The Elusive Consultant

by Carol Marinelli

Emily smiled as Max rushed in, still unshaven, pulling his stethoscope out of his pocket and wrapping it around his neck.

  ‘Where have you been, Slater?’ Chris asked good-naturedly. ‘You haven’t left us yet.’

  ‘Sorry, guys.’ He looked as flustered as Tessa felt and she mumbled into the telephone even though the piped music was still playing in her ear.

  ‘I tried to ring you at six.’ Emily nudged him as she brushed past. ‘Where on earth were you?’

  ‘I didn’t hear it,’ Max muttered. ‘I’ll explain later, Emily,’ he added quietly.

  You liar. The words were on the tip of Tessa’s tongue and for the tiniest instant her angry eyes flashed up at him, his obvious guilt as he looked away twisting the knife already lodged in her heart one turn tighter, but her angry words were never spoken. Instead, they screamed through her mind as the nurse supervisor came back onto the line.

  ‘Look, I know the staff want to go to Max’s leaving party but the department still has to be covered internally. And as for tomorrow, do you have any idea what an agency nurse costs to cover a Saturday night?’

  ‘Of course I do,’ Tessa argued. ‘I’m the one who tackles the roster every week, but this is a genuine shortfall that’s not our fault. Kim had agreed to work the night shift this weekend, she’s hardly capable now.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Tessa, you’ll just have to work something out.’

  ‘Tessa.’ Max caught her as she came off the telephone. ‘Can we go somewhere to talk?’

  ‘Here will have to do, Max.’ She didn’t snap, didn’t even wither him with a look, but her voice told him her answer was non-negotiable. ‘I’m busy.’

  ‘You should have woken me.’ He was trying not whisper, but from the nervous shift of his eyes as he checked the coast was clear, Tessa was in no doubt his words were definitely for her ears only. ‘You know we need to talk, Tessa, and you know damn well that it’s impossible to do that here.’

  Tessa nodded. It was as much of an answer as he was going to get.

  ‘Tonight,’ Max begged. ‘At my party, don’t dash off.’

  ‘What, you’ll try and squeeze me in a five-minute time slot?’

  ‘Don’t judge me, Tessa,’ he pleaded. ‘Not without hearing me out first. Tonight, we’ll talk tonight.’

  Again she nodded, but her eyes stayed fixed on the floor.

  ‘Over here, Max.’ Chris’s voice had that slightly urgent ring to it that meant time was of the essence and Max was left with no choice but to go. ‘Tonight,’ he said again as he dashed off. But even before he had left the tiny annexe, before the scent of him had cleared, Tessa had picked up the telephone.

  ‘About those night shifts,’ Tessa said slowly. ‘I’ve just found someone to fill them.’

  * * *

  They had their own little party for Max at lunchtime. A quick call to the local pizza shop, a crate of cola and enough chips and dips to feed an army.

  People came and went often in hospital life. Six-month contracts, two years sometimes, but inevitably people moved on to pastures new. To bigger, slicker hospitals or poorer developing countries. There was a world of pain out there and a bayside hospital in Victoria wasn’t going to hold everyone for ever.

  Not even Tessa.

  Her notice was already written in her head.

  Even dream jobs had their downsides.

  But today wasn’t about Tessa and how she was going to live with her guilt, it wasn’t about Emily and the fact her fiancé was leaving, it wasn’t even about the department and how it was going to cope.

  It was about Max.

  Dr Max Slater, who had given his all to his beloved department, who had pulled the staff up when they’d been down, created comradeship when there had been conflict and managed to put a smile on everyone’s face over the years.

  So they raised their plastic cups to wish him well, and listened as the speeches droned on, tucking into pizza with one ear on the intercom, ready to be called away at any given moment. And Tessa finally realised that Max was right to go.

  He had a talent, a God-given talent that saved lives, a career that needed to be furthered. And when finally it was Tessa’s turn she plastered on her usual smile and stood at the front of the staffroom and made the hardest speech of her life.

  ‘I’m not going to inflate your ego further, Max, by telling you all how much we’ll miss you.’ She smiled hard, absolutely determined not to cry. ‘I think you know that already. All I’m going to say is that we all wish you well. You’ve been wonderful for the department, for the staff and most importantly for the patients, and London’s very lucky to get you.’

