Part 11 (1/2)

'Yeah, I guess,' conceded Joe. 'When's Polly going to die?'

'Oh, not for years and years,' the doctor said. 'I'm guessing Polly here will live to be a hundred.'

'Yeah?' said Joe incredulously. 'I thought she was dying. The gerbil in our homeroom died. It had a rash as well.'

'No kidding, little buddy. That jacket, is it made of wool?' the doctor asked me, pointing to it.

'I don't know.'

'I guess there'll be a tag?'

I checked the tag and it said wool.

'Okay,' said the doctor. 'Polly doesn't like wool next her skin. I'll let you have some cream. Apply it four times daily and the rash should soon clear up.'

'She won't need any other meds? No painkillers? You don't need to run some blood work to be sure it's just an allergy?'

'No blood work,' said the doctor wearily. 'No other meds. You guys remember no wool next the skin and Polly here is going to be fine.'

'We got it, Doc,' Joe told him, man to man.

The doctor gave him a high five.

I got a prescription and was told to take it to the pharmacy.

As we were walking down the corridor, the candy striper happened by again and asked Joe if he'd like a juice or popsicle? Joe beamed at her and said he surely would and thank you, ma'am. She beamed right back at him and took his hand. I could see her thinking, a kid with good, old-fas.h.i.+oned manners, someone's raising children right today. Then she said if I would like, she'd take him to the hospital canteen and meet us there. She also told me where to find the pharmacy, like I was dumb or something and couldn't read the signs.

As I was waiting in the pharmacy, the nurse we'd seen came in. She nodded hi and then went through a door into an office. But she left the door ajar.

'That's the guy through there?' asked someone else.

'Yeah, that's him,' the nurse replied and I could hear the giggle in her voice. 'A case of weekend father syndrome, he was panicking because his baby had a little rash.'

'What was it?'

'Just an allergy. He'd dressed the kid in a wool jacket and she had a lanoline reaction.'

'He should have known, the klutz. No wool next to the skin on babies, it's an irritant.'

'Quiet down, Mary-Lou, he'll hear you.'

'Well, perhaps he ought to hear me? Guys like that, they say they're fathers, but they never change a diaper, never read a tag. They never use their brains.'

'Their brains live in their shorts and they-'

I didn't hear the rest because they realised they hadn't shut the door and now they closed it, snickering.

'Mr Riley?' said the pharmacist. 'Okay, this is a moisturising cream. It's very light and you can use it any time. Just smooth it on your daughter's skin, don't rub, and soon ...'

She rattled on like I was stupid and had never seen a tube of cream in my whole life. I took the stuff and headed out the pharmacy with Polly and her discharge papers, feeling like a fool.

'Dad, is Polly going to die?' asked Joe as I strapped them both into the backseat of the trash-mobile then offered them some bran-rich cookies from a store of sugar, salt and allergen-free snacks that Lex kept on the dash.

'No,' I told him. 'Polly won't be dying yet awhile. You heard that doctor, didn't you? She's going to live at least a hundred years.'

Joe looked so disappointed. I thought he would cry. But the little guy was tired. He'd had a busy day. He'd been to the zoo and to the children's hospital. He'd seen tigers, foxes, doctors, nurses, candy stripers, kids with plasters on their wrists and ankles, kids with pirate patches, just like on TV. He'd have lots to say to Mrs Daley on Monday, wouldn't he?

Oh, and to tell his mother, too.

'Mommy, Mommy, we went to the hospital! Polly nearly died!'

'What?' Lexie stared at me in horror. 'Pat, whatever happened? Did you let her fall, eat something bad?'

'She had an allergy.' I shrugged. 'But I didn't know it at the time. I thought it needed checking out.'

'You took her to the children's hospital?'

'Yeah, we went to the ER and Joe thought he had died and gone to heaven.'

'Please don't talk about my children dying. Pat, you should have called the doctor's office. There's a weekend number in the binder. You say she had an allergy. What caused it?'

'It was a wool reaction.'

'Oh, I see,' said Lexie and did her best school-princ.i.p.al-from-h.e.l.l impression folded arms and mouth set in an angry, disapproving line. 'She wore her robin jacket, is that right?'

'Yeah, but she-'

'Patrick, you should know no wool next to the skin, particularly in the case of little ones and babies.'

'So why do you dress the kid in wool?'

'When she wears that little coat, she also wears a tee with a high neck and sleeves that come down to her wrists. If you ever noticed what your children wore, you would have noticed that.'

'Why don't you put it in the garbage and buy her a new jacket made of cotton or whatever?'

'Your mother sent it on her birthday.' Lexie sighed. 'I never would have bought it. The stupid thing's hand wash, and that's a drag. But Polly really loves it. She loves the birds on it. They all got names. She sucks the cuffs as well that's why they're fraying.'

Yeah, I thought, it figured. It was the sort of jacket Mom would buy. She loves to get new clothes for Polly, real expensive stuff she can't afford, perhaps because I had a little sister who died of scarlet fever before I came along.

'Good weekend?' I asked to change the subject and hoping Mr Wonderful had fallen off a bridge and drowned to death. Or somehow got himself burned up in a precisely-targeted incendiary attack.

'Yeah, it was great.' At the thought of Mr Wonderful or so I guessed Lex became all bright and glowing, and I wondered if I'd ever made my wife light up? I never checked.

'What did you do?' I asked.

'I told you, one of Stephen's friends got married. Come on, kids, it's late and you got school and stuff tomorrow. You should be in bed.'

As Lexie hurried them toward the door, Joe turned to glance at me. 'Thank you for the weekend, Dad,' he said. 'I had the best time ever.'

'Why was that, then?' I was curious to know what I got right and to hear him talk about it while his mother listened.