When my legs finally gave out, I sank into one of the stiff wooden chairs at the kitchen table.The stack of unopened bills sat where my dad had left them.
“I’m trying,” I whispered to the empty room.Then, quieter, “I really am.”
My phone chimed with a text.I smiled when I saw the number.Sarah and I had grown close during my residency.She was a brilliant veterinary technician who could do just about anything, and the person who got me through complicated surgeries while somehow keeping me on schedule.She was only a few years older, but when she got mad, people listened.It definitely wasn’t the blue rainbow sparkle hair or eyebrow piercings that made her terrifying.
Sarah:How’re you holding up?
Erika:There are complications.
Sarah:The kind that might keep you there longer???!!
Erika:Yeah, like long-term kind of longer.
My phone rang.
“You will not be staying down there.I need you back up here.These other doctors are driving me crazy.”
“This is about you, then?”
“Of course it’s about me.”She chuckled.“Dr.James asks my opinion before she’ll do any blood test to make sure it’s what I think she should do.She’s also terrified to do any sort of big surgery to the point she’ll push euthanasia over a fixable problem.Dr.Center makes me deliver all the bad news.Then he swoops in and tries to make it better.Like today I had to tell the client for him that the guy’s dog was coughing because he had lung cancer.You don’t do crap like that.He needs to grow some balls and be the doctor.”
“That’s not your job.You’re right.It’s okay to tell him that, you know.He’s an intern.”I sighed before saying, “I was given guardianship of my eight-year-old brother.”
“What?Did you not know about him?”
“I knew he existed.I didn’t know I was designated to be his guardian if his parents died.You’d think that’s the kind of thing you get asked before you’re named.”
“What’re you going to do?”
“I have no idea.And there’s more.My dad forged my signature on a contract that puts me in debt to his business partner for half the clinic.The partner bought him out last year.And, plot twist, the business partner is my high school ex, who hates me.Although I’m pretty sure I hate him more.”
“Is this the guy who ended up going to his baseball game naked?”That was her super-interested-in-gossip tone.
“Yes.”
“That was epic revenge.”
“That actually wasn’t on purpose.I think he’s going to try to force me to stay here and help him with the business to pay off the debt.Oh, and I had to pull a cow today.”
“Youpulled a cow?”Sarah whistled.“I knew you were super, but I didn’t know you could do cows.”
“It was miserable.Raining, freezing… It was the whole farm-medicine nightmare package.I remembered exactly why I don’t do large animal work.It’s never been my dream to be elbow-deep in a cow’s ass while getting showered in manure slop.Real glamorous stuff.”
“Lovely,” she said.
“Then I made a complete jerk of myself.I didn’t realize Josh was Vinny’s baseball coach and I pointed out his pants were too tight.”
“You didnot.”She burst out laughing.“Did you get caught staring at his ass?”
“His ass was disgustingly great in baseball pants.Then I remembered it belonged to the douche of the century.”
She snorted.“So he’s still hot, huh?”
“So hot,” I groaned.“Unfairly hot.He was supposed to gain a hundred pounds and work on his dad’s farm, not become a veterinarian who looks like he lives at the gym.I swear, Sarah, if he posted about his work online, he’d go viral.He’s got an eight-pack—not six—and could probably work as an ass model.Every woman in this town is either sleeping with him or trying to.Except me.”
“Sounds like he’s trouble.There’s got to be a way out of all this before you end up in Mr.Fantastic Ass’s bed and hate yourself.”
“I’m with…supposed to be with…”
