Tennessee Vet

by Carolyn McSparren

  “Blood?” She picked up a wicked kitchen knife and sliced the sandwiches crossways, then slid two halves apiece onto plates and added pickles and potato chips. “I grew up on a farm. I was pulling piglets out of sows when I was five or six years old. Gangrene bothers me... Sorry, not the proper social chitchat over snacks. Death bothers me. Creatures in pain bother me. Damage I can’t fix bothers me. If it can live a happy life, then whatever I have to do to get the animal to that point is merely repair work. The same thing your mechanic will have to do with your radiator grille—I just do it with flesh and bone instead of metal.”

  “Did you always want to be a vet?”

  She laid out silverware and napkins and handed him a plate. “I wanted to be an Olympic three-day event rider. Jumping incredibly large and athletic horses over humongous fences at death-defying speeds.” She looked down at herself and let out a rueful sigh. “That was twenty pounds ago when I was seventeen. I was a good enough rider for local over-fences horse shows, but even if my pop had been able to afford a million-dollar jumper or the training and travel to go along with it, I wouldn’t have been good enough.”

  “Why not?”

  “Most three-day eventers at the Olympic level are certifiably insane. I have too much imagination. I could always visualize what would happen to the horse if I crashed.”

  “The horse? Not you?”

  This time she laughed. “Human doctors say ‘First, do no harm.’ We say ‘The animal always comes first.’”

  “So my eagle took precedence over my antique automobile grille?”

  “Of course it did, as you knew at the time. A lot of people would have sliced up the bird to avoid nicking their chrome. You didn’t.”

  “As dearly as I love and baby that car, it is not alive. That bird, as he told us in no uncertain terms, is. No contest.”

  “I have to keep warning you. He may not make it.”

  “I did. He will, too.”

  At the back of the kitchen was a banquette breakfast nook. He took his sandwich, slid in to one of the seats and stretched his right leg out to the side. “Be careful of my bum leg. I can be a hazard to navigation.”

  “Beer, wine, water, soda?”

  * * *

  “I WOULD KILL for a beer.” What Stephen really wanted was a handful of opioids to cut the ache in his right leg and knee. That was what he got for being macho. He’d left his cane on the front seat of the car. And he didn’t take opioids. It would have been too easy to get hooked on them in rehab. Even if reality sucked, he preferred it to living in cloud-cuckoo-land.

  “What’s with the leg?” Barbara said as she started on her sandwich.

  “Hey, you’re not kidding. I know Southerners and their pimento cheese. This is exceptional.”

  “Thank you. All my own work, as the street artists say in London. So, do we not mention the leg?”

  “Most people don’t. They avoid staring, but I can tell they’re dying to ask about it. That’s part of the reason I’m at Emma’s. Sometimes I feel as if I am one gigantic leg with tiny little arms, legs and head sewed on around the edges.”

  “I’m sorry...”

  “No! Please. I don’t mind talking about it, if you don’t start every conversation from here on out with ‘And how are you today, Stephen?’”

  She chuckled. “Promise.”

  “Okay. I was headed home from a faculty dinner. I had not touched a drop of alcohol. I was driving a small SUV that had belonged to my wife, and a guy in a gigantic diesel pickup truck T-boned me when he ran a light. He, by the way, had three DUIs pending already. They used the Jaws of Life and several miracles to get me as far as the trauma center at the Med Hospital Trauma Center. Very much the way we got our eagle disentangled from my grille. I spent the next year getting operated on, going through rehab, getting operated on some more, more rehab, lots of titanium pins in my bones, skin grafts, yada, yada, yada. In the end, I kept my bionic leg and knee, and I’m down to a cane after a wheelchair and a walker. But I still limp, more when I’m tired.”

  “And you hurt.”

  He nodded. “They say that more exercises like walking and swimming will help diminish the pain. That’s one of the reasons I’m here.”

