Chapter 5 ~ Dr. Daniel H. Wright

“Money is only a tool. It will take you wherever you wish, but it will not replace you as the driver” 

~Ayn Rand~

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Daniel’s point of view.  Sleepless night, Strip District, Pittsburgh, PA, Sunday, 3:55 a.m.

Tonight was a hard day to get through. When I was in the Middle East, I saw a lot of horror but it was different, it was somehow at a more emotional distance. Our training made sure we were capable of reacting to different situations and as challenging as some of those were, I somehow didn’t take it in. In this case, I find it more difficult to distance myself, because when it comes to children, it's so much harder to let go.

All right, let me go back a bit. I’m a tough guy, a daredevil if you like, I like fast cars and skydiving and I take ice-baths to relax. I’ve always wanted to do something that mattered. I come from a long line of tough guys. My grandfather was a soldier, fought in WW2 and in Korea; he didn’t make it back from there though. My father refused to join the army, but became a policeman. He is close to retiring now. Our relationship is much better now than it was when I was younger, he is one of those guys who is pretty much married to his job, so he was hardly ever home when I was a kid, and my parents divorce was messy. I actually added my mother's maiden name in a teenage rebellious way to hurt him. I don't think it worked though, but Wright worked well for me so something good came out of it. 

When my father caught me at 16 making out with a guy and I told him I was bisexual, he didn’t take it well. He didn’t kick me out, but he didn’t talk to me much either. Later he told me that as a young man he dreamt that one of his children would be taken from him, and he always suspected it would be me as he had a feeling that I might be gay, and he didn’t know how to protect me for people wanting to harm me. 

We've come a long way since then, but there he was sharing his fears and all I could say was “Don't worry dad, I'm gonna be fine, and I'm bisexual, I'm sexually atracted to women and men.” He really didn’t get it. “Yeah, and that's what I said, that makes you gay.” I gave up trying to explain.

I'm  sure that’s one of the reasons I chose my profession – to show him that I could take care of myself and didn’t need someone to protect “that fag”. I guess my younger brother Charlie, also had a tough guy thing to prove to him, even though he never said anything to me. He was too young when I left. He joined the police force like our father. He was shot on duty only a few months after he started working. My father never really got over that. 

I opted to stay living with him after the devorce when Mom and my two younger siblings moved.  It wasn't ever bad, he was never ever mean to me, even though we weren't close back then. That being said, I couldn’t stand my father’s silent treatment so I only really came home to sleep, spending my after school hours at the gym or studying either at the library until it closed, friends houses or different diners where I was allowed to sit and read. I was on a mission to prove I could make something of myself. I finished high school a year early with 1550 on my SAT’s. I got into pre-med at and finished it in two years both summers included. When I finished pre-med, I moved to Maryland, joined the military and studied medicine. I went to Afghanistan when I was 25 and stayed there for almost two years until I had worked myself into the ground. I was discharged from duty and I promised myself I would never see another war. 

But of course I couldn’t stay away. After spending almost a year on sick leave fucking, drinking, drugging and thinking about ways to end my sorry excuse for a life, I admitted my need for more fulfillment in my life. Like I said it’s in my genes. I joined Doctors without Borders and spent a couple of years in different parts of the Middle East.

Soon I met Barbara, a spoiled swiss girl who was over there pouring out her father’s money in one of her charity programs. I also met Anita again. I’d first met her after coming back from Afghanistan. It’s hard to describe Anita in one sentence. A fantastically sexy dancer who grows the best weed I’ve had in my life? A troubled but interesting girl? The best listener I’ve met?  She’s all of those things and more. Now she had made some changes in her life and she wanted to become a nurse and came overseas to volunteer for 6 months. Now, in case you’re wondering, no, it was not a coincidence, my life is not a paperback love story where the doctor and the sexiest nurse coincidently end up married, with a bunch of cute kids, happily ever after. I was indeed responsible for placing the volunteers and I recognized her name on the application form. Of course I placed her in my unit. And we certainly hooked up and I have to admit that she and I shared something special. She is the coolest person I have met. Again, if you’re wondering, yes I was fucking them both, amongst a few other people. 

That’s when Barbara told me she was pregnant. That certainly came as a surprise since I had known for a pretty long time that it wasn’t my destiny in life to spread my genes. When I volunteered to donate a load of sperm for a cell biology class during Pre-Med I’d found that I had Azoospermia, and further testing revealed a Y-chromosome defect making my swimmers very few and unable to carry out their mission. 

In a momentary insanity I figured I’d pretend I believed her lies. I proposed to her, we got married and I moved with her to Switzerland. It was certainly not a noble thing to do but I figured that two can play this game and the worst thing that could happen would be a handsome divorce settlement. 

It turned out that Barbara was expecting twins, and she wanted to be near her widowed father for the birth. He lived near Lucerne and I got a job as an ER doctor there. Barbara and I didn't agree on many things. She felt that I shouldn't be working as a doctor and that charity work would be more suitable and someone else could do the dirty work. I disagreed, I liked my job, and I have to admit the feeling of getting used to their lifestyle scared me a bit, the designer clothes and beautiful cars were lovely but I needed more, I desperately needed something real, a distraction from all the lies. So my work became that realness and throughout my nearly two years stay in Switzerland I kept the job at the hospital. Barbara and I pretended to love each other and played the perfect couple to her father who seemed happy that his spoiled girl had found herself a doctor to marry. 

