by Sue MacKay
‘Excuse me—stand back.’
One look and she knew this wasn’t good.
On her knees, she said to the woman, ‘Hi, I’m Steph—a paramedic.’ She reached for a wrist, found an erratic pulse. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Alison Knowles.’
Good response. ‘Do you remember what happened?’
‘Not really.’ Her speech was bubbly and difficult to understand. but she continued talking. ‘One minute I was cycling through the intersection...the next I was face-down on the road.’
Literally, if the swelling under her jaw and the missing front teeth were indicators. Alison had done quite the face-plant.
‘I told the cops a van cut through a red light and collected her,’ a man standing nearby informed them. ‘Got her smack in the middle of his van and sent her flying through the air.’
‘Better than going underneath the van,’ someone else noted.
Kath had pads for the heart monitor attached to Alison’s now exposed chest.
Steph stood up and looked around at the crowd. ‘Thanks for helping this lady, folks, but can you now move back and give her some privacy while we attend to her?’
A uniformed cop pushed through. ‘I’ll take care of this.’
His shoulders were tight and his head high. He had a job to do. One he should’ve already been doing, but what had to be bum fluff on his jaw suggested he was hardly out of kindergarten, let alone the police academy.
Steph swallowed the impulse to grin. ‘Thanks. The further back the better.’
Like the other side of the road.
Back on her knees, she asked her patient, ‘Did you roll yourself over or did someone help you?’
‘Two guys.’ Her face was white and her eyes were glazing. ‘I think...’
They should’ve left her as she was, in case there was damage to the neck and spinal cord.
‘We’re going to put a neck brace on. I need you to remain as still as possible while we do that, okay?’
Steph and Kath worked fast, asking questions, taking obs, checking Alison’s head for trauma, then her shoulders, and finding the left clavicle was broken, and her right knee twisted, possibly dislocated.
Steph drew up some morphine. ‘I’m going to give you some pain relief before we load you on the stretcher.’ Not that it would negate all the pain, but any relief was better than none.
Alison didn’t answer.
Kath shone a light in her eyes, got a small blink. ‘Fading consciousness.’
Once the morphine had been administered they prepared to shift the woman onto the stretcher, with the help of two strong-looking bystanders. With Alison slipping in and out of consciousness time was important.
They were quickly loaded and the cop had the traffic stopped to let them out onto the road back towards Auckland Central.
‘Impact injury to the right shoulder and hip,’ Steph reported with surprise, seeing Michael when they arrived back at the emergency department.
Why did he have to be the one she handed over to every time today? Doctors didn’t usually rush to meet them unless it was a Code One job. Was he on the lookout for her when he heard the ambulance bay bell ring? But he’d been ignoring her earlier. Men. Who could understand them? Not her, for sure.
‘Trauma to the skull?’ he asked as he scanned the PRF she’d handed him.
‘Soft area at the front of her cranium, injury to the jaw and cheekbones.’
Further tests, including X-rays, would be needed.
As Steph began pushing the stretcher into the department Michael took the other side. Huh? Had he forgotten he was the doctor, not the nurse or paramedic? Had he forgotten he wasn’t talking to her?
He glanced across at her and said quietly, so no one else would hear, ‘Is this why you changed careers? You’re an adrenalin junkie and speeding around with flashing lights turns you on?’
There was a level of censure in his voice that grated.
‘Yes, that’s exactly why I’m a paramedic. We get loads of attention, racing through the streets,’ she snapped.
What was this about? They’d got on well last night, with Michael being so understanding about her infertility.
‘That explains it.’
Now he was smiling that gut-clenching, heart-speeding smile, as if he was on a mission to upset her and winning.
Drawing a calming breath, moderating her tone when she wanted to yell at him, she said, ‘I haven’t really changed. I still care for people who are hurting one way or another.’
They’d reached a resus room, and as everyone moved Alison across to the bed Steph gulped back unexpected tears. If he didn’t want anything to do with her then he should just say so. He knew how to—had done it before.
Picking up the blanket, she turned to head back to the ambulance, leaving Kath to fill the medics in on their patient. She had a gurney to stow, equipment to tidy away, new blankets to place ready for their next call.
‘Steph—wait.’
Michael appeared beside her.
‘I’m all out of sorts today. Didn’t get much sleep. But I shouldn’t be taking it out on you when you’re not the cause. I know how much you care about your patients. I really do.’ His fingers shoved through his hair, displaced the errant curls on his forehead. ‘Can we catch up tonight?’
‘I don’t think so.’ Not very forgiving of her. Okay. ‘Can I answer that later, when I know if I have to pick my parents up from the airport or not?’
‘No problem.’
He headed back to Alison, who was now surrounded by doctors.
Kath joined her at the ambulance. ‘You want to check how Melanie and her babies are doing? Here’s your opportunity. The radio’s quiet.’
Throughout the night she’d woken often with the sound of Melanie’s pain ringing in her skull—only somehow in her dream it had become her own anguish. Familiar torment that had laid dormant for a few years but seemed all too happy to rise up and knock her for six now.
‘I’ll be quick.’