  “Good luck with finding a public swimming pool this side of Jackson. Even this late in September, it’s still warm enough to take a dip in the little lake where Seth and Emma have their cabin, but not for much longer. And if you walk on our road out there—” she pointed toward the front of the clinic “—watch out for crazy drivers, and the occasional deer in your face.”

  “Boy, are you Miss Comfort!”

  “Just sayin’. I have nothing to offer you for dessert,” she said.

  He took a final swig of his beer. “That was wonderful. I can make it to morning without hunger pangs.”

  “I can front you breakfast stuff—eggs, bacon, bread for toast, even coffee.”

  “Not necessary. Emma is taking me to Williamston so that she can introduce me to the denizens of the café. I feel as though I’m being presented at court.”

  “Around here, you’re pretty much right. What are you planning to do about your poor car?”

  “Call my mechanical genius in Memphis to come get it and try to locate a grille for it. In the meantime, I’ll have to rent a car. I assume there is some place to do that in town?”

  Barbara waggled a hand. “If you’re lucky, our esteemed mayor, Sonny Prather, will rent you a baby truck. I assume you can’t borrow one from your wife. Obviously, her SUV didn’t survive your accident.”

  He caught his breath. “Slight miscommunication. Nina, my wife, died several years ago of cancer. The night of my accident I was driving her SUV because the Triumph was in the shop. It often is. I just kept her old car as a backup for me and my daughters to use in case one of our cars was out of commission. I decided to drive my Triumph up here today instead of the sedan I bought to replace the SUV. At the moment, my younger daughter, Anne, is driving that while her car is being worked on.”

  Her hand flew to her mouth. “Oh, I am so sorry! I thought your wife was in Memphis.”

  He reached out and laid his hand on her other arm. “Don’t be. You had no way of knowing from the way I talked. Took me a couple of years to be able even to say ‘cancer.’ Now, I think I’ve turned that last year into a kind of myth. It’s as though every time I mention it I add one more layer of scar tissue I can use to protect myself.”

  “I know exactly what you mean. John—my vet partner in the clinic as well as my husband and the father of our two children—died several years ago. One of those young heart attacks, unsuspected and nearly always fatal. I felt as though someone had turned off the sun like flipping a light switch. The only thing that saved me was that I had to take over the clinic alone to support the family or starve. I had good friends who helped keep me sane. Apparently, I did a decent job, but I have almost no recollection of the first two years after John’s death. The children helped. I have a son and a daughter, Mark and Caitlyn. Those are their pictures on the mantelpiece. Suddenly, I was the sole support of the family.”

  “Must have been tough. I managed to act sane until my accident, then I was doped up until I was aware enough to refuse anymore opioids, and being rehabilitated—a synonym for attempted murder. Anyway, I’ve been planning to buy a new car. This may be a good time to go ahead and do it. Let’s face it, the Triumph is my toy, but it’s not practical. I had to have the entire transmission replaced with an automatic so I could drive it safely with one completely functional foot and leg. I’ve about made up my mind to buy a small truck, except I have no idea what to buy or where to buy it.”

  “You are deep in the land of the pickup. After breakfast, get Emma to take you shopping and introduce you around. Tomorrow is not one of her days doing receptionist duty here, so she’ll be free.”

  “I can’t drag Emm
a around, the shape she’s in.”

  “Don’t tell her that. Now, how about we see if you can drive your car to your house. I’ll follow you.”

  “You don’t have to do that. It’s only a couple of miles. If I get stuck on the side of the road I can walk home.”

  “This is the country. You do not want to be walking down this road in the middle of the night or you’ll be the one stuck on somebody’s grille.”

  “Let me at least help you clean up the dishes.”

  “That’s what God gave us dishwashers for.”

  “May I check on our patient before we leave?”

  Barbara sighed. “I’d rather check him myself after I come back from following you home. I want him kept as quiet as possible. Hey—my clinic, my rules.”

  Stephen drew himself up but did not actually protest. He was not used to being questioned about his decisions. No doubt she knew her business, but she hadn’t a clue how invested he already was in the eagle. It was obvious she wanted him out of the way.

