Tawny
“Red roses, Tawny!” the head nurse, Rosy, gushed as she pushed the vase of flowers toward me. “Dr. Stanton has outdone himself.”
I pushed them back toward her. “But Dr. Stanton is wasting his time and money trying to woo me.” I put my hands on my hips as I made my way to check on one of the laboring mothers we were taking care of at the hospital. “Keep them in the nurses’ station. Let everyone enjoy them. I’m not trying to be mean to the man. He’s just not what I want.”
Rosy called out after me, “What the hell do you want, Tawny Matthews?”
I wanted my Marine to come sweep me off my feet, was what I wanted. And I even though I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to get that, I wasn’t ready to move on to anyone else yet.
Dr. Stanton didn’t make my pulse race. Nor did he make my insides white hot with just one touch. If a man could make that happen in me, the way August had, then I might give him a shot. Until that happened, I wasn’t going to waste my time or any man’s time either.
Pushing the door open to room 28, I stopped short as I saw a man had climbed up on the bed with the laboring mom. Kissing her, pawing at her, and even pulling at the button of his jeans, he had a mission that I couldn’t allow. “Ahem!”
The couple stopped what they’d been doing to look back at me. The woman blushed, the man hopped off the bed, and I crossed my arms as I tapped my foot.
The guy was quick to let me know why they’d been doing what they had. “Look, I know this looks bad.”
“Ya think?” I was stupefied. I hadn’t ever seen anything like this.
The short guy with thick glasses came around to the end of the bed as his girlfriend fixed the hospital gown, covering her bare sexual organs back up. At least she looked thoroughly embarrassed; the guy looked as if what they had been doing was completely natural.
His explanation spilled from his thick lips. “You know how we can’t have sex for six weeks after the baby comes out of her, right?”
Still tapping my foot, I gave the idiot a hard look. “Yeah, I’m aware of that, sir.”
“Okay, then. So, you can understand that I was working last night, you see.” He shifted his weight to the other foot as he looked at the floor as if he was pleading his case to it instead of me. “She went into labor this morning before I got home. Her dad brought her up here. And I just got here a little while ago. So, do you see what I’m getting at here, nurse?”
“You wanted some last-minute nookie, yes, I see what you’re getting at. But what you don’t understand is that your girlfriend has a dilated cervix.” I glanced at the woman, who still had a red face. “And you. You should be more worried about yourself and your baby right now than anyone’s sexual needs. It’s time to put the baby first, and everything else goes after your child.” I just couldn’t understand the people. And it enraged me that the young woman, who was older than I was when I had Calum, would allow such a thing to happen to her body.
The idiot of a man jumped in as he pointed at the laboring mother in the bed. “She wanted it too!” He looked at his girlfriend. “Don’t deny it, Lucy.”
She was mortified and pulled the blanket over her head. “Donald, just shut up!”
I pointed to the door. “Out, Donald. I’ve got to make sure she’s okay now. And if we find you two doing anything like this again, we’ll ban you from the hospital.”
“You can’t …” he tried to stand up to me.
“Try me,” I snarled at him as I jerked my head toward the door. “Out!”
He left us, muttering as he went. And I looked at the woman in the bed as she pulled the blanket off her head. “I’m sorry.”
It was her first pregnancy. I supposed this type of thing was to be expected from couples who didn’t have a clue. “Okay. I’ll pretend that didn’t happen and we can move on from here.” Snapping on a light blue glove, I pushed her knees up and inserted one finger to check her cervix. “We’re at a six. Do you know what that means, Lucy?”
She shook her head. “I really don’t have a clue. You see, my mother died when I was a kid. Dad raised me. And he never remarried. I’ve never had a female mother figure to tell me anything about any of this.”
My eyes went wide with shock and disbelief. Was that possible in this day and age?
“You didn’t have a television?” I had to ask as I threw the gloves in the trash can.
“We did. Dad wouldn’t let me watch anything other than PBS though. Donald was my first and only lover. He and I moved in together when I turned sixteen, and Dad said I had graduated from homeschool.” She looked ashamed, and now I could see why. She’d had it rough.
“Well, I’ll remember all of that then. You see, you can have an epidural now, if you would like to.”
“And that is?” she asked.
Did this woman’s doctor tell her nothing?
“A thing that will make the rest of your labor and delivery virtually painless. Most women are screaming for one by now.” Then I began to wonder if she was having any real pain or not. She hadn’t complained at all. All of our mothers complained at one point or another. “Lucy, are you feeling pain at all?”
She nodded. “Yes. It’s horrible. But I was taught not to make a commotion over anything. I didn’t want to bother anyone.”
