That chick is weird
Millie looked down at her arms and sighed. Deep grooves where the nails had bitten into the skin marked her palms, and there was the familiar livid bruising on her inner forearm. She closed her eyes slowly, forcing her hands apart and taking a deep breath before she moved to the sink to wash them. The sting of the soap on her exposed knuckles was weirdly comforting as it cut through the fog of her anxiety. She looked up at herself in the mirror; all she could see was the dark circles under her eyes and the tight set of her mouth. It was a long time since she’d been this bad. She knew that she was going to have to do something. There was no way she could go through with the presentation.
There were things she simply could not do, and talking to a lecture theatre full of people was one of them. Talking to just one person was often a challenge for Millie, but two hundred? No way. There was literally nothing for it: she would have to speak to Him, again. Her hands shook as she held them under the hand drier and grabbed a small plaster from her desk. They were still shaking as she carefully applied it to her knuckle, and then arranged her papers and keyboard symmetrically in perfect alignment, before shutting down her computer. Taking a deep breath, she smoothed the front of her skirt and started for the door, but stepped back as it swung open.
‘Oh, sorry dear,’ Don said as she retreated further to avoid being mown down – their small office did not offer much room for manoeuvre. ‘Are you finished reporting?’ He squeezed past her to get to his chair before muttering a few expletives when his computer wouldn’t let him log in. Millie reached past him to grab the wallet he had slung on the desk and took out his smartcard.
‘We have to use these every time we log on now, Don, remember?’ she said gently, pushing the card into its slot and typing in his password (after a number of IT helpline call-outs with forgotten passwords it was now just easier for her to keep track of it for him). Don ran both hands through his white hair causing it to stick straight up almost as if he had been electrocuted, then smiled at Millie, the wrinkles at the corners of his eyes going into overdrive.
‘What would I do without you, love?’ he said, grabbing her hand and giving it a squeeze. Don might rely on her for all things technological (at seventy-four he was not keen to start learning all the new computer systems the hospital brought in) but she knew she owed him far more. Without Don she probably wouldn’t have a real conversation with another human being for weeks on end.
Millie never said anything in meetings, the radiographers she worked with had long since given up any kind of small talk with her, and she avoided the rest of her colleagues like the plague. Sharing an office with Don was the best thing that could have happened to her. Don didn’t intimidate her, he didn’t expect too much of her. She could relax around him and she had been able to tell him about her limitations without him making her feel like a freak. She’d even, after weeks of persuasion on his part, been back to his house for dinner a few times and met his wife Irene, who was just as warm and understanding as Don.
Don and Irene were good people, kind people. The sort of people who tolerated someone as painful to be with as Millie. She knew that was why they pretended to like her.
‘You know it’s really the other way around, Don,’ Millie whispered. Don’s smile faded as he frowned up at her.
‘Listen, Camilla, Irene and I have been talking, and –’
Millie dropped his hand and turned to grab her handbag from her chair. ‘Sorry, Don,’ she said, cutting him off. Lately he’d begun trying to persuade her into trying to make some changes, and before he launched into one of these lectures he would always preface it with the fact he’d consulted Irene, as if she was the oracle of all things and this gave gravitas to his opinion. So far Millie had successfully managed to dodge the subject. ‘I’ve got to pop out for a bit.’
‘But it’s ten o’clock,’ Don told her. ‘You hardly ever leave in the middle of a reporting session.’
This was true. Millie was a creature of habit and routine; not in a funny, quirky way, but in a slightly desperate, trapped and terrified way. However, the fear of standing up in front of two hundred people was overriding that of breaking her routine for a morning. She had no choice; she had to talk to Him before it was too late, and she knew he wasn’t operating right now, as he had just sent a consultant-wide email out about a reorganization of rotas.
‘I know I’m bad but I can break my routine once in a while without too many dramas,’ she said, going for a confident smile, which was rather more shaky in nature. Don raised an eyebrow but kept quiet as she slipped from the room. Millie hadn’t told Don about how she’d been backed into a corner over the last week. Mr Martakis had managed to get Dr Small, the head of the radiology department, on side to make her present at the Grand Round. Dr Small had implied that if she didn’t, he’d have to think about moving her into the registrar office in order for her to ‘assimilate better’. It was blackmail. He knew Millie wouldn’t cope without Don.
Walking anywhere in the hospital was a challenge for Millie: eye contact, casual nods and smiles were simply not in her repertoire, so she mostly kept her head down or stared straight ahead. Nobody called out to greet her anyway; nobody really knew her – unless it was as ‘that prickly bitch radiologist’ or ‘Nuclear Winter’, both of which she still overheard on a fairly frequent basis.
