by Eden Rose
“Uh, oh. Okay!” The waitress tries to recover from being caught flirting with me.
I shake my head at Calista. “Really? Was that necessary?”
She places her hand over her chest with feigned innocence. “Was what necessary? I was just reminding her that I’m hungry and she’s in my way.”
I lean over the table to grab her hand. “You have a jealous streak, don’t you?”
“I thought you figured that out when we were on vacation.”
I notice she never refers to the vacation as her honeymoon even though that is what it was supposed to be. She always describes it as a vacation which is alright with me. If she told people it was her honeymoon and we met, that would make me look like fucking shit.
“Yeah.”
It’s a matter of minutes before our salads are delivered to the table. “So, what do you do for a living?” I ask her even though I already know. The last thing I want to do is throw her off by telling her I know everything about her.
Publicly listed, that is.
“I’m a doctor at our hospital in town. I’ve been working there for about a year.”
Stabbing some lettuce with my fork, I take a look at her and see how much she loves her job. It's written all over her face how much she loves it and I can’t help but smile for her.
“You’re so young, though.”
Calista smiles. “Growing up, my parents were really into my schooling and worked hard for me to get into a good college. I actually graduated high school three years early and college earlier than they had planned.”
“Do you get along with your parents?” I ask her.
“Yes, of course. I love my parents. They adopted me when I was little.”
“What do they do for a living?” Yeah, I’m trying to get as much information on her as I can. The more information I have on her and where she’s from, the more I can protect her.
She shrugs. “I don’t even know to this day.”
Deciding to let it go, I reach over the table to hold her hand again. I drop my fork onto my plate to bring my other hand over to hold her. “You have the most beautiful eyes I have ever seen.”
“You said that before.”
I smirk and so does she. “I meant then too. Absolutely perfect.”
My gut is telling me the closer I get to Calista, the farther away I get from Amanda.
Or worse. Jeopardize my chances of getting to Vincent “Pop” Moretti.
Calista
“Code Red! Code Red! We need a doctor ASAP!”
I throw the rest of my sandwich down on the tray and scurry towards the door to get to the main emergency room. I should have known I should have waited to take a break. There’s never a good time to take a break on the midnight shift.
“Move!” I yell to someone who gets in my way when I’m trying to run out of the cafeteria.
Never fucking fails.
My stomach grumbles in protest as I walk further out of the cafeteria but the way tonight is going, it's important to move quickly. So far, there’s been two gunshot wounds and one attempted suicide that I have been assigned to. It's been a long night and all I want to do is crawl in bed with Victor.
There’s no time to think about him and how I want to be in bed with him. Or how I want to be snuggled up in his arms.
“Paging Dr. Inzo! Paging Dr. Inzo!”
“I’m coming!” I yell back even though they can’t hear me.
I hear the familiar sound of a gurney being wheeled down the hallway towards the emergency check in desk. “I’m coming!” I yell towards them before they can check in the patient.
A group of EMTs are surrounding the gurney and I can’t see who is on it nor can I see the condition of the person. “Move!”
When the EMTs move out of my way, I see a woman who looks emaciated on the table with pale, sunken in skin. The woman has to be about my age but her lack of personal care has taken away from her looks. Her dark hair is matted against her face and her lips look busted open.
“What do you know?” I demand plugging my stethoscope into my ears in hopes of catching her heartbeat.
The first EMT to my right, looks over at me and he shakes his head. “The poor woman escaped hell. I’ll be surprised if she makes it.”
I look over at him and let him see my rage. “You don’t ever admit something like that in front of a patient. How do you know she can’t hear you?”
He shakes his head again while giving me his dead eyed stare. “If she can hear me, she’s a miracle. We caught her running through the desert like the devil, himself, was chasing her. She ran through a sticker bush before collapsing right in front of us.”
“Any other trauma? Any other visible wounds on her body?” I ask while running after the gurney making its way towards the available room.
“No, Doctor. We don’t know anything else. When we tried to touch her, she screamed.”
I jerk my head back. “Was she unconscious the whole way to the hospital?”
“She woke up for a few seconds and screamed the whole time. We had to sedate her in order to get her to calm down. We didn’t catch her name or where she’s from. We don’t know anything about her.”
I shake them off. “That’s fine. Thank you. Give your information to the nurses and we’ll take her from here!” I yell over my shoulders and push her through the doors to the emergency room.
“What happened to you, sweetie?” I ask her fully knowing she won’t answer me.
Sheila’s at my side in a matter of seconds. “What do we know?”
