belt and picked Joel up, murmuring soothing words as she carried him out of the living room. "Hey, Rachel," she called. "Come and look at Joel."

"What?" Rachel appeared at the door of her room. "Oh! Hold him lower down, Mom; I can't see."

Cuddy crouched down next to Rachel's wheelchair.

"He's small," Rachel pronounced.

"He's only two months old," Cuddy said. "Look at his little hands! Aren't they perfect? Look, they even have fingernails."

Rachel carefully took one little hand in hers and examined it. "Does he have fingerprints yet?" she asked.

"Yep." Pete had appeared in the doorway and was looking at them with the same puzzled expression he'd worn in the living room. "Fingerprints develop while the foetus is still in its mother's womb. The fingerprints expand as the hand grows, but they don't change."

"Oh, look, he has blue eyes!" Rachel said.

Pete moved to her side and gazed down at the boy. "Most Caucasian infants start off with blue eyes," he said. "Blue means no pigmentation – that's the colouring - as yet. That will change in the coming year when the cells in his eyes, the melanocytes, start producing pigmentation. That means you can only use an iris scan to identify him when he's about a year old."

Despite the factual nature of the information he was imparting, Cuddy noticed that his expression was worried, or maybe nervous. Was he bothered because Wilson was now saddled with someone who was needier than he was? It didn't make sense: Pete had been aware of the danger posed by Amy and her child. He and she had discussed the repercussions of Wilson getting a needy female pregnant, and Pete had been resigned and fatalistic about it. He'd even cracked jokes about it, saying that since he couldn't remember being best man at Wilson's second wedding, this was a good opportunity to recreate the memory. Had he hoped that Amy would show Wilson the cold shoulder once the child was born? Well, now she had, but not in the way Cuddy had privately hoped she would.

Joel squalled, tearing her from her thoughts. "Where's Wilson and the formula?" she asked.

"In the kitchen," Pete said.

Cuddy rose from her half-crouch and held the child out to Pete. "Here, hang on to him while I help Wilson," she said.

Pete backed away. "No way, Jose," he said. When she frowned at him, he added, "Lisa, it doesn't take two people to make one bottle of formula. Wilson can handle it."

"Can I hold him?" Rachel asked.

Cuddy looked at her doubtfully.

"Mom, nothing can go wrong. I'll just sit with him on my lap," Rachel said.

"Good point," Pete said. "She can't trip and fall, dropping the piglet."

"Okay," Cuddy said. She adjusted Rachel's arms, placed Joel in them, and tucked Rachel's hands tightly into place. "Hold on, and don't get distracted!" Once she was certain that Rachel was holding Joel securely, she pushed the wheelchair into the kitchen.

Since Amy had had the foresight to supply a thermos flask of boiled water along with the formula, preparing a bottle for Joel proved no challenge. Nor did feeding him: when Cuddy proffered the bottle he latched straight onto the nipple and drank up most of it with little fuss and bother.

The problem started afterwards.

"You have to burp him," Rachel offered wisely.

"I'm trying!" Wilson said, jiggling a red-faced, bawling Joel against his shoulder.

"Shall I give it a try?" Cuddy asked, repressing memories of Rachel crying almost non-stop for the first eight weeks of her life.

"Sure," Wilson said, handing the baby over to her.

Joel burped resoundingly the moment Cuddy patted his back - she could barely repress a smirk of victory - but promptly started crying again.

"Camomile tea," Cuddy muttered, heading for the kettle while balancing Joel against her shoulder. It had done zilch for Rachel when she'd been that age, but you never knew. "Did Amy say anything about …?"

"No!"

"Jesus!" Pete appeared in the kitchen, a scowl on his face. "Three people in here, and you can't keep the vermin quiet?"

"Be our guest," Cuddy snapped, holding out Joel.

To her surprise Pete took him. He held him at arm's length, gazing at the red scrunched-up face, and then he draped the baby face down over his left forearm, arms and legs dangling on either side rather like a sloth on a branch. Then he moved around the kitchen, his right hand travelling down the boy's spine, feeling for deformations, and then up to the head, palpitating the skull.

"Anything the paediatrician missed?" Cuddy asked bitingly.

"Nope," Pete said.

Just then Joel broke wind resoundingly. He gave another little burp and calmed down. Wilson and Cuddy stared at Pete, who smiled with infuriating superiority. "When air needs to come out," he explained to Rachel, "the opening has to be at the top, because air moves upwards, like bubbles in your soda. If you hold him upright, it's difficult for him to fart."

