The Doctor Takes a Detour

by Bren Christopher

  “You sound awfully cheerful.” A grim, disembodied voice filled the car, sending Josh’s mood plummeting once again.

  He didn’t let it show in his voice. “And why wouldn’t I be?”

  “Because you’re making the biggest mistake of your life?” Talk about judgmental. Marcus was the king of judginess.

  “I thought that was the night I went home with you.”

  “You don’t mean that,” Marcus rebuked him.

  “Maybe not,” Josh admitted. In the aftermath of pain and anger that had followed their breakup, it was all too easy to forget the two good years they’d had together. “What do you want?”

  “To find out when you’re coming back. I can only hold your slot so long. I’ll need to advertise soon.”

  Marcus’s reasonable tone made Josh stop and wonder whether he’d actually turned in his letter of resignation. The few days after he’d gotten out of the hospital had been awfully hectic, but . . . “I’m pretty sure I quit. You do have my letter, right? I copied HR and all the admins.”

  “Yes, I have your letter. You should have just given it to me. I could have held it while you made up your mind.”

  Josh resisted the urge to bang his head against the steering wheel. Instead, he pulled into the parking lot of a seaside-themed café decorated in oversized plaster conchs and cringeworthy pink pastels. They had a waffle breakfast special advertised on their sign, and that was good enough for him.

  “Joshua? Are you there?” Marcus paused, waiting for an answer. The familiar noise of the hospital’s administrative suite echoed in the background: phones ringing, voices arguing about the latest cost-cutting measure, traffic noise from Madison Avenue far below. Josh had spent enough time in Marcus’s office—and bent over that desk—to recognize it. “I want to know when you’re going to get this foolishness out of your system and come home.”

  After easing the car into a parking space, Josh sat back in his seat, but left the car running. He pushed the vent so the blast of cool air hit his hot face and took a deep breath. “I started a new job today.”

  “Yes, as a GP, if I remember correctly.” Scorn dripped from his cultured voice. “You’ll be bored out of your skull in a week.”

  “That’s my problem, not yours. Not anymore.”

  A weary sigh greeted that statement. “How long are you going to blame me for what happened?”

  Josh resisted the urge to click off the phone. Marcus would just call back. He gazed through the café’s plate glass window at a server in a bright-pink seashell-patterned dress. She poured a cup of coffee for a patron, the steam rising into the air. He could almost smell it. “I need to go.”

  “How is it my fault a junkie in the ER went crazy with a knife? I wasn’t even there.”

  “No, you weren’t there, and neither was the security that should have been.”

  “Again, how is that my fault?”

  “Gee, I dunno. Remind me. Who cut the budget?”

  “You can’t blame me for doing my job.”

  “Can I blame you for throwing me to the wolves afterward?”

  “My job is to protect the hospital.”

  All he wanted was some damn waffles. Josh closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the headrest. “And what about me? I was your fiancé for God’s sake.”

  “You got a very reasonable settlement.”

  “That’s not—”

  “Come home, Joshua. Let’s put this unpleasant business behind us. I have your ring.”

  Josh’s eyes popped open. “What now?”

  “I’ll give it to you when you return.” Impatience finally broke the cool veneer. “I can’t hold your job much longer, and I can’t hold your place in my bed forever.”

  “I never asked you to—”

  “So get over this foolishness and get back here.”

  “You think I’m being foolish?” Josh’s voice rose. “Even if I decided to go back to New York, I’d never go back to you, so go find somebody else to fill that empty bed.” He stabbed the End Call button and then sat, trying to calm his breathing.

  The phone rang. “Jesus Christ,” he yelled, glad his windows were rolled up. He jabbed to accept the call. “Damn it, Marcus, I told you it’s over. Stop calling me.”

  “Wow,” an amused voice said. “Glad I’m not Marcus.”

  “Oh.” Josh frowned at his caller ID, not recognizing the local number.

  “Sorry if I caught you at a bad time, Doc. This is Ian. Ian Manolas. From yesterday, remember?”

