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“We could meet again and discuss this further,” Adam said. “I’m open this weekend.” His expression was calm, but I could see his knee bobbing up and down under the table. Was he nervous?
“Okay,” I agreed.
“Great. I’ll be in touch.” Adam stood, cradling his new plant protectively, I noted with approval.
“Wait.” Before he left, I had to make one thing clear.
He looked down at me expectantly.
“If you see me at work, can you not act too friendly? I’d like to avoid rumors, and you know how the hospital can be.”
Adam raised an eyebrow, but he didn’t argue. “Of course.”
I followed him toward the exit. Adam left quickly, barely waving to Davis on his way out, but I paused when Davis caught my eye.
“We’ll be in touch soon with a brief survey about your experience,” he told me. “And in about thirty minutes, the app will give you the chance to release your contact information to your new friend. If you choose not to, your match will disappear, and you’ll have the chance to find a new one.” He paused for a moment and smiled, so handsome it almost hurt to look at him. “Thanks for doing this.”
“Yeah,” I said vaguely, caught up in trying to make sense of what had just happened. Dr. Donaldson. A cruise. His grandma. The snake plant. Everything we’d said spun through my mind.
Mexico sounded nice. I’d never been, though I’d gotten my passport at Ellie’s urging. She wanted to take me to Belize. Or had it been Fiji? Maybe Lake Como? I shook my head. Unimportant at the moment.
What should I do? Being romantically linked with someone from work was the last thing I ever wanted, and I would never go on a trip with a man I barely knew.
Still, Adam seemed so sincere about his grandma, and who wouldn’t want to go on a free cruise?
Not to mention the fact that Adam was adorable beneath his scholarly shell. Even his anxiety about asking me to meet up again was a bit flattering. I, Jenna Allen, could make the unflappable Dr. Donaldson nervous?
I’d release my contact info, but I didn’t have to decide about the trip at that moment. I’d go home, talk things over with Ellie, and arrange another meeting with Adam. If I didn’t think it was the right thing to do, I’d just tell him no.
I began Saturday morning with three things on my agenda: clean my apartment, learn how to care for my new plant, and practice what I would say to Jenna when she came over with her roommate as we’d coordinated over text last night.
Somehow, I’d have to come up with the right words to convince her to pretend to be my girlfriend. Me, who’d once overheard a patient describe me as having the personality of stale bread.
Davis Hardcastle probably would’ve persuaded Jenna with nothing more than a smile and the lift of an eyebrow. Maybe charm was something I could learn by studying? An internet correspondence course, perhaps, or I could design my own course of study watching Davis’s movie star brother until I could copy all his mannerisms.
I shook my head in disgust. I was a scientist, not a professional actor. Women were never going to swoon over me. Coaxing recalcitrant bacterium to multiply—expert. Persuading wary acquaintances to pretend to be my girlfriend on a family trip—novice.
As far as my needs went, Jenna was perfect—my whole family would love her. But I couldn’t shake the vague worry that maybe Jenna just wanted to make a friend on the app and her earnest yearning was thwarted by a guy too clueless to have even considered how selfish of a request he was making.
WasI asking too much? If our situations had been reversed, there was no way I’d accept a vacation with a stranger’s family. I didn’t even really want to go on my own family vacation, where I’d be tortured by Mom and Nicole’s constant sniping and toleration of whatever flavor-of-the-month boyfriend Mom’s Frank turned out to be. And it was always a disgusting flavor when it came to her partners. Sushi with processed cheese melted on top, or a chocolate and herring milkshake.
It took less than five minutes to stuff all my takeout containers into the garbage and push the full bag into the hallway trash chute. Apartment clean, I looked up care instructions for the plant Jenna gave me.
I was adjusting thesansevieriaon the countertop so it was the recipient of the kitchen window light when I got a call that an elderly patient I’d seen the night before was deteriorating—MRSA possibly developing into sepsis. I abandoned the plant and set off for Beaufort on foot, a perk of living so close.
A little down the street from the hospital doors, a rideshare vehicle pulled up. It took my brain half a second to identify the person getting out of the red Mazda as Jenna. It took the rest of the second to recall she’d said not to be too friendly. I kept walking forward, fishing for my phone in my pocket so I wouldn’t have to make eye contact, suddenly worried she’d only said that because she found me so awkward that she feared embarrassment by association.
“Hey, Dr. Donaldson!” another woman called from the street. I recognized the voice, but I didn’t turn around to greet Amy. I pretended to be engrossed in my phone and continued inside, hoping my abstraction would provide a plausible cover for my rudeness.
I scanned my badge to bypass hospital security and made a beeline for the stairs, not planning to risk the elevator when I had a critical patient to attend to and a woman who wouldn’t want to be trapped with me in an elevator. I didn’t get very far before I saw caution tape blocking the stairwell and cans of paint stacked just to the side of the door.
Wonderful. The staff elevators in the back of the hospital were also closed for renovations that seemed to be taking three times as long as they were supposed to.
I pivoted away from the stairs just in time to see Amy and Jenna approaching the elevator. I had no choice but to join them in the queue.
Amy moved a little too close to me. “Hi!” Either she had something in her eye, or she was winking.
I gave an entirely awkward wave. “Hello.”