"But you weren't holding him bottom up," Rachel said.

"No, because the air wanted to get out at both ends. And most likely his meal would have come out if I'd dangled him upside down. Milk is heavier than air and likes to go down. But like this," he nodded at the contented infant, "he gets his stomach massaged by my arm, while the air has an escape route. Okey-dokey, back to Daddy you go!" He held out his arm to Wilson, who took Joel with an air of trepidation.

"It ain't rocket science, Wilson," Pete said condescendingly.

"You," Wilson said, "were lucky, that's all."

"And you got talked into buying a lemon," Pete threw over his shoulder as he left the kitchen. A moment later the front door slammed.

	Chapter Index

Comments

[menolly-au.livejournal.com]

Lifestyle changes... I like that :)

[readingrat.livejournal.com]

Thanks. The working titles that you see are usually a sort of shorthand for the main plot point that the chapter deals with, so that I can find chapters quickly when I need to read something up or revise them. Then, just before I post the chapter I think, "Oh no, that's lame -- it'll look really stupid in the chapter index !"

[menolly-au.livejournal.com]

LOL - I struggle enough with titles for the story, I go for the prosaic Chapter One, Two etc for my long fics :) I did enjoy the Hobbit titles on Kelpie though :)

I love Joel, and I think Pete had beginners luck with the burping :) Although I did love the image of Joel draped like a sloth over his arm (and checking for abnormalities at the same time - a multi-tasker our Pete!) I think mostly that would get you regurgitated milk all over the floor...

And Pete and Rachel at the dinner table! Great fun for Rachel (and probably makes her feel more at ease with Pete) but arrgghh... too much of that could get annoying real quick :)

And I'm like Cuddy - squee! Baby!!!!! (As long as I can hand them back because, you know, baby....)

[readingrat.livejournal.com]

I go for the prosaic Chapter One, Two
I used to do that, but it looks kinda stupid on ff.net, especially if you start off with a prologue that messes up your chapter count. And after giving The Kelpie decent chapter titles I'm kinda obliged to continue the tradition.

I think Pete had beginners luck with the burping :)
He was the only one who wasn't a bundle of nerves. Nervousness transfers itself to infants somehow or other; I suppose that the infant can sense the accelerated heart rate (and possibly a change in body odour) and that the person's movements get stiff and jerky. Wilson has just had a four-hour round trip to New York with Joel screaming in the car for two of those hours -- and trust me, a screaming baby in a car is a traffic hazard of note! Cuddy has always been nervous around strange children. Pete is the only one who couldn't care less, because he knows that if he can't calm Joel down, then he can pass him back to Wilson, who will have to deal with the problem. So, no pressure for Pete, lots of pressure for Wilson.

I think mostly that would get you regurgitated milk all over the floor...
It was the posture that worked best for my kids, heaven knows why. A midwife showed it to me. The brats love it, but they look really, really dumb -- well, like sloths, actually.

[yarroway.livejournal.com]

So Wilson's a full time dad now. I hope he files for child support. I get the feeling he and Cuddy are going to pair up in some non romantic way and raise the kids together.

Are these sequelae of partial liver donation common? That's terrifying. Why would anyone ever donate?

[readingrat.livejournal.com]

So Wilson's a full time dad now. I hope he files for child support.
He's a single parent, but whether he'll opt for full time fatherhood is a different matter. I think he might feel too guilty to file for child support.

Are these sequelae of partial liver donation common?
Most live donations are parent-child ones (which answers your question why people donate) where a lot less liver gets transplanted, so there are no statistics on cases like Cuddy's. However, even adult-to-child donors take a few months to recover: they aren't supposed to drive or work for six to eight weeks and to lift no more than 10 - 15 lbs during that time. I'm assuming that Cuddy, having had more liver than average removed, would take longer for a full recovery. (In case you were wondering about Wilson's quick recovery after donating to Tucker -- yes, that's truly amazing.) As for concentration and memory, mine suffered noticeably during my pregnancies; it took me almost a year to recover fully from the later ones. (It got so bad I couldn't even read newspaper articles, let alone whole novels.) I assume that this was because the foetus used up my bodily resources, including my brain. Transferring that to the liver recovery process: The liver may not be as big as a foetus, but it is undoubtedly a vital organ. Cuddy is underweight, so there's precious little her liver can use to regenerate; in case of doubt, her liver will probably regenerate at the expense of her brain. She'll survive and sooner or later everything will be back to normal, except that at Cuddy's age natural ageing tends to kick in too.

Thanks for reading and commenting :)