  And because she had to do it, because it was utterly and completely the right thing to do and to have omitted it would only have raised eyebrows, as she handed him the small package Tessa leant forward and kissed him on his unshaven cheek, the bitter-sweet feeling of his skin beneath her lips, and for a lingering second his arm pulled her closer and she felt him squeeze her tight as she handed him the package.

  And that was it.

  It was time for Tessa to stand back and watch as he politely read the card first, the pages filled with signatures, little jokes and one-liners, all the staff wishing him well for the future. And she watched him swallow hard as he read it, knew, because she at least knew that much about him, that Max would be finding this hard.

  He didn’t have to feign surprise when he opened his present. A fluorescent pink pen with a large rope round it fell out first and everyone howled with laughter.

  ‘So you don’t lose it.’ Tessa smiled.

  His real present came next, and they shared one tiny look, both remembering that day, walking through the shop, not knowing what was to come.

  When an innocent friendship had still been very much alive.

  ‘Thanks, guys.’ For a moment he gazed down at the pen set in his hands as his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down a few times.

  ‘Look at us.’ He smiled as he looked up. ‘Jane in a soft neck collar, the charge nurse covered in bruises, me with one eye closed and an eyebrow full of stitches. We’re worse than the patients.

  ‘But that’s what this place does to us.’ He looked around the room. ‘And you know the most amazing part of it all is that we come back for more. How many times do we go home and swear that’s it? That we’ve had it up to here?’ He jabbed at his neck and waited as a few murmurs of agreement made their way around the gathered audience, then Max smiled again. ‘But the sun comes up the next day and we climb into our cars and head back to it, even though we swore we wouldn’t, because that’s what we are. Emergency staff. And that’s what we’ll always be. Like it or not, this place always pulls you back. It’s not just the drama, though, that’s keeps us here, you know that as well as I do. It’s the people we work alongside day and night, the community we’ve built together that makes it so much more than a job to all of us.

  ‘So with that in mind I won’t keep you any longer, I’ll just thank you all for coming, thank you for this wonderful present which I’ll treasure and promise not to lose and say that I’ll see you all next year, same time, same place. You’re not getting rid of me that easily.’

  The plastic cups were raised again, and Max stepped forward into the room, lost as he mingled in the crowd of colleagues. Tessa stood there, sure it was the last time she would see him, that this really was the end. Everyone would want a piece of Max today—the doctors’ mess lunch, Admin’s afternoon tea, even Narelle from the canteen had the promise of one last coffee. It was easy to slip away unnoticed to grab her bag from the changing room, tell Jane she was going to grab a few hours before the night shift started.

  The hard part was pulling the curtains on the bright afternoon sun, slipping into the unmade bed where the scent of Max still lingered and trying to work out how it could all have gone so wrong.

  How a wonderful friendship, a decent, kind and special man could all be reduced to this horrible pile of rubble.

  CHAPTER TEN
/>   ‘HOW come you’re not at the party?’ Kelly, one of the night staff, smiled curiously as Tessa joined them at the nurses’ station.

  ‘We were short.’ Tessa shrugged. ‘Did you hear about Kim?’

  ‘Yes, poor thing. But surely it’s a bit of overkill, filling a grad nurse’s position with a charge nurse.’

  Tessa gave a dismissive nod. ‘Apparently I still come cheaper than an agency nurse—try working that one out.’ She was hoping the conversation was over, that Kelly would just accept that she was here, but deep down Tessa knew it could never be that easy. She and Max had been friends for a long time, and the fact she wasn’t at his party merited a five-minute moan at least.

  ‘That’s so unfair,’ Kelly rattled on. ‘You and Max are friends—surely Admin could have forgotten about the budgets for one night. You should have put your foot down. You’re supposed to be off sick anyway after your adventures the other day. Max will be so disappointed if you don’t go.’

  Tessa doubted that. For all his bravado about a ‘little talk’ at the end of the day, there was no chance of that. Emily would be there, along with rest of the staff. They’d have had more privacy in the middle of the corridor! Max knew that as well as she did. He no more wanted to attempt a justification of last night’s behaviour than Tessa wanted to hear it.

