Winners by Danielle Steel Page A

smiled as soon as she saw Lily, who was mildly sedated for pain, but awake. She was responding well to the medications.
    “How are you feeling, Lily?” Jessie asked her gently as she stood next to her. She had read all the entries in her chart carefully at the nurses’ desk before she came in. Lily had had a few minor problems, and some discomfort, but she was doing remarkably well. She was young and strong. And it was much too soon to tell her the implications of her injuries, so she didn’t know yet, and Bill hadn’t said anything to her either. She needed time to recover from the surgery. She didn’t know either that she would have to go to rehab when she was released from the hospital, to learn a whole new way of life, and adjust to her injury. Jessie was not planning to broach the subject with her for some time, although she had been candid with Lily’s father. What Lily needed now was time and healing. Jessie used all her energy and discipline to focus on her patient.
    “I’m okay,” Lily said quietly. She was alert enough to know that she had sustained a very serious injury—she just didn’t know the realities of her future. “Thank you for everything you’re doing for me,” she said, and Jessie was touched.
    “That’s what I do.” She asked about some pain the chart said Lily had had the night before, but it was normal for her to have considerable discomfort, despite the paralysis in her lower trunk and limbs.
    “How soon can I go home?” Lily wanted to know, which Jessie thought was a good sign.
    “Not for a while. Let’s get you feeling better first,” she said noncommittally. But she also knew that it was typical of patients with any illness or injury to feel that if they could just get out of the hospital, they could leave the problem there. Lily was going to be taking this problem with her, for the rest of her life. But what Jessie planned to tell her, when she was ready to hear it, was that in spite of her complete spinal cord injury, she could still lead a full life in almost every possible way, and others had done it before her. She needed to be shown what she could do, not just what she obviously couldn’t, and she would learn all that in rehab. Jessie was going to recommend that she stay at Craig Hospital in Denver for three or four months. She knew it would come as a blow to Lily and a shock to her father, but Jessie wanted her to make the best possible adjustment. She hoped to have her there within a month, if all went well.
    Jessie spent nearly an hour with Lily, just talking and observing her for small medical details while seeming to just be casually chatting, and then she left and Lily dozed off. Jessie ran into her father at the elevator as she was leaving, and Bill was getting off, on the floor of the ICU. He seemed surprised to see Jessie, and mumbled awkwardly for a moment, which was unlike him, as he looked into her eyes, which were two deep pools of pain. She was far less cheerful now that she was not at her patient’s bedside, and he could see how distraught she was. Jessie was deathly pale.
    “I … the nurses told me about your husband yesterday … I’m really sorry … and about the things I said … I was just upset about Lily. I still am, and I want to get all the consultations I can for her when we leave here. Someone, somewhere must have some new space-age, state-of-the-art procedure that will help her walk again. We can’t just give up and let her sit in a wheelchair for the rest of her life. That would be a tragedy for her,” he said grimly, but his tone with Jessie was considerably gentler than it had been the day before.
    “It’s only a tragedy if we treat it that way,” Jessie said firmly. She was stronger than she looked, even in her own dire situation. She was still a supremely competent medical practitioner, and her patient’s needs and best interests were at the forefront of her mind at that moment. “Her life doesn’t have to be a