Vetted Further

by K'Anne Meinel

  Fiona woke early after a good night’s sleep. She loved the RV. It felt like a second home to her. She blessed the stars again for her wife having found it. She knew Allyssa often felt she might have taken advantage of the woman who sold the RV out from under her husband. However, Allyssa had given the money to the woman in good faith and legally it was hers to sell. They could debate the ethics of it until they were blue in the face, but the fact was Allyssa had legitimately purchased the luxury vehicle and it was theirs. They had no control over the price the woman asked for the RV or whether her husband was agreeable to the sale. Fiona finished her breakfast, cleaned up the RV, and went to check on her patient. The mare and its foal were doing fine. She smiled as the rancher came out. He was well pleased with the foal because he’d paid a lot of money for the siring. He clapped Fiona on the shoulder, delighted as all get out. She drove away, pleased for him and thinking how similar her current situation was. They had purchased sperm for her mate too!

  She was home in time to stop the Xpedition next to the pumps, fuel the huge vehicle, and park it before they took the Jeep into Sweetwater for their appointment.

  The girl at the desk raised her eyebrows slightly as Fiona introduced them as Doctor and Mrs. Herriot. “You’ll have to fill out these forms as this is your first visit,” she told the women, handing them a clipboard with five double-sided forms.

  They sat in the reception lounge and Allyssa filled out the information. “You remember all that?” Fiona asked, seeing some of the questions.

  “I called the doctor’s office in Denver for some of the information,” she confessed as she got out the insurance card to write down those numbers.

  Finally, they were called by a nurse, but when Fiona stood up with Allyssa, the nurse held up her hand and said, “Only Mrs. Herriot. Your friend can wait here.”

  “This is my wife, Doctor Herriot,” Allyssa snapped, feeling defensive.

  “Oh, I’m sorry. Of course,” she backed off immediately and escorted them to a room with a bathroom attached. “Please pee in this cup and put it in the cupboard there,” she said, pointing and handing her a cup with a sealed cap. “When you’re done, you can return to the waiting room until we call you again.”

  Feeling foolish after the woman left, Allyssa murmured, “Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything?”

  “Well, they will realize soon enough that same-sex couples exist. Go on, pee,” she encouraged, trying to lighten the mood and relax her a little. She had been a bit snappish, but she understood. She too felt defensive when people assumed they were only friends.

  “Should I close the door or…?” she asked, hesitantly.

  “I’ve seen you pee before,” she pointed out dryly, laughing.

  “Um, yeah,” she answered as she pulled down her jeans and unscrewed the cap, breaking the seal. She squatted over the toilet, holding the cup where she thought her stream would come out. She still managed to get some on her hand, which made her wrinkle her nose and glance up at her wife, who she saw was giving her privacy by looking at the poster on the wall. The poster contained 3D imagery of a baby in a uterus with all the parts labeled. Finishing up, she opened the cupboard in the wall and placed the cup inside. She saw where someone had attached a sticker to the cup with her name and some numbers on it, probably for identification in the clinic system. She quickly washed her hands with soap and water. “Wanna go sit in the waiting room again?”

  “I guess,” she shrugged, putting her hand on Allyssa’s lower back to escort her. They sat next to the large fish tank in the room and watched the fish swimming lazily back and forth. People came and went as they sat there. It seemed a very long time before the same nurse called them again.

  “How can anyone watch those game shows?” Fiona was asking her wife as they left the waiting room to follow the nurse.

  “I know. I’ll stick to soap operas,” Allyssa teased in return. Neither of them watched much television. They both enjoyed the National Geographic channel or Animal Planet but those weren’t available in the waiting room.

  “Oh, gawd. That’s just as bad,” she complained and grinned.

  “Hi, there. I’m Leslie Stoward,” a pleasant-looking woman came forward with her hand outstretched.

  “I’m Allyssa Herriot and this is my wife, Doctor Fiona Herriot,” the blonde introduced them.

  “Ah, yes. You are the heroes I saw on TV last year. It’s a pleasure to meet you both,” she said with a smile. “I see you came in for a pregnancy test. Have you been trying long?”

  “No, this was our first attempt.”

  “Well, first time’s a charm,” she quipped, pleased for them. “Let’s get your weight and vitals, and we can talk a little as we go.”

  Realizing what she had just said, Allyssa and Fiona exchanged a gleeful look. The doctor took her weight, height, and pulse, then did a general exam, asking questions about how she was feeling, checking her breasts, and asking if she had any questions.

  “I think I’d refrain from taking anti-nausea medicine and see if you can weather this for the next month. When did you say you impregnated?” she asked, taking in both of the women.

  “Okay, so you are probably due…” she grabbed a wheel from her counter and fidgeted with it as they gave her the date.

