Destiny's Road

"I hurt my knee surfing."

"Really. Wonderful. Brendan!"

Nothing happened immediately. Schiavo said, "Sit down. How long ago?"

"Almost three weeks." He sat down.

"Is it healing all right?"

"I suppose."

"Come back after you see your wife. I'll have Brendan scan you. Here," She handed him a card. "Your wife's name, address, age, and whatever you remember about her medical history."

Jeremy began writing.

A barrel-shaped man jogged in. 'ja, mein Führer!" His uniform was very like Schiavo's, with a label that read:

Brendan Shaw

Surgery

Duty Doctor

"Brendan, want some exercise?"

"Run up to the library?"

"Yeah, find out where they're keeping a burn patient and get her status. Karen Winslow. You could take the lift. Who'd know?" She took Jeremy's card, glanced at it, handed it to Brendan.

"I go, effendi!" Brendan jogged out, knees high, arms pumping. He slowed to a walk while in Jeremy's sight, but not Schiavo's.

Schiavo handed him another card. "Fill one out for yourself too." Jeremy filled out what he remembered from his credit rating. Put it in his pocket. Closed his eyes....

Brendan's voice jolted him awake. "Winslow? We've got her in Intensive. Out the door, turn left, it's the next building over, fourth floor, Room Four-ten. Her doctor's Nogales, but she's home today. Come back after you see your wife and we'll scan your knee."

Karen smiled. "Jeremy. Can't move. I can't disturb the skin."

"All right." He went around to her good side and she gripped his hand. The sheet didn't cover much of her. They had her hands tied... loosely, and padded, but she couldn't reach herself. The skin over half her body was shiny and patchy. It made him queasy to look, but he could well understand why nothing should touch her skin.

"So good to see you, Jeremy. What kept you?"

"They couldn't find my credit record at first."

Her eyes doubted him. He'd always wondered how much she'd guessed.

He told her how matters stood at Wave Rider. No customers, and a good thing too. Himself, walking around brain-dead with worry. The Otterfolk were getting bored; what they brought in was skimpy. Nine days until the caravaners arrived. She listened... dozed. .

There was a hand on his shoulder.

He'd gone to sleep with his cheek on Karen's good arm. "Lloyd?"

"Don't wake her."

Karen's hand was slack now, and he disengaged. Their youngest daughter's mate said, "I'll take you back to Gran Harlow's place. It'll hold four for one night."

"Can't go yet. The doctor wants to look at my knee."

"About time."

Medical was the strangest, scariest place Jeremy Winslow had ever been. He hoped it didn't show. You're supposed to have seen this before.

He told Brendan Shaw, "The waves were rQlling in from way out there. Little shelled heads all around me. I hadn't been out for weeks because the caravan was in. They like it better when you take chances, you know? I caught this beautiful curl and rode it till my knees turned to water, and then let it break and carry me till the board hit sand and I lit ru

Brendan Shaw had a hand sca

"Will it grow back?"

"No." He moved to scan the good knee for comparison. "The meniscus isn't alive, exactly. Your body grows this spongy cushion in your knee joint, and it only grows once. Now there's a piece floating free. When it gets between the bones, that hurts."

"Too right. Can you sew it up?"

Brendan wrapped a blue pad around Jeremy's knee. Jemmy grimaced at the cold, and Brendan gri

Just like that? Jeremy's teeth were clenched. The cold burned him, but fear did too. But if he put this off, he'd spend days getting his nerve up....ard? In his shirt pocket.

Brendan took it. "Lie down and I'll put you out. Or I could give you a local, but most patients don't want to be here when this is happening to them."

No telling what he might blurt out while he watched things being poked into his knee. "Put me out."

"Safer, actually."

Jeremy closed his eyes as Shaw settled a skeletal metal structure on his head. Wet pads touched both eyes and the nape of his neck. "Three hundred years old if you figure it was built on Earth, but it still works. Local anesthetic would be a drug. Much cruder."

Jeremy woke up hurting. A bulky cast held his leg stiff and a little bent. A young man handed him pills and a mug of water. Brendan said, "Aspirin. You're not allergic."

"Good. All done?"

"Oh, yeah, two hours ago. You looked like you needed the sleep. Here. Do you know how to use crutches?"

"No, I've got my stick."

"No, use crutches for a few days. Try standing up. Now, the trick- you okay?-the trick is to never put your weight on your armpits. The crutches go there, but your weight is on your arms and hands. Crutches move first, then your foot. Steady. Try it again."

"Where's Lloyd?"

"Let's go see."

Brendan darted down a hail. Jemmy followed. Crutches, right foot, crutches-he felt unstable. His knee hurt like fury. Brendan darted back. "Lloyd Winslow? He's got your pack too."

Lloyd saw Jeremy come in and started to laugh.

The bus stopped in the middle of a block to let them off. Lloyd was chattering. "We thought we'd take you to Romanoff's for di

Jeremy's wife's father's second wife was Jeremy's age. She was dark with black kinky hair, white showing through now. Her beauty had refined itself. Why she'd married old Harold was something he had never asked. She was too good for him.

Twenty-seven years ago the vision of Harlow standing in the doorway of Wave Rider had gone straight to his glandular system. He'd held himself polite and diffident, a pit chef looking for a job; but what had she seen in his eyes? He'd never asked.

Had Harold been relieved when Jeremy married Karen? Today... she was not much changed, but he knew what she saw from the dismay in her eyes. A young man grown old, fatigued and in pain.

"What on-? I think you'd better have the downstairs," she said. "Used to be an office."

Harlow leased one quarter of a big two-story building of poured stone. The old office was big enough for a bureau and a big futon-big enough for Brenda and Lloyd, but they'd moved upstairs-and an old computer with a dark screen.

Anything he did to his left leg hurt. He crawled down the crutches, maneuvering around the leg's rigidity until his back was on the futon. He didn't move again until Brenda woke him for di

Could be worse. He might have lived as a cripple, forever waiting for his knee to heal.

Lloyd's laughter chopped off when Jeremy entered.. He said, "Sorry. But they were going to look at your knee. You went away with a limp. Next thing, you're staggering in on crutches with your whole leg cased in concrete! It's everything I grew up knowing about Medical. I shouldn't have laughed, Jer, but I hate that place."