than that everything was alright.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Blake took her hand. The touch was foreign, and Madison looked at his hands, rough and big, capable. It was like she hadn’t seen them in ages.
“How did you find out?”
“I had to write up your medical information, and they phoned that doctor of yours. She clued them in on the Willebrand thing so they could stop the bleeding. They patched the wound up with Fibrin glue and gave you Desmopressin or something like that. To stop the bleeding.”
For the first time she felt the heavy bandages around her leg under the covers.
“What happened?”
“You lost so much blood, and that and not eating made you pass out. If you’d told me about this bleeding thing I could have helped you.”
Madison closed her eyes again. “I didn’t think it was important. I didn’t think… you wanted to know.”
“Why wouldn’t I want to know?”
She took a deep breath. “You’re always so strong. Everything works with you. And then you told me how your life wasn’t what you wanted. I didn’t want to look like I was trying to sabotage that, suddenly tell you something like this to make you pity me and stay.”
Blake shook his head. “I can’t believe you’d think that,” he said. “We may have grown apart, but you’re still my wife. I don’t want anything to happen to you. And you need to tell me these things so I know what to do when you end up unconscious in a pool of blood on a hotel floor.”
Madison nodded. She looked toward the window.
“It’s probably late. We should get back on the road. The kids are waiting.”
“They can wait a bit longer. I want you okay before we set foot out of here. Even if we have to stay another night. I called both offices already and put in more leave.”
“You didn’t have to do that,” Madison said.
“I know.”
Madison fell asleep again soon after that. She was more drained than she expected. Blake stayed by her. Whenever she woke up he was at her side, checking if she was alright.
By noon a doctor came round and talked to them.
“You need to take better care of yourself,” he said to Madison. “You gave us all quite a scare.”
“Is this going to be a problem?” Madison asked. She felt handicapped somehow. The doctor shook his head.
“Not if you make a plan to get patched up when you do get injured. You should treat this the same as hemophilia. It’s a bigger deal than you think. I know you don’t feel sick, and when everything is going according to plan nothing is wrong. But people hurt themselves a lot more than you think. Even if it is just a small nick. You should just keep an eye out and make the effort to stop the bleeding as soon as possible. Then none of this should happen again.”
Madison nodded, but Blake was the one that asked a couple of questions. He wanted to know about the disease, how it worked, what the options were for treatment and what he could do. He was attentive and caring. Madison stared at the man she’d been married to for thirty years, and apparently didn’t know.
When the doctor left, Blake went to get coffee, and Madison fell asleep again before he returned.
3
They were on the road again by seven the next morning. Madison had been released from the hospital late the previous afternoon, and they’d gone back to the hotel room armed with medication and instructions. Blake seemed determined that something like this would never happen again. His attentiveness and care caught Madison off guard; for a man that had been so distant for so long he really made an effort with her.
They didn’t talk much along way, as the last time they drove, but this time the silence was companionable. Blake suggested that Madison choose a station, and the drove together, listening to a talk show Madison hadn’t had time for in a while.
The last stretch to Boston would be a fourteen hour one, and they had a lot of time on the road.
“Let me know when you want me to take over
Learning to Kill: Stories