  Climbing into the Triumph always took some doing. Before he attempted it, Stephen checked to see that there was no coolant leakage behind his radiator and collected a couple of small pieces of grille he’d missed earlier. The little car started and ran smoothly. The headlights of Barbara’s truck came on, and their small convoy eased out of the parking lot onto the road.

  Accompanied by worrying clinks, he drove slowly and carefully, but the car ran smoothly. He pulled into the driveway in front of his new abode, shut off the engine, levered himself out from behind the wheel, grabbed his cane from the passenger’s seat and limped up to Barbara’s truck. “Thank you for everything. I’ll come by to check on him as soon as I can after breakfast.”

  She leaned out her open window. “Here’s my card. Numbers for me, the clinic, my cell and my email. I’ll let you know if something changes. Mr. MacDonald—”

  “Stephen, please.”

  “And I’m Barbara. Try to get some sleep, and don’t worry. He obviously wants to live. Now we have to hope his will is as strong as his bones.” She pulled away and waved through her window as she drove back onto the road and turned toward the clinic.

  He stood in the dark and watched her taillights until she turned the bend and disappeared. Heck of an introduction to the country, he thought. And a heck of an introduction to the most interesting woman he’d met since Nina died.

  Though she was a bit too sure of herself...

  CHAPTER FIVE

  “AN EAGLE? REALLY?” Emma Logan swiveled as much as she could to look at Stephen in the passenger seat of her SUV. It was clearly a challenge to get the distance she needed between her stomach and the steering wheel while still being able to keep her feet on the pedals. “Have you talked to Barbara this morning? How is he?”

  “I called at six thirty this morning. That was as late as I could wait. She told me she’s calling in one of her colleagues from the raptor center in Memphis to give her a hand in case she has to pin the wing. I’m glad she decided to bring in another vet. She seemed excellent, but it never hurts to have a second opinion.”

  “She’s a gem, but she’s going to kill herself unless she can hire another vet to take some of the pressure off her. There is a vet south of Williamston, but he’s only interested in small animals. The closest large animal vet is in Somerville, twenty-five miles away. Seth says she and John picked this location because nobody else was practicing here. And now the locals love her, so everybody calls or just shows up when they have a problem. Some days when I’m working for her I can barely find a place to park.”

  “I suspect you need earplugs.”

  She laughed. “The big fancy kind. The dogs and cats aren’t the worst. It’s the pigs. Ever hear a pig squeal when it’s being restrained?”

  “Probably the way that eagle screamed last night.”

  “Oh, I’ll bet Little Oinky can top that eagle’s decibel level. Pigs have no defense mechanisms except flight and noise.”

  “Not Olympic sprint speed, right?”

  “Right, although under pressure even a full-grown domestic pig can put on a surprising turn of speed for a short distance. When anything or anyone tries to restrain them, their instinct is to squeal and run. Preferably knocking you down and stomping on you in the process.”

  “I thought they ate people.”

  “I think that’s an old wives’ tale. I do know, however, that hogs keep growing until they die. I rode along with Barbara to see a pig with an abscessed hoof the other day. I swear the hog, Arnold, was the size of a camping tent—and not for one person, either.’’ She looked down at her belly and sighed. “I know how he feels.”

  “I didn’t ask last night,” Stephen said, “but if it’s not a rude question...”

  “When am I due? First week in December. Perfect time. After Thanksgiving and before Christmas. Assuming good ol’ Kicks here can read schedules.” She patted her tummy. “Actually, I have tons of energy, unlike the first three months, when all I wanted to do was sleep and eat. Barbara says all mammals tend to do that. She’s warned me that when I start rearranging the linen closet and cleaning out the kitchen cabinets I need to watch out for labor. Sometimes I wish I was a sea horse. The daddy has full responsibility for the offspring.

  “Here we are at the café. Prepare to be checked out.” She turned into the parking lot of the brick building. A small sign over the door read Café, and a sign on the window said Open. Other than that and the large number of cars in the lot at seven thirty in the morning, nothing shouted that this was the place everyone in town came for meals, if they ate out at all.

