Marcus came out at six-forty. His eyes were red. "They just took him back," he said. He sat down hard, one chair away from her this time instead of two. "He had his folder. They let him take it right up to the doors. Dr. Osei read his letter. She answered all his questions. Out loud. Every one." He swallowed. "Number four, she said he could keep the wire. Number five, she said, 'Theo, I am not planning on it, and I am very good at my job.'"
"Good," Celeste said. "That's good."
"She put the folder in a plastic bag and taped it to the foot of the gurney. So it'd go in with him." He scrubbed his face with both hands. "Six hours, they said. Maybe seven."
It was nine hours.
At hour five a nurse came out with an update: everything going as planned; the second valve was more complicated than they'd hoped; they were taking their time. At hour seven there was no update. Marcus got up and walked to the window and back, and to the window and back, and Celeste watched him do it eleven times and then rose and went to the desk and asked, politely, in the voice she had once used to make vice presidents go quiet, whether someone could please come out and tell Mr. Hale something, anything, because it had been two hours. And someone did. The surgery was going well. Dr. Osei was being careful. They would come the minute there was news.
"Thank you," Marcus said when she came back.
"It's the one thing I'm good at."
At hour eight he started talking. About Theo. About how Theo had learned to read off the sides of the units in the back of the truck—AIRFLOW, CAUTION HIGH VOLTAGE—before he was four, and how he'd learned the name of every kind of rivet by watching videos of aircraft assembly lines. About the first time Walt Ferris had let him sit in the right seat of the Citation, on the ground at Des Moines, and how Theo had put his hands on the yoke and gone completely still and silent for nine minutes, which was the longest Marcus had ever seen him go without moving.
"Walt's grandson's on the spectrum," Marcus said. "Did he tell you that? That's how he got into all this. The grandson had to fly to Denver for a seizure thing, and they tried to do it commercial, and it was a disaster. They had to get off the plane before it left the gate. So Walt went and bought a beat-up King Air with his retirement money. Then a donor gave him the Citation." He shook his head. "Man flies eighty kids a year. For nothing."
At nine hours and four minutes Dr. Amara Osei came through the double doors in her scrubs with her surgical cap still on, and Marcus stood up so fast his chair went over.
She was smiling.