by Lilian Darcy
Sharon Curtis talked about a new restaurant. Circulating nurse Barbara Thompson outlined her holiday plans. Dylan asked Annabelle about her weekend. Casually. He always did it casually, and if she guessed that he was still looking for ways to make her life a little easier, she didn’t let on.
Why should she? He hadn’t succeeded in his mission to any significant extent. Once, during the past three weeks, she had let him buy her lunch—but only because he’d offered to buy Barb’s at the same time. Annabelle had also mentioned that her car needed some work, and he’d recommended the place where he had his own vehicle serviced. Later, he had phoned the head mechanic and asked him to look out for her.
‘Do me a favour, OK?’
‘Tell me what it is first, Dr Calford!’
‘If the bill is more than a hundred dollars or so, leave some of the items off her statement and charge them to my account.’
‘No problem.’
The invoice he had received a few days later told him he’d saved her a whole thirty-seven dollars and eighty-eight cents.
As a way of easing the economic burden that had fallen onto Annabelle because she hadn’t married Alex Sturgess, Dylan was barely making a dent. Should he leave the whole thing alone? Put it down to an over-developed sense of responsibility on his part, and ignore it until it went away?
And what about that moment—that very long, slow, intense moment—four weeks ago, when they’d almost kissed? Where did that fit in?
Today, Dylan could only file it under I for Inconvenient. He didn’t want it. Not yet. Not with someone he had to see every day, and the kind of woman he had to take very seriously or not take at all. Life had been a lot simpler four and a half weeks ago, when he hadn’t known what Sister Annabelle Drew looked like in a wedding gown and a bathing suit. He wished he’d never found out.
‘Want to tell me how we got to this point with this patient?’ he asked the resident, in an effort to distract himself from the pain of his back and the unwanted pleasure of watching the way Annabelle’s body moved beneath the soft fabric of her green surgical gear.
‘You mean the whole history?’ James Nguyen said.
‘Quick summary, from when he got carried off the rugby field, with his knee packed in ice.’
‘OK. Well, I’d guess that was probably some kind of twisting injury.’
‘Yep, a high-grade synovial tear.’
‘And you would have had him in for pinhole surgery. Fibreoptic instruments inserted into the joint.’
‘And what did we do?’
‘Shaved the detached tissue and sucked it out,’ James said promptly.
‘Graphic, but correct.’
‘But obviously that wasn’t enough?’
‘No, we found evidence of a big cruciate tear, quite a mess.’
‘So we had to actually open up the knee.’
‘Which is what we’re doing now. Have a look.’ Dylan leaned forward a little, and a fresh spasm of agony attacked him. His hand tensed and shook for a moment, and he hoped no one had seen. ‘See how I’m going to shift the leg now? Or rather, get you to shift it and keep it there.’
‘That’s a better angle, isn’t it?’
‘Gets to be instinctive after a while.’
In the half-second left before he touched scalpel to flesh to make the cut, Dylan flashed a quick look at Annabelle. If anyone guessed that he was having trouble and pain, it would be her. Nothing to do with the chemistry that had built between them lately, but purely because she was such a cool-headed and experienced theatre nurse.
Her brown eyes met his, but he couldn’t read her expression. She looked as composed as ever. She wasn’t frowning. Not that he could see below the blue line of her mask anyway.
His own face felt as tightly screwed up as a piece of unwanted paper and he felt himself sweating. Great! Just great! His body was paying for its excesses just as surely as this patient was paying for his years as a professional rugby player. So much for new beginnings!
But I’m only thirty-three! Dylan thought. The weekend wasn’t that physical, was it?
The rugby player’s knee was a mess, they found. Much worse than Dylan had expected it to be. From the history reported by the patient, he remembered that there had been some knee trouble a few seasons earlier. ‘Nothing big. Didn’t stop me from playing,’ Jason Gregory had said.
Perhaps he should have stopped, however, because playing with the damaged knee had made it a lot worse. There was extensive damage to the bone surface now, with some necrosis—death, in layman’s terms—at the ends of both major leg bones.