  It had been a terrible mistake.

  One never to be repeated.

  ‘If the department’s quiet around eleven, I’ll take my supper break early and pop over—it’s only in the doctors’ mess.’ Tessa forced a smile. ‘I’ll cut quite a dash in my uniform.’

  ‘Well, you make sure that you do,’ Kelly insisted, only dropping the painful subject when Tessa pointedly turned to the whiteboard and nodded for the late staff to start the handover.

  Of course, because Tessa wanted the place to be busy, because she wanted patients hanging from the rafters and ambulances screeching into the ambulance bay, the department was quieter than the morgue. ‘Go on.’ Kelly nudged her as they stood listlessly cleaning the trolleys. ‘You’ve got your pager. We’ll bleep you if it gets busy. Take a good hour.’

  She really didn’t have much choice. Ducking into the changing rooms, Tessa splashed on a dab of perfume and a slick of lipstick, but her heart wasn’t really in it. It was bad enough going to a party in your uniform, let alone the cringe factor of seeing Max’s face drop a mile when she walked in.

  Turning out of the entrance, Tessa lingered a moment as an ambulance pulled in. ‘Go on.’ Kelly shooed her off. ‘It wasn’t even a blue light, we’ll be fine.’

  But as the paramedics opened the rear doors, an awful guttural scream filled the corridor and all thoughts of parties and farewells flew from Tessa’s mind as she watched the poor battered face of Josie peering out from under a swaddle of blankets as the paramedics wheeled her along.

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘Not sure, Tessa.’ It was Ryan again and he greeted Tessa warmly, yesterday’s adventure having formed an eternal bond between them.

  ‘Found unconscious down a side street, multiple cuts and bruises. She’s totally incoherent, terrified, in fact, poor old girl. All I can get is that she was at the cash machine. That’s about it—the rest is just ranting. Looks like she’s been mugged, there’s no purse or money in her bag. We’ve told the police, no doubt they’ll be along soon.’

  ‘Oh, Josie.’ Tessa tried to take her patient’s hands but the movement only startled her and Josie jerked frantically away, screaming at the top of her voice.

  ‘Let’s get her into a cubicle,’ Tessa said above the screams.

  ‘She looks familiar,’ Kelly said, her eyebrows furrowing as she tried to place the battered, bleeding face.

  ‘Her name’s Josie, she’s one of the regulars. I know her pretty well, at least as much as anyone can know her. I’ll deal with her.’

  ‘But what about the party?’ Kelly urged. ‘We’d manage.’

  ‘I know you would,’ Tessa said, and as her eyes strayed to the pitiful sight of her patient, Tessa knew she wasn’t using Josie’s injuries as an excuse not to face Max. Josie needed a familiar face now and Tessa could provide it, and at the end of the day she was on duty and patients came first, always. ‘But it’s better if I stay.’

  For the best part of an hour Tessa fought to help Josie, to clean her wounds, to get her, fighting and struggling, into a gown, all the while doing her best to orientate her, to reassure her over and over, but it all seemed to no avail. Josie had wandered off to a different scary place and for a while nothing Tessa said or did seemed to calm her.

  ‘It’s Tessa, Josie,’ Tessa said gently for the hundredth time, as she wrapped a blanket around the painfully thin shoulders. At last Josie was clean and dry and the screaming seemed to have died down a touch. ‘You’re at the hospital, you’re safe now.’

  ‘I saw him,’ Josie sobbed. ‘I was at the machine and I saw him.’

  ‘You’re safe now,’ Tessa said over and over until finally she seemed to be reaching Josie. ‘The police will be here soon and you can tell them what happened.’

  ‘I tried to chase him.’

  ‘You should have just let him go,’ Tessa started, but as Josie began to get agitated again Tessa realised she was on the wrong track. ‘It’s all OK now.’

  ‘Where’s my coat?’

  ‘It’s under the trolley, Josie. I’ve put it in a property bag.’

  ‘I need my coat.’

