Not as sexy but a valid point, Evie conceded.
‘Some institutions recommend you don’t become pregnant for at least a year after your transplant, even with stable kidney function, whilst others say two years. Here, we prefer to say eighteen months to two years.’
‘That won’t be a problem,’ Max announced confidently, leaving Evie to wonder whether that was because he had every intention of using protection this time. Or no intention of needing anything to start with.
‘Okay.’ The nephrologist nodded. ‘Then let’s move on to your serum creatinine levels and how we expect these check-ups to progress during the next few weeks.’
CHAPTER TEN
MAX LEFT EVIE to complete the final tests whilst he checked on the recovery of the patients.
It was a welcome escape. The air had been loaded with expectation since their conversation with Arabella Goodwin. They were both acutely aware that once they left the hospital to go back home, sex would be on both their minds. And, despite everything that had been said, Max was still conscious of not wanting to push Evie into anything she wasn’t ready for.
He saw the person lingering outside his office long before the woman saw him. Something about the way she was hovering intrigued him, shifting from one foot to the other, playing with her long hair and toying with her clothing, first pushing the sleeves of her flannel shirt up in the heat of the hospital, then pulling them down again. He crossed the heavy-duty linoleum hallway in a couple of long strides.
‘Do you need something?’
She jumped back from the doorway to glance nervously at him. She could be here to see anyone, but instinct told him she was one of Evie’s troubled teens.
‘I was wondering about Dr Parker? I didn’t realise her transplant was last week and she’d already been discharged. They told me to come and see you.’
‘Right.’ He wasn’t prepared to give anything away.
‘How...how did the doc’s transplant go?’ the young woman asked tentatively.
His eyes swept over her. The flannel shirt—incongruously heavy for the day’s temperatures—was open over a lightweight top and trousers, but it was as the young woman messed with her sleeves again that Max caught sight of the scars that lay on her forearms. Multiple thin, parallel lines of silvery-white scars from razor blade or knife lacerations.
Hastily the young woman pulled the sleeves down again, her eyes sliding away from his for a moment, before changing her mind, standing a little taller and making herself meet his glare.
The tacit action garnered his respect, but still he was guarded.
‘The transplant went very smoothly,’ he answered finally. ‘Dr Parker responded very well to the procedure.’
The young woman’s relief was visible.
‘Good. That’s good. Great, in fact. Where is she staying? Can we come and see her?’
‘She needs her rest,’ Max cut in pointedly. Evie hadn’t once mentioned expecting a visit from an ex-patient to him.
‘I know she’s still recovering,’ the woman agreed. ‘I just wanted to know she was all right. They won’t tell me anything, even though Dr Parker said she’d put my name down to visit as soon as she was cleared for visitors.’
‘She doesn’t need her focus to be split right now. Do you understand?’
The young woman’s brow furrowed in confusion. He suppressed a stab of frustration and smoothed his voice out.
‘Dr Parker is very committed to her work, I appreciate that, even though she hasn’t practised for quite a few months now, but she needs to take the time to recover and look after herself. If she feels she’s needed somewhere else then she’s going to try to rush the healing process in order to get back to work.’
He was surprised to see the woman offer a soft smile of recognition.
‘Yes. I can just see her doing that. Well, can you tell her that I was here because I wanted to know she was okay? We all did.’
‘All?’ It was Max’s turn to frown.
She jerked her head towards the waiting room chairs down the hall where a group of kids, surrounded by a cluster of small bunches of flowers, home-made fruit baskets and cards waited. They were all watching the exchange between Max and the woman intently, without crowding the two of them, which was why he hadn’t noticed them before.
‘Who are they?’
‘Some of the kids from the centre.’
A lot of the kids from the centre by the look of it. And gifts from even more of them, judging by the mini-mountain. Max stared in shock.
‘You look surprised, but Dr Parker has helped so many of us turn our lives around. That’s a big deal.’
She narrowed her eyes, assessing him, then clearly decided she had nothing to lose.
‘You saw my scars.’ She lifted her still-covered arms before dropping them back down to her sides. Nevertheless she met his stare head-on, her chin tilting defiantly.
‘I used to self-harm for years, ever since I was a kid. I couldn’t even admit it to myself, let alone tell my family. Eight years ago I met Dr Parker and I’ve been cut-free for seven years now, and I’m working on keeping it that way.’
‘Understood,’ Max acknowledged.
Max considered the strong young woman standing in front of him, surprised at her inner strength and matter-of-fact way of talking to him.
‘So you’re all here just to see how Evie...Dr Parker is?’ He eyed the group with fresh eyes.
‘Yes. Dr Parker was there for us, supporting us, when we needed her. Now we all have good futures and she was hugely responsible for that. So we just felt this was our chance to be here for her, now.’
Evie clearly meant a lot to them, and he knew the feeling was mutual. Having to resign her post must have been an agonising decision for Evie to have made.