  The minute Stephen opened the glass front door for Emma the noise poured out. People noise. Not jukebox or even radio. “Ah,” he said with a grin. “Nothing but conversation and cutlery.”

  “Oooh,” Emma said. “I’ll have to remember that the next time my sometime boss Nathan wants me to come up with a title for a new restaurant.”

  “You’re still working for Nathan? I assumed you quit when you married Seth and moved up here from Memphis.”

  “Long distance via computer and cell phone. I’m not leaving the county again until Kicks is a separate entity. Between doing special projects for Nathan and running the appointment scheduling for Barbara three half days a week and supervising the addition to the house and—”

  “Having a baby.”

  “It’s crazy, but what would I do if I stayed home? Play video games? Listen to the men who are working on the addition to the house? They all speak Spanish, so our conversations consist mostly of smiles and charades. I’ll be glad when they are finished, so I can have my house back. Hey, my word! Here’s Barbara.”

  Stephen felt his heart stop for a moment as he swiveled to look at her. He assumed she’d come to tell him the bird had not survived the night. Well, she’d warned him his rescue was unlikely to survive. He grabbed a deep breath and prepared for some new psychic pain.

  She waved at them and wound her way through the restaurant to their table, speaking to nearly everyone she passed. She slipped into the seat across from him and said, “Morning, Emma, Stephen. Mind if I join you?”

  “You already have,” Emma said, though she nodded and smiled. She raised a hand to catch the eye of Velma, the waitress.

  “I had to come tell you personally,” Barbara said to Stephen.

  “You don’t have to tell me. He didn’t make it, did he?”

  Her eyes opened wide. “No, no. I should have realized you’d think... He made it through the night and swallowed a mouse whole an hour ago. Tried to devour my fingers, too. He hated the mouse, because we had to give him one of the frozen ones we keep for emergencies. I did thaw it. He grumped a bit, but he ate it eventually. At the moment, he’s trying to figure out how to remove his neck collar so he can tear off his bandages.”

  “But he’s alive?”

 
“So far. One of my best vet buds from Land Between the Lakes park is driving over his morning. We may have to pin the wing, although checking the X-rays, I don’t think we’ll need to. If he survives that, we start the healing. Then, if that works, we start rehabilitating him—if we can figure out where to do it.”

  “How can you do that without a flight cage?” Emma asked.

  “We can’t. We may have to move him up to Reelfoot Lake before he heals. It’s crazy that we can’t have one closer than that. We desperately need it for all the birds we rehabilitate. In the meantime, Stephen, since he’s your responsibility...”

  “I should have mentioned that last night. I’ll be totally responsible for your charges. I do have a book to write. I intend, however, to monitor his progress closely. Anything you need, I will attempt to provide for him. I plan to see him fly away without a backward glance.”

  “No charges. He’s part of my work with the animal rehabilitators group. If we could clean up the outdoor cage Seth and his team built for Emma at The Hovel when she first moved here and was raising her abandoned skunk babies, we could move the bird down there once he’s out of the woods and ready to rehabilitate... It’s not adequate for a flight cage, but it will do to start off with once we dare to give him that much space. But as to responsibilities, if you want to avoid a big fine for hitting him...”

  Stephen started to protest.

  “I know, I know. He hit you. Tough to prove it. If you work with me on him, the law will probably cut you some slack. Killing an eagle could mean not only incurring a massive fine, but—if it could be proved it was done on purpose—you could get jail time as well. There are even restrictions about possessing an eagle feather.”

  “I would hope you could testify on my behalf.”

  She cut her eyes at him. “I believe you, but I did not actually witness the accident. Let’s hope the eagle heals completely and is released back into the wild. We’ll give him the best possible care.”

  He hastened to assure her that he appreciated her professional skills. Although, he had only last night’s experience to rely on. He had the feeling she was not used to being questioned.