by Cara Malone
“Krys!” Chloe called as soon as she walked into the chapel. She waved Krys over to a row of pews where she was sitting with Ivy and a couple of women Krys didn’t recognize. Megan and Alex were standing at the altar with their hands linked together, the pastor behind them discussing stage directions for the two of them.
“They look like they’re really getting married,” Krys said with a huge grin as she slid into the pew behind Ivy and Chloe.
“Yeah, it’s happening,” Ivy said, an amazed look on her face. “They’re nuts.”
Chloe bumped her shoulder into Ivy’s and Ivy grinned back at her, wrapping her arm around Chloe. Then Chloe introduced Krys to the other two women sitting in the pew.
“This is Megan’s childhood best friend, Ruby,” she said, putting her hand on the shoulder of the very pregnant woman beside her. “And her wife, Max.”
“It’s nice to meet you,” Krys said, extending her hand to both of them over the top of the pew. Ruby looked to be around seven months pregnant and had that fabled glow about her, and her wife, a short-haired blonde woman with her hand clasped in Ruby’s, smiled but seemed a little more reserved.
“They came all the way from Ohio to be at the rehearsal,” Chloe said. “Ruby’s family lives in Chicago.”
Krys smiled – Chloe certainly had the gift of gab and she could become friends with just about anyone given enough social proximity. The five of them talked for a little while, keeping their voices low so as not to disturb the pastor, and then it was time for the readings.
Krys had memorized hers almost as soon as she’d received it and it had been sort of fun – like reviewing flash cards when she was a medical student. When the pastor called her up, she gave Megan and Alex a happy wave, then went to the podium at the left of the altar. There was a copy of her speech in a binder there, but Krys didn’t need it tonight, nor would she use it on the day of the wedding.
When she leaned into the microphone and started to recite it, the pastor cut her off.
“I won’t make you do the whole thing tonight,” he said with a smile. “This is just a dry run to make sure everyone knows their place in the order of the ceremony. Thank you, dear.”
So Krys sat back down and the pastor called Ruby to the altar to repeat the process.
“Everyone’s dressed up,” Krys said, leaning forward to whisper to Ivy and Chloe. “I’m still in scrubs from the clinic.”
“At least you’re not in a tuberculosis ward,” Ivy said.
“That’s true,” Krys answered. “Darcy, Mary and I still have to get the second half of the test in a couple weeks to make sure we’re not carrying a latent form of the virus.”
“You’ll be fine,” Chloe said. Then a sparkle came into her eyes and she said, “So how is Darcy?”
“Umm, she’s fine,” Krys said, playing dumb. She knew exactly what Chloe was driving at, but she refused to acknowledge it.
“She is fine,” Ivy said with a raise of her brows.
“You know, I could kill you for putting that thought into my head when she first came into the emergency department,” Krys said. “You got me all flustered and I felt like an idiot in front of her.”
“Because you like her?” Chloe asked.
“Just because you’re blissfully happy in your relationship doesn’t mean everyone has to be paired up,” Krys said. Chloe had been pitching different women to Krys for months now, trying to force her into a relationship because she thought Krys worked too hard, and the rest of their friends had jumped on board with the idea.
“How can blissful happiness be a bad thing?” Max asked as Ruby slid back into the seat beside her and took her hand again.
“Great,” Krys said to Chloe. “You’ve gotten them to gang up on me, too?”
“That’s enough from the peanut gallery,” the pastor said.
“Sorry,” Chloe called back. “Megan and Alex, you both look beautiful up there!”
After the rehearsal was over, the whole crowd drove into Chicago to have dinner at a fancy restaurant. The food was phenomenal and after the meal, Chloe and Megan both hooked their claws into Krys, convincing her to stick around and have a drink.
They went outside to a patio bar with soft white string lights all around the perimeter and a few of the tall buildings in downtown Chicago. No sooner had Krys picked up her beer bottle than Chloe was back on the subject of her romantic life.