‘So, will you give the gifts to Dr Parker, and tell her we were here?’
The woman’s voice broke into his musings.
‘Of course.’ He dragged himself back to the present but his words were sincere.
‘Okay.’
‘Okay,’ he echoed thoughtfully, watching as the group gathered themselves together, offering him a selection of nods, smiles and even a tentative farewell wave or two.
These kids to whom Evie meant so much.
Gathering up as many of the cards and gifts as he could, he began the first of several trips to his office. He’d load them into the car later. At least it might give them a distraction. Something else to talk about other than the inevitable after today.
It was only as he entered with the final armful that he heard Evie’s voice behind him, in the corridor.
‘Max?’ Her hazy tone filled him with emotions he didn’t recognise. ‘What are all those?’
‘Gifts for you. They were dropped off today,’ he answered honestly. ‘I’ll bring them home at some point and you can look at them when you’ve rested. Today’s check-up must have taken it out of you.’
‘Yeah, I’m pretty beat,’ she agreed sheepishly.
‘Then I guess it’s a good job I anticipated this and brought you special fuel to keep you going until we get home and eat.’
With a flourish, he produced a muffin from his pocket, unsure whether she would remember.
‘White chocolate and raspberry. You remembered?’
He had expected confusion at worst, a laugh of recognition at best, but he hadn’t been prepared for the intense look she suddenly shot him. A look that told him she’d already fast-forwarded past their impulsive encounter that very first evening and to the five nights that had followed. And the flush that leapt to her cheeks, the way her eyes rapidly dilated, convinced him that X-rated images were flicking through her head. The same X-rated images that were now flashing through his brain.
His body tightened in primal resp
onse.
He coughed, trying to clear his head. The white-chocolate muffin was supposed to have made her chuckle. A thoughtful gesture. Yet now he couldn’t seem to shake this electric charge from coursing around his whole being.
‘I’ll go and get Imogen from the crèche.’ He didn’t want her wandering through the main hospital exposing herself to any number of germs or viruses. ‘Take the car keys. I’ll meet you in the car.’
The conversation with the surgeon had brought up the physical side of their relationship again, and it didn’t look as though either of them were going to be able to contain it, now it was out there.
The sooner they gave into it, the better.
* * *
‘Is everything okay, Max?’
Since she’d discovered Max really did still want her the way she wanted him, she’d been unsuccessfully striving to ignore the way the atmosphere felt as though it were fizzing around them. Their conversation had been stilted on the drive home, even though they’d both been trying. Perhaps too hard.
Whilst Imogen had been awake they’d had common ground to talk, but now she’d gone to sleep, with just the two of them, it was back to strained politeness. Not what she’d expected after the fun of their exchange in the nephrologist’s office. It felt as if they were taking two steps back for every step forward.
‘Those gifts you saw me with earlier, they were from a group of your former patients, your so-called troubled teens,’ he announced suddenly.
The conversation starter took her by surprise.
‘Really?’
‘Well, I say teens, but one of them looked more like she was in her twenties. Long dark hair, self-harm scars on her inside forearms?’
‘Sally came to hospital?’ Evie fought to keep her tone light. ‘With which others? Why didn’t you tell them to wait?’
‘Sally,’ he mused. ‘I didn’t know. I never asked her name. And I certainly wasn’t going to suggest they wait for you—you’re still too vulnerable for that many visitors. Remember—no confined spaces, no peak-hour transport, no big welcome-home party.’
‘I know. How was Sally, then?’ Evie changed the subject. ‘Still doing well?’
‘Yes, according to her.’ He drew his lips into a thin line. ‘But she’s no longer one of your patients. Not since you gave up your position and moved away.’
‘She’s a friend.’
He clicked his tongue.
‘You need to learn the difference between a patient and a friend.’
‘And you need to learn not to be so dispassionate about either.’
She tensed, preparing for an argument. None came.
‘I was thinking something not too dissimilar.’
‘You were?’ That didn’t sound like Max.
‘As it happens,’ he confirmed tightly, but didn’t elaborate. ‘So, Sally said she’d been with you for eight years.’
‘No, I’ve known her for eight years but she hasn’t been my patient for the last five of them.’
‘So she never talks about any problems.’
‘I told you, she’s a friend. Friends do discuss problems sometimes, you know. But I don’t talk to her in exactly the same way I did when it was purely doctor-patient.’
‘What kind of problems?’
He sounded genuinely interested, rather than interrogating her. But still, she didn’t want to break any confidences.
‘I don’t feel it’s my place to discuss things she’s told me in confidence.’
‘I thought you said it wasn’t a doctor-patient relationship any more.’
‘It isn’t. Not telling you is a matter of choice, not ethical boundaries.’
‘I see. It was only that she seemed very open when I talked to her.’
That was true. Sally was open.