Fear and exhaustion greeted her through the PICU window. She didn’t hang around, understanding that it wasn’t her place, but was grateful to see the babies were still in their incubators, with mum and dad hovering over them. There was a long way to go, but they’d made it this far. A positive start.
The next time she went into the ED with a patient Michael was nowhere to be seen. He’d probably knocked off a couple of hours ago. As she and Kath would when they got back to base.
Yet, futile as it was, she still scoped the department for a glimpse of scrubs-clad long legs and thick, unruly dark hair that her fingers itched to touch—and still came up disappointed when relief should have been loosening her tense muscles.
His comments about her being a paramedic still rankled, despite his genuine apology. Something must have caused him to say it in the first place. Was it her he was out of sorts with? Or was it himself he was having trouble with?
The way Chantelle had exploded onto the scene to snatch up her son had hurt him. She’d seen it in his tight mouth and sorry expression, in the need in his eyes. Need for what? A child of his own?
Her blood chilled. There was her escape route. There was nothing she could do if he wanted a family, so she had to get over him. And she wasn’t going to do it by taking off for places unknown again. No more running away. Even if it felt as if her heart was breaking.
She continued her inner debate all the way back to base, and while she topped up the ambulance, went out to the car park and got into her cute red sports car. She sure loved this machine...
But what if family wasn’t the cause of that need underneath all those other emotions that had skittered through Michael’s eyes? Chantelle was family, and it seemed he looked out for her and Aaron big-time. More than necessary? More than Chantelle wanted?
Michael took responsibility seriously. She’d seen that in the department, even during those two weeks when she’d been having the time of her life he’d made sure she was comfortable about everything. She guessed she’d never really known him—and chances were she wasn’t about to learn any more.
Which was good, wasn’t it? Wasn’t it her goal to get over him? But did all goals have to be met? Or could she change her mind? Go after him instead of trying to shove him back into a box labelled Man Best Forgotten?
A yawn sneaked up on her. There hadn’t been a lot of sleep going on last night. Along with the rerun of negative pregnancy tests there’d been visions of Michael, lovingly holding his nephew. Pictures had rolled through her head on a circuit, waking her again and again.
Michael was committed to watching out for his sister and his nephew. He was committed to his work. He gave and gave—at home and in the department. Yet he said he didn’t want commitment with anyone else. What did he do for himself? Did he have a secret hobby, like collecting stamps?
Steph laughed around another yawn. She could not picture that at all.
Waiting for the car’s heater to do its thing before heading to the supermarket for something boring to eat, she felt an intense loneliness roll over and around her. It was like nothing she’d known before—not even when Freddy had left her in those bleak days when nothing had gone her way.
Now she was back in Auckland—seeing her parents regularly, getting to know her new work colleagues, and installed in her own home with all her possessions around her—she shouldn’t feel despondent. This was what she wanted. Wasn’t it?
How often had she said that? Starting out in Queenstown, then in London, in Italy... Her sigh was sour. Tonight was different. She wanted this and more. There was so much love in her heart, still waiting to be shared. What was wrong with her that she couldn’t find a man to love her for who she was? A man who wouldn’t reject her when the going got tough?
A text landed in her phone.
Don’t need picking up. Got back on earlier flight and took taxi. Going to bed early, exhausted. Love Mum.
So, home or Michael’s? Home was safe. Michael’s was fraught with emotions she didn’t want to face tonight.
Undecided, she put the car into ‘drive’ and headed for the supermarket. Wherever she went she needed food. And maybe a bottle of wine.
* * *
Michael heard the low roar of a car in his driveway as he quietly closed Aaron’s door. The kid had been fighting sleep for an hour but finally he’d succumbed. The last thing he needed was for him to wake again.
He knew who’d driven up. She hadn’t phoned to tell him she’d be around, and yet he’d delayed phoning the Thai restaurant to put his order in.
Opening the front door, he leaned a shoulder against the frame. ‘Your parents got home all right?’
Stephanie grinned up at him from the bottom step. ‘All by themselves.’
He laughed. ‘You wouldn’t have taken that matchbox on wheels to collect them, would you?’
‘Why not?’ Her grin widened, then was stolen by a yawn. ‘Sorry. Am I too late to add fried rice with pork to your order?’
She was standing in front of him now. He breathed her in. Honey and hot toast. Mouthwateringly delicious.
‘Hello?’ Stephanie waved a hand in front of him. ‘Anyone home?’
‘Don’t know. I’ll go find out.’ He stood back to let her in, then remembered what she’d asked. ‘I haven’t ordered yet.’
‘So you really do eat Thai on Tuesdays? Then this is perfect.’ She handed him a bottle of Pinot Gris.
His heart slowed. ‘You remembered.’
‘Your favourite wine? Of course I did.’
There was no ‘of course’ about it. Two years was a long time to remember trivia.
Stephanie prefers Oomph-brewed coffee to Wake Up.
Okay, he got it.
She used to go crazy whenever I kissed a trail of kisses below her ear.
Michael slammed the door shut, wincing as he remembered the barely sleeping Aaron, and headed for the kitchen and some glasses. He needed a drink. Like right now. So much for trivia.
