Doreen's friend Kate called her a jerk who wore her bleeding heart right under the hospital volunteers badge. What did it matter, Doreen thought, if first, she was helping others less fortunate, and second, it made her feel good to bring a smile to some patient's face? The terminal cases and those on the verge of dying were most in need of a friend, a caring soul.
The hospital she visited once a week for two hours had a dog, she knew. Dogs would revive patients' interest in life, if only for the duration of their visit. Doreen was not unaware that she was attractive — at least as fetching as a Labrador with her long, silky hair. Kate called her a sexual provocateur. "You're so tall that you're intimidating, your breasts are too perfect, and you look like a walking baby-making machine."
"Ha ha," Doreen said with sardonic laughter. "There's only one baby. I take care of her by myself as a single mother. Don't get on my case." Unconsciously, her hand massaged her stomach as though inviting sensation in her torso.
"I'm thinking you're Florence Nightingale on some weird errand of mercy. Always taking care of others."
* * *
Any doubt Doreen had disappeared when she looked in on Devin McCarthy and brought him a choice of magazines. Sitting on the edge of his bed in the private room, she asked the noncommittal question, "How're you doing," and gave him a big smile.
The patient looked her up and down. "Not so good. Who're you?"
"Volunteer. My name's Doreen Coburn. I just come by the see if there's anything I can do to make time go by while patients recuperate from whatever."
"Well, I'm not doing so hot. It's...well, it's hard to talk about it."
"What's wrong?" She put her hand lightly on Devin's arm to show empathy.
"I collapsed at work. When I woke up the doctors had done their tests. Told me I have less than a week."
"A week here?"
"A week to live. Or less. It's cancer," and he pointed to his head. "X rays show there's nothing but scrambled eggs up there."
"Where's your wife? Your family?" A cold chill made her revisit mortality, the death of her husband and her weekly visits to church services.
He waved his hand airily. "My wife ran off with a co-worker. No children." He laughed hollowly. "No lover. In fact, it's been two years and I know I'll never love again. Never know the feel of a woman's kiss, her soft body."
Doreen's empathy — the qualities she'd been coached on and an internal reservoir of caring — went into overdrive. It had been three years and six months since her husband, friend and lover had gone under the wheels of a drunk driver. If there was any good fortune, her lawyer had collected a million dollars in damages, another reason Doreen could work part-time and volunteer a few hours.
"I could kiss you," she offered tentatively. Immediately, Devin's arm snaked around her neck and pulled her face to his. The man smell and scratchy unshaven cheeks brought back a flood of recollections. She tried to replay the memory of what her husband had felt like falling like a canopy over her body, probing until he had seated himself inside her and then thrusting up in the act that had been pleasure and procreation. But her memories were cobwebby, just as her libido was dusty.
She pulled free, decisively, and said, "I'll lock the door." Visiting hours were over and most of the nurses were on break. If she could assuage this poor man's final desire before passing, well, it would be her gift. Charitable if not exactly Christian.
She dropped her skirt and pulled her polo shirt over her head, letting Devin watch every move. Bending, she pulled down her panties, glad she could show off a thong, and then arched her back so her bra would fall free. Then she got under the sheet and wrapped her arms around the patient. Her breasts were cold with anticipation, but her heart chilled that she might prove inadequate attendant to the patient.
"I don't have a condom," he whispered as his hand lifted her breast and thumbed a pink nipple. The hand quickly slid down to reach between her legs and fingers parted her lips to find her clitoris.
