When I saw her lying in the bed next to me with the needle in her arm slowly draining the blood out of her, working over the wad of crumpled paper in her fist slowly, methodically…well, it was love at first sight.
“Come here often?” I asked.
“As often as they’ll allow,” she brightly replied.
“Every 56 days.”
“More or less.” She dazzled me with her smile.
We started around the same time, but I finished before her. (With me, it always seemed to take no time at all to fill my bag. Ordinarily, I thought that was a good thing, but, this afternoon…) I lingered at the table with the juice and cookies, even though I felt well enough to leave, surreptitiously glancing at her holding the cotton to the needle hole in her arm to stop the bleeding.
When she walked up to the table, she asked, “Buy a girl a drink?”
“Orange juice or peach?”
“I feel like…peach today.”
“I should have guessed. Garcon!” I snapped my fingers. “The lady will have a peach juice, and I’ll have another round.” The elderly volunteer was not amused, but we laughed.
The seasons changed. You could tell because the muzak in the clinic changed from patriotic to celtic Christmas. We kept running into each other, at first by chance, soon by design. After six months, we took the plunge and agreed to meet somewhere other than the clinic. It was awkward, at first; we didn’t know if we would like each other as much in the context of the world outside the clinic. But, we overcame this.
We were married the following June. It was a small ceremony – just the immediate medical staff. I got hooked up by my left arm, she by her right so we could hold hands in the middle. City Hall insisted we get our blood tested, even though we assured them that it was not necessary. What kind of a world is it if Canadian Blood Services can’t vouch for you?
I’m type O, she’s B Negative – I guess you could say it was a mixed marriage. But, we put a lot of effort into making it work. And, for a while, we succeeded.
We rented a small apartment four blocks from the clinic. Don’t get me wrong – we weren’t obsessed or anything. She had her job as editor of a small but influential literary magazine (which, as it happens, rarely ran short stories about the tragic fall in blood availability in the country); I taught television production at a small but influential inner city college (where, as it happens, nobody appeared interested in developing a series about blood donation). No – we weren’t obsessed; we just liked how easy the apartment made it for us to do our civic duty.
Where many couples develop artificial anniversaries, our relationship came with a built in anniversary every two months. On our fourth such anniversary, my wife had exciting news: she was expecting! A child! Obviously, for her giving blood was our of the question for the duration, but that was okay: for the first couple of trips, she came and held my hand.
On our eighth anniversary, my wife, now well along in the pregnancy, had to stay home. I offered to stay with her, but she insisted that I go to the clinic. I was willing to stay, but she insisted that I go.
It was weird, lying on the bed without her lying on the bed next to me. I was shy – it was like starting all over again. The blond who was lying on the bed next to me smiled warmly. I smiled back. No harm in that, right?
Our beautiful baby girl was born a couple of weeks later. Unfortunately, the birth had left my wife iron deficient; no matter how long we waited, her drop of blood would not drop to the bottom of the vial of water. They say that pregnancy changes a woman. It’s true. As long as she was low in iron, my wife could not give blood.
On our next anniversary, I went to the clinic without asking my wife, who seemed to resent it. To my surprise, the blonde was there as well. We struck up a conversation. She seemed light and unapproachable, unlike my wife, who had been surly since our daughter was born.
I started returning from the clinic later and later. Eventually, my wife confronted me: “You’re giving blood with another woman, aren’t you?” I hemmed and hawed, but, in the end, I couldn’t deny it. My wife demanded a divorce and, not being an unreasonable man, I concurred.
We split the property amicably enough, and there was no quarrel over visitation rights. The sticking point that led to our long, acrimonious court battle was the question of who would get custody rights of the clinic. I argued that, since I had been giving blood there longer than she had, she should be the one to find another clinic. My wife’s lawyer argued that, since I had been the one who had been unfaithful, I should be the one to find another clinic. When the judge suggested that we simply go on different days so we wouldn’t meet, we both argued that he had missed the point.
After far too much in lawyer’s fees, I decided to find another clinic. The blond I had met at the first clinic understood what I was going through and agreed to meet me at the new clinic. Hmm…new clinic, new blood. Could this at long last be love?