I liked the old man, he was definitely old school, and so deep in the closet he was actually in Narnia, but he was a genuinely good person, who had been raised in a homophobic environment. I actually spend more of my free time with him than with Barbara. I liked many of his values in life and after some time he also admitted to me that he liked mine. I encouraged him to contact an old friend. The two geezers went on a “research trip” together and shortly after they came back Barbara and I got invited to an engagement party. So I guess my web of lies did produce one good thing.

When the twins were born I found that my earlier assumptions that I wasn’t interested in fatherhood weren’t entirely true. I actually adored those babies even though they were not my blood. A few months after they were born, I severely cut my hours at the hospital and became a devoted halftime dad. I didn't want the babies to have a nanny too much. Barbara and I were far from a happy couple. We both had other lovers but pretended to her stuck up friends that all was good. 

With time the old man's health got worse and treatments were not helpful. Shortly before he died he asked to speak to me alone. He told me he knew all along that I wasn’t the twins father. Of course the old man had me investigated before the marriage and had gotten hold of my medical records. He asked me to honor his last wish and not tell Barbara that he knew. He told me he felt it was thanks to me that he had found happiness, albeit a short one, with his old friend and it was his wish that when we finally came to our senses and ended our loveless marriage I would find someone who really loved me to fill my life. I tried to assure him I was happy but he wouldn't have it. 

“I've had such good fortune in my life, financial success, a beautiful daughter to spoil. I've enjoyed fantastic art, visited amazing places all over the world, but until I found Ludwig again, thanks to you, I constantly desired something more, I was never fully content, I was lonely in my glorious lifestyle. And you might have fun my boy, but will be hurt if you don't leave. I know my daughter. She will kick you out sooner or later. You need to leave before the twins get much older. They will miss you too much if you become a part of their memories” 

Then he winked at me. “You don't need to worry about money. I changed my will to include Ludwig, but there’s plenty left in there for Barbara and you. The will is now contingent on annulling the time clause in the prenuptials I had you sign. You’ll get half even if you leave today.”

Trying to convince him I was well paid at work and it wasn’t about the money was useless, he wouldn’t listen. His exact words were: “Mein Schatz, it is such a dull life to have just one yacht.”

He fell asleep that night and died peacefully.

His words did come true, it was Barbara who pulled the plug on our marriage. She announced she was sleeping with a multimillionaire from Monaco and that she had decided to end our marriage but for the sake of the children she wanted to do it in a classy way. Those were her words and what she meant by that was “just do as I say”. I honored my promise to her father and kept my mouth shut. The lawyers are still figuring out the details of the money. She knows I won’t go cheap, and she can certainly afford it. Even if she gives me millions and a villa on both continents she’ll still be loaded. She was the sole heiress of one of the richest men in Europe and will soon be married to another one. 

I came back four months ago and moved back home to Pittsburgh where I got a position as an ER physician at Shadyside. I got a small loft right off Liberty avenue, great location, private parking. Short driving distance to work too. I miss the twins and even though Barbara has said they’ll visit me when they’re older I don’t see that happen. They are too little to really remember and it wouldn’t be right. Hopefully I will have other children somehow one day.

I’ve been wanting to spend some more time with my father. We both need and want to work on our relationship, better late than never. But we are both ridiculously busy at work, I’m still the new guy so I take all the unpopular shifts and he... well… I guess that’s where I have my workaholic gene from. He’s been very frustrated, they’re in the middle of a difficult case that seems to be going nowhere. In the last year, five teenagers have been found dead but they haven’t been able to identify any of them. They’ve all been sexually abused. Semen samples don’t match, they’ve been found in different areas,  but they are sure there is a connection. Recently they had a breakthrough when the FBI contacted them about a large international child porn ring being brought down. One of the victims was on those sites. And more material with others had been filmed in the same location. 

“This is making you sick dad” I tell him. I’m worried about him, he’s been taking blood pressure medicine since I can remember. Now he’s putting on weight and is definitely not sleeping well. Who could when dealing with that kind of shit anyway. I tell him to come by the hospital and get a check up. 

We’re having one of our food and chat dates. Something we've been trying to make happen at least once a week since I came back, if we're both off work at the same time we give each other priority and sit down somewhere and grab a meal. I desperately want to talk about something else so I ask him when I’ll get to meet his new girlfriend. He’d told me that he’s been seeing someone for nearly 4 months now. He met her on the job. 

“Are you sure she’s straight? I thought all the women on the force were lesbians” I can’t help teasing him since we never really talked about our old problems. He gets my joke and smiles at me, “I’ve always liked your sense of sarcasm, but we do have straight women at work, and she neither lesbian nor staff by the way. I met her… because of working on this damn case. She found one of the bodies… uh… in a dumpster behind her workplace.” So much for trying to change the subject.  My dad is a little pink in the face, and I think he’s in love, it’s so cute. “We got off on the wrong foot… I was a fool… couldn’t control my big mouth... but we worked it out, I can’t wait for you to meet her. She’s a special lady, you’ll like her.” Whatever he means by that. He also tells me that he would like to retire soon but he’s having a hard time tearing himself away. 

The phone rings and he picks up in a hurry.

“Horvath“  My father’s face turns serious as he listens to the voice on the other end. “God help us... what?… Where is she? …I’ll be right there”

He quickly gets up and ends the phone call. “Come on, they found another one, this one is alive.”

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