  Like he’d for one second forgotten those dark eyes and that solid chest. “Hmm, I think so. The paramedic, right?”

  “Yeah. The paramedic.” The snicker in the arrogant bastard’s voice said Josh hadn’t fooled him for a second, but at least he couldn’t see the warmth flooding Josh’s face.

  Burke’s warning came back to Josh, and he steeled himself to turn down Ian’s request to volunteer at his underground clinic. “How can I help you, Mr. Manolas?”

  “Well, Dr. Parker, I wanted to see if you made it home in one piece last night.”

  “All my pieces and parts are accounted for, thank you.”

  “Glad to hear it. Wouldn’t want you to lose any crucial bits that you might need later.”

  Was he flirting? Why would the man flirt after Josh had snapped at him two seconds ago? “How did you get my number? Wait, let me guess. Good friends with Deputy Bob, are you?”

  “I can neither confirm nor deny my source.”

  “I’m surprised you went to the trouble. All concierge doctors should drive into a ditch and die on the way home, according to you.”

  “Ouch. That’s not quite what I said . . .”

  Josh chewed his lip to keep from saying anything. He waited.

  “Okay,” Ian acknowledged. “It kind of was. I’ve had run-ins with Langdon and Burke in the past, as well as some of the other town docs. I shouldn’t have taken it out on you.”

  After a moment, Josh grumbled, “’S’okay. I shouldn’t have been so pushy. We both had a long night.”

  “I’ll let you go, then. I’m sure you have a rich hypochondriac pacing the marble floors of her mansion, waiting on you.”

  Ian’s tone was light, even teasing, but Josh cringed a little as Mrs. Bollinger popped into his mind. Then he paused, perplexed. “Is that the only reason you called?”

  “Why else? I’m sure I’ll be seeing you around. You docs to the rich and famous always call us to clean up your messes.”

  “Hey,” he protested. “You call that an apology? That’s not—”

  A siren wailed in the background. “Gotta run. Bye, Doc.”

  What. The. Eff. Josh glared down at his phone. Did Ian think he wasn’t good enough to work in his stupid clinic? Of course, Josh would have turned him down, but . . . “Hell with it. I need waffles.”

  Walking out of the frigid church meeting hall into the summer evening felt like walking into a sauna, if the sauna was sitting on Satan’s back deck in Hell. Sweat sprang out on Ian’s face and under his armpits, trickling down the chill bumps still roughening his skin from the freezing AC in the church hall.

  “Jeez.” He used the bottom of his T-shirt to wipe his face, inadvertently flashing his belly to the world and earning a low cat call from Marianne.

  He stopped to give her an exaggerated leer. “Like what you see?”

  Marianne snorted. “Just ’cause I’m old, don’t mean I ain’t got eyes, boy.”

  Ian slung an arm around her frail shoulders and squeezed gently. “Good meeting tonight. You’re a great leader.”

  “I am good, ain’t I?” Mischief lightened her faded brown eyes. Eyes that had seen far too much tragedy in her long years, but that never failed to have a smile for him.

  “Don’t know what I’d do without you,” he whispered into her gray hair. She’d been there for him, her and the other members of this NA group, every week, sometimes every day during that dark time when he’d first come home from the Army. />
  “I do.” She hugged him back. “You’d go on helping people, no different than you’re doing now, and you’d be fine.”

  That had been the root of his problem, hadn’t it? Wanting to help people. Wanting to heal everyone. Wanting to save every one of his fellow soldiers.

  She eyed him searchingly, and then as if reading his mind, she went on, “But not too much, right? You work too hard between your regular job and the clinic. Don’t forget to take some time for yourself.”

  They waved goodbye to the others as everyone drifted out after the group, some with coffee cups in hand. As they walked toward the parking lot, he smirked down at her. “But what would I do if I didn’t work?”

  She stopped and gave him a grave look. “You got a family who loves you. A niece and nephew who adore you. One day, you’ll wonder where they went. What they’re doing. How you lost contact.”