So no, nobody attempted to interact with her as she walked down the corridor. In fact nowadays it was actually as though nobody could even see her, which, in Millie’s opinion, was for the best.
You’d have thought the urologists would all have their own offices, but if anything they were more cramped than down in radiology, and He shared his office with two others. She paused at the door as a burst of loud, male laughter sounded from the other side. Before she could stop herself she took a step back into the middle of the corridor, straight into the oncoming traffic of a hospital trolley, which smacked painfully into her ankle, causing one of her high heels to snap clean off. The pain and the shock caused her to let out a very uncharacteristic scream as she collapsed down onto her side, spread-eagled across the corridor.
‘Jesus Christ!’ the porter shouted, reversing the trolley to release the heel of Millie’s shoe. ‘Are you okay?’
Millie twisted over to her hands and knees. Her hair had somehow worked its way out of the perfect chignon to spill over her shoulders and into her face. This was literally straight out of one of her nightmares.
‘Hey, love?’ she heard the porter call more softly but closer this time. ‘Can you get up?’
She nodded at the floor, concentrating on slowing her breathing down. ‘I’m fine,’ she whispered, lifting her head slightly as she heard the ominous creak of a door opening, through which she saw two big, leather-clad shoes emerging from the office.
*****
Pav opened the door and was about to step out when he saw the woman on her hands and knees in front of him. A porter was hovering anxiously over her, seeming unsure whether to help her up or leave her in her frozen position on the floor. Light brown wavy hair was covering her downcast face and spilling down the back of her fitted grey dress.
‘I heard a scream,’ he said, crouching down in front of the woman and cupping one of her elbows with his hands. ‘Are you o –’ The woman unfroze at rapid speed and pulled away from him violently, only to smack her head on the trolley above her.
Pav winced but made no more moves to touch her for fear the woman might actually knock herself out if she sustained another injury. He watched as she pulled herself up to her feet on the trolley with her back to him, then heard her whisper ‘Sorry’ to the bemused patient, and ‘I’m fine’ to the porter, before stepping back so that they could pass, and nearly stumbling into Pav on her uneven heels.
His hands shot up to enclose both her forearms before she could go down again. She tried to wrench away but another trolley was bearing down on them, so Pav had no choice but to keep hold of her. He dropped his hands once the trolley had passed, and then watched as she stepped away and turned in a small circle (hobbling on her one heel) until she was facing him. She pulled her hair back from her face and tucked it behind her ears. Wide grey eyes flicked up to his and she froze again.
Dr Morrison.
Dr Morrison, looking human for once. It was safe to say that under normal circumstances she was not his type in any way: perfect make-up, perfect clothes, never a hair out of place. Everything about her screamed uptight, and Pav was not into uptight stuck-up women. He liked women who smiled easily, who weren’t afraid to get messy, who were friendly, easy-going. This was the first time Pav had seen her without that fucking roll thing firmly in place at the back of her head. She looked … different.
‘Uh … hi, Dr Morrison,’ he said, stumbling over his words slightly, which was almost unheard of for him. ‘Are you all right? You must have taken quite a hit.’
She was still staring at him, her lips parted and her cheeks flushed. She looked almost … cute.
‘Dr Morrison? How hard was that bump to your noggin?’
She blinked slowly, her long lashes shadowing her cheeks for a moment whilst her face drained of colour. When she looked back up she no longer had any trace of cute in her expression; her mouth had snapped shut into a tight line and she seemed to be focusing on his shirt collar rather than his face.
‘I’m fine,’ she snapped at his shirt collar, wobbling slightly as she balanced on one heel, then flinching away from him again when he went to steady her.
Gah! That bloody word again. He swore this woman could be lit on fire and she’d still be using it.
‘Okay,’ he said, drawing out the word. ‘Is this about tomorrow?’
She nodded and her thick hair slipped over her shoulders.
‘I … I …’ She met his eyes briefly, then looked past him into his office. ‘I need to talk to you.’
‘Okay, well, come on in and we can have a chat.’ She hesitated; bit her lip before squaring her shoulders and moving past him into his office.
‘Hey, Dr M., how’s it hanging?’ Jamie said from his desk, smirking at Pav.
‘H-hello, Dr Grantham,’ she said, not even sparing him a glance as she hobbled into the room and then turned back towards Pav, who was now perched on his desk.