‘I suppose you’re right. Sally’s always felt that by talking about what she’s been through it will bring it to more people’s attention and lessen the stigma of it—especially considering she’s managed to turn her life around, get a good degree and good life experience. But she still can’t seem to get a job, because every time anyone sees those scars they discount her without another thought.’
‘That really bothers you, doesn’t it?’ He was suddenly curious.
‘Yes, it does. Because she fought hard to understand why it started, what her triggers are, and what alternative outlets worked for her so she didn’t harm herself any more. But because the visual scars are always there, she’s never allowed to move forward and get on with her life.’
‘Okay, so tell me how she started.’
She hesitated again, about to tell him again that it wasn’t her place to tell him. But that wasn’t what Sally would want.
Evie gave an almost imperceptible shrug.
‘She started self-harming just before she hit her teens. Her parents were going through a particularly acrimonious divorce, which included fighting over custody of her older sister—the more accomplished of the two of them. She felt as though she was the one neither of them wanted.’
‘So, why cut? Divorce happens to a lot of kids.’
‘And self-harm happens more than you’d think, too. A&E records suggest around fourteen per cent of kids aged between eleven and sixteen can self-harm. But the real figures are likely to be significantly higher because many cases go unreported.’
‘How? How does it get missed, Evie?’
His cool, unemotional tone suddenly grated on her. She’d fought daily to convince enough individuals and institutions without having to convince Max as well.
‘I don’t know. Perhaps because not everyone has people interested enough to notice,’ Evie cried in exasperation. ‘Or because not everyone is as thick-skinned and self-possessed as the great Maximilian Van Berg. Unlike you, the rest of us are human, and what other people say or how they treat us can hurt.’
‘What the hell is that supposed to mean?’ he growled angrily.
‘It means I hate that these kids sometimes feel they have no one on their side. Some might grow out of it before it gets noticed, especially with boys who find other ways than cutting, which they think is more a girl’s thing. But just because they punch themselves, or walls, or initiate fights where they know they’ll get hurt doesn’t make it any less self-harming than cutting is.’
‘You’re saying if boys fight they’re replacing cutting themselves with getting beaten up?’ he said scornfully. ‘Boys fight, it’s a normal part of growing up. It’s a way of letting off a bit of steam against another kid who has got under your skin. Better than the social exclusion some girls use against others. Isn’t it that kind of ostracising which contributes to some kids self-harming?’
‘Yes, but I’m not talking about evenly matched boys taking the occasional argument into the playground, Max, I’m talking about some boys who purposefully get into fights every single day, especially if they choose older or bigger kids who they know will easily beat them up and hurt them.’
‘A broken nose, even a broken rib, depending on who they choose to fight?’ Max demanded unexpectedly ‘If kids call them names because they have a big nose, or ears which stick out?’
‘Sometimes it’s that,’ Evie agreed. ‘Other times it’s following a traumatic event. But it doesn’t even have to be so clear-cut. It might just be a sense of feeling they don’t measure up somehow. And they might not fight other kids, they might wait until no one’s around and punch walls, or deliberately put themselves into dangerous situations. That’s when it goes from boys fighting as a normal part of growing up, to them finding a way of self-harming without actually cutting.’
She expected him to come back at her. Instead he stared at her, unexpectedly silent, his face set into an expression she’d never seen before. It worried her.
‘What is it?’
&nb
sp; ‘Nothing, I’m sorry.’ He seemed instantly contrite.
‘Max?’
‘It’s nothing.’ He was really making an effort to sound nonchalant. Anyone else might have bought it. But not her.
‘Max? What’s wrong? Talk to me.’
CHAPTER ELEVEN
MAX FROZE. HER WORDS were like an unexpected bombshell. And then it was as if a red-hot rod seared through his gut.
Evie had no idea of the emotional Pandora’s box her words had just opened. How could she? He’d never told her. He’d never even realised it himself. He’d seen it in people like Dean, although he hadn’t recognised it for what it was. But himself? Never.
And yet, for the first time in his life, he felt as though he was looking at someone he could actually trust.
It wasn’t just about the sex.
The thought slammed into him like a lorry jackknifing into his chest. For all the banter and teasing in Arabella’s office, he knew Evie was more than just that one fling. And it wasn’t just about the daughter who would now connect them for ever. He wanted that connection with Evie. He wanted her to be in his life. Her and Imogen.
And that meant talking to her, confiding in her, in a way he’d never anticipated confiding in anyone in his life. It meant trusting Evie. But he could do it, because he owed it to her to be as honest with her as she’d now been with him.
‘Was that you, Max? Were you that kid?’ she asked gently, and he was reminded that he wasn’t just trusting Evie, the mother of his child. He was trusting Dr Parker. He didn’t know who he was talking to right now, but he didn’t suppose it mattered, just as long as he talked.
‘I used to come home every night with a bloody nose, a black eye or cracked ribs,’ he started hesitantly.
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