  “I spend time with them,” he protested. “I went to the kids’ birthday party.” And had stayed for ten minutes, just long enough to give them the presents he’d picked up at Walmart on the way there. He couldn’t even remember what he’d bought in his haste. He’d been due at the clinic, but . . . A pang of guilt made him wince.

  She smiled, the old bat. Point made.

  He made sure she got into her battered old truck and waved as she pulled into the evening traffic, before heading to his bike. The clinic was holding evening hours today, and he was on the schedule. Unlocking his helmet from the Honda, he slipped it on, thinking about what lay in store for him. The clinic wouldn’t be overly crowded—it usually wasn’t—but the people who came were desperate for help. Either they had no transportation to make it into the city, or they had no health insurance, despite the fact that their low income would qualify them for financial assistance. Most of their clients wanted to live off the grid for reasons of their own, but some had no idea how to go about getting aid when they needed it.

  No doctor on duty tonight, so that would limit the help they could give, but Lucia had been there all afternoon with a couple of other volunteers, so hopefully she’d caught most of the cases that needed prescriptions. There were legal limits to what a nurse practitioner could prescribe, but even more limits for a paramedic.

  The volunteers would be ready to leave soon, and he needed to help Lucia with the last few patients and then lock up. And after he walked Lucia to her car, he’d go back and boot up his laptop to continue the never-ending hunt for donations of supplies. If he got tired of that, there was always the slow-running drain in the bathroom sink.

  If it weren’t for Lucia, he would have had to reduce clinic hours months ago. But since she’d had the twins, she’d given up working full-time and filled in at the hospital on an on-call basis. The flexible schedule left her time to spend with her family and volunteer a few hours a week at the Glades Free Clinic.

  Ian’s gloom turned to excitement as he left downtown behind, heading east into the Everglades, taking a back road to get to the clinic. His favorite route took an extra twenty minutes but was worth every second.

  The burden of responsibility flew from his shoulders as he entered the long dirt straightaway. This road was seldom traveled, having been superseded long ago by a state road running in a more direct line northeast.

  His heart leaped as he opened the throttle and bent over the handlebar, pushing the bike as fast as she would go. Wind whipped the loose shirt away from his body and stole the breath from his lungs. Every sense sharpened. He scanned the road ahead, looking for wandering animals and downed branches. Dirt kicked up behind, leaving a trail of dust.

  A muddy patch in the middle of the road almost did him in. The wheels spun and slipped, and he almost laid the bike down. Recovering his balance at the last second, his excited shout was absorbed by the trees.

  With a chuckle, he throttled back. More muddy areas littered the road. Wouldn’t want to see Lucia’s reaction if he ended up in a bike accident in the middle of nowhere with no one to blame but himself.

  His pulse slowed, but the rush left a grin on his face as he turned the corner past the family-run pharmacy the clinic sometimes used. That reminded him—he’d have to get them a list of needed supplies. The old man who ran the place was pretty good about donating to the community. With no Walmart or even a grocery store anywhere around, the Pharm-Aid did a decent business here at the far edge of town, as evidenced by the battered trucks and muscle cars half filling the lot.

  Another block down and he pulled onto the fractured pavement of the parking lot in front of a half-deserted shopping center. His wheels bumped over the ridges and cracks, the pavement buckled from heat and age. The Space-for-Rent signs posted in most of the storefronts were fading in the relentless sunlight.

  He locked up his bike in front of the plate glass window fronting the clinic. Neat red stenciling on the window advertised the Glades Free Clinic. He’d done that stenciling himself, two years ago. He’d had such hopes back then. But good intentions didn’t recruit volunteers or pay the bills. Knowing the right people, schmoozing with the rich—Ian was the first to admit that kind of networking was not his forte.

  The depressing thoughts only slightly diminished his grin and the bounce in his step.

  An older man paced in front of the clinic, his gait quick but without purpose as he made random circles down the walkway. He smoked a cigarette with sharp drags, unaware or uncaring of the ashes scattering over the sidewalk and his own clothes. The other hand jiggled in his pocket. Playing with his keys?