“Nothing. We need to find out her wounds and see if she has any marks on her. Schedule all the tests for her and see if we can find anything. We need to see if she has any bleeding on her body and how many scratches could possibly be infected.”
While checking over the woman, I try hard not to gag. It's obvious the woman has gone through hell and her smell is pretty ripe. I feel awful this is what I’m focusing on but I can’t help it. The woman needs a bath but I don’t know how bad her injuries are.
Would giving her a sponge bath affect her injuries? Make them worse?
I check over her body to see if I can find any other injuries and there’s a bunch covering her body. Scratches, scrapes, fractures, everything visible on her body has been accounted for.
Just from looking at her, I see she has a broken leg, a broken arm and probably a majority of her ribs are broken too. This woman is going to be in a world of hurt when she wakes up from passing out. I have every intention on keeping her in a medically induced coma to give her body enough time to heal.
However, I have several tests that need to be ran and she needs to be awake.
My stomach grumbles as the X Ray technician comes in to take all the pictures I need to better assist her. Each time she had to move the patient’s arm or leg I winced. I couldn’t imagine the amount of pain she is in right now.
“That should do it. We will put it on the top of our pile and get back to you in about an hour. We will make a disc so you can put it on the projection screen to look at better,” the tech says with her hand on her hip.
She’s a pretty woman. A little younger than me with bright blue eyes and beautiful blonde hair. I would hate her on sight but she’s an excellent coworker.
Nodding, I pull out my phone to see if Victor has texted me yet.
VICTOR: What are you up to? You know, I’ve been thinking about you
VICTOR: Mostly good thoughts… mostly dirty ones
VICTOR: your coming over after work still, right?
ME: it's been a busy day in the hospital and i don't know what time I’m getting out.
ME: I’ve been thinking about you, too
“Let’s get something to eat,” Sheila suggest and rubs her stomach.
*
“Are you ready?” Sheila asks me as I down the rest of my coffee.
I’m working over and my body is arguing with me about it. I’m so tired and hungry but every time I try to eat somethi
ng, I get a page about another patient.
Today has been the day from hell.
“I don’t know. That’s like asking if I’m ready to see an ex or something.”
She giggles. “Yeah, right. You’ve dated one guy and now you’re shacking up with the hottest guy I have ever seen in my life!”
I shake my head at her. “What did you find out about my patient?”
“The girl is about twenty-eight to thirty-five years old and has lived a hard fucking life. Looking at her body, I can see she has lost too much weight and we need her to gain some back before we can let her leave.”
“Let me see the X-Rays.”
I take my disgusting hospital coffee with me as I walk towards the exam room to look at the scans of my newest Jane Doe.
“This is exactly like that woman last year. Do you think she’s the same person?” Sheila asks me.
“What do you ladies have here?” Kyle asks with a cocky smile. “Do you need help finding anything out about her?”
I roll my eyes. I’m too tired and hungry to deal with his fucking shit. “You will be the first to know!” I shout at him without acknowledging him any more than that.
“You don’t have to be a fucking bitch!” He shouts back at me.
I spin to look at him square in the eyes. “You are really working my nerves!” I state.
“You think just because your new boyfriend is a hit-”
“What do we have going on in here?”
The chief of the hospital is staring us down with her arms crossed across her chest. “I can hear you yelling at each other from down the hall. Any word on the new Jane Doe?”
“Nothing yet, Chief,” Kyle answers before I can even open my mouth.
“This is not your patient. Don’t you have rounds to do or something?”
Kyle’s eyes flare and he leaves quickly. He’s out of the exam room before we can even say another word to each other which is a good thing. He’s about to talk some shit that he doesn’t know about. The bastard is trying to get me to fight him.
“Thank you, Chief.”
I’m going to have to do something with Kyle. He’s becoming too… cocky. He needs to leave the hospital before he ruins his career by acting like a fool. Each time he one-ups me, is another time he’s about to get punched in the jaw.
Victor
Another day and another day I’m no closer to finding Moretti. The man is good at hiding and he’s not going to come right out and point at himself.
Every day I don’t find Moretti, I feel Amanda slip through my fingers even more. I wasn’t able to protect her then, what makes me think I could do it now?
Now that I’m pretty fucking close to being in love with for a different woman.
“Have you completed your mission yet?”
These assholes are working my last nerve. “Not yet.”
“Might I remind you that your time is running up short and you only have a few more days to complete it?”
“I don’t need you to remind me.”
“Do you want to find out what happened to your wife or not?”
