“I’m sorry,” said the brisk voice on the phone, “but I think you meant to call Dr. Forester. His number is 555-8189 and ours is 555-8198. This is Simply Suits in the mall. You didn’t mean to call Simply Suits, did you?”
My jaw dropped to the floor, which made it hard to talk, but if I could’ve talked I would’ve screamed, “Of course not, you idiot! Why would I call Simply Suits to tell them about my herpes?”
As I was trying to decide whether I should just hang up (which would be extremely rude according to the way I was brought up), the girl said, “Oh my God, is this Jane Dough? That’s what Caller ID says. This is Tina Coffey. Remember me from high school? I’m managing this place now. I never thought I’d be a manager, but I just love clothes. So what are you doing now? Oh, never mind. Sorry about the herpes. That’s a bitch.”
I managed to make it through two minutes of conversation with someone I couldn’t remember whatsoever while letting her think we had been best friends. Then I took a couple of deep breaths. I was an adult and I had an agenda, I told myself.
The next call went much differently. “Dr. Forester’s office,” said the receptionist.
“I’ve just moved here, so I’ve never been to Dr. Forester, but I have a rash on my … you know, and it’s really unbearable. I was wondering if there was any way Dr. Forester—of whom I’ve heard so many nice things—could fit me into his schedule.”
The very helpful receptionist gave me an appointment for that afternoon, and I gave her my insurance information.
Now I just had to get through the appointment.
*****
Dr. Forester’s office was fifteen miles away in a smallish, two-story, brown stucco medical building that had seen better days, and it had seen those better days fifty years ago from the looks of it. The tenants must have thought so too because a large sign at the entrance to the crumbling porte cochère announced their impending move to an ultra-modern medical plaza. I didn’t care how the place looked. In fact, the less distinguished the building, the less self-conscious I was sure to feel.
I was wearing a lacy pink thong with matching bra, just in case the doctor was young and good looking. He probably wouldn’t be asking me out, considering my problem, but a young, good-looking doctor … enough said.
The waiting room was packed with women who had never learned that it was rude to stare. Newcomers were collectively sized up and appraised from head to toe. I couldn’t get a fix on what they thought of me, and I didn’t care. My rash was driving me crazy, and the thong wasn’t helping.
When I finally met Dr. Forester in the examining room, I realized I could have saved myself the discomfort. He reminded me of Clarence, the angel who gives Jimmy Stewart a hard time in the old black and white movie It’s A Wonderful Life. He was of average height and weight, with some extra padding in the midsection. He had thick, unruly white hair and big, bushy eyebrows.
“So what seems to be the matter?” he asked kindly. I was too embarrassed to say.
“I’ve got … something,” I mumbled. I didn’t know whether or not to tell him of my suspicion. I decided I shouldn’t predispose him to that diagnosis.
“What?”
“I don’t know what. That’s why I’m here.”
“No, what did you say? You’ll have to speak up. I can’t hear as well as I used to,” he said, cupping his hand behind his ear.
Perfect. This wasn’t a conversation I wanted to have at all, let alone at ear-shattering volume. “I have something, you know, down there,” I said louder.
“Well, sure you do,” he shouted. “We’ve all got something down there, don’t we?” He let out a guffaw at his joke.
I didn’t want to seem like a bitch so I smiled—tightly—while he got over himself.
“Ahem, yes, well, let’s take a look,” he finally said.
I put my feet in the stirrups and scooted down the table while chanting my favorite mantra to myself. In twenty minutes this will all be over. In twenty minutes this will all be over. I’d been using that since the night before my first oral book report, substituting whatever period of time was appropriate. It worked, for the most part.
“Uh-oh,” he said.
I may not know a lot of things, but I do know that “uh-oh” isn’t something you want to hear your gynecologist say when he’s looking between your legs.
“What? What’s wrong?” I tried to steady my heartbeat by reciting “The Three Little Pigs” in my head. When I got to the third little piggy that had herpes, I almost flipped out.
