Page 21 of Seeley


Font Size:  

CHAPTER FIVE

Amaranta

“I’m not being superstitious,” I insisted as I added pumpkin-flavored creamer that Michael had been a doll enough to bring in to my coffee in the break room.

“Mainlining coffee because it is a full moon and you think it makes accidents happen is, by definition, superstitious,” Christian insisted.

Shocking all of us—himself, it seemed, included—Dr. Christian Laurier had been true to his word. In fact, he’d been slightly better than his word. He not only had shown up for the expected shift, but one afternoon, he dropped by to put in an hour or two before heading home since his last two patients of the day at his private practice had canceled on him.

“Seriously, where did you do your residence?” I asked. “Because, like clockwork, every full moon, we were absolutely slammed. Every single one. That’s not a coincidence.”

“She’s not wrong,” Michael agreed. “And it happens here too. Everyone gets sick or hurt all at once. Soon as the sun goes down.”

“Don’t feed into her delusions,” Christian said, shaking his head.

“I’d tell you to stick around and see, but I really don’t think you’re going to willingly put in any extra time.”

“There’s not a lot of goodness in my heart,” Christian admitted. “And I’ve used up about all of it being here for this long,” he told us, twirling his keys around his finger, and I hoped for his sake that he still had his rims when he went outside to fetch it. Though a petty little part of me would have enjoyed the look on his face to realize some kids jacked them to make a little pocket money.

“Is medicine really just all about the money for you?” I asked.

“If it was just about the money, I’d have gone into finance,” Christian said, shrugging. “It’s about the diseases. Not so much the people.”

“But the people have the diseases!” I said, letting out a laugh.

“Unfortunately, yeah, dealing with them is part of the job,” he said, opening the break room door. “Have fun with your patients that are absolutely not here because of the full moon,” he added as he went out into the hall, leaving me to rush behind him.

“Christian!”

“Yeah?” he asked, half turning to me.

“Thank you. Really. This community really needs extra help.”

“I’m not here for the community,” he said, rolling his eyes. “We’ve established that.”

“Why are you here then?” I asked, mildly horrified that he was trying to get in my pants or something like that.

“Because I find your dedication to it admirable. And because some small part of me feels guilty about the salary we are paying you to make us all look good. Only a small part, though,” he added with a twinkle in his eye before turning and making his way out.

“I mean, I know he’s kind of a dickhead,” Michael said as he moved in at my side. “But I kind of like him.”

“I know, right?” I agreed. “I’m not sure how I can both want to slap him and have a drink with him at the same time.”

“Right. Like you drink,” Michael said, rolling his eyes.

He was right. I didn’t. Almost never, anyway. I was just always at work. And when I was out, I was alone. There was just something undeniably sad about drinking alone. Besides, who needed to feel dehydrated afterward?

I’d say I left that in my college days, but the fact of the matter was, I really never drank much.

“So, scale of one to ten, how bad do you think tonight is going to be?” Michael asked as he wiped off the board to be ready for a fresh batch.

“Well, let’s just hope we have a chance to eat later,” I said, taking the file for the next patient.

We didn’t.

I mean, unless you counted grabbing handfuls of microwave popcorn between the never-ending stream of patients counted.

Which our noisy stomachs agreed… didn’t.

Source: www.allfreenovel.com
Articles you may like