Oh, hell!
Now my heart went out to her. “I’ll call in the anesthesiologist now. After you’re feeling better, I’ll get you some information about parenting classes that you and your boyfriend can take to help you take good care of yourself and this baby. And information about birth control too.”
“What’s that?” she asked as she looked at me with a confused expression.
I was beside myself. “How many times have you seen your doctor with this pregnancy, Lucy?” I hadn’t seen her chart to know a thing about her. This was my first visit to her room.
Walking in on them the way I had had thrown me off and I hadn’t followed the normal steps of checking out the patient’s chart before dealing with them. I opened the chart I’d picked up from the door when I came in and found she’d had no prenatal care at all. Dr. Simmons had been assigned to deliver the baby when Lucy came into the emergency room.
“Oh, wow.” I looked at her. “Okay, honey. I don’t want you to worry. I’ll take good care of you.” My heart went out to the young woman then, and all the judgment I had been doing was left in the dust.
What mattered now was making sure the baby was healthy, and so was the mother. I would be sure to get as much information as possible for the poor thing before she left our hospital.
Leaving the room, I let her know I was going to get that epidural happening right away. I walked out the door and right into Dr. Douglas Stanton. His hand grazed the top of mine as he blocked my way. “Hi, Tawny. Did you like the flowers?”
I don’t have time for this. “Sure. Um, I’ve got to hurry up. Can we talk later?”
He pulled my hand up, leaving a kiss on top of it that didn’t do a thing for me. “We sure can. How about over about dinner tonight?”
The man was rich, smart, and attractive, with blonde hair and blue eyes. I was pretty sure he was some kind of a genius too because he was only about twenty-six and already an obstetrician. And with all that, I was sad to say he just didn’t do it for me.
Reluctantly, I agreed to go to dinner with the man. He deserved to be let down easy, I thought. “Okay, Douglas. Dinner tonight it is then. I’ll have to call my mother and make sure it’s okay for her to watch my son though.”
He pulled a business card out of the pocket of his jacket. “Give me a call when you know for sure.” He smiled slyly as he looked me over. “What size are you, Tawny, a two?”
“Yes.” I had no idea why he would ask such a question. “Gotta go.”
After I was done with work, I finally called my mother. “Mom, you don’t have to say yes to this.”
“Okay,” she said. “I probably won’t.”
I crossed my fingers that she would have something she just had to do, and I would have a great excuse not to go out to eat with Douglas. “I was asked out for dinner tonight.”
“By who?” she asked.
“A guy named Douglas Stanton,” I told her.
“Is he a doctor?” she asked me, and I could hear the smile in her voice.
I bit my lower lip as she’d been keen on the idea of me working as a nurse and meeting wealthy doctors that I might someday marry. I could’ve lied to her and told her that he was a custodian and then she would’ve said no for sure. But I didn’t like to lie. “Yes, he’s a doctor.”
“Then you have a yes from me, Tawny. Stay out as late as you’d like to. You’re off tomorrow, aren’t you?”
Shit!
“Yes.”
“Stay out all night if you want to. You’ve needed to meet someone for a long time. Don’t let this man slip through your fingers. See you tomorrow. Or not. I want you to have a good time. Just keep me updated on things, okay?”
“K.” I hung up the phone.
The vase of roses still sat on the desk of the nurses’ station. I took out the card Douglas had given to me and called him. He was happy that I could make it and only moments later another gift arrived for me.
The other nurses all watched as I opened the box a messenger had brought. Pulling out a little black dress in size two, I found a pair of matching heels and even a black bra and lace panties. “Okay, this is too much.”
The women were in awe of what Douglas had sent to me. One of them said, “I wish he would bestow gifts on me the way he has you, Tawny. You are one lucky girl.”
I didn’t feel lucky. I felt terrible that I had led him on. And now I had to go out to dinner with the man, wearing the things he’d bought me.
“This is bad, ladies.” I looked at each one of them. “I don’t care for the man, like, at all.”
Betty snatched the panties out of my hand. “Learn to. These are expensive underwear, Tawny. That dress alone costs around three hundred bucks.” She threw the panties back at me. “Don’t be such a bitch.”
I blinked and felt a bit stunned. “I’m not. I just don’t like him in that way. Why is it being a bitch if you just don’t have a spark with someone?”
Elsa took a motherly approach as she came to me and put her arm around my shoulders. “Just give the man a chance, dear. He’s gone to so much trouble for you already. He deserves a chance, don’t you think? Maybe he’ll grow on you.”
Yeah, like a fungus!