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I stared after her trying to figure out how that small woman, maybe five foot three if that, and probably only weighed a hundred pounds could have hit me so damn hard that it felt like I’d been hit by a car.
Over the woman’s shoulder, the little girl peeked up and waved to me. Her little hand opening and closing a couple times. I lifted a hand to her as I got off the ground and found a few other women staring at me.
Damn, that was one hell of a tackle. I dusted off my hands and watched the mother race up to the parking lot. Maybe I should go after her and explain what happened. I didn’t need the police searching for me, thinking I was a sexual offender or something worse.
“Hi, Doctor Young.” A young boys voice caught my attention, and I glanced to the left to see Adam Mitchell racing by.
“Hi, Adam.”
“Hi, Wes, are you okay?” Adam’s mother Jersey asked as she approached.
“Yeah, I’m fine.”
“Your bleeding,” Jersey said.
“I’ll be okay.” I started to smile but winced at the pain. Damn that smarts!
“Did Charlotte do that to you?” Jersey asked as she glanced back toward the parking lot.
“It was nothing. She reacted like any scared mother would.” Maybe harder than most women I knew would, but hey, I had touched her baby bear and obviously momma bear was very upset about that.
“Oh, geez, I’ll talk to her. I’m so sorry. She had a bad experience with a stranger once.”
“Her daughter fell from about twelve feet up and hit her head, you might want to have your friend get her daughter to the doctor to be checked. I saw it happen; it was a bad fall. I really was just checking to make sure she was alright.”
Jersey put her hand on my arm, “I know you were, Wes. She’s really funny about anyone talking to her daughter. I’ll give her a call.”
“Thanks, I appreciate that.” I glanced at my watch, damn I had to get going.
She handed me a tissue she pulled out of her pocket. “It’s not used, just crumpled. You should put some pressure on your cheek.”
“Thanks, Jersey. I gotta run. I’ll see you later, tell Bruce I said hello. Hopefully, we can have dinner soon.”
“I will, Wes. See you later.”
I used the tissue she gave me and applied pressure as I headed back to the pathway. I glanced down to see a few blood droplets on my sweatshirt. Great. Another one bites the dust.
* * *
Four hours later, I was at work and walked out of the doctors’ lounge when I ran into one of the nurses who skidded to a halt when she got a look at my face, “Oh, who did you piss off, Doctor Young?”
I chuckled, “If you only knew.” I had needed to put two butterfly closers over the cut on my cheekbone. My skin had split like I’d taken a scalpel to it, but I knew that after I’d cleaned it well, and closed it, the scar would be very small, if not non-existent once it fully healed.
She raised a brow and chuckled. “Chasing women around town again, and did you trip over something when someone caught your attention?”
I chuckled, “No, I was trying to help someone, and they obviously didn’t want my assistance.” Well, that wasn’t exactly what happened, but it was close enough.
The more I thought about it, the more I realized how it might have looked to a mother in panic mode. A strange man talking to her daughter off to the side. It was no wonder she attacked me. I’m surprised that she didn’t start kicking me while I was down with as angry as she had been.
Donna shook her head, “You’re a good, man, Doctor Young. I hope karma bites that person in the ass. I was coming to find you, you have a trauma coming in, five-year-old with a head injury.”
I frowned, was this the little girl from earlier, or another child who had struck their head? “Thanks for the heads up, Donna.”
I went out to the desk and asked what they knew about the patient coming. When the paramedics had called in, they had given her stats and explained that she was unconscious. Must be a different child then, since the girl I had seen fall, had been alert and awake. They were still five minutes out, so I told them to get the pediatric trauma cart ready and went to check on another patient’s test results. Never a wasted moment in the emergency department.
Donna called my name when the ambulance arrived, and I closed out of the report on the computer and grabbed a pair of gloves as I headed toward the trauma room. When I saw an older woman following behind the gurney, I released a sigh of relief. Thank god, it was not little Marisol from today.
That relief was short-lived as I turned into the room and got a look at the sweet little face from earlier today. “Ah, shit,” I muttered and then went to the side of the gurney.
