“Can't I stay?” Gabriella begged her with imploring eyes, and he tightened his weak grip on her fingers.

“You can come back in a couple of hours. He needs to sleep,” she admonished her, wishing people could understand what the ICU was all about. Having visitors there at all was a hazard and a nuisance.

“I'll come back later,” she whispered, stroking his cheek gently with her hand, and he closed his eyes for just an instant, and then opened them as he made a deep guttural sound. It was obvious that he was trying to speak to her. “Don't try to talk. Just rest.” She kissed his cheek, and then told him what he knew anyway, “I love you.” She meant it from the bottom of her heart, and all she wanted now was for him to get better.

She cried all the way home on the subway. She didn't have enough money on her for a cab, and she reminded herself to ask Steve about the money in her wallet when she got back. But when she walked into the boardinghouse, everyone was so upset that she forgot all about it. Steve was waiting for her, and Mrs. Boslicki and Mrs. Rosenstein, and several other boarders. They had been sitting in the living room for hours, waiting for news, as Steve explained again and again how he had looked, and where he'd been lying, and what he thought must have happened when he found him.

“How is he?” they asked almost in unison the moment they saw her.

“I don't know,” she said honestly, “he had a stroke, and he hit his head when he fell. He can't speak and his right side is paralyzed, but he recognized me. He keeps trying to talk, but he can't, and he seems very upset.” She didn't want to tell them how terrible he looked, but it was written all over her anyway, and Mrs. Rosenstein started to cry again as soon as she heard Gabbie's description. Gabriella went to her then, and hugged her, and tried to tell her he'd be all right, but none of them could be sure now.

“How could something like this happen so quickly?” Steve railed at the fates, and everyone kept saying how fortunate it was that he had walked in and found him before it was too late. If he hadn't, the professor would be dead now. Of that there was no question. “I guess there are some blessings to being unemployed,” he said cynically, and Gabbie looked sympathetic. She knew how embarrassing that was for him, but he'd had a lot of bad luck, and she understood that. She was sorry for all the complaining about it she'd done recently, and the pressure she'd put on him. She felt guilty now, seeing the condition the professor was in. It reminded her of how quickly life could change, and how easily one could lose the people one loved. But she had already learned that. It made the problems between them seem so unimportant.

He walked over to her and held her. “I'm sorry, Gabbie.” He knew how much the professor meant to her, or he thought he did. But in fact, he didn't. The professor had become the final symbol of the family she never had, the one person she could turn to, and count on, other than Steve. He was the father she had never had, trusted confidant, beloved mentor. He had given her the praise and the hope and the unconditional love she had always longed for. He meant as much to her as Mother Gregoria had, though she had known him for a shorter time. And having lost so many and so much before, the thought of losing him now, she knew, would destroy her. He couldn't die. She wouldn't let him.

Gabriella called the hospital several times, while Mrs. Boslicki and Mrs. Rosenstein forced her to eat dinner. She could barely get the food down, as Steve went upstairs to do some things. But she managed to eat a few mouthfuls of stew, just to please them, and two of Mrs. Boslicki's famous dumplings. And as soon as she'd finished, she jumped up from the table.

“I'm going to go back to the hospital now,” she announced, looking for her bag, and then she remembered that she had no money. She ran upstairs to her room. She had an envelope with some cash in a drawer, underneath her stockings, and she pulled it out of its hiding place quickly, and was shocked to see that it was empty. She had had two hundred dollars in it only yesterday morning, and it was no mystery to her where it must have gone to. She didn't want to confront Steve now, but she didn't want to take the subway at night either.

She hurried downstairs to Steve's room, and he was sitting there, reading some letters he had written. “I need money for a cab,” she said without ceremony.

“I don't have any, babe. I'm really sorry. I had to order more stationery today, and xeroxing my résumés again cost a fortune.” He looked genuinely apologetic, but she wasn't in the mood now.

“Come on, Steve, you took two hundred dollars out of my envelope, and almost everything I had in my wallet.” They both knew that no one else could have done it.

