Max reached across the table and lay his large hands over Hannah’s. “You’re trembling. Now, don’t you worry, sweetheart. We’ll tell him about us as soon as he comes down. How can their being here affect us? We’ll go on with our lives just as we have been.”

“Do you really think so?” Hannah asked.

“I’m sure of it. They’ll stay until the baby comes, then in a few months they’ll move on to a city.”

“Don’t be too sure of that. Things change.” The knot in Hannah’s stomach began to hurt.

2

A Loss of Function

Through her open windows, Grace heard the slam of a car door. She had been up most of the night worrying about her health. This particular bout of insomnia started weeks ago when her internist had advised her to see a kidney specialist.

“Your blood work indicates there may be a slight problem with your kidneys. Nothing serious, but we need to check it out,” he had said in a voice that Grace considered much too casual for the information it imparted.

The nephrologist had been young, pleasant, and patient. He had taken a thorough history and drawn a crude rendition of kidneys and arteries on a notepad. He explained that high blood pressure, compounded by diabetes, could, over time, adversely affect one’s kidneys. “I’m going to have my nurse set you up for a sonogram to see if there’s a blockage in the arteries that go to your kidneys.”

Grace’s mind snapped shut. Blockages sounded ominous. “And if there’s a blockage?”

“If there’s a restriction of blood flow to your kidneys, we’ll go in and clean out the arteries. It’s a routine procedure these days,” he replied and smiled, but his smile had not reassured her.

Grace remembered Bob’s heart attack several years earlier and his angioplasty, a surgical procedure to clean the plaque from a blood vessel to his heart. Bob had made light of it, saying that he had felt absolutely nothing. But the prospect of a probe snaking through her arteries terrified her, and when the young doctor suggested the possible “procedure,” Grace felt weak and had had to clutch the cold metal arms of her chair for support. The nurse had walked her from the office to her car.

Later, when she told him, Bob said, “Now don’t you go worrying yourself silly while you wait to have that sonogram.”

“How can I not worry? I’m scared out of my mind.”