Then Tuesday came, and I watched him back out of the driveway with his official badge clipped to the pocket of his blue scrubs, the same as every other weekday.

A sudden rush of tenderness swept over me, and I decided to pack a hot roast beef sandwich and a piece of warm peach cobbler into his favorite canvas bag.

Under the metal fork, I tucked a handwritten note that made me smile as the kettle boiled on the stove.

“You don’t have to hold up the whole world on your shoulders today, so please let me look after you for twenty minutes.”

I imagined how his tired eyes would brighten when I surprised him in the staff lounge on the third floor.

But the moment I stepped through the sliding glass doors of Valley Memorial Center in Madison, an uneasy hush seemed to trail every step I took.

I walked up to the main reception counter, where a nurse named Rachel had always welcomed me with warm hugs and happy stories about her grandchildren.

The second her eyes met mine, her bright look disappeared, and she hurriedly dropped her clipboard onto the counter.

“Good afternoon, Rachel, is Brian in between surgeries right now?”

I lifted the insulated bag with a grin, set on keeping things light and playful.

“Please don’t page him ahead of time, because you know he’ll just scold me for wasting my afternoon driving across town.”

Rachel didn’t smile back, and she didn’t make any teasing remark about how stubborn he was.

Instead, she threw an anxious look at another nurse standing next to the computer monitors, biting her lower lip until it went white.

“Did something happen to Brian on his morning rounds?”