by Holly Rayner
“Great.” A few seconds of silence followed, neither of us sure who would speak first. Thankfully, Dr. Hunt decided to speak.
“There’s so much I’d like to say, but I’d rather do it in person,” he said. “Would you be able to meet me tomorrow?”
“I work until six. Are you available after that?” I asked.
“Yes, that will work just fine. There’s a medical museum near the hospital; do you know which one I’m thinking of?”
As a matter of fact, I did. I stopped into the museum quite frequently before my night shifts to sit in the beautifully landscaped courtyard, eat dinner, and drink a cup of coffee. It was one of my favorite places in the city, and medical personnel got free admission.
“Yes, I do,” I said with a smile in my voice.
“Perfect. I’ll be waiting in the lobby of the museum when you get off work.”
I could hear the authority in his voice. He didn’t sound commanding, but rather, he sounded confident—much more comfortable on the phone than I was, certainly.
“Sure, that sounds great.”
“I’ll see you tomorrow, then, Ms. Richards.”
“Okay, see you then.”
As soon as I hung up, I grabbed a throw pillow off the couch and turned around, launching it at Greg. It hit him in the side of the face and knocked him sideways. When he shot me a dirty look, I stuck my tongue out at him and stomped down the hall to my room. God, living with my brother was definitely causing me to regress into acting like a teenager.
Chapter 5
“So it’s true, then?” Ciara asked, grabbing my arm and pulling me into an empty room.
“What is?”
She had just asked me whether I wanted to go out for after-work drinks with her and her sister, and I’d told her I had plans. Even if I didn’t have the meeting with Dr. Hunt, I would have lied to get out of those plans. As much as I liked Ciara, her older sister was no fun to be around. She complained about everything and always had too much to drink.
“You’re meeting Dr. Spencer Hunt this afternoon?” Ciara hissed, her fingers digging into my skin as she squeezed my bicep in excitement.
I winced and pulled my arm free, rubbing the tender spot. She gave me an apologetic smile.
“How did you hear about that?”
“Mike told a few people and those people told a few people. You know how news travels around here,” she said with a shrug. “But it’s true? He reached out to you?”
I hadn’t told anyone for a reason. I wasn’t sure what to expect from the meeting, and I didn’t want anyone coming up with any crazy theories about a possible romance between the two of us the way Greg had. I just wanted it to be a quiet meeting that I would remember fondly and never speak of. However, lying about it now would only fuel the rumor mill. It would be best to tell the innocent truth.
“He gave me his number and I called last night. He just wants to meet and thank me for taking care of his son. It’s not a big deal at all. It’ll probably last for ten minutes. Tops.”
She shook her head. “I’d trade places with you in a second. Have you seen pictures of that man? Dr. Dreamy. And a genius, to boot.”
“It’s not a date,” I reminded her. “It’s completely professional.”
Ciara hummed, unconvinced.
“I’m serious,” I said. “And I don’t really want this getting around any more than it already has. I don’t want this to become a big deal, and I definitely don’t want to field a bunch of questions about him to curious strangers. Okay?”
“Fine.” She sighed and then aimed a finger at me. “But you have to swear to tell me everything that happens. And also confirm whether the famous Dr. Hunt is truly that handsome in real life.”
“Deal.” We shook hands and I couldn’t help but laugh.
Ciara kept her promise to not tell anyone else about my meeting with Dr. Hunt, but it didn’t matter. Mr. Antione had told enough people that everyone knew about it by lunch. When it came time for me to leave, I passed no less than five different people who winked and wished my luck on my way out of the hospital. My cheeks didn’t stop burning until I made it to my car.
The medical museum was less than a half mile down the road. It was a modern building—panels of natural wood, walls of glass, and steel beams. I parked in the parking garage next door and then walked through an underground connecting tunnel to the main lobby. A flash of my nurse’s badge at the front gate earned me a thumbs-up from the woman behind the ticket counter, and I walked in.