  Ian paused out of arm’s reach. He’d seen the man before. Last week? The week before? “Tully? Do you want to come inside?”

  Tully scowled at him. “Nothing wrong with me.”

  “No. I didn’t say there was.”

  “Just waitin’.”

  “Okay. But can I help you with anything?”

  “You sure are nosy. Can’t a man walk around without bein’ interrogated?”

  Ian was about one second away from demanding Tully take his hand out of his pocket and show him what he had in there, but Tully must have seen something in his face, because he flicked the butt on the ground and then stepped back and raised his hands. “I don’t want no trouble. Just waitin’ for George.”

  “George is inside?”

  “That’s what I said.”

  “I didn’t know you two were friends.”

  “What’s it to you?”

  “Making conversation, that’s all.” This was not a welcome development. Not at all. If there was anything worse than one belligerent drug addict who felt the world owed him, it was two.

  When Tully simply glared at him, Ian went inside to find George.

  The small waiting room held scattered plastic chairs in seventies burnt orange. A dark-haired child sat on one of the chairs, her feet dangling as she stared around the almost-empty waiting room with enormous brown eyes. Her little fingers clutched the hand of a grim-looking older woman.

  One other patient waited, and Ian’s step faltered before he headed for the thin, gray-haired man shifting in the uncomfortable seat.

  Ian held out his hand. “Mr. George.”

  George took his hand with evident reluctance. His grip was weak, his pale skin cold. A noticeable tremor shook his fingers. He snatched his hand back as if knowing the touch had betrayed him.

  “Good to see you, man.” Ian noted dark circles under the pale, darting eyes. “Kinda surprised you’re in again so soon.”

  “Not sleeping.” George twitched. “Don’t feel right.”

  “Ah, okay. We’ll see what we can do.”

  He blew out a breath, relief on his face as if he thought he’d convinced Ian that was his only problem.

  But Ian wasn’t there to judge. “It’ll be a few minutes, okay?”

  George nodded and then stared down at the floor. His leg bounced uncontrollably.

  Ian smiled at the dark-haired little girl and her mother—grandmother? The woman gazed at George, her mouth curling in contempt, then scow
led at Ian. “We’ll be right with you,” he told her.

  She gave him a bare nod of acknowledgment.

  He made sure they’d both signed in. Maria Fuentes and her granddaughter, Tara. And as always, George had signed as George, leaving the last name blank.

  Ian headed down the corridor to the single exam room on the right side of the hall. From the small office on his left came the murmur of Spanish as Gabriel helped someone through the process of signing up for health care insurance.

  At the end of the hall, the closed supply room door hid Ian’s makeshift office. His desk stood along one wall, while a work counter holding a sink shared the other wall with a couple of heavy metal shelving units. Those shelves held donated medical supplies and over-the-counter drugs. Ian was grateful for the donations, but those shelves were never as full as he’d like.

  The exam room door stood open. He poked his head in to see Lucia changing the paper covering on the exam bed. “Hey, sis. How’s it going?”

  She glanced up. “Almost ready for the next patient.”

  Her voice sounded a little hoarse, and George wasn’t the only one sporting weary shadows. Instead of returning to the waiting room, he stepped inside and closed the door. “You okay?”

  “Just tired.”

  Not surprising, with her working part-time on call at the hospital, taking care of a pair of rambunctious twins, and volunteering at the clinic. A pang of guilt twisted his gut. He asked too much of her, he knew that, but without her, the clinic could never have stayed open as long as it had. It had never seemed to bother her. “Two left.”

  “Sounds good.”

  Now wasn’t the time to start a conversation. They’d be able to close up the place soon, and then he’d walk her to her car, as he always did, and find out if anything more was wrong.

  He pitched his voice low. “Mr. George is here.”

  “So soon? I gave him his insulin last week.”

  “Says he isn’t sleeping.”

  “Oh.” She stiffened.

  “Yeah, don’t worry about it. I’ll stay with you when you see him. Let’s take the little girl first so we can get her out of here.”