Compromised, page 20
part #1 of MetroGen Forbidden Love Duets Series
“How’s the baby?” Michael blurted and grabbed Carver’s shoulder, tiredness making him clumsier than usual. “Do you have pictures?”
“Do I? We have a billion. She came home two weeks ago.” Carver whipped out his phone and began scrolling.
There were hundreds of pictures. The She-Doctor Carver was in almost every one, full of smiles. The baby had Tiffany’s coloring and eyes darkening to brown.
“She’s beautiful,” Michael whispered in awe.
“She is,” Carver agreed. “I’ve never seen Manika so happy. Thank you for this, man.”
“It’s the least I could do,” Michael said. This was the first time he’d seen the baby since birth, as the hospital had been so careful to preserve the privacy of the parents.
“Still, when I think back to how messed up my life was in December. Manika thinks it’s fate, written in the stars. She got sick, which was the reason you introduced us to the mom. I get it’s selfish after what happened, but for us, this is a blessing.”
“Yeah,” Michael said. Losing Tiffany was cruel. Still, if the baby was with the Carvers, he’d have a chance to see her again. “I understand.”
“If you ever want to see Victoria, you can. You brought Manika back from despair.”
“I didn’t do that. She did it. The baby’s just part of the healing.”
“But it was why she picked us. She told us. It wasn’t our money. It wasn’t our degrees. It was because Manika was honest about her despair.”
Despair was the perfect word. It was the black space where you had nowhere else to go. He’d been there and back. The hell you couldn’t survive. “I know despair.”
Michael rubbed his eyes. What was he saying? How tired was he?
“Oh, sorry about that. I can see you’re post call, and I’m doing the over-share thing.”
“It’s okay. I’m happy for you and her. And you can tell your wife meeting me today was fate.”
“You’d better go get some sleep… I’d call you ‘kid,’ but…”
“The med students call me ‘Old Guy.’”
“I’m a rookie firefighter in my forties. Do you know the Fire Chief is younger than I am?”
“The Fire Chief?” No one in the waiting room wore any special insignia beyond the blue uniform he was familiar with form his time with Erin.
“He was here. Blonde guy, white shirt, black blazer. Been really supportive of Theo Jefferson, Erin’s best friend. Stayed by his side while she was in the OR.”
Michael’s mind flashed to the man he’d seen walking down the hall to the PACU and then his glimpse of white in Erin’s room .
If that was the Fire Chief then that meant that he... and that would mean that she... and... also...
Carver shrugged, unconcerned about any post call behaviors. “You seem pretty tired. Why don’t I see you around? We’re gonna have lunch up here soon if you want some pizza.”
“Gotta do something first.” Michael shooed the nurse who was headed into Erin’s room to do vitals.
He popped his head in a few minutes later and saw the glowing couple—Erin and the man who must be the Fire Chief—getting their picture taken with their two witnesses, Theo Jefferson and a blonde woman who resembled the groom.
“Everything okay in here? There’s about to be a firefighter party outside here.”
“You’d better go,” Erin Hudgens-whatever-her-name-was-now said to her blonde boyfriend. Or husband. Or fire chief. This was getting confusing.
“I don’t want to. Think they’ll notice I’m grinning like a damn fool.”
“I love you,” she smiled.
“Is it wrong to say I love you more?” the man kissed her head, not even moving his gaze from Erin.
Michael avoided staring directly at them. They sounded incredibly happy, and he blamed the stinging feeling behind his eyelids on exhaustion.
Secret happily ever afters were for others, not exhausted medical students who were due in general surgery clinic.
Chapter 35
Barely able to get through the first three clinic patients, Michael vowed this was his last patient of the day. He grabbed the next chart off the wall and walked in without reading the name.
For a few seconds, he was fairly sure he was having a sleep-deprivation hallucination. The woman on the exam table was the spitting image of his old ballet teacher.
Then again, her chart probably wasn’t lying too. “Instructor McClunis?” he asked.