The lobby ceiling was two stories high and made mostly of glass, flooding the space with natural daylight. A black tile floor stretched from the lobby back to the exhibit space, which was visible because of the building’s open floor plan. Thin white dividers featured photographs and diagrams of the medical history of Boston’s hospitals and medical advancements.
People taking the audio tour wore large gray headphones and shuffled around from placard to placard. The average age of museumgoer seemed to be around seventy-five. I was the youngest person there by at least forty years, which made it quite obvious that Dr. Hunt had not arrived yet. His head of dark hair would have been quite obvious in the sea of gray.
I debated for a moment whether I should sit on a bench next to the ticket counter, but quickly decided I’d rather peruse the nearby exhibits. Not only would it give me something to focus my attention on, but I didn’t want Dr. Hunt to walk in and see me waiting for him like a child outside the principal’s office. I knew his opinion of me didn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things, but it mattered to me. And after my somewhat embarrassing phone call the night before, I wanted him to see me as a mature, capable adult.
So, I folded my hands politely behind my back and began perusing the first exhibit. It was a brief overview of the medical history of Boston. I knew the first fact already, which was that Boston had the first municipal hospital in the United States. Though, the next placard pointed out that there was no pediatric ward for fifty years, which was news to me. I tried to imagine the children I cared for every day, in the brightly colored hallways and rooms covered in cartoon animals, instead being cared for in the plain blue-and-white rooms where the adults stay. The hospital was a scary enough place for a child without putting them in a drab, sterile room.
I was intently reading about the buildings they’d allocated for the children’s hospital and studying black-and-white photographs of the first children’s ward, when I felt a hand on my shoulder. I jolted and let out a small yelp of surprise that echoed around the room. Everyone not wearing the audio tour headphones turned to look at me. My face flushed.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to surprise you.”
Suddenly, my mild embarrassment turned to mortification. I was standing in front of Dr. Spencer Hunt. I’d been so involved in the exhibit that I hadn’t noticed him approach. I should have sat on the bench near the ticket counter. Then, I would have seen him walk in and I could have taken a moment to compose myself so I wouldn’t startle like an idiot. There was nothing I could do about it, now, so I took a quick steadying breath and thrust my hand out.
“That’s okay. It’s great to meet you,” I said, hoping I sounded confident and not deranged.
He gripped my hand and shook it, smiling down at me. For a few seconds, I found myself dazzled. His teeth were bright white and straight, his smile wide and friendly.
“The pleasure is mine,” he said, reminding me of a romantic lead in an old romance movie. “I was thinking we could sit and talk somewhere, but it seems a waste not to walk through the museum if we’re here.”
I gave him a smile and a nod. “That sounds great.”
As soon as we headed into the museum proper, I noticed people staring at us. We did appear to be the only people in the building not collecting social security, so I chalked it up to that. I also tried not to pay attention to anyone else; since first talking to Dr. Hunt, I had utterly failed to be the put-together woman I wanted to be, and it was time to turn
things around and make a better impression. I didn’t need any distractions.
“As I’m sure you already know, I asked you to meet me because I wanted to thank you for your good deed the other day with my son’s school bus.”
He slipped his hands into the pockets of his navy-blue suit pants. The jacket was missing from the outfit, but he still looked professional. His crisp white button-down shirt was impeccably fitted, staying close to the lines of his torso, and his matching navy-blue tie with white polka dots was skinny and posh. I felt ridiculous in my jeans and maroon sweater, but I was grateful I’d at least bothered to change out of my purple cheetah-print scrubs before leaving the hospital. Most of the time, I left work in my scrubs and ran errands and stopped for food. I was so accustomed to being in them all the time that I didn’t stop to think how odd I might look.
“It was nothing, really,” I said, waving him away.
Dr. Hunt shook his head. “It was something to me. Do you have any children, Ms. Richards?”