  Both women liked Doctor Stoward, Leslie as she insisted they call her. She was thorough, pleasant, and in no hurry despite the obvious discomfort of her nurse. She answered all their questions and offered advice and suggestions they could easily follow. “I’m going to have Lena here give you a supply of prenatal vitamins. They will last you through your first trimester and then, you will have to get a prescription for the rest,” she said as she carefully printed what she wanted on a prescription pad. It was the first time either of them had seen a doctor with legible handwriting. “We want him or her to get big and healthy and strong,” she said with a smile. “I’ll see you next month for a checkup and then, every month until the seventh month when I’ll reevaluate. By the eighth month, we will be seeing each other twice a month.”

  “Do you anticipate any problems?” Fey fretted.

  “No. Allyssa’s young and healthy, and from what you’ve told me, you two have healthy eating and exercise habits. I wouldn’t ride for a while, but I’d say you can do that Christmas parade if you choose a nice sedate horse.”

  “She can ride then?” Fiona worried.

  “Yes, if she takes it easy, but for now, take it even easier,” she advised, patting Allyssa on the leg comfortingly. “If you want, I can prescribe tranquilizers for your wife,” she added conspiratorially to the blonde, who laughed heartily.

  Fiona, who heard her clearly, joined in the laughter.

  They both left thrilled at the news and with a feeling of well-being. “Wow, we did it,” Allyssa said as Fey took the wheel of the Jeep.

  “You heard her. You are to sit with your feet up and eat bonbons,” Fiona told her in mock seriousness.

  “That is not what she said at all. We can still take our walks, just no riding for the first trimester and afterward, riding carefully and only on a sedate mount.”

  They teased each other on their way to the restaurant, a bar that had lunchtime meals for the locals, and went in to eat. They kept their voices low, since they knew most of the people who came in to eat. They had only come to eat at the bar a time or two, and their acquaintances looked at them curiously, a few greeting them by name.

  “I’ve got to get back to work,” Fiona said regretfully when they were back at the ranch.

  “Earn that money. We,” she said, patting her imaginary baby bump, “are going to need it!”

  The vet laughed, as was expected, but the money aspect did worry her. They had their health insurance to cover the costs of having a baby, but the cost of raising the child might be a little tight, and she worried about that. There was so much she had considered before, but now, it was real. Allyssa was pregnant. It was no longer just speculation and her income wasn’t always what it s
hould be.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  “Mrs. Herriot, this is Blake Dalden from Conservation Cellular–” began the caller but before he could continue, Allyssa interrupted.

  “We have our phone service. Thank you for the call and please don’t call again,” she said to the solicitor and hung up before he could say any more.

  Twice more he tried calling, once on a different day, but her answer was always the same. The third time she added, “Take us off your list. We aren’t interested in what you’re selling.”

  Allyssa got a lot of solicitation calls: from automated computer calls that she hung up on immediately, to salespeople, who obviously had an agenda and a job to do. Most of them were for Doctor Herriot but she knew how the pharmaceutical calls went. Those who had the temerity to drive out and try to catch the doctor in to sell them the latest in their medicines found a formidable woman in Allyssa, who did all the ordering for Fiona. She’d utilized the ‘do not call’ registry and placed all their phones on the list but still, salespeople came to the ranch occasionally.

  Allyssa was still fighting morning sickness. She’d counted how many days she had thrown up her breakfast. The crackers and water always made her feel better, but she woke up each morning starving. Time and time again, she threw up the cereal or eggs and toast after she tried to keep her food down. The worst was acidic orange juice. She was really grossed out when she tried drinking cherry Kool-Aid once. It had sounded good, and it tasted great going down, but when it came up it was hot and acid-filled. She learned to assess her food on its ability to come back up and how she’d feel tasting it a second time. She hated that. It made her cranky, and she tried hard not to take it out on her wife, her pets, or their clients. Strangely, one thing that helped was drinking Dr. Pepper. The carbonated prune juice, that’s what she’d read it was, seemed to keep her regular and didn’t make her puke. When she was feeling particularly cranky, she took advantage of her mood and made phone calls to her file of unpaid clients.

  She had a three-step system for clients that were late paying. The first step was to send out a past due notice with a notification of fees that would begin accumulating the next month if they didn’t pay. The second step added those fees and notified them of additional fees if they still didn’t pay. The third step was an additional notification and a telephone call. When she was cranky from her pregnancy, she wasn’t quite as pleasant to those clients who came up with excuses. They expected Fiona to work for free, and one even had the temerity to point out she had an expensive truck to ride around in, so she could afford to give him some time to pay the damn bill. Allyssa took satisfaction in letting him know, in no uncertain terms, that he was way out of line. She told him he was taking food out of their mouths and reminded him Doctor Herriot had shown up promptly to care for his animals and they would accept no further excuses. The clients whose bills remained unpaid for a fourth month were sent to a collection agency, which could impact their credit scores on the three major credit bureaus.

  “Your wife is a bit of a terror,” complained one rancher.

  “Oh, why is that?” Fiona asked, as she injected a mixture into the udder of the cow she was treating and watched to see if she would get kicked for the effort.

  “Well, I was a little bit late on that last bill of yours and she went off.”

  Finishing up on the cow, whose tail started twitching as she considered kicking the doctor, Fiona rose and backed away. She knew the signs and was relieved to get out of the way before she earned a bruise or worse.

