Danielle Steel - Rogue

She was thumbing through People magazine later that night, while waiting for a call from Daphne to pick her up, and came across a picture of Blake at a party the Rolling Stones had given in London. He had a well-known rock star on his arm, a staggeringly beautiful girl who practically had no clothes on, as Blake stood next to her and beamed. Maxine stared at his photograph for a minute, trying to decide if it bothered her, and confirmed to herself that it didn't, as Sam snored softly next to her, his head on her pillow, the empty popcorn bowl beside him, and his love-worn teddy bear in his arms.

As she looked at the photograph in the magazine, she tried to remember what it had been like being married to him. There had been the wonderful days in the beginning, and the lonely, angry, frustrating days in the end. None of it mattered anymore. She decided that seeing him with starlets and models and rock stars and princesses didn't bother her at all. He was a face from her distant past, and in the end, no matter how lovable he was, her father had been right. He wasn't a husband, he was a rogue. And kissing Sam softly on his silky cheek, she thought again that she liked her life just the way it was.

During the night, the heavy rain turned to snow. The temperature dropped considerably, and everything was blanketed white when they woke up. It was the first real snow of the year. Sam took one look at it and clapped his hands in delight.

“Can we go to the park, Mom? We can take out the disks.” The snow was still falling, and the scene outside looked like a Christmas card, but Maxine knew that by the next day it would be a mess.

“Sure, sweetheart.” As she thought about it, she realized, as she always did, that Blake was missing the best part. He had traded all of this for jet-set parties and people all over the world. But in Maxine's eyes, the best of life was right here.

Daphne came in for breakfast with her cell phone glued to her ear. She left the table several times, whispering to a friend, as Jack rolled his eyes and helped himself to the French toast Maxine had made. It was one of the few things she could cook well, and often did. He poured on a huge amount of maple syrup and commented on how dumb Daphne and her friends were these days about boys.

“What about you?” his mother inquired with interest. “No girlfriends yet?” He went to a dancing class, and a coed school, and had plenty of opportunities to meet girls, but he had no interest in them yet. His primary interest so far was in sports. He liked soccer best of all, surfing the Internet, and video games.

“Yerghk” was his response, as he devoured another piece of French toast. Sam was lying on the couch, watching cartoons on TV. He had eaten breakfast an hour before when he got up. Everyone came and went at leisure on Saturday mornings, and Maxine cooked for them as they came in. She loved the domestic side of life that she didn't have time for during the week, when she was in a hurry to see patients at the hospital before she went to her office. She was usually out of the house well before eight o'clock, when the kids left for school. But with rare exceptions, she managed to have dinner with them every night.

She reminded Sam then that he had a sleepover at a friend's that night, and Jack chimed in that he did too. Daphne said three of her friends were coming over to watch a movie, and a couple of boys might drop by too.

“Now there's a new chapter,” Maxine commented with a look of interest. “Anyone I know?” Daphne just shook her head with a look of irritation and walked out of the room. Clearly, to her, the question didn't deserve an answer.

Maxine rinsed the dishes and put them in the dishwasher, and an hour later, she and all three of her children were headed to the park. At the last minute, the two older ones had decided to come along too. She had plastic disks for two of them, and she and Daphne wrapped garbage bags around their bottoms, and slid down the hills with the boys, and other children, with squeals of glee. It was still snowing, and her children were still young enough to act like little kids once in a while, instead of grown up, as they wanted to be. They stayed out till three o'clock and then walked home through the park. It had been fun, and she made them hot chocolate with whipped cream and s'mores when they got home. It was nice to think they weren't so old after all, and still enjoyed the same childhood pastimes they always had.

She dropped Sam off for his sleepover at five o'clock, on East 89th Street, Jack in the Village at six o'clock, and was back at the apartment in time for Daphne's friends to show up with a stack of rented movies. In the end, two additional girls had turned up. She ordered pizza for them at eight o'clock, and Sam called at nine “to see how she was,” which she knew from experience meant he might not spend the night at his friend's. Sometimes he couldn't pull it off, and came home to sleep with her or in his own bed. She told him she was fine, and he said he was too. She was smiling when she hung up, and could hear squeals of laughter coming from Daphne's room. Something told her they were talking about boys, and she wasn't wrong.