“You have a fungus.”
Eeeew. That was even worse than uh-oh. “A fungus?” My voice was an octave above its normal range, so I took a deep breath and pulled it back down. “How did I get a fungus down there?”
The doctor stuck his head around the cloth covering my lower half. “What?” he yelled.
I shouted back, “How did I get a fungus down there?”
He stared at me, perplexed for a few seconds. “No, not down there. On your foot. It’s on the inside of your left foot. It’s just a little ringworm. You probably went outside without your shoes. Welcome to Florida. Get some of that ointment for jock itch and use it morning and night for six weeks.”
Jeez. Yesterday I would have been appalled to learn I had a fungus on my foot. Today I was relieved.
“What about the other?”
“Looks like a contact dermatitis rash,” he said as he got to his feet.
That was it? That was all he was going to say? I wasn’t paying someone to tell me it was a rash. That much I knew. Besides, that particular part of me hadn’t been contacted in months. From what I’d read online, contact dermatitis appeared immediately following the contact. Herpes, on the other hand, could show up at any time between contact and death.
“Are you sure it’s not herpes?” There. I’d said it. The dreaded “H” word.
“What?”
“Herpes!” I shouted. “Could I have herpes?”
“You have herpes?” He shrank back, as though afraid to stand too close.
“No! I mean, I don’t know! I mean, I suppose I could. I had sex with someone …”
“You had sex with your son?”
If I hadn’t been so worried, I’d have laughed out loud, as ridiculous as the conversation was. I deliberated on whether or not I should leave before the situation deteriorated further, but I hadn’t come this far to find out nothing. And the worst part was over, surely.
“Is there a test for herpes? I’d like to do the test for herpes, if you don’t mind.”
“I don’t mind,” the doctor said. “Just let me see if I can find it. I don’t do a lot of them. Most of my patients have enough sense to use condoms.”
I had sense too, but as far as I knew, they didn’t make a condom for someone’s tongue. You idiot, I told myself. The prospect of sex with Javiar Bardem after being sexless for almost two years had obviously knocked the sense right out of me.
The doctor rummaged through a couple of drawers and scanned the shelves of a cabinet. Then he went to the door and opened it. “Has anyone seen the test for herpes?” he shouted. “I’ve got this woman in here who thinks she has herpes.”
“Hey!” I said, but he was already out the door, closing it behind him. I could still hear him, though, and so could everyone else within a two-block radius.
“Jane Dough here thinks she has herpes,” he yelled out. “Has anyone seen the herpes culture kit?”
Holy crap! Was he really screaming my name out there within hearing distance of a packed waiting room? I did a frantic mental scan of the Health Information Privacy form, which might have worked if I had actually read it, but seeing as how it was a contract of sorts, I’d just skimmed and signed, as usual. I remembered a lot of worthless stuff about the people the doctor could leave messages with and verbose passages about signed releases, but I didn’t recall that shouting had been covered. But it had to be in there somewhere, didn’t it?
Maybe I was hallucinating.
Maybe what I really had was syphilis and it had gone to my brain. I sat there stunned until I heard him yell my name again and something about having sex with my son.
I shot off the table and yanked on my thong and capris. I shoved my feet into my sandals and ran to the door. I cracked it open a sliver and peeked through just in time to hear a woman on the waiting room side of the open glass window say, “I think it’s so professional that the doctor is using the name Jane Doe so that none of us knows who that poor woman with herpes is.” She squinted at the door I was shielding my body with, as though she had X-ray vision.
“Oh, no,” said the helpful receptionist. “Her name really is Jane Dough, but that’s D-O-U-G-H. You probably read about her in the paper. She writes those sexy romances under the name Janie Jansen.”
For God’s sake! Had no one read that privacy act? The buzz of excited conversation from the waiting room competed with the loud ringing in my ears. For two seconds the word lawsuit flashed through my mind—before it was knocked out by the words reporters and herpes. I snapped myself out of my daze and concluded there was no way I was walking out past those women.