Dylan glanced at the patient’s face, looking peaceful, slack and unaware beneath the uncompromising glare of the overhead lights. Although slightly distorted by the tube protruding from the man’s mouth, it was a strong and well-proportioned face, attached to a powerhouse body. Jason Gregory had appeared on magazine covers more than once as sporting hero, hunky pin-up and family man. By all accounts, he was a decent guy, a faithful husband, a keen father and a real team player.
But he would need a complete knee reconstruction, and he would never play professional rugby again.
And I’m going to be the one to give him the news, Dylan realised. How’s he going to take it?
At his age, a player of his calibre could reasonably expect another five years in the game. Had he invested his earnings well? Had he considered his future? Not all former players could make it as coaches or commentators. Not all of them had good heads for business, or a second skill they could turn to once their playing days were over.
How did a man deal with having to give up the career he loved, the vocation that had done so much to make him who he was? When it was gone, what was left?
‘Here’s something that didn’t show up during the earlier surgery,’ Dylan told the resident. He indicated the extensive areas of bone damage, the necrotic ends and the mess of injuries to the ligaments.
The very young-looking Dr Nguyen whistled. ‘What are we going to do?’
‘Patch it up for now and plan a complete reconstruction for later. There’s no choice. Get in closer and have a look, because it’s a degree of damage you might not get to see again for a while.’
Dylan stepped sideways to make more room for the junior surgeon. As he bent over the surgical field, he felt his back burn and spasm with pain once more.
Annabelle had noticed something of what he was feeling.
Dylan wasn’t certain of this until two hours later, after Jason Gregory had left Recovery to return to his private room in the orthopaedic ward. In the interim, Dylan had done a routine knee replacement on an elderly woman. He felt exhausted from the effort of battling the pain, and more exhausted from the effort of hiding it. It had subsided now, fortunately.
His fears hadn’t. He’d chewed painkillers like caramel toffees after Jason Gregory’s surgery, and they’d kicked in about an hour ago. Painkillers weren’t an ongoing solution, however. What was going on in his body?
‘Are you OK, Dylan?’ Annabelle fixed him with her big brown eyes as he poured himself a brimming mug of tea. He had the vague notion that the drink would be soothing, and definitely didn’t want the stimulant effect of coffee, or its bitter taste in his mouth.
‘I’m fine,’ he answered.
He was fine now, physically, thanks to the painkillers. He’d only taken them for the sake of his performance in surgery. Couldn’t risk freezing or doubling up or getting distracted when he had an open knee or hip on the table in front of him and a whole team of people taking their cues from his own performance.
‘You looked concerned back there,’ Annabelle persisted. ‘Was it Jason Gregory’s knee? You weren’t expecting he would need a total reconstruction, were you?’
‘No, I wasn’t, but when we opened up the knee and I saw what it looked like, it didn’t make sense to consider anything else. You heard what I was saying to James.’
He leaned against the counter-top, partly to get himself safely out of her a
ura and partly to test whether his back would behave. It did. The painkillers? Or his cautious movement?
Annabelle’s aura was another matter. No woman should smell that good after four hours of surgery. A little steamy, because it was hot and she’d worked hard, but still clean and sweet, like soap and flowers.
‘Will he be able to play again?’ she asked.
‘Realistically? No, he won’t,’ Dylan answered. ‘Not professionally. Some players might get bullheaded about it and try.’
She had her hair twisted into a knot on the top of her head, and a couple of the pins were coming loose. Any minute now it would tumble down to her shoulders, releasing its scent of shampoo. No, OK, she’d felt that it was about to fall. She was reaching up to push the pins back in. The soft green fabric of her top moved across her breasts and he had to fight not to watch. He focused on her face, which wasn’t any less attractive than the rest of her body but a lot more acceptable as the object of a man’s gaze.
‘Playing professionally is all that counts at his level,’ she was saying. ‘How are you going to tell him?’
