Cell by Robin Cook Page A

have to take me kicking and screaming.”
    George found himself thinking that under different circumstances he and Tarkington could have been friends. He admired the guy, even admitted to himself that he liked him. George also wondered if he really had what it took to be a good doctor. Seeing people confront their mortality was unsettling at a very deep level.
    â€œI’m sure your doctor has a plan of action,” George said. “There’s more than one way to beat these things.”
    Tarkington nodded. “Well . . . thanks. I appreciate what you doctors do. But I need to get home and think this through.” He gave George’s arm a squeeze as he walked past. It was a melancholy sort of gesture reflecting a human need to connect.
    As George watched the man walk away, he wondered if he could have offered more support. Then he turned and entered the hospital, thinking how much easier it was to spend time with Tarkington’s MRI printout than with the man himself. It was so much less emotional, so much more scientific, and so much more an intellectual exercise. Yet ultimately it was about another human being, and in this situation it was like being responsible for the man’s getting a death sentence. George shuddered. That was the part he really didn’t want to think about. Maybe even radiology wasn’t safe enough for him. What if he had taken the same MD-MBA course that Paula had taken? If he had, he might be living in a Santa Monica house with a pool and driving a new Porsche Carrera without ever having to be touched, however obliquely, by something like pancreatic cancer.
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    G eorge walked into the MRI control room, where Claudine and another technician, Mark Sands, were in the midst of a study. Mark was an African American with whom George had spent a lot of time. Of all the technicians, Mark understood the MRI best in all its technological subtleties. Under his guidance images progressively wiped across the screen, generating anatomical slices of a human body in a fashion that never failed to astound George. Claudine glanced up and gave George a thumbs-up, which George interpreted to mean that things had gone well during his absence.
    George raised his eyes and glanced through the observation window at the huge, doughnut-shaped magnet. He could see the feet and lower legs of a woman protruding from the MRI. He guessed from the woman’s position that it was another abdominal study.
    With the equipment on autopilot under the watchful eye of Mark, Claudine took a moment to quickly review what had transpired during George’s absence. It was confirmed that there had not been any problems and no one had come looking for him, which eased George’s residual anxiety. Soon he was feeling entirely relieved about having been out. Clearly he had not been missed.
    Using a monitor, Claudine went through the images of a torn ACL, which had been the first case she’d done with Susan’s assistance after George had left. Next she showed George a bothersome lower back done with Mark’s help. In both cases the tests were diagnostic and well done.
    â€œWhat’s up with this current case?” George asked, nodding toward the patient in the adjacent room.
    â€œHer name is Claire Wong. She’s forty-three years old and has a history of lobular breast cancer. She’s been treated with a mastectomy and chemotherapy combined with radiation. Although she’s currently asymptomatic, her oncologist wanted the abdominal MRI, just to be certain there aren’t any additional problems. So far it looks good.”
    George nodded again, feeling an uptick from the unease the encounter with Tarkington had generated. The idea of another cancer case made him feel superstitiously uneasy. Moving over to Mark, he looked over the man’s shoulder at the most recently formed image. To his chagrin he immediately noticed something that