I grabbed my purse and ran to the window, the only other way out of the room. I could jump from the second story if I had to. I’d done it lots of times as a kid. It was one of those stupid things I did to prove I wasn’t afraid of heights, though I definitely was. My knees were paying the price now, and they’d probably break when I did it this time, at this age, but I didn’t care.
I flipped open the vertical blinds and almost fainted with relief. I was at the front of the building; the overhang of the porte cochère was directly below.
I slid open the window, straddled the sill, and paused while I asked myself if I really wanted to do this. Hell, yes! was the answer. They might have heard my name, but they didn’t have a face to put with it—yet. What were the chances that most of those women in the waiting room had cellphone cameras? Pretty good, I was thinking, and those cellphones were probably pointed at the door in eager anticipation now. If my picture was in the morning paper with the word herpes in the headlines, I would probably have to kill myself.
I gulped in some air and chanted aloud, “In ten minutes this will all be over. In ten minutes this will all be over.”
I dropped about a foot onto the overhang and scrambled, half sliding, half tumbling down the sloping roof to the closest point to the ground. Crouching there, I peered over the edge to make sure no one was directly beneath me, and my body went so weak I almost fell over, head first. It was only about eight feet or so, but my brain didn’t seem to get it.
I pitched my bag to the ground, rolled over into a prone position, and slid my legs over the edge. I heard something rip, but I kept going, scooting farther and farther, fearing the moment that I would be so far over that I’d have to drop and hang by my arms. I didn’t think I could actually hang by my arms since I hadn’t worked out in ten years—okay, never—but I had no choice. Any minute I’d be forced to switch my weight to my arms. My muscles would fail, and I would fall. It occurred to me that I should have looked for a place where there was grass beneath me instead of concrete. Crap.
I heard a shout that sounded like, “Catch her!” I couldn’t tell where it came from but my bet was the open window. My heart was pounding so hard I was sure it would leap out of my chest. They probably thought I had robbed the doctor’s examining room and was making my getaway.
I decided I didn’t care if I hit concrete. No matter how much it hurt, I was getting out of there. I didn’t know if I could go to jail for fleeing a doctor’s office out the window, but I wasn’t sticking around to ask. I switched my weight to my arms and dangled for a moment. Then I let go—at the same instant that someone caught me and swung me to the ground. I turned around on shaky legs expecting to face a security guard, but that wasn’t what I saw.
He was drop-dead gorgeous, early thirties, and more than half a foot taller than me, with broad shoulders and thick, dark hair that was curling a little onto his collar. He had the most amazing gray eyes, and they were sparkling with humor. I took in his long white coat and the name tag that said Dr. Bryan Rossi.
Great. Now I meet a young, good-looking doctor.
He smiled, revealing one sexy dimple. My knees gave out and I stumbled. He caught me again, but this time he didn’t let go so fast.
“You aren’t trying to get out of paying your bill, are you?” He sported a curious grin.
“Certainly not!” I did my very best to sound indignant. In my experience that worked when you wanted people to mind their own business. At least it worked when other people did it to me. He let me go, and I straightened my clothes and myself in an attempt to look like anything other than a woman who had crawled out a second-story window and rolled to the ground. “In fact, I’ll pay them double if they’ll take my name off the roster and forget I was here.”
The grin grew wider.
“I’m serious. And don’t worry about the bill. They’ll get their money. They know where I live.”
I turned on my heel and strode off with as much dignity as I could muster, considering I’d lost one of my shoes. It was my favorite pair of sandals too, but I was so glad to get away without further humiliation that I told myself I didn’t care.
When I got home I went straight to the bathroom, tore off my clothes, and stood under the pulsating shower massage until what seemed like bedtime. I put the unfortunate incident out of my mind. Tomorrow would mark my first full day working my butt off to get my property in conformance, and that meant I needed a good night’s sleep.