‘Straight. No ifs or buts. The way I hope someone would tell me if I were in the same position.’ A small, distracting throb of fear ran through him. ‘I don’t want him thinking he’s got a chance at one of those one-in-a-million medical miracles they make TV movies about. I’ll tell him why, and what would happen if he tried, and why he can’t exercise to compensate, and what will happen if there’s damage to the other knee as well.’
‘And then you’ll let him go away and try to put his life back together.’
‘Are you saying I should do it differently? Or that I should do more? I think it would be wrong to encourage him to play again. To hold out false hope for him, and risk even worse damage.’
‘No, I’m not questioning any of that. But you look as if you want to do more, as if this has hit you quite hard. Is it because he’s such a star player?’
No, it’s because my back is killing me. Like a sixty-five-year-old man who overdid the pruning and fertilising in his rose garden on the weekend.
It had better not be the start of a pattern! he threatened inwardly, not knowing where to direct his anger. It had better not get any worse!
‘When someone’s profession is such a big thing in his life, it’s always going to be hard,’ he answered Annabelle, his voice a little rougher than usual. ‘Nothing to do with being a star. It’s the ramifications. What if he’s…’ he cleared his throat ‘…not good at anything else? What if he’s left with no belief in himself?’
Annabelle nodded, moved by the way Dylan spoke with such blunt feeling. She reached for a clean mug, draining upside down on the sink, then watched covertly as he strode across to the fridge, opened the door and hunted for the milk.
He was moving a little stiffly today. His usual animal-like ease with his body seemed to be missing. She remembered the way he’d swum in her pool, tan-line free, and wondered, Is it because of me? I feel as if I move in an unnatural way when I’m around him, too. That stupid moment four weeks ago when I thought we were going to kiss…I think about it—relive it—every time I get within a metre of him, and that happens too often!
Three or four days a week, five or six hours a day, in surgery.
He still had his back to her, standing in front of the fridge. Beneath the hospital green scrub pants, she could see the faint dark shadow of his black underwear—or maybe it was navy—and the edge of a white T-shirt, coming untucked at his waist. It revealed a small, crooked triangle of smooth, beach-brown skin.
He had one elbow propped against the top rim of the fridge, and with the other hand he was probing a spot low on his spine, as if he was testing a bruise. After a few more seconds, he reached cautiously for the milk.
She almost said something, teased him about overdoing it on the weekend, but then he turned and his expression was so preoccupied and closed that she didn’t dare to say anything at all.
‘Nothing’s come up yet,’ the unit co-ordinator, Ruth Stacey, told Annabelle half an hour later in her private office. ‘You’re highly trained and you work in a specialised field, which means it’s not easy to move you around.’
‘That’s what I wanted to say.’ Annabelle sat up straighter, then leaned forward. She tried to sound efficient, rather than as if she was begging, although the latter was closer to the truth. ‘I’d be willing to switch to night relief work, and just go where I’m needed, for the sake of changing my hours. I know I haven’t done general ward nursing or obstetrics for a while, but if you talked to the director of nursing…’
Ruth Stacey shook her head. ‘I’m not taking you out of the theatre suite,’ she said. ‘That’s where you’re needed. You know that scrub nurses with your experience aren’t thick on the ground. Leave it with me. Something will come up in time.’
‘Oh, I’m sure,’ Annabelle said, obedient on the outside, rebellious within. ‘Thanks for keeping it in mind.’
She appreciated that Ruth had other priorities, and didn’t want to push the unit co-ordinator any harder than she already had.
So, change hospitals?
She thought about it as she left Ruth’s office. Any other hospital in the city would add at least an hour to her daily commute between home and work and Mum’s, but that might be worthwhile for the right timetable.
Although she knew it wasn’t Ruth’s fault, she hated being put on hold like this. A flat ‘No, I can’t change your shifts’ might have been easier than this ‘Be patient and I’ll try to work something out for you’ message she’d received on both her visits to the unit coordinator’s office.
Out in the corridor a minute later, she was in no mood to meet Dylan. Both of them were on their way back to the theatre suite for another two or three hours of surgery.
