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They were down to their last appointment for the morning, a case of mange in an indoor/outdoor family cat when there was a knock on the exam room door.
Hunter set the cat back down in the box her owners had brought her in and called out, “Come in,” but Isobel was already halfway to the door. She opened it to Sandra, his receptionist.
Sandra seemed taken aback to find Isobel on the other side of the door. Hunter almost smiled. She had to stop startling people like that.
“What is it, Sandra?” he asked.
Sandra looked past Isobel and smiled at him. He and Sandra had both grown up in Hawthorne, she was just a year behind him in school. She’d been working at the clinic for about six months after Dr. Roberts long-time receptionist had retired. “Doctor, there’s a family out here with a dog they say has a hurt leg. They don’t have an appointment.”
“I’ll put them in exam two,” Isobel said, striding confidently past Sandra. Sandra’s mouth dropped open and she swung her head back to Hunter.
Hunter nodded. “We’ll see them. Give me five.”
He turned back to Mrs. Voorhees, explained the treatment regimen, and gave her the medication she’d need.
He washed his hands and went into the next exam room. He was about to order Isobel out to go clean and sterilize exam one when he saw her crouched on the floor cuddling a young Labrador retriever to her chest, stroking his head one moment and gently rotating his back leg to check for injury the next.
The dog whimpered and burrowed into her stomach when she’d only barely moved the leg. Not a good sign. Isobel’s eyes leapt to Hunter’s as soon as he came in and he could tell she was thinking the same thing.
He glanced around and saw a short, compact woman with three little girls crowded around her. “Hi guys, I’m Dr. Hunter.”
Their eyes were all fearful as he came in. The littlest girl was sniffling. Hunter wasn’t great with kids’ ages but he thought they were all between five and ten, maybe.
“Who do we have here?” Hunter leaned down on his haunches and looked at the dog.
“That’s Jupiter,” the middle tallest girl said. She had big plastic glasses and frizzy brown hair similar to her mother’s. “My dad ran over him.”
The mother looked mortified and hurriedly stepped forward. “Hi, I’m Pam. My husband wasn’t looking where he was going this morning. He was in a hurry and he backed out of the garage without looking.”
The youngest girl burst into tears and the mom stopped and turned to her daughter. “Oh honey, it’s going to be okay. The doctor here is going to make Jupiter feel better.”
“Let’s see what’s going on with him. How old is he?”
He reached for Jupiter, keeping his eyes on the dog and off Isobel as she transferred the dog into his arms.
“Just a little over ten months,” Isobel answered.
Hunter shifted the dog in his arms and felt down along the problem leg. The dog whined the same way he had when Isobel touched him. Hunter suspected a break but there was only one way to be sure.
“Okay,” Hunter stood up, holding the dog to his chest. “I’m gonna take this handsome guy to x-ray. We’ll be right back with some more answers for you.”
“Is Jupiter going to be okay?” the girl with glasses asked.
Hunter offered her a gentle smile of assurance. “We’ll go get a picture of his bones and then we’ll have a better idea of what we need to do to fix him up. Okay?”
She nodded reluctantly. Isobel hurried to open the door for Hunter.
The x-ray room was just a couple doors down and Isobel opened that door for him as well. He kept it clinical as he told her where the lead aprons were and put everything in place to get the images they needed.
He lifted Jupiter off the x-ray table when Isobel said softly, “You were good with the girls back there. It’s got to be hard when you can’t promise that their dog will be okay.”
Hunter didn’t say anything as the printer spit out the x-ray film. He silently handed Jupiter off to Isobel. She took the dog and scratched his head, being careful not to jostle his back leg.
“I mean, in college, they try to prepare you for that part of the job. I spent a semester volunteering at a clinic but I still never got used to it.”
The room was dark apart from the light box on the wall that Hunter slapped the x-ray films against. The atmosphere was a little too intimate. He didn’t want to bond with Isobel about the difficulties of being a vet. Because of course it was hard being part of the worst day in a child’s life when they had to say goodbye to a beloved animal. But the truth was, he’d gotten so used to it, it bothered him less and less over the years. Which bothered him even more.
Hunter frowned when he saw the x-ray against the light. “I was afraid of that,” he murmured.
