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She was tempted to add more. To tell him about the one or two per cent who developed complications. But somehow she had faith he’d already looked that up himself. She needed to let him run with this—he was more than competent.
* * *
Four hours later she’d seen a steady stream of patients. She kept being tempted to go and find Joe and catch up with him, but she knew that would look as if she was checking up on him. So instead she busied herself with putting a temporary cast on a broken wrist, prescribed antibiotics for everything from a severe chest infection, pneumonia and a kidney infection to an infected insect bite that really needed attention on a daily basis.
She also had a chance to catch up with a few long-term patients of the hospital who had tuberculosis, and a few with HIV. She always did her best to try and review the long-term patients to make sure they were keeping up with their treatment regimes and not suffering from any complications.
By the time she’d finished, Joe was waiting for her at the door, holding Regan’s hand.
‘How are things?’ she asked.
‘Both patients seem quite stable. They’re going to stay in the hospital overnight and Terry will keep an eye on them.’
Lien nodded. Terry was one of the other local doctors and she trusted him completely.
‘Let’s wash up and we can go and find some dinner, then,’ she sighed. ‘Let’s grab the car. There’s a place just down the road that I like.’
They drove a little closer to the city and settled into a local restaurant half an hour later, but not before she’d made both Joe and Regan reapply their mosquito repellent. It hadn’t taken them long to adjust to wearing long sleeves and trousers on a daily basis. Today’s cases of dengue fever hadn’t been unusual, but it still made her nervous.
Joe was surprised by her choice of restaurant. It was styled like an old American diner and even had a play area in the corner for kids. He glanced around at the street. It was dotted with a variety of international restaurants—some of them chains—but this one seemed a little more unusual. It was already crowded, with a host of locals and tourists.
‘What?’ she asked as she slid into one of the booths.
He shrugged as he slid in on the other side. ‘I’m surprised this is one of your favourites.’
‘Ah.’ She nodded as she perused the menu. ‘When I worked in Washington there was a diner that I loved. I swear they’ve stolen the chef’s recipes and just transported him over here, because the burgers in here taste exactly like my favourite over there.’
He eyed the menu with caution. ‘Okay, which one of these is your favourite?’
She pointed. ‘The barbeque grand. Double stack with cheese, pickle, onion rings and fries.’
He laughed and she pointed to something else. ‘If you’re not that hungry you can always have the southern fried chicken burger. I like that too.’ She paused a second. ‘But if you’re having that one, have it with the curly fries with cheese sauce and bacon.’
He shook his head. ‘Where on earth do you put it all?’
‘Hollow legs.’ She smiled. ‘It’s a family secret.’
The waitress came over a few moments later and they ordered quickly. The lights in the diner were bright.
They’d booked into a nearby hotel for their stay. It was comfortable and run by a local family. Joe was tired, but in no hurry to head back. Once they went back to their rooms he wouldn’t see Lien again until the morning. This was the first time they’d had to sit down properly all day. Regan had made his way over to the kids’ corner and was playing with a garage, dinosaurs and a pirate ship. Joe watched him for a few moments then turned to Lien. Since the moment he’d got here, he’d found her to be the person he wanted to talk to most—particularly when it came to Regan.
‘I got a report from Regan’s nursery teacher just before we headed down here.’
‘Really? What did she say?’
He played with the cutlery in front of him. ‘She said he’s been doing great and has settled in well.’
She tilted her head to the side. That was the thing about Lien. She seemed to be able to read him so well. ‘So why the long face?’
He leaned his head on one arm. ‘They said that sometimes he takes himself off into the quiet room and just lies down.’
‘The quiet room?’
‘It’s a space they keep in the nursery to allow kids to have some time out. It’s got a library, and some cushions. The lights can also be dimmed and it has planets and stars painted on the walls.’
‘What’s bad about that?’ Her question was reasonable. She made it sound so simple. But it didn’t relieve the knot that had been churning in his stomach since the nursery teacher had talked to him.
He swallowed, his fingers drumming on the table. ‘Regan told the teacher that he goes in there to speak to one of the stars because it’s his mum.’
* * *
Her stomach flipped over.
‘Oh.’ She hadn’t expected that. In all the time she’d been around Regan he hadn’t mentioned his mum, and she hadn’t wanted to bring it up.
His gaze met hers. ‘Yes. Oh.’
She wasn’t quite sure what to say. ‘Is there a reason that he thinks his mum’s a star?’
Joe nodded. ‘I told him a story a few years ago, about how someone had bought us a star to name after Mummy, and that she would always be up there to talk to.’
Lien shifted a little in her seat. ‘That’s nice. And it seems a good explanation for a kid as young as Regan. So, what’s wrong? Is this unusual for him?’
Joe’s eyes looked sad. He interlinked his fingers and Lien got the distinct impression he was wringing them together. She could sense his low mood and frustration. ‘He’s never done this before. At least, he’s never told me he does this. But he told his nursery teacher. What does that mean?’
Lien glanced at the happy little boy playing in the corner of the restaurant. He was currently involved in a great battle between dinosaurs and pirates, complete with sound effects. She reached her hand out to Joe’s. ‘It means he’s a four-year-old boy who still wants to talk to his mum.’ The truth was, she knew nothing about any of this. But she could try to think about this rationally.
‘Now Regan’s at nursery he probably sees other kids being dropped off by their mums and their dads. Maybe it’s left him feeling a bit lonely. Maybe taking that time to go i
nto the quiet room and talk to his mum, the way he sees the other kids doing, makes him feel less different.’
She put her hand between his and intertwined her fingers with his. ‘I know this is hard, Joe. I’m not an expert in kids—I’m not a parent. I can only tell you what I think it might be. Most kids don’t want to be different from each other, even though they are in a million ways. I bet if you think back to your childhood or teenage years you can remember doing something that stopped you feeling different from others.’
Her heart squeezed inside her chest. For her, it had been in her late teens. It had been realising just how poor her family were, and all the different ways she’d tried to hide it from her friends. She’d tried to fit in every way she could. She had been pretty. And smart. Well mannered. When people had found out where she’d really come from—one of the most deprived suburbs in Hanoi—she’d seen them wrinkle their noses. And that was before all the stuff with her ex-boyfriend. He’d told her so many times how perfect she was—until he’d found out where she came from.
It had taken qualifying as a doctor and adulthood before she’d realised she should be proud of her upbringing, her parents, and what she’d learned in life.
Assumptions around poverty were made all over the world. Dang Van Lien made it her job to challenge them at every turn. She wasn’t stupid. She wasn’t dirty.
Yes, she’d been hungry at times. Yes, the house she’d been brought up in would have seemed like a slum to others. Her clothes had mainly been second-hand, most of her school books had been borrowed, and she’d spent her whole childhood finding ways not to require money. But she’d been brought up in a simple, tidy house filled with love. Her parents were proud people. Even though she’d offered to help them move, they didn’t want to. They’d told her on lots of occasions they had what they needed.
That didn’t stop her buying gifts that were gratefully received. She’d replaced most of the household appliances and pieces of furniture as they’d broken down or had got to the stage where they couldn’t be repaired. Every birthday and Christmas she bought her parents brand-new sets of clothes and a pile of books. Two years ago, her father had even accepted his first mobile phone.