“Michael Harper,” the woman greeted him, as slim as he remembered her from his teens.
“Umm, it says you came back to discuss your incision.” Michael skimmed the printed chart. In the past decade or two since he’d seen her, she’d been promoted to CCFD battalion chief… and had been crushed by a ceiling in the August apartment fire.
“Not exactly. I’m really damn fucking tired. I didn’t know losing my spleen would make me feel this shitty. Do you think there’s a towel or scalpel in there?” She pointed at her abdomen through the paper gown. “There’s my urine in case you think I have a UTI or something.”
“You lost more than your spleen.” Her list of injuries was impressively extensive, assuming he was reading her chart correctly. It was unlikely he’d have imagined quite this array of injuries.
“Everything else was a broken bone. Doesn’t explain why I feel breathless and dizzy and tired.”
“You had a pneumothorax needing a needle decompression in the field.” Michael checked her chart again.
“Yes, but I was feeling better for a while, but ever since I went back to work a few months ago, I’ve felt awful.” Her words did have an odd breathless quality to them. “I thought you went to Cleveland State to major in business and ballet.”
“I did. I got my CPA-MBA.” Michael checked the vitals listed in her chart. Her heart rate and respiration rate were on the higher end of normal, and she didn’t have a fever, which argued against an infection.
“And you’re a medical student now. How did that happen?”
“Joshua died in Afghanistan a few years ago. I should have been more supportive.” He put his stethoscope on her chest and listened to her heart. She might have had a slight murmur.
“Josh would be proud of you to change your life,” McClunis said.
Feeling even more tired than he did before, Michael took the stethoscope out of his ears. They were having a highly personal conversation in the middle of her exam, and he couldn’t control his response. “How would you know?”
“I watched you two for years. Anyone could see he dragged his butt to ballet because you loved it.”
“I should have been a better brother. I…” he stopped himself. “I’m sorry. I’m supposed to be examining you and asking you about how you’re feeling.”
“I’ve been to the doctor before, but Harper, you look like crap. It’s like seeing one of my rookies after a bad twenty-four-hour shift. And I’ve seen you tired, like the time you practiced the pas de deux for Romeo and Juliet with Caitlyn for three hours.”
“I’m a medical student. It comes with the territory. You’re my last patient before I go home. Tell me about your breathing.” He redirected them away from his personal problems and toward hers.
She let him. “I can’t explain it. I feel like I’m panting even when I’m sitting still. It’s only been since I went back to work as battalion chief. I feel exhausted all the time, though not as tired as you.”
“What has your work said?” Michael asked, considering how long one firefighter had worked with a ruptured appendix.
“You think I told them yet, medical student who won’t admit he’s on his last legs? Have you met the Fire Chief? Nice enough guy, but he’s not a fan of weakness, especially since I promised him I could handle myself.”
Michael tried very hard not to think about the past few hours and the Fire Chief. He opted for something more neutral and also true. “I met him. There was a photo shoot at the hospital in September.”
“I’d have been there if I hadn’t gotten hurt. That photo shoot starred my strongest group of women from Firehouse 15. The bitch who runs HR told me how much people loved them.”
Once again, Michael hid how much the Fire Chief loved them. He palpated her abdomen. “They seemed nice.”
“We’re not nice. We’re firefighting warriors. So I need to find out if there’s a towel inside of me. I think it presses into my stomach and makes me puke sometimes.”
He paused and palpated lower. “Puke?”
“Yeah, not all the time. Do you think it’s my appendix?”
“I think you’d be a lot sicker a lot faster.” Michael had a thought. “Hang on a second.”
He stepped away and set her chart down, reviewing the numbers while he took out a test from the drawer. It was possible.
With his back to her, he put a quick dropper of urine onto the test and waited.
“I’m sorry I brought up Josh. I really liked him.” McClunis said.
Michael took a deep breath, trying to control himself. He’d been one continuous bruise for these last four months. “Thank you.”