She was relentless when she wanted to be.
“Darcy seems really nice,” she said.
Then, apropos of nothing, Megan added, “Why don’t you invite her to the wedding?”
Krys nearly choked on her drink.
“Because I just met her,” Krys said, ticking off the reasons. “Because I don’t want her to get the wrong impression.”
“What impression?” Chloe asked. “That you’re into her? Because it seemed pretty obvious by the way you were blushing like a maniac in the hospital room.”
“Is she into men?” Megan asked as Alex came over and joined the group, handing Megan a whiskey sour.
“Definitely not,” Krys said, and Chloe elbowed her in the side until she rolled her eyes. “Here’s a reason – I can’t ask her to be my date to the wedding because she already asked me out and I turned her down.”
“Krys!” Chloe chastised. “Why did you do that?”
“I don’t have time for a girlfriend,” Krys said. “I spend eighty hours a week in the ER and another ten to thirty in the clinic. When would I date?”
“You could cut back on your clinic hours,” Megan suggested. “Come on – I see the way you look at me and Alex, and Ivy and Chloe. You know you want this.”
She slid her arm around Alex’s waist and kissed her temple. Megan was right – Krys did want a love life, but that want was hidden deep beneath everything else. It had been buried for many years and uncovering it would be no simple task.
“I just see so much loss every day at my job,” she said, taking a long swig from her beer bottle. “People come into the ER and they were having a totally normal day. Then they get sick out of nowhere, or get in a car accident, and that’s it for them. And I have to watch their family members deal with that unexpected loss – it’s unreal. I just don’t think I could handle something like that, and if I’m not in the ER working, then more people are losing their loved ones. I only get a hundred and sixty-eight hours a week and I’d rather spend them saving lives than getting attached.”
“That’s one of the saddest things I’ve ever heard,” Megan said, pulling Alex a little closer.
“It’s hard to lose someone you love,” Alex said. “Trust me, I know that. But what’s the point in living if you don’t pour your heart into your relationships?”
They all pondered this for a moment as Krys finished her beer in one long gulp. Then she set it on the bar and said, “Well, she’s persistent, so I guess we’ll see what happens.”
Chloe grinned and said, “I knew I liked her.”
Krys changed the topic of conversation to the lovebirds, asking Megan and Alex how the wedding planning was going now that their date was fast approaching. They talked about Megan’s mom catering the event and the fact that they’d decided to go dress shopping together instead of turning it into a big reveal moment in the church.
And then, when they excused themselves to mingle with their other guests, Megan gave Krys a conspiring look and said, “Don’t show up stag to my wedding. I already put you down for a plus one.”
Krys just shook her head.
“Meddlesome,” she said, but in the back of her mind, she started to wonder what it would be like to bring Darcy to the wedding. She probably looked stunning in formalwear – or anything other than scrubs, for that matter – and Krys imagined that Darcy would be a lot of fun at a wedding. If she could make a hospital room interesting, surely nothing was outside of her wheelhouse.
Of course, it was fantasy to think that Darcy would actually want to come. Sure, she was flirtatious in the moments whe
n they were alone in the clinic, and their quarantine date had been fun, but who wants to go to a wedding full of strangers on their second date?
Hospital room for the first date, wedding on the second, Krys thought. It would make for an amusing story if nothing else. But it was not going to happen. It would only send mixed signals to Darcy, who had to be confused by now.
Krys couldn’t help melting a little bit every time Darcy laid those gorgeous, dark eyes on her, and she’d given in to small flirtations ever since their impromptu date. She found herself taking a little more care with her hair when she knew Darcy would be at the clinic, slicking it with product to make it extra glossy, and she’d even impulsively bought a tin of tinted lip balm from the hospital gift shop one afternoon. She never wore makeup – there was no time to bother with it – but when she saw the rose-colored balm, she wondered if Darcy would notice it.