  Tessa pulled the bag out. She had already been through the coat pockets and checked the lining, but it was intact. Poor Josie had taken Tessa’s advice and, Tessa thought with a huge lump in her throat, what terrible advice it had been. Suddenly the world seemed a horrible place. Josie, dear Josie who wouldn’t harm a fly, who had always been safe in the little bayside town, lay on the trolley bruised and bleeding and scared, and a so-called fellow human being was to blame.

  Once her wounds had been cleaned up, there wasn’t much more Tessa could do, apart from stay with the old lady, reassure her over the crackling of the police walkie-talkies, guide her through the endless questions that Josie couldn’t or wouldn’t answer. And finally, when the interview was over, when the psychiatrist had been and a strong sedative ordered for Josie, Tessa ducked into the toilet to run the taps loudly and rant at the injustices of the world and question, as all Emergency staff did every once in a while, just why the hell they put themselves through it.

  * * *

  ‘Look who’s here!’ Kelly beamed as Max stood up from a stool in the annexe. ‘And look at all the yummy leftovers he’s brought us.’

  ‘Hi, Max.’ Tessa didn’t even attempt to inject enthusiasm into her voice as she bunched up her tissue and tossed it into the wastepaper basket.

  ‘You didn’t come—’ Max started.

  ‘I had to work.’

  Max nodded. ‘Kelly just told me about Josie. Do you want me to put my head in?’

  ‘She’s asleep now.’ Tessa shrugged. ‘Anyway, she doesn’t really recognise anyone.’

  ‘Come on.’ He had her hand and didn’t seem to care who saw it. ‘Let’s go to my office.’

  ‘No, Max.’ Tessa pulled her hand away but the emergency corridor really wasn’t the place for this type of conversation and after a reluctant pause Tessa marched off to his office, the empty desk and discarded boxes ramming home the fact that she’d already lost him.

  ‘Emily and I are finished.’

  ‘Again,’ Tessa sneered.

  ‘We have been since you went away on the trauma course, and if you’d get off your high horse for five minutes I might be able to explain things.’

  ‘Guess what, Max?’ Tessa slapped her hands on her thighs in exasperation, interrupting his flurry of words with the most abrupt of voices. ‘I don’t want to get off my high horse. I happen to quiet like it up here, and for your information I’ve got enough problems of my own to deal with without worrying about what’s going on between you and Emily. Yes, we slept together and, yes, as far a
s sex goes it was pretty darn good, but it didn’t change anything, the earth didn’t move that much! You’re still flying off to London tomorrow, I’m still going to be here and you’re still a liar!’

  ‘I’ve never lied to you, Tessa. The fact is you just don’t want to hear the truth!’

  ‘Then take the hint and leave me alone, Max.’

  ‘I don’t get you, Tess...’ He was shaking his head, looking at her with utter bemusement. She could smell whisky on his breath but she knew that the alcohol hadn’t touched the sides, that the raw emotion in his voice had nothing to do with too much to drink and everything to do with her. ‘For all the friendly smiles, for all the cosy chats and comradeship you bang on about, you don’t really let anyone within a square mile of you, do you? Why do you keep pushing me away, Tessa? Why won’t you hear me out? Why won’t you just let me love you?’

  ‘Because I don’t want your love, Max.’ She watched as he winced, amazing even herself at the assuredness in her voice. ‘So there’s really nothing more to say. I just want you to go.’

  ‘You don’t mean that.’

  ‘Yes, Max,’ Tessa said slowly, deliberately, even managing to look him in the eye as she did so, ‘I do mean it. I just want you to go and get on with your life, so that I can get on with mine.’

  Opening the office door, she watched as Emily teetered towards them, her eyes glittering from too many tears and too much champagne, and Tessa just managed a rueful shake of her head.

  ‘Your fiancée’s here, Max.’ Tessa gave him the blackest look she could muster. ‘Or should I say ex? I really can’t seem to keep up.’

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  THE only good thing about night duty, Tessa thought as she started her car on Saturday night, was that at least she been so exhausted after her shift she’d actually managed to sleep.

  Well, sort of.

  Looking at the clock on the dashboard, Tessa glanced up at the sky, squinting her eyes in the late evening sky, trying to make out a flash of silver, the sight of a plane.

  What was the point?