Endings. Barbara Bergin
voice, “Did Doc introduce you to Mary Ellen?”
“Yes, he did.”
“What do you think, girl to girl? Do I have competition up there?” She had a little mischief in her eyes.
“Brenda, leave Doctor Cohen alone. That’s not a professional question, and you’ve always been jealous of that old battleaxe.”
“Battleaxe, my ass. Hal used to date Mary Ellen, but she didn’t know anything about office management. Basically he needed an office manager more than a nurse. I was cheaper too.”
“I think I’ll just go check out the clinic layout here…” and Leslie pointed down the hall.
“Brenda, see what you’ve gone and done, gotten Doc Cohen’s nose outta joint.”
“Don’t be silly, she knows I’m just teasing. Did they treat you good over there, sweetie?”
“It was really nice, for a first day and all. Everybody’s very helpful. From what I can tell, things are run very well. Best I’ve seen in a long time.”
“Doc and I operated on old J.T. Cullen’s mother-in-law. Remember, she used to be a school teacher. I had her once. Didn’t like her at all. She sent me to the principal’s office more than once. I thought about making her leg short.”
“Well…you did.” Leslie said it really seriously. Brenda and Doc both looked at her, eyes wide, and she smiled.
“I can see you’re going to have to be on your toes with this one, Hal.”
“Tell me something I don’t know.”
“You’d better come with me. I’ll show you around the office. Then we’ve got over twenty patients this afternoon. You going to stay?”
“Of course.”
“Good. You’ll see how Doc does things with the paperwork and stuff. I don’t know what you’re used to, but my staff and I do all the coding so you don’t have to worry about that. If there’s diagnosis codes you use that we don’t know, we’ll just ask you, that’s all.”
That was pretty sweet as far as Leslie was concerned. Coding was a pain in the ass and had absolutely nothing to do with patient care. It was just something used to try to help doctors get paid, but half the time it didn’t help and some of the time it had the opposite effect. Plus, she was always paranoid that if her codes didn’t match up perfectly, some guys in black coats would come marching through her front doors accusing her of fraud. Ridiculous. Let doctors practice medicine and nurses take care of patients. It’s what they do.
They saw the twenty patients together and it was one of the strangest experiences she had ever had in a clinic. Again patients were treated almost like family, and some of them were. People talking in the hall, comparing notes. The staff showing patients off to other patients. A nice incision, a good range of motion. Doc, bustling in and out of rooms telling patients what they needed to do. There wasn’t a whole lot of privacy, but no one seemed to care. If there were delicate situations, then those patients were put in a room and the door closed. People were chatting with each other in the waiting room and didn’t seem to mind if they had to wait. No one complained anyway.
Today patients were more concerned about Doc. He had a pile of gifts people had brought with them. There were flowers, plants, homemade jelly, a teddy bear, chocolates of every sort, and a number of gag gifts. The whoopee cushion was her favorite. Doc went into a couple of kid’s rooms and intentionally sat on it. Then that prompted the kids to start making their own variety of fart noises. Some were adept at doing it with their armpits.
What is it about gas and kids? She remembered having some great whoopee cushion fun with Victor and Vivian. They blew it up and squished it over and over until the thing wore out and Leslie’s cheeks were sore from laughing so hard with them. Everyone who came over that week got directed to the seat with the hidden pink balloon. Each time it went off, they all got off, laughing like they had never heard it before.
Later on, after clinic was over, they went into Doc’s office where he put the whoopee cushion under one of his consultation chair cushions. Then he called Brenda in and asked her to sit down, because they needed to go over some things. There was ever so slight a change in his voice so she knew he was up to something.
“Now what?” She looked at them suspiciously as she sat down, and out came the bleeeep, riiiip, braaaaap. She jumped up.
“Oh, you. You are just acting like a little kid. I should have known. Look at the two of you.”
Her voice was full of indignation. And the two of them just laughing, a knee slapping, gut laugh. It was an irresistible situation, infectious, and pretty soon Brenda was laughing too. And just like that, Leslie felt the tears welling up in her eyes unexpectedly, as she thought of Vic, Vivi and their whoopee cushion. Did she throw it away? To her astonishment, Doc and Brenda saw it too and stopped laughing, kind of fizzled out. She was embarrassed, but Brenda stood up and came over to her.
“This reminded you of something, didn’t it sweetheart? Let’s quick think of something else. Hal, go get us some Diet Cokes, will you?” And he was already up, moving as fast as he could to get out of that room.
“I am so sorry,” Leslie said. “I can’t believe that happened. You probably think I’m some kind of baby, crying all the time or something. I don’t know what came over me.”
“It’s okay, Leslie. Don’t even think about it here. We understand, and we’re like your family while you’re here. You’ve brightened up Hal’s day, in some way. I can see it in his eyes. Maybe, in our way, we can return the favor.” Brenda put her hand on top of Leslie’s and patted it. “I just knew you two were up to no good when I came into the room.” She stood up. The moment gone. All better. Leslie smiled at her.
Doc yelled from down the hall, “Two Diet Cokes, coming up!”
Leslie felt exhausted when she left Doc’s office. They made plans to meet again the next day. She gave him her cell phone number, just in case something came in during the night and he needed help. Of course she knew he didn’t need help, but she felt ready to get to work, day or night. Work had the ability to exhaust her mentally and physically. It made it easier to get to sleep at night and easier to get through each day. Some of the doctors doing locum tenens work wanted low key, easy jobs, but as far as she was concerned, the busier the better. Most jobs were set up to be like babysitting. The surgeon would shut down his practice, farm out the follow-ups to other guys in town or to their family physicians. She would be there only for emergencies. There would be nothing else to do. She could sight see, but a lot of times there was nothing to see. It was excruciating. She would try to read, watch TV, exercise, but always her mind went back to her family.
Already she could tell this job was going to be different. On the one hand the inevitable questions into her background would come. It was simply the way nice people behaved. It would be difficult to keep from telling the truth. On the other hand, Doc seemed to be making no attempt to lighten her load, and was apparently ready to turn everything over to her. This would make the month or so she was there fly by.
It was a cool evening with a soft breeze and a clean smell in the air. A little dust devil stirred in the front of the hotel under the portico. The wind defined west Texas. There was very little to stop its progress. Dust devils were always at play in areas that diverted its course. It was as if the wind was trying to get even for standing in its way. Doors would stay open indefinitely if one didn’t turn to make sure they were shut. There were annoying little triangles of dust in the corners of windowsills where the wind constantly tried to penetrate. Grasses and small trees were permanently bent to its will. The little dust devil swirled and swirled unimpeded until she stepped into the view of the automatic eye opening the sliding doors to the hotel. The miniature tornado played out, dropping its contents on the ground at her feet.
“Ah, Doctor Cohen. Good evening! You had a long day. Would you like some coffee? I have some fresh in the dining area over there?”
“You