“Jess is fine,” I said, reminding myself of Mr. Antione always asking me to call him Mike. “And no, I don’t have any children.”
“It’s true what they say about having kids. It’s like having your heart walk around outside of your body. I know I can’t protect him from everything. Or even most things. But you still try. From the time he was a baby, I plugged all of the outlets, put foam padding on sharp corners, hovered over him while he learned to walk. But I couldn’t be there on the bus that day, and you were. You took care of him when I couldn’t, and even though it seems small to you, it’s everything to me.”
Dr. Hunt wasn’t emotional, but I could hear the earnestness in his words. He loved his son so much, and the force of it nearly moved me to tears.
“I’m glad I was there to help keep everyone calm. Jamie hardly even needed me, though. He was so brave.”
“He likes to put on a brave front, but he is just a little kid beneath it all. I have to remind myself of that, often. He acts so mature, so grown up at times.”
I imagined Dr. Spencer Hunt as a little kid, before he was a doctor, when he was just Spencer. He started medical school at fifteen, so I had to assume he had been a very similar child to Jamie—very studious, very serious. Did he have any other hobbies aside from learning? Did he dig earthworms from the mud or watch Saturday morning cartoons? It was hard to imagine him in anything other than a suit.
All the pictures of Dr. Hunt online had prepared me for him to be handsome, but somehow, he looked even better in real life. The pictures had been too perfect. The lighting was staged and his skin was pore-less and perfect, like the fake desserts on display in bakery windows—all for show, but not for consumption. Standing next to Dr. Hunt with the natural light from the glass ceiling filtering down over us, I could see the small hairs around his forehead that were frizzy from the light afternoon rain and some small freckles left over from the summer. He looked better because he was real.
At the same time, thinking about his minor imperfections made me achingly aware of my own. What did I look like after twelve hours working at the hospital? I’d touched up my makeup in the bathroom before I left, but the lighting there was dim and nowhere near as unforgiving as natural sunlight. I nervously tucked my hair behind my ears and crossed my arms over my chest.
We stopped at the next exhibit, inspecting the glass cases of antique surgical equipment. There was a scalpel and a bone saw, forceps and a syringe. The silver handles and blades were imperfect in places, but everything was perfectly sharp and in good condition. It looked like, in the right hands, the tools could still be used to great success.
“I hope you aren’t bothered that I tracked you down,” he said suddenly. “I saw your picture in the paper and noticed the black nurse’s bag. I know it probably seems a bit excessive to call every hospital in the city looking for you, but once my mind is set on something, very little can deter me until I reach my goal. I just wanted to meet you and say thank you.”
My heart fluttered at the idea that, even for a second, Dr. Spencer Hunt had been obsessed with me. Could there be any truth to Greg’s outlandish theory that the famous billionaire had found my photograph attractive? I tried to remember the picture. How much of my face had been visible? Was it just the back of my head, or had there been a profile for him to go off of? Then, I quickly dismissed the idea. It was because of his love for his son, not his potential love for me.
“I wasn’t bothered at all,” I told him. “Really, my only concern is that you would go to all this trouble for me. I assure you, it was no trouble for me to stop and help. I work in the pediatric ward and have for several years, now. Even though I have no children of my own, they are my passion. As soon as I saw the bus crash, I knew I had to stop. It was an instinct more than anything else.”
“Just because you were running on instinct doesn’t mean you aren’t a good person,” he said. “A lot of people’s instinct would have been to take a video of the scene as they drove past.”
I nodded. “I suppose you’re right. I guess most medical professionals are selfless in that way. I go to work so I can make enough money to pay rent, but I spent four years in college, sleepless and dirt broke, because I wanted to one day go to work to help people.”
“That’s why you became a nurse?” he asked. “To help people?”
“Yes. Is there another reason to become a nurse?”
He shrugged. “I’ve worked with a lot of nurses. Not all of them talked about their desire to help people. Some of them liked the idea of working three twelve-hour shifts a week and having four days off. Some didn’t want to be behind a desk all day.”