The kitchen was a mess, with plastic bowls and spoons and a fork littering the little table Aaron had used, with matching dollops of mashed pumpkin and potato on the floor.
‘Tonight was an epic battle. But Aaron’s finally, finally asleep. I hope.’
He shouldn’t have said he was here. The questions were already lighting up in Stephanie’s eyes.
‘Chantelle was asked to work tonight. She fills shelves at the supermarket part-time.’
‘Impressive.’
‘She doesn’t have to do it. I’ve offered to pay her university fees so she doesn’t have to get a student loan or borrow for everyday expenses.’ Stubborn didn’t begin to describe his sister.
‘She’s got a child, is studying for a degree and works when you’ve given her an out? Even more impressive.’ Stephanie twisted the cap off the bottle and took the glasses he’d lifted from the shelf.
‘That’s all very well, but she’s constantly exhausted. And then there are the days I get Aaron because she’s doing too much.’
‘You don’t want to look after him? I’m not believing that.’
He took the glass she offered. ‘I adore my time with him. Watching him grow from a tiny baby to where he’s at now, running and crashing, spitting out words in excitement over a moth crawling across the floor—I wouldn’t miss that for anything.’
‘So what’s the problem? Seems to me Chantelle is doing a great job making a life for her son.’
He didn’t like the way those lovely eyes were drilling into him, searching for answers to her questions. She wasn’t getting them.
Snatching up the dishcloth, he bent to wipe up the mess. ‘You’re right,’ he acknowledged, hoping that would shut her down.
‘Want me to phone our order through?’ she asked.
Relief loosened his tongue. ‘The number’s on speed dial on my phone. I’ll have pork green curry—hot. Just tell them Dr Mike and they’ll know where to come.’
‘Dr Mike?’
‘I was eating there one night when one of the cooks knocked a pan of boiling oil off the stove onto his leg. It was like a scene out of a horror movie, with oil everywhere, the guy screaming in agony, and blood from where his head hit the edge of the stove as he went down.’
‘Is the cook all right now?’
‘Good as new—if you don’t count the scars.’
‘Do they still charge you for meals?’
Her smile went straight to his heart. He cursed silently.
‘They tried that one. Eat all I want as often as I want, for free.’ He shook his head. ‘I told them I’d go somewhere else if they didn’t take payment, but now I get wontons or deep fried shrimps with every order.’
‘Win-win. I like that.’
Her lips touched the rim of her glass and he watched as she took in a mouthful of wine.
That mouth, hot and slick on his skin, had been sensational, and it was another piece of trivia from two years ago. How had he found the strength to stop their affair? Must’ve needed his head read. Because right now he would not be able to stop if they were to start again.
‘Here.’ He thrust his phone at her. ‘Order dinner.’
Her head tilted to one side. ‘Yes, sir.’ And she did as he’d demanded.
He’d been that close to reaching for her, removing the glass from her slim fingers and hauling her curvaceous body he’d been hankering after for two long days and nights up against him. He still was that close. Closer, because he’d taken a step nearer.
He needed to step back, because no way did he want to hurt Stephanie further down the track when he inevitably messed up.
But one kiss...?
‘B
ugsy’s gone.’
Michael spun around to gape at his nephew, standing in the kitchen doorway rubbing his eyes. ‘Hey, buddy, you’re meant to be in bed.’
The little guy did have his uses. Stopping that potential hug, kiss, whatever might have followed, was mammoth.
‘Bugsy. I want my monkey.’
‘I’ll find him.’ Michael swept the little boy up into his arms, kissed his forehead. ‘Bet he’s hiding under the bed. That’s his favourite place, isn’t it?’
‘Water!’ Aaron cried.
‘Of course.’ Michael smiled.
Of course. And then it would be I want a ’nana.
‘Stalling tactics?’ Stephanie asked.
‘You’re on to it.’ With one hand he filled a bottle with water from the fridge. ‘There you go. Let’s find Bugsy.’
‘I want a ’nana.’
‘You’ve had dinner.’
Aaron’s mouth opened, the indignant cry already in his expression.
‘All right—half a banana it is.’
‘Softy,’ Steph called from behind him.
‘It’s my middle name.’
* * *
Michael forked up rice and curry, chewed, swallowed. ‘Tell me more about why you joined the ambulance service.’
Stephanie’s fork banged onto her plate. ‘We’ve already done this.’
‘The flashing lights and screaming sirens bit, yes. But not the real reason that had you changing from a career you loved and were exceptional at.’
‘Nothing like going from rugby to medicine?’
‘Low blow.’
Tell her, it’s no secret.
‘My rugby career was stellar, yes, and at first I couldn’t see past the hype and the excitement, the sheer thrill of playing in front of those large crowds. Two episodes of concussion wised me up, made me grow up. A third knock and doing anything as intense as becoming a doctor would’ve been in jeopardy. I’d always known rugby wasn’t a lifelong career.’
‘Not all players see it so clearly.’
‘Unfortunately. But I do understand the attraction. It’s exhilarating, being on the field with forty thousand people watching your team, cheering or booing—didn’t matter, they were there because of us.’