  “Did I come out to treat your stock?” she asked, putting the syringe away and gathering her things.

  “Well, yeah.”

  “Did I come out as soon as you called?”

  “Yeah,” he continued grumpily, recognizing the argument her wife had used on the phone.

  “Then there is no reason for you not to pay for my services, right? I have to pay up front for my meds and supplies and you want to make me wait for my money?”

  “Yeah, but there is no call for her to…” he tried again, sure he could convince her to get her wife to stop the collection calls.

  “No, there is no call for you to not pay your bill, so she has to resort to calling you. You think she wants to make those calls? Would you want to?” She looked down the row at the healthy-looking cows. She had treated several over time. “I can’t do this for free and you know it. My wife is doing her job. I do my job. It’s only fair we get paid in a timely manner.” She left it at that but inside, she was giving herself a pat on the back. People like him were used to making the vet and everyone else wait for their money. He should be glad it was Allyssa calling him; she would have been a lot less diplomatic.

  The next time that farmer called to request Fiona come out and look at one of his prized heifers, he was met with a tone that left no room for discussion. “Sir, I’m sorry, but Doctor Herriot won’t be able to provide further veterinary services to your animals until you have paid your past-due account in full.”

  “Well!” he blustered, angry at being called out on his bill. He’d avoided her last two collection calls and had already received a notice from a collection agent. “I’ll just get somebody else,” he finished triumphantly, hanging up on her.

  “I’m sorry, sir. We are unable to take on your account until we know you have paid your past-due account with Herriot Veterinary Services,” he was incredulous to hear at the first place he called. It was the same at the second and third veterinary offices he called. What he didn’t know was Allyssa had called all the vets in a one-hundred-mile range that serviced the area. The vets had banded together, keeping in contact and updating each other with a list of unpaid veterinary services and those clients who were regular offenders. Helping each other out was the only way they could all survive in this market. Rather than competing, as some were better set up than others, they were helping each other, and Allyssa had started it. Slowly, word spread…pay your vet bills or your animals would not be seen by any of the vets in the area.

  There were some who still tried, flaunting their contempt for her attempts at collection by buying new trucks and stock and always seeming to have the money for everything else but their unpaid bills. Allyssa figured eventually, karma would catch up with those people. One day, she got a phone call and a visit that confirmed it. One of their clients, a successful female rancher, showed up completely irate because a loan she had tried to take out at the bank for an expensive bull had been turned down. Her credit was not good, and it showed on all three credit scores. She didn’t pay her bills, and she felt it had all started with that pissant vet and her wife. If Allyssa hadn’t been prepared to pull her gun, the woman’s tirade would have turned violent. As it was, Rex was growling and upset. Allyssa called the sheriff, who gave the rancher a word of warning. Word of the incident spread, and others who had thought to drive out to the vets’ and try to intimidate the wife decided against that idea. No one wanted to get shot, and Allyssa had proved she was prepared to defend herself.

  “Are you okay?” Fiona worried, mentally crossing that client off her list forever.

  “I’m fine. I was in the right. She owes us thousands, and we can’t afford to float her a loan forever. I’m going to the courthouse tomorrow to file a lien on her ranch.”

  “You’re what?” Fiona was incredulous. She didn’t know collections could get so involved. Once it was in the collection agency’s hands, she thought that was the end of it, but once it went out to the three credit agencies, it was out there until the client paid the bill.

  “She isn’t going to pay the collection agency; she made that clear. She said she is not going to pay us on principle. She tried calling a couple other vets too,” she informed her wife. “Now, after these threats, I’ve decided to get a lien against her property. At the same time, I will file a report with the sheriff and maybe request an order of protection, so she can’t come on the ranch again or get within one hundred feet of us. It’s not like she has a plausible e
xcuse for not paying her bill. She’s just being a bitch on principle.”

  The filing of the lien and the order of protection were publicly accessible, and the rancher was embarrassed when she was served with both. She eventually, grudgingly paid the vet bill, the collection agency’s additional fees, and the fees Fiona and Allyssa had incurred at the courthouse. She vowed never to use them again but discovered the other vets in the area demanded a deposit for their services before they would touch her animals. Her reputation was ruined. It was a lesson to others who might have thought to try something like that.

  “I’m worried the stress of things like this will harm you,” Fey fretted as she caressed the slightly rounding frame of her wife.

  “Nope, the doctor says I’m fit as a fiddle,” she crowed. She’d recently had a checkup, but Fiona had missed it due to a patient. However, she was pleased they’d reached the end of the first trimester and could start telling people.

  Allyssa’s call to her sister amazed them both. “How’d you know I just went into labor?” her sister asked, surprised to hear from her.

  “You did?”

  “That’s not why you called?” she asked, her eyes narrowing on Derek, who raised his hands in innocence. He hadn’t called anyone but her mom.

  “No, I called…” she hesitated to tell her after hearing Carmen’s news. “It can wait,” she finished lamely.

  “Nuh uh. You called for something. I have hours to go here, so tell me.” She sounded stressed and a bit out of breath.