‘I’ve told you to call me Jamie.’
Dr Morrison didn’t respond to that, so Pav decided to fill the awkward silence.
‘So … Millie,’ he started, but paused as he noticed her briefly startled expression at the use of her first name. Somehow, in her present state it seemed more fitting than ‘Dr Morrison’. But Pav would have expected annoyance, not bewilderment, in reaction to his use of it. ‘How can I help you?’
She cleared her throat and focused on his computer screen. ‘I can’t do the Grand Round tomorrow. You’ll j-just have to get someone else.’
Pav sighed. ‘Listen, we’ve been through this before. I don’t know why it’s such a big problem. The Grand Round is fairly informal. It won’t take up much of your time. And it’s relevant to everyone. It’s important, Millie.’
Another flinch, this time accompanied by a small frown. Pav crossed his arms over his chest. He wasn’t lying. Her research – her published research – was going to revolutionize pre-op care. Yes, okay, it was in his interest to get Millie to speak so that she would at least consider the conference. But it was important stuff and it was relevant to everyone. To be honest he was starting to lose patience with this woman. That was why he’d scheduled her to talk at the Grand Round without consulting her. Why couldn’t she even be bothered to present it to her own hospital? The one that had helped her test and audit the bloody thing in the first place.
‘If I just forward somebody else the slides, they could present it with Anwar instead. It doesn’t have to be me, I mean –’
‘Dr Morrison,’ Pav snapped, reverting to formality, seeing as the gentle approach was not working for him, ‘as far as I’m aware you’ve never presented anything at a Grand Round. Don’t you think it’s about time you did?’
‘I’m not –’
‘Why can’t you spare the thirty minutes it would take, anyway?’ he asked, straightening to his full height, which was nearly a full foot taller than the woman in front of him, who had given up balancing on her one heel and sunk down to stand on her other foot. ‘Would it kill you to participate for once?’ He felt his frustration bubble up again and didn’t seem able to tamp it down. There was something about being around this woman and not having her fully acknowledge him, connect with him, that was driving Pav insane.
‘Pav, I think –’
‘Shut up a minute, Jamie.’
‘I just can’t,’ she said. ‘It’s impossible, I –’
‘It’s not impossible,’ he cut her off again. ‘You’re at work that day. Your head of department says you’ve no commitments conflicting with that time. I’m sorry but you’re just going to have to –’
‘Please,’ she whispered, meeting his eyes in her desperation, and he could have sworn that they were glassy with unshed tears. He frowned and pushed away from the desk towards her, but she stumbled back. Pav held his hands up and retreated a step to give her the space she obviously needed. She was holding her bag in front of her almost like a shield. His frown deepened as he saw that her knuckles were white from her grip on the leather.
‘Hey,’ he said, gentling his tone. ‘Are you sure you’re okay? You’re –’
‘Fine,’ she cut in, her voice coming out in another bark. He watched as her eyes cleared of moisture and her expression turned cold. ‘I have to go.’ She turned towards the door. There was something so achingly vulnerable about the way she was hobbling across the room that Pav forgot her earlier reaction to him. He stepped over to intercept her before she could leave, and cupped her elbow.
‘Listen, maybe we should …’ His voice died as she wrenched her arm from his grip, stumbling again and nearly going down but gripping the door handle to steady herself. She straightened slowly, then focused back on his shirt collar.
‘I’ve got to go.’
‘I don’t think –’
Without letting him finish she pulled open the door, kicked off her shoes, snatched them up with her handbag, and ran out into the corridor. By the time Pav looked out after her she was gone.
‘That chick is weird,’ Jamie said through a smile as Pav went back to his desk to grab his wallet; he was already late for his list that afternoon.
‘Yeah,’ he muttered, shoving his wallet into his back pocket and rubbing the back of his neck. ‘Yeah, she is.’
‘Maybe you should let her off this presentation business,’ Jamie suggested. ‘Doesn’t seem to be her gig. And you know what Libby says about Dr M. being misunderstood. That she’s … well … sensitive … or something.’
Pav frowned at the door, then shook his head. ‘She’s not given me any real reason she can’t do it, mate. It’s not enough of an excuse that she just doesn’t fancy it. We’ve all got to contribute from time to time. She needs to get over herself and quite frankly she needs to stop being so prickly and start becoming a team player. I mean, how long has she worked here now and everyone still calls her Dr Morrison? Get over yourself. Smile more, look people in the eye; it’s not rocket science. Jesus.’