I look at my phone and then put it up to my ear. “I’m beginning to think you’re using me and you don’t know anything. Are you fucking with me? Is that what this is? Too afraid to face Pop by yourself that you call me?”
I’m playing with fire but I’m tired of these guys thinking they are going to call the shots here. This is my fucking life and I’m not going to let them try to dictate what I’m doing.
Plus, I’m beginning to think Calista is picking up on my extra protective nature. The woman is constantly pushing back at me as if she doesn’t need me.
I want her to need me.
Click.
That’s what I thought.
I light my cigar and take a puff of it to get it started. I’m looking at the stuff she brought over since her apartment had it's flood.
She should be back home any time now and I need her here. I need her here especially now that I’ve pissed off these fuckers.
The last thing I need is for her to be a casualty of some fucking war I have stepped into. All I wanted was to find out what happened to Amanda but the closer I get to Calista, the more peace I find. However, in my experience, peace is something easily lost.
Calista
I’m running on empty fumes as I drive my car towards my apartment. Yeah, I’m supposed to be going to Victor’s but I have to have time to unwind.
The mystery lady has me wondering what the fuck is going on with people. She’s the second case in the past year and we have not a clue as to what is happening. Do we have some sick fucks running around Arizona kidnapping women? Is that what is going on?
Parking my car in the parking garage, I dredge up the stairs until I get to my front door. This is the one thing that sucks about living in an apartment: stairs. Oh well.
Peeling my clothes off as I walk through the door, I leave everything in the middle of the hallway. Fuck it. I will get to it later. I’m eager to wash off the hospital grime.
Even as the water beats down on me, I can’t seem to get a handle on what is happening with these two women. The first one, we never heard anything back about her. We don’t know if she ever made it home or if she even had a home. The amount of sexual abuse she faced, I wouldn’t be surprised if she had to have more tests done. In cases like these, doctors only learn limited facts. We don’t get the whole story even when we want to know what it is.
Does it make me a bad doctor for wanting to know more about this patient? How else am I supposed to help her if I don’t know anything about her?
The steam billows around me in the shower creating a nice barrier between me and the cold air from my apartment. In Arizona, you have hot and then you have hotter. There’s no in between and it's hotter outside right now making me turn up my air conditioner as high as it will go.
“Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!” I mumble under my breath while washing all the shampoo and conditioner out of my hair. “God damn it!” This case has me all messed up and there’s not a damn thing I could do about it. If I were to go back to the hospital right now trying to figure out what’s wrong with her or what happened to her, I would be sent home. There’s not a damn thing I can do.
By the time I’m clean, the water has turned cold on me. Shivering, I step out of the shower and grab the towel next to the shower. My teeth chatter together and I do my best to warm up after the cold air hits my body.
That’s when I hear it.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
“Calista, are you in there? Calista, baby? Are you okay?”
“Who is it?” I demand while running towards the door. However, before I get to the door, I slip on the tile from the kitchen floor and slide towards the door. Right before I get there, I gain my footing. “Fuck!” I yell.
“Pussycat, are you all right?”
I throw open the door to see a man who looks like he saw the devil himself. Victor’s normal pristine look is altered by his shirt being untucked and his tie around his neck loose. His five o’clock shadow is showing but the man is still fine.
He rushes through the door before I even step aside. “You left your door unlocked?” He barks while looking around my apartment. His eyes are wild like he’s expecting to see something not allowed here.
“Victor, what’s wrong? Why are you acting like this?” I wrap my arms around my body trying to shield myself for whatever blow is about to happen.
I just know something’s going to happen.
“Lock your fucking door, Calista. Nut cases can come in here and you don’t know who the fuck they are.”
Obviously a nutcase did come. You’re standing in front of me.
I nod my head. Really? What else is there to do? The man is half cocked on something. “Are you okay? Victor, you’re being a little cra-”
His eyes narrow at me looking down at my towel cladded body for the first time. “You think you can leave your apartment open while you take a shower? You m
ight as well leave out some fucking cookies for the crazies. Maybe some milk!”
“So, the ‘crazies’ are now ‘Santa’?” I’m egging him on but I say those words with air quotes around them. “I’m a big girl, Victor. I’ve lived on my own for quite a while. I don’t need you to swoop in and take care of me. Now, if you’re going to calm down, please stay. If you’re going to be a crazy psychopath, please leave.”
I don’t want him to leave but I don’t want him to stay either. I’m all sorts of screwed up but I can’t help it. The man brings out something in me I love and hate all at the same time. He brings desperation out of me.