When Margaret came up the driveway with Jamie, Charity rushed out to help them. She explained the situation briefly to Margaret, who insisted she go to see Elijah right away to talk to him about it. She also suggested talking to her father. With Jamie settled comfortably in front of the T.V. to watch a princess movie, Charity slipped out.
She pulled into the hospital. She hadn’t bothered calling Elijah because she knew after the MRI meeting he had back to back surgeries and she hoped to catch him in between. Fight or no fight, this needed to be discussed.
She headed to the visitor’s parking area. She knew if she were to get a ticket, she would lose her cool over the simple infraction. It had become one of those days. She moved through the visitor checkpoint to obtain a pass.
“Good afternoon, Charity!” Beatrice said. She was a fixture at Thompson Hospital. First, she was a nurse in the 1970’s, who married a doctor. She gave birth to a son while her husband served in Vietnam. After her boy was grown and her husband retired, Beatrice showed up again as a frequent visitor to her husband. He was ill for years. When he died, her son became a resident and she started volunteering. Now her son was an anesthesiologist on staff and she was aged, smiling and still volunteering at the hospital. Charity wondered if some young doctor might view her similarly one day. “It’s been a long time since I saw you! I’m not used to seeing you check in as a visitor.”
Charity smiled. “Visitor today. Security’s changed a lot over the past few years.” She winked. “I’m sure my shooting had something to do with it, so I’m not complaining.” Charity pulled the orange V sticker with the name C. Thompson-Bennet off the tab and stuck it on her blouse.
“Did I get the name right? In my day we got married, took our husband’s name and that was it. The hyphen confuses me. I have no idea what my son will do when he marries his husband, but I’ll always call him Pecan Pete.”
Poor kid. Another one whose pet name is a nut. “It’s nice chatting with you Beatrice,” Charity said. “I’m in a bit of a rush, trying to catch Dr. Bennet between surgeries.”
“You go, girl!”
Charity went through to the elevators and headed to Elijah’s floor. Her father, whose office was across from Elijah’s, bumped into her in the hallway.
“Charity! What a nice surprise. Is everything okay with Jamie?”
“She’s good. Margaret and her are watching a movie.” She debated talking to her dad but held off. It would only make him angry. “How’s the walking science experiment going?” she said, referring to the heart monitor he was discretely wearing. She planted a kiss on his cheek.
“This thing’s a pain in the ass. I have to carry two cell phones now. Why I haven’t consolidated everything into one device is ridiculous. Now I have this monitor that I have to keep within six feet of my body. If I don’t, some guy in a cubicle in San Jose gets an alarm that sends everyone into a panic. In addition, they know if I exert myself in any way.”
Not twice in one day! Enough sex talk from the seniors. “It’s only for a month and it’ll let them know how much Warfarin you need. That is what they have you taking, right?”
“Yeah, but Margaret and I are on this yoga routine. I’m going to reduce my medications over time as much as possible. Jamie ready to get the cast off?”
“Yeah Dad, the little Peanut will be out of that thing in a matter of days. She’ll have intensive rehab but you know kids, they’re resilient. They can power through things we as adults can only dream. I hope we haven’t been too selfish with Margaret.” Charity took the opportunity to gauge her father’s feelings about Margaret. Her chances of catching Elijah before he went into surgery were looking slim as she chatted away with her father.
“No, no. Margaret is where she needs to be and as long as it’s not with Haunch Bradenton I’m fine with it,” Dr. Thompson said.
“Things seem to be going well with you and Margaret.” Charity was hesitant to get involved with her father’s love life. She wanted her father to sense that she was giving him a sort of permission. He didn’t need Charity’s o.k. but she knew he wanted it.
“We have a long way to go, but I believe we’re moving in the right direction.” Her father smiled in a way she had not seen in a very long time. His color was robust and he was carrying himself with a different kind of confidence.
“I’m glad.” She checked her watch. “I have to find my husband before he scrubs up for his next surgery.”
“O.k. we’ll talk again soon. Charity, one more thing.”
“What’s that Dad?”
“Remember that V on your badge stands for visitor. Don’t go where you’re not allowed.” He winked.
Does he know everything? Charity smiled and hurried to Elijah’s office. She knocked once and stepped inside.
Elijah was alone behind his desk looking sexier than the first day she laid eyes on him. His dark hair was wet as he normally took a shower between surgeries. He hadn’t shaved in a couple of days, which made him every woman’s fantasy.
“Sorry… I didn’t call.” That was as close to an apology as she could muster.
Elijah walked over to her and lifted her off the ground. He kissed her as he pushed her up behind his office door. With gentle force, if there was such a thing, he drove his tongue into Charity’s mouth. If ever she needed a moment of passion that was it. In fifteen seconds, he had her juices flowing. With her face flushed he set her down. “I’ve got a double hernia to repair. I don’t think I can take you to surgery with me, your sweet breath on my neck would be a distraction.” Elijah smiled and pulled at the waist of her green skirt.
“I know you’re in a bit of a rush.”
“Is Jamie okay?” he asked suddenly.
