AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The way he smelled spicy clean. The spark that flickered through her when his warm fingers clasped hers. The heat in his eyes when their gazes met. The way she’d instantly wanted him with an intensity she’d never experienced before or since that spring break they’d met.
She’d looked at him and seen her future.
She’d seen…
Chelsea! Get a grip. Her hot thoughts meant allowing someone to see the Chelsea she kept carefully hidden away from the world, and that’s something she’d only done once. The result hadn’t been pretty, and she never wanted to bare her scars again.
Yet, realistically, she knew that to marry and have children, which she hoped to do someday, she’d eventually have to trust someone to see the real her.
She sighed, reminding herself the first day on her new job wasn’t the time or the place to be fantasizing about the hunky doctor who’d haunted her heart for ten years. Or to be rehashing all the reasons why that particular fantasy wouldn’t ever come true.
Taking a steadying breath, she knocked on the door and entered the exam room.
With tachycardia, bulging eyes, and rapid weight loss, her first patient probably suffered from hyperthyroidism. After giving him a complete examination she gave a lab slip to the nurse and asked him to schedule a follow-up appointment for a few days hence.
Chelsea washed her hands and went to the next patient room to read the chart notation.
Five patients later, and feeling good about her morning, she stood outside an exam room, reviewing the nurse’s note. Hannah Belew. Sixteen. Wants to go on oral contraceptive.
“Hi, Hannah.”
The petite young woman on the exam table didn’t appear to be in her teens, much less like she should be asking for birth control. However, Chelsea refrained from pointing out her observation as the girl already looked like her hackles were up.
“The nurse’s note says you’d like to discuss birth control. I’ll need to ask some questions so you and I can decide together which birth-control option is the most appropriate for you.”
“OK,” the girl said with a pink tinge to her cheeks. She didn’t meet Chelsea’s gaze.
“Have you ever had a pelvic examination before?”
Mouth agape, the girl shook her head. “No way.”
“Are you sexually active?”
She hesitated, giving Chelsea her answer.
“You won’t tell my mom any of this? Patient confidentiality and all that, right?”
A sticky question if ever there was one.
“I’m not obligated to tell as long as you’re not threatening your life or someone else’s.”
“I have a boyfriend,” Hannah admitted, apparently satisfied with Chelsea’s response. The young girl shrugged her shoulders. “He likes sex.”
“Do you?” Chelsea asked the obvious question, catching the teenager off guard.
“Like sex?” Hannah averted her eyes and took a moment before answering. “I like my boyfriend.”
Apparently Chelsea wasn’t the only one who could answer with diplomacy.
“Hannah, if your boyfriend really cares about you, he’d like you regardless of whether or not you agree to have sex.”
Regardless of whether or not long scars marred your back.
Kevin hadn’t, and Chelsea often wondered if the scars from his rejection ran deeper than those of the surgeons who’d operated on her scoliosis.
Then again, Jared had also rejected her, without having seen the imperfections of her body. But she’d understood, even respected his determination to do the right thing as she’d been underage.
Hannah didn’t speak, but Chelsea could feel walls being thrown up. The young girl didn’t want to hear what needed to be said.