“I enjoy those parts of the job, too,” I said, “but helping people has always been the number one goal.”
He tucked his lower lip in, his chin dimpling in thought, and I wondered what he thought of me. Just as he had worked with a lot of nurses, I’d worked with a lot of doctors and surgeons. Not all of them respected the nursing profession the way they should.
“Well, you satisfied that goal last week,” he said. “You helped my son, and I’m grateful.”
I had a feeling Dr. Hunt wouldn’t feel content until I’d accepted his gratitude, so I relented.
“You’re welcome. It was my pleasure.”
All at once, he seemed to ease in demeanor. His shoulders settled a little lower and his stiff, business-like walk turned into more of a casual lope.
We walked through the next portion of the museum, mostly reading the displays and commenting on the exhibits, until we reached the double doors that led out into the courtyard. Dr. Hunt pushed the door open for me and I stepped outside. It had been bright when I’d walked into the museum, but the sun had dropped significantly in the short time I’d been inside, and it was now dusk.
“This is one of my favorite places in the city,” I said.
“Oh, really? I guess I got lucky when I picked this location. How come it’s your favorite place?” he asked, leading us towards a wooden bench in the back of the courtyard. It was beneath a large tree, the leaves only just beginning to yellow. Stone planters filled with greenery and flowers dotted the brick walkway.
“It’s close enough to work that I can come here for a lunch break, if I get one, or eat my dinner here before starting an evening shift. It’s a nice way to spend some time in nature in the middle of the city.”
“Did you grow up in Boston?” he asked. “It’s a beautiful city, but I can imagine it would be hard for someone who loved the outdoors to find full satisfaction in city life.”
“My parents live in Belmont, so pretty close. And don’t confuse my love for this courtyard as a love for nature. I will run and scream if a bee gets within five feet of me,” I said, instantly wishing I hadn’t. What if Dr. Hunt loved the outdoors? What if he spent his weekends fishing and kayaking? Then, I wondered why it mattered what he liked to do. Like I’d told Greg and Ciara, this wasn’t a date. He didn’t have to like me. Yet, I found myself hoping he did.
Despite my internal struggle, Dr. Hunt laughed. “I grew up in a small village in England. Sheep walking across the road constantly, birds singing by the windows in the mornings, and enough bees in my mum’s garden you would have thought we were beekeepers. But I could always be found in my bedroom, reading.”
“So, not a great lover of nature, either?” I asked, relieved.
“I wish I was, but no.” He shrugged. “I prefer a comfortable sofa and a good book. Not very exciting, but it’s true all the same.”
“It seems like it’s served you well so far,” I said. “Would you rather trade all of your medical knowledge to know everything there is about outdoorsy stuff like hunting and skinning animals?”
“No.” He barked out a laugh and shook his head. “Besides, my surgery skills might come pretty in handy with skinning an animal. I’m sure there’s a little crossover between the two hobbies.”
“Very true. You might be a master outdoorsman—you just don’t know it yet,” I said.
He leaned into the bench, head back, mouth open in an easy laugh. I wanted to make him laugh like that over and over again. I wanted to know everything there was to know about him. Were his mom and dad disciplinarians or free spirits? Did he have any siblings? What was his favorite color? I also didn’t want to look like a psychopath, which I certainly would if I turned this simple meeting into an interview. He was probably inundated with adoring women on a daily basis, and the last thing he needed was someone else throwing themselves at him.
I needed to remember why we’d come here, why we were meeting at all.
“But Jamie has been doing fine since the crash?” I asked.
Dr. Hunt opened his mouth to answer when a loud beep sounded through the courtyard. It seemed to be coming from the sky, and when I looked up, I realized there were speakers strung through the canopies of the trees. The beep was followed by a recorded message:
“The museum will be closing in fifteen minutes. Please make your way towards the front lobby.”