Charity waved her hand. “She’s fine. She’s with your mom. I need to talk to you about something.”
“Can it wait? If it’s not an emergency, can we discuss this after my surgery?”
“It’s not about earlier.” She leaned against the door, trying to prevent him from leaving if he decided he needed to. “I came to tap in to some of your sage wisdom regarding my work at Pinnacle.” She knew he needed to go. It was silly to try and make someone else wait because she was worried about a job that wasn’t life threatening. “You should go. We can talk at home, after you’re done hanging out with Simon.” She tried to keep her voice neutral and not sound like she really wanted him to cancel his evening plans.
He kissed her cheek and reached for the door knob. “I’m going to let Simon know tonight I won’t be available on a regular basis anymore. Can we keep Julie out of the loop on this one? I don’t want to create any friction.”
“What kind of friction would we be creating?” That was an odd comment.
The hospital intercom clicked on. “Paging Doctor Bennet.”
“We’ll talk later. Give my peanut a kiss.” He kissed Charity again quickly on the lips. “Oh and when is Scott’s party? I need to make sure it’s on my calendar so I clear surgeries for the party.”
“I’ll check with your mom. I haven’t even thought about it since the accident.” Charity watched Elijah run down the hall and then she slowly made her way back to the hospital entrance. Another function to add to her complicated pile.
She followed the green line on the floor, which was the directional used by visitors so they wouldn’t get lost. Red went to cardiac care, yellow to imaging and so on. She wondered if the color-coded system was ever used. What if someone was colorblind?
“Hey, Dr. Thompson-Bennet.” Conrad Hasti lowered his head and continued down the corridor beside her.
“Conrad, I have been meaning to come and see you since the accident.” She stopped walking. “Sorry about the way I acted. I’m really sorry about that.”
“It’s okay.” His face burned red.
Charity wondered how he managed to find clothes, or how he made his way out of the bathroom. Poor guy. “How’s school going? Have you started applying to medical schools yet? You haven’t asked Elijah or me for a recommendation so I was curious.”
Conrad stared at the ground. “There’s no rush on the letter. To be honest I’m not exactly sure what I want to do. I don’t know if I have what it takes to be a doctor.”
She wanted to hug the young man. “I’m going to tell you my story. It almost caused me to give up on fulfilling my dream of becoming a doctor. I didn’t cause a death or anything close but I messed up a pregnancy diagnosis of all things. Ironic in a bad way because I was pregnant at the time. A woman presented in the emergency department suffering from what I assumed was a case of food poisoning. The patient had been on a cruise boat. A sunset charter that had reported an outbreak. I asked her if she was sexually active. She said no. Looking back, I realize that perhaps it had something to do with her devout faith and she was engaged but not married. I prescribed her with chloramphenicol and sent her on her way with the instructions to push fluids. It wouldn’t have been a big deal because the meds don’t harm the unborn child. I didn’t know the girl was going rock climbing and zip lining the next weekend. She fell off course and was rushed to the hospital. The baby survived but if it hadn’t, I would have blamed myself.
“I know now that patients lie to their doctors sometimes. A young engaged woman, what was I thinking? Or not considering? I doubted myself after that. I thought I didn’t have what it would take. Because you care, you’ll be a good doctor. My mistakes were my own and I forgave myself. If the profession were to lose everyone who made the slightest mistake in life then there would be no doctors.” Charity patted Conrad on the shoulder.
“Thank you, Dr. Thompson-Bennet. I appreciate you sharing that with me.” Conrad shoved his hands in his pockets and smiled. “If I do continue, I’d like to get into peds, I think.”
“I have two things to say about that. Number one, enough with the long name. You make me sound more important than I am. Call me Charity. Second, I would trust the life of my child in the hands of the doctor you’ll become.”
Conrad laughed. “Thanks! That’s a compliment coming from you, Doctor—Charity.”
“Good. I’m glad. I want you to come to me when you need a letter. Are you looking at anywhere in particular?”
“I’ve been contacted by a few universities,” Conrad said casually.
That was a very good sign. Medical universities didn’t contact applicants, they contacted and basically begged universities.
“Columbia, Harvard, Michigan, Oregon, but who knows. I’ll keep you posted.”
Charity knew Conrad was intelligent but his list was more impressive than her own list at that age.
“Please do and please come visit Jamie. When she gets out of her cast, she’ll be anxious to show off her moves.” Charity hugged him briefly before heading out to the parking lot.
In the sedan, Charity called Hal Jaworski. Her talk with Conrad had given her confidence. She’d tell Elijah about it later tonight. His voicemail answered.
She left him a message, “Hal, this is Charity Bennet. We need to arrange a time to meet. I have some issues to discuss. We can meet at Starr HQ. I look forward to your call.”
She wanted to tell the lascivious cow where he could shove his charitable campaign but she held back. On the phone wasn’t the professional way to do it. She frowned. Hal was lucky he wasn’t meeting her now. She wasn’t feeling a hundred percent, and someone had pushed her bitchy button. The pompous man was not going to force her to do things she didn’t want. She’d make sure of it.