As I was getting out of the shower, it hit me that in spite of all I’d been through at the doctor’s office, I hadn’t gotten any blasted medicine for my rash or herpes or whatever it was.
Dang!
Chapter 5
I was jarred awake by an insistent doorbell. I slid out of bed and staggered, sore in places I didn’t know I had. Criminy. How was I going to whip my yard into shape when I was so out of shape myself?
I pulled on clothes that I grabbed off the floor and peeked out the peephole to see my sister Nicole, who’s two years older than me. When we were kids we passed for twins. We had the same dark blond hair and blue eyes, were the same average height and build, and wore the same clothes. While our faces have changed, most physical characteristics still match, except for our hair. My dark blond was a little longer than shoulder length and when not in a ponytail, pretty much hung as it pleased, while Nicole’s, a golden blond, was styled in a becoming, angled bob.
Nicole was wearing a pink rayon two-piece jacket and dress that cut across her knees. Her low-heeled matching pumps and shoulder bag completed the ensemble, making her look every inch the respectable young lady ready for church even though she was headed to her job as project manager for a local technology firm.
I did a quick downward sweep of my own attire. A blue-and-purple-striped pajama top with a mustard stain in the middle. Green and white polka-dotted pajama bottoms that I’d pulled on inside out. No one would mistake us for twins now.
I thought about going back to bed, but Nicole would never let me get away with that. There is an interesting dynamic between us, one that’s been there since my birth. In a family where everyone would rather be dead than say what’s really on their minds, Nicole and I say exactly what we think, but only to each other. I previously thought we spoke freely because we respected each other enough not to lie, but I’ve since changed my mind. We just know each other so well there’s no point in lying. Plus neither of us is willing to spend the extra time it takes to dance around the truth.
The pained, impatient look on Nicole’s face told me I was in for a worthless visit where my conduct was dissected and criticized, followed by advice that would have more to do with what people thought than what I wanted.
I yanked open the door and was smacked in the stomach by a newspaper. Like the whirlwind she usually is, Nicole passed me without stopping. She propelled herself down the hal
l to the bathroom, entered, and slammed the door. From behind the door she yelled, “Go ahead and explain it. Not that I expect to believe anything you say, but I’d just like to hear it from your mouth. For posterity.”
“Your posterity or mine?” I shouted back. The chances of my having one weren’t looking so good.
I unfolded the paper and shrieked. There I was—or rather, there my ass was—hanging over the roof of the medical clinic. I now knew what that ripping sound had been.
I squeezed my eyes shut for a minute to shield myself from the ghastly photo, though of course that didn’t work since I opened them to take a second look. In fact, I couldn’t seem to stop looking, and I finally understood about not being able to turn away from a car crash.
The only thing worse than having your butt caught mooning the world in a thong was to have a large black dot stamped over it as though the sight might emotionally scar the reading public for life. Or maybe that wasn’t worse. At least most of my butt was hidden behind the dot. A rather humungous dot, unfortunately. I wanted to kill the guy who invented the cellphone camera. It had to have been a guy. A woman would never invent something that could record us at moments like this.
Above the picture the headline read, Romance Writer Shows More Than Guts. Oh, for Heaven’s sake. I didn’t read the article. I didn’t want to know if the word herpes was in there. I didn’t want to have to kill myself.
“What will people think?” Nicole yelled over the flushing of the toilet. “First the husband hunting and now this. I’m not even going to ask what you were doing on that roof. All I want to know is, are you trying to destroy our reputations?”
Hmmm. I was the one with the butt hanging out for the whole world to see, but did anyone in the family think about me? No! But I was expected to think about them, and worry about what everyone else would think about them, thanks to their association with me.
“Gee, Nicole, it seems that you’d be asking some different questions if you cared about me at all. Like, ‘Jane, you aren’t going to have a breakdown over your butt being in front of the whole world, are you?’ Or ‘Jane, you didn’t hurt yourself climbing out of a two-story window and jumping to the ground, did you?’”
Rules of Lying (Jane Dough Series) Page 4