“Do you still dance?” she asked.
“Not often.” The last person who had seen him do anything resembling real dancing was Angela the night that he stripped for her. The fake date dance lesson still made his skin crawl.
He checked the test. And checked it again.
Michael leaned his head on the wall.
“Harper, what the hell is wrong with you?” No sooner were the words out of her mouth than McClunis dashed off the table and puked in the trash can. “Stupid towel again.”
He wet a washcloth for her mouth and gave her an alcohol wipe. “Wave that under your nose. It’ll help.”
She took it gingerly, now several shades paler, but improved under his recommendations. “What’s wrong?”
“I should get my attending.”
“No, Harper, you will tell me what is wrong or I’ll order you to do six fouette turns and a triple pirouette.”
“I’m a medical student. I can’t…” She was glaring at him, and he no longer had the energy or will to resist. “You don’t have a towel inside.”
“You can tell by magic.”
“You’re tired, you’re aching, you’re breathless, and you’re nauseous. Probably because you’re pregnant.” He held up the pregnancy test he’d run, and it was unmistakably positive.
“What?”
“When was your cycle?”
“I don’t know. I lost a lot of blood, and I thought I was in menopause.”
Michael flipped open the chart. “According to your chart, Mr. Trevor McClunis is your emergency contact, so I’m assuming his affection for you hasn’t… diminished.”
“Are you suggesting we still fuck like bunnies? Yes. He’s almost fifty. We weren’t allowed to have sex again until after Christmas, and he spent a lot of time in the gym. His muscles are a sight to behold.”
“I’m not commenting on that.” Michael had seen the two of them so completely in love, and as a kid, he had envied the muscles of her Super Bowl winning NFL defensive end husband. “So, you must have gotten pregnant sometime in that window, and since this isn’t first morning urine, you’re past eight weeks.”
McClunis broke into full on hysterical laughter. “I’m gonna kill him. I told him he should have gotten a vasectomy. You’re sure I’m pregnant?”
“The tests don’t lie… I guess you could have a molar pregnancy or a weird tumor like a teratoma that imitates pregnancy. I wouldn’t count on it. Those are really rare.”
“More or less rare than a woman pushing fifty getting knocked up because she didn’t think she needed birth control at her age?”
“Umm?” Michael drew a complete blank. Nora probably would have the answer to that. “Does this mean you want me to call someone or get you information on your options from OB?”
“Are you asking me if I need to go to unplanned parenthood? No, I’ll handle this myself from here, thank you. I’m high risk, right?”
“I assume. Everyone over thirty-five is.” Michael was not getting pinned down on this one.
“Smart enough not to answer. Good job, rookie.” She took her phone out of her CCFD messenger bag and dialed a number. He stared dumbly, wondering how she even had a signal. “Hey, it’s Leslie. Trevor knocked me up again… yes, I know how old I am. I need to find out if it’s a mutant or not… I’ll be right up.”
“Everything okay?” Michael couldn’t take much more of this, as McClunis jumped of the table and started dressing rapidly, heedless of his presence.
“As okay as it can be. I’m going upstairs to OB. Not a word to anyone, understood?”
“I’m supposed to tell my attending.”
“You don’t need to. OB is going to confirm everything right now so you don’t have to. She’ll have plenty to write in my chart and give me a fun chat about safe sex.”
“But I—”
“You’re punchdrunk sleepy and in no condition to take care of anyone. Trust me, I’ve got this handled. If it’s meant to be, then it’s meant to be. Not what I expected, but I didn’t get this far without Trev and I learning to roll with the punches.” She looped her bag over her arm.
“Well, good luck. And congratulations.”
She paused at the door before turning back. “Your attending needs to send you home. I wouldn’t trust you with a spoon let alone a scalpel. You are beyond tired, kid. We ask too much of our rookies sometimes. I see in your face what I’ve seen a thousand times when my rookies don’t have anything left to give.”