“Honest, sweetheart, I didn't. I just took about forty bucks last night for the xeroxing. I'm sorry I forgot to tell you. I was going to tell you tonight, but with everything happening, I forgot. All I have left is two dollars.” He opened his wallet and showed her, and she was even more upset that he was lying. She knew he was embarrassed to be taking money from her, and that he lied about it sometimes. But his stories wouldn't pay her cab fare.

“Steve, please, I need it. I don't have any money to get to the hospital, and I don't get paid again till Friday. You have to stop doing this.” Lately every time she opened her wallet to pay for something, she discovered that it was empty. But this was no time for his nonsense.

“I didn't do anything,” he said, looking instantly hurt and angry. “You're always accusing me of something. Can't you see how hard this is for me? Do you think I like it?”

“I can't talk about this now,” she said, feeling panicked again. She just wanted to get back to the professor.

“Stop blaming me for everything. It's not fair.”

“I'm sorry.” She always tried to be fair with him, but the inequities between them made them both very touchy. “Mrs. Rosenstein's not doing it,” she said, trying to sound calm to Steve. “And somebody keeps taking all my money, I didn't mean to be rude about it.”

“I forgive you,” he said, walking over to kiss her. “Do you want me to come with you?” He looked mollified after her apology, though still visibly wounded, and she always felt so terrible after she accused him of something. Maybe it really wasn't him. She left her door unlocked a lot, it could actually have been one of the other boarders, and looking at Steve's face, she was beginning to think so.

“I'll be okay. I'll call you if anything happens.” She ran down the stairs then, after kissing him again, and looking embarrassed, she asked Mrs. Boslicki if she could borrow cab fare. And without hesitating, her landlady handed her ten dollars from her own purse. It was the first time Gabriella had ever asked her for anything, and she wasn't surprised, since everyone knew that she was supporting that deadbeat. They had all grown tired of him by then, with all his grand stories about Stanford and Yale, and his excuses about why he couldn't get a job. They couldn't see why, since everyone else did. Maybe he thought he was too good for the jobs he was being offered. He got enough phone calls, and they had to be for something. Mrs. Boslicki was sorry now that she had pushed Steve at Gabbie at Christmas. She thought she could do a lot better.

“Call and tell us how the professor is,” Mrs. Boslicki said as Gabriella flew out the door and ran down the street to hail a taxi.

And as soon as she saw him, she knew things were not going well. He looked restless and seemed to be in pain, and every time he looked at Gabbie, he got agitated and stared at her so intently, she was frightened. Eventually the nurses asked her to leave again, but she decided to stay anyway, and sleep on the couch in the ICU hallway, just in case something happened.

She went back and sat with him at dawn. The nurse on duty said he was awake, and he seemed a little more peaceful.

“Hi,” Gabbie whispered, as she sat down next to him. “Everyone at the house said to say hello.” She had forgotten to tell him the night before, but she was sure he knew that anyway. “And Mrs. Rosenstein said to tell you to take your medicine, and don't make a fuss about it.” She had actually said that to her, dabbing at her eyes with a hankie. “We all love you,” she said, and meant it more than she could ever tell him.

She had been thinking all night about taking some time off, and nursing him when he got home. She was sure Ian would understand, for a few weeks at least. She had some vacation time coming anyway, and there was nothing she wanted to do more now than be with him. She started telling him about a story she'd been working on the week before, and she told him that Steve really liked it. And as she said it, the professor frowned again and lifted his left hand and slowly wagged a finger at her. He was very weak and he could hardly raise even his good hand, and she smiled as she saw what Mrs. Rosenstein called his “famous finger.” He was always pointing and waving a finger at someone to emphasize a point or warn them of something. She thought he was scolding her for not writing more often.

“I will,” she said, thinking she understood him, but she didn't. “I've just been so busy, with work, and trying to help Steve, it's hard for him still being out of work,” she said gently, as the finger wagged again, and he looked like he was going to start crying. “Don't try to talk,” she admonished him. “They'll make me leave again if you get all worked up. When you come home,. we'll go over some of the stories together.”

She hadn't sold a story since the first one, but she knew she wasn't working as much as she should have. The rest of her life seemed too distracting. And now this. She couldn't imagine writing a word while she was worried about him. All she wanted to do now was infuse him with life, and help him get healthy. That was the only thing that mattered to her.