What’s Duncan doing right now? Annabelle wondered. Having an afternoon rest, as he’s supposed to do? Or pestering the staff, disturbing the other children and trying to escape outside so he can run around? He needs me, and I don’t want to be here!
‘We’ve got another sportsman’s knee coming up,’ Dylan told her as they walked side by side towards the lifts. ‘Should start a public awareness campaign. Warning—exercise can be dangerous to your joints.’
Annabelle could tell that the black humour was an effort. He was feeling the same as she was. ‘You don’t want to be here today, do you, Dr Calford?’ she said.
‘Not much.’
‘When are you going to talk to Jason Gregory?’
‘Tomorrow morning, probably.’
‘Tell me how it goes. If you want to,’ she added quickly. ‘If you need to offload. I mean, I saw that ruined knee, too.’
‘Thanks,’ he answered, but she had the feeling he had hardly heard.
In the end, Dylan told his sports-star patient the devastating news a little sooner than he’d planned. He needed to see another post-op patient in the two-bed room directly opposite Jason Gregory’s private one, and heard the rugby player talking to his wife, Jan, as he crossed the corridor to Jason’s room.
‘Feels crummy.’
‘Ask Sturgess if it’s supposed to,’ Jan replied.
‘Wasn’t Sturgess who operated. It was Calford. He’s meant to be one of the best. He did Mark Allwood’s knee last season, and he was playing again in about six weeks.’
‘That’s great!’
Yes, it was, Dylan agreed. But Mark Allwood’s knee hadn’t been anywhere near as bad as Jason’s. He’d had a simple, low-grade synovial tear, easily dealt with through pinhole surgery.
Pausing in the doorway, he watched as Jason and his wife both turned to look at him. Their faces were expectant, nervous, hopeful. He took a deep breath.
‘Let’s have a talk about your surgery,’ he said. ‘If you’re feeling up to it, that is.’
‘Still a bit wonky,’ Jason answered. ‘But go on. Let’s hear it. While Jan’s here. She’s better at coming up with the right questions than I am.’
‘L
ike when will he be able to start training again?’ Jan started at once. ‘How much physio will he need? How much should it be hurting right now?’
‘Let’s start at the beginning,’ Dylan said.
When he moved to the end of the bed and leaned on the high, wheeled meal tray, his back gave another spasm.
If this was me, hearing this sort of news about my future, how would I take it? he thought, and his stomach felt sick and leaden as he began to speak.
‘What did Jason Gregory say?’ Annabelle asked Dylan the next day, between operations.
‘He’s going to get a second opinion.’
‘From who?’
‘Alex, I expect.’
‘Well, Alex is good. And experienced.’
‘More so than me, obviously.’
‘Yes. He’s been doing it longer.’
There was a tiny silence, as if both of them felt uncomfortable about the intrusion of Alex’s name into the conversation. Annabelle certainly did. It was like an old injury. You thought it had healed, then it flared up worse than ever after one small bump.
‘Gregory’s not suggesting you’ve overreacted to the problem, is he?’ Annabelle asked finally.
Dylan looked tired and stressed. As if he hadn’t slept, or was fighting off an infection. Somehow, though, the fatigue lines around his eyes and mouth took nothing away from his male appeal. Annabelle was as strongly caught up in it as she always seemed to be just lately.
The knowledge nagged at her—taunted her almost. It was as if some malign voice was whispering in her ear.
You were going to marry Alex, the voice said. Would that have made you safe from being so aware of another man? Could you ever have felt this way about Alex himself? When are you going to sort out what’s real, what’s important, what’s fantasy and what’s sheer desperation? When are you going to decide whether you’re still furious with Dylan Calford, or whether you’re going to give him the smug satisfaction of knowing that you’re grateful because he was right?
‘A mistake?’ Dylan echoed. ‘No, he and Jan are both being very good about it, actually. Sensible and cautious. Asking questions first and leaving decisions until later. Getting a second opinion is a perfectly valid thing to do at this stage.’