“I’m fine.”
“Don’t lie to me. You’re carrying a lot of sadness inside. You need to go and do something that makes you happy. Whatever it is, dancing or not, go do it. Otherwise, you’re going to wash out. Capishe?”
“Yes, instructor.”
“And, maybe it’s because I’m pregnant and emotional and might get killed by this pregnancy, but there’s one more thing I want you to hear.” She came over and gave him a hug. “No matter what happened between you and Josh, he loved you, and you loved him. That was never in doubt, and nothing will ever break that bond, not even death.”
He stood there, unable to move or think. “You think so?”
“I know. Pregnant women are like this.” McClunis let him go. “And remember, tell no one. I’ll tell my job in my own time.”
“Yes, I understand,” Michael said for the second time in the same day, wondering how he had become the secret keeper of every single member of CCFD. “And thank you.”
“Anytime. Off I go to OB.”
Chapter 36
Angela reread the numbers on her pager. She’d moved onto electrophysiology this morning, a lighter rotation, and she had plans to meet Kayla for lunch. She could use a friend, especially after yet another run-in with Michael. He had to be long gone, post-call by now.
Room 1191
Strange. No stranger to the eleventh floor, she didn’t remember a Room 1191.
She followed the numbers upward and passed Room 1185. The next hallway was the wing earmarked to home the future hyperbaric chamber.
For the life of her, she couldn’t come up with a reason anyone would have paged her to this area. Room 1191 didn’t even have a door.
A hand pulled her into the dark room, illuminated only by the light from the hallway.
She stifled her scream because she realized Michael was hiding in the shadows.
He just stared at her, his stance wavering slightly. Exhaustion weighed him down as if he’d been up all night and beyond, which she expected to be true.
It was insane how much more thrashed he looked since she’d seen him at the coffee cart. What had he done to appear pounded on both sides by a hammer and possibly sawed open with a couple of scalpels? More than most medical students, Michael was not best suited for overnight call. It pulled him apart and his tongue lost its leash.
“Did you page me?” She kept her voice hushed.
“Yes. Angela. I—” An expression of befuddlement crossed his face before changing into grim determination. “Aww, screw it.”
He stepped forward and went in for the kiss.
This was no small, tentative kiss. It was full blown ‘I love you and adore you and I want to melt our bodies into one’ kiss. The same kind that had made her risk her career by having sex in a family conference room and still haunted her dreams.
Her back landed against one of the unfinished walls, and he clasped her left hand in his right. His left hand was busy tilting her lips to his for a better angle. Her body voted ‘yes’ by coiling around him, desperate to fill the sweet ache it carried, endlessly unfulfilled.
The cranberry dress was equally enthusiastic, not resisting him in the slightest. The fancy pretty underwear, hose, and garter belts, which Stella insisted she wear to be pretty ‘under’ her clothes, welcomed his hand on the bare skin above the garter.
“Michael, we have to stop.” She ripped her lips away, though her body wasn’t willing to move.
They held each other, heaving breaths mingling between them.
“I love you,” he said, “And I was wrong.”
“Wrong?” she echoed. He apologized to her? This had to be a dream.
“I was wrong about everything. I wasn’t fair to you. I obviously have my own shit I need to work through, but you were never the problem.”
“You love me?” she whispered.
“Like crazy. I don’t want to fight this anymore. Staying away from you has been hell. I’m miserable and—” He glanced down at her clothes. “Maybe you aren’t as miserable because you look beautiful and polished and—”
“Miserable. No matter how I change my clothes, I could never shake you.” She put her arms around his neck.
“I was hoping you would say that. Or I wasn’t hoping you were miserable… I’m sure you get what I mean. I’m babbling. I’ve gone a long time with no sleep, and I’m not sure what I’m saying. One thing is certain. I love you, and please take me back.”
He kissed her again, which less than helpfully made it hard for her to comprehend his strung together sleep-deprived sentences.