In the end, Krys chickened out and left it in her locker at the hospital. Even if it made Darcy’s eyes linger on Krys’s lips a few seconds longer, there was no point in leading her on.
She was amazing and the attraction was mutual, but Krys didn’t want a relationship, nor did she have time for one. It would be cruel to ask Darcy to the wedding, no matter what Megan and Chloe had to say about it.
10
Darcy
Darcy’s father doted on her after she got home from the hospital and he cooked steaks on the grill during their weekly family dinner with Daniel just to celebrate the fact that nothing bad came out of her exposure to tuberculosis. It was nice, but with his job as a commercial pilot, Darcy knew that all good things had to come to an end. He was back in the air again a few days later, and then Darcy was by herself like she always was.
Well, it was just her and Harvey, and lingering thoughts of her strange date with the mysterious Dr. Stevens.
To distract herself, Darcy clicked on Harvey’s leash and took him to the dog park often. The days were hot and the sun was high in the sky. Harvey was typically panting before they even made it to the end of the street and Darcy always took him straight to the water fountain to hydrate when they arrived at the park.
When he’d had his fill, she unclipped Harvey’s leash and let him run.
On this day, he bounded immediately over to a standard poodle that hung around the park often and who Darcy suspected Harvey was in love with. She found a bench in the shade and watched them chase each other for a while as she let her mind wander.
Krys was something else and even though it had taken place in a hospital room under threat of a serious infection, Darcy was inclined to count their first date as a success. There had been some real chemistry between them, even with a half-dozen of Krys’s doctor friends coming by to check on her all the time.
There was just one thing about that day that wasn’t sitting quite right with Darcy.
When she called her dad, he’d been worried about her, but he’d also sounded alarmed that Darcy hadn’t told her mom about the exposure. Any other mom would want to know about something like that, and might even come down to the hospital to visit her in full protective gear. Darcy had told her brother about it, assuming the news would make its way down the pipeline to her mother, but she never heard from her.
As Darcy watched Harvey pounce on the standard poodle and roll with her into a patch of dirt, she thought it wasn’t entirely her mother’s fault.
Darcy hadn’t done anything to reach out to her since she’d gotten home, either.
She watched the dogs for a few more minutes, letting the idea ruminate, and finally she dug her phone out of her pocket and dialed her brother’s number.
“Hey, Daniel,” she said as soon as he picked up. “It’s me. Got a second?”
“Sure, what’s up?” he asked. Daniel was a few years older than Darcy, but he’d always been a good big brother. She hoped he was still up to the task.
“You and Mom still see each other regularly, right?” she asked.
“Yeah, I have dinner at her place every Friday,” Daniel said. “You know that.”
Darcy breathed deeply, then asked, “Did she ever ask about me when I was in the hospital? I mean the first time, for my leg.”
“Of course,” Daniel said. “I kept her updated the whole time.”
“But she never came to see me,” Darcy said.
“She thought you didn’t want to see her,” Daniel said.
So this is my fault, Darcy thought with a twinge of irritation. She’d been in a decade-long standoff with her mother and who knew how many years her mother had been blaming her for their silence, while Darcy was pointing the finger at her mom? Well, someone has to be the bigger person.
Maybe it was listening to Krys talk about her parents, who would love to see her if they didn’t live on the other side of the country. Or maybe it was just time. She took another deep breath and said, “I think it’s time to bury the hatchet, or at least try to.”
“You want to come to dinner at Mom’s house?” Daniel asked. Darcy could hear the optimism in his voice and she wished she could temper it – this wouldn’t be an easy relationship to repair.
“No,” Darcy said, exaggerating the word. “No, I’m not ready for that. But maybe we could get coffee sometime – all three of us. Do you think you could ask her for me?”
It seemed silly, being a grown woman afraid to talk directly to her mother, but if Daniel didn’t do the asking, Darcy would probably never build up the courage.