Two extremely uncomfortable-looking thirteen-year-old boys dropped by at ten o'clock. They were shorter than the girls by several inches, showed no signs of puberty, and devoured what was left of the pizza. And only minutes later, with mumbled excuses, they left. They had never made it as far as Daphne's room from the kitchen, and said they had to get home. They had been outnumbered by the girls three to one, but would have left early anyway. The scene was too much for them. The girls looked far more mature, and rushed back to Daphne's room to discuss it as soon as the boys had left. Maxine was smiling to herself, listening to them squeal and giggle, when the phone rang at eleven. She figured it was Sam wanting to come home, and she was still smiling when she answered, expecting to hear her youngest son's voice.

Instead, it was a nurse at Lenox Hill Hospital's emergency room, calling about one of her patients. Maxine frowned and instantly sat up in rapt attention, asking pertinent questions. Jason Wexler was sixteen, his father had died suddenly of a heart attack six months earlier, and his older sister had died in a car accident ten years before. He had taken a handful of his mother's sleeping pills. He suffered from depression, and had tried it before, though not since right after his father's death. He and his father had had a terrible argument the night he died, and Jason was convinced his father's heart attack and death were his fault.

The nurse said his mother was hysterical in the waiting room, Jason was conscious, and they were already pumping his stomach. They thought he was going to be okay, but it was close. His mother had found him and called 911, he had taken a lot of sleeping pills, and if she'd found him any later, he would have been dead. Maxine listened carefully. The hospital was only eight blocks away, and she could walk it at a good clip, in spite of the six inches of snow on the ground that had turned to slush late in the afternoon, and then frozen solid in brown icy patches by nightfall. It was treacherous when that happened.

“I'll be there in ten minutes,” she told the nurse efficiently. “Thank you for calling.” Maxine had given Jason's mother her home number and cell phone months before. Even when the call group covered for her most weekends, she wanted to be there herself for Jason and his mother if they ever needed her. She had been hoping they never would, and wasn't pleased to learn of his second suicide attempt. And she knew that his mother would be desperately upset. After losing her husband and her daughter, Jason was all she had left.

Maxine knocked on Zelda's door and saw that she was asleep. She wanted to let her know that she was going out to see a patient, and to listen for the girls, just in case. But she hated to wake her, so she closed the door softly without making a sound. It was her day off, after all. And then Maxine walked into Daphne's room as she pulled a heavy sweater over her head. She was already wearing jeans.

“I have to go out to see a patient,” she explained. Daphne knew, as they all did, that her mother went out to see special patients, even on the weekends, and she looked up and nodded. They were still watching DVDs and had gotten quieter as the night wore on. “Zelda's here, so if you need something, you can get her, but don't make too much noise in the kitchen, please, she's asleep.” Daphne nodded again, her eyes riveted to the screen. Two of her friends had fallen asleep on her bed, and one was doing her nails. The others were avidly watching the film. “I'll be back in a while.” Daphne knew it was probably an attempted suicide. Her mother never said much about it, but that was the reason she usually went out late at night. Her other patients could wait till the next day.

Maxine put on boots with rubber soles and a ski parka, picked up her purse, and hurried out the door. She was on the street minutes later, walking against a bitter-cold wind, moving south at a good clip down Park Avenue, toward Lenox Hill Hospital. Her face was stinging and raw and her eyes watering by the time she got there, and walked into the emergency room. She checked in at the desk, and they told her what cubicle Jason was in. They had decided he didn't need to go to the ICU. He was groggy but out of danger, and they were waiting for her to admit him for the night, and decide the rest. Helen Wexler pounced on her the minute she walked into the room, clung to her, and began to sob.

“He almost died…,” she said, hysterical in Maxine's arms, as Maxine led her gently from the room, with a glance at the nurse. Jason was dozing in the bed and hadn't stirred. He was still heavily sedated from the residue of what he'd taken, but he no longer had enough on board to risk his life. Just enough to help him sleep for a long time. His mother kept repeating that he had almost died. Maxine led her a fair distance down the hall, just in case her son woke up.