“Sure,” Daniel said, and Darcy let out a long breath of relief. “Whatever will get you two back to normal.”
“Thank you,” Darcy said. She gave him a few dates and times that would work for her, then they hung up and she called Harvey away from his poodle friend. “Come on, buddy, let’s get out of this heat. You’ll get your chance with the poodle again some other day.”
The next time Darcy saw Krys, she was whipping into the clinic parking lot in her little Honda like she was late to save the world.
Darcy had just climbed out of her truck to start her volunteer shift and made an exaggerated jump to safety as Krys pulled into a spot further down the row. Darcy waited for her and when Krys got out of the car, she asked, “How was the wedding rehearsal?”
“I didn’t even get to recite my speech,” Krys said, sounding pouty. It made Darcy smile.
“You were the teacher’s pet in school, weren’t you?” she asked.
“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Krys said. “I was my high school valedictorian and I graduated both college and medical school with honors.”
“Did they give you a medal to wear around your neck all the time?” Darcy teased her. “World’s Best Student.”
“They should have,” Krys said, refusing to be made fun of.
Darcy smiled, and suddenly she had an idea. “Hey, do you remember that nude painting class I told you about? It wasn’t a joke.”
In fact, it was happening tomorrow night. Darcy had been thinking about how she was going to make good on her promise to get Krys out of the hospital and the clinic, and also about ways she could avoid showing up alone to what was sure to be an embarrassing meet-up. Sipping wine and painting a naked lady in a group of strangers just sounded sad, but doing it with a girl she really liked sounded like the most delightful type of mutual humiliation – one that would offer plenty of opportunities to bond.
“No way,” Krys said, shaking her head adamantly. “I know where you’re going with this and you can forget about it.”
“Are you afraid of the naked female form?” Darcy challenged. “Or afraid your art skills have atrophied?”
“I know my art skills are no good – that’s why I became a doctor and not a painter,” Krys said as they headed across the parking lot, gravel crunching beneath their feet. She laughed and added, “But I’m not afraid. I see naked people almost every day.”
“So come paint one with me,” Darcy said. “It’s tomorrow night and I already know you’re not on the clinic schedule. There will be wine
involved, and it’ll be funny if nothing else.”
“I don’t think so,” Krys said, holding the door for Darcy to enter the clinic. “The meet-up thing is not really my scene.”
“Okay,” Darcy said, a little disappointed but not surprised. She’d have to try harder if she was going to tear down Krys’s walls.
As they walked down the hall to the treatment room, Krys said, “Oh, the boy with TB got discharged this morning. He’s going to make a full recovery once he finishes his course of antibiotics.”
“That’s good news,” Darcy said, but she didn’t get a chance to say much more. It was a busy afternoon and every bed in the treatment room was filled. Russell was rushing from one bed to the next and Krys jumped immediately into the fray to help out. Darcy leaned her cane against the file cabinet where it would be handy if she needed it but tucked out of the way, and she got to work.
She really liked volunteering at the clinic. She’d worked about a dozen shifts by now and she was beginning to really feel needed here, which was welcome after three months of shiftlessness, fruitless meet-ups and daytime television. She watched Krys effortlessly slip out of their conversation and into her role as a physician, smiling and reassuring the patient in bed three as she popped his obviously dislocated shoulder back into place.
Darcy wanted Krys badly – or at least she wanted the chance to get to know her better – but she also wanted to belong here at the clinic. She didn’t want to push Krys too hard and end up losing both.
The team treated patients, settling into a rhythm together, until the afternoon rush was over. Russell and the other medical assistant went home around dinnertime, when most of the patients were also home tending to their families, and for a couple of minutes, it was just Krys and Darcy in the treatment room. They changed all the bedsheets and restocked the supplies for the next round of patients, and then there was nothing to do.
Krys leaned up against the row of file cabinets and glanced at Darcy’s cane in the corner.