City Surgeon, Outback Bride

by Lucy Clark

  ‘Everything’s still good,’ Stuie reported over two hours later.

  It was four hours before the drains had been put in, the skin stapled back together and the anaesthetic reversed. And still the rain was hitting the roof of the hospital. When it rained in this part of the outback, it rained.

  Rayne walked wearily out of Theatre, surprised she felt like a million dollars on the inside. ‘That was…amazing,’ she said as she degowned.

  ‘You’re not too exhausted?’ Henry was surprised.

  ‘Totally.’ She nodded for emphasis. ‘But it was still amazing. How do you do it? Day in, day out?’

  ‘Do you mean standing in one place for so long or the work?’ He was secretly pleased that he’d managed to impress her.

  ‘Both.’

  ‘The standing you get used to fairly quickly. The other is lots of study and hard work.’ He watched her closely. ‘Why don’t you really consider doing further study?’

  Rayne smiled. ‘I can’t leave Deni.’

  ‘You may not have to.’

  ‘I can’t study surgery here, Henry.’

  ‘Why not? You could do the training at Wagga and they have a university there that offers the required courses.’

  Her eyes widened. ‘You’ve looked into it?’

  ‘I’ve looked into a lot of things.’

  Rayne was astounded. Was it possible? Could she study surgery while still being a GP? No. It would be too much work, too much pressure on Jasmine, but perhaps in the future… The hope that had flared at Henry’s words settled down to a more reasonable level. ‘I’d never even considered staying in Deni and studying surgery. Of course, I can’t do it now, but perhaps later…when Jazzy’s more settled.’

  ‘It’s something to consider.’

  ‘Actually, I can’t. I can’t be on call for Wagga Base hospital as a surgical registrar. I’d have to do night shifts and all sorts of odd hours. That wouldn’t fit in with my clinics and house calls and the rest of my life.’

  ‘You do know that you can study surgery part time?’

  ‘No. Really?’

  ‘Of course. And as to the actual practical hours, you could work here at Deni.’

  She shook her head. ‘We don’t have a surgeon here to supervise.’

  ‘Rayne!’ Tanya’s call came from down the corridor.

  ‘In here,’ she called back, and both she and Henry turned to face the harassed triage sister. ‘How are things going? Do you need us?’

  Tanya sighed heavily. ‘Things have settled but I do still need help. Henry, there’s a case in treatment room one. If you wouldn’t mind taking a look, I’d appreciate it. Now that the rain isn’t so hard, we can use the helicopter, but only if you think it’s necessary.’

  ‘Right-o. Lead the way.’

  ‘What do you want me to do?’ Rayne asked.

  ‘We’re out of 0-negative. Could you get some more brought up?’

  ‘Sure.’

  Henry watched as Rayne walked off before he followed Tanya. He still wasn’t used to everyone pitching in like this. Rayne was a trained doctor yet she’d been sent off on an errand an orderly would do. Then again, perhaps all the orderlies were busy and there was no one else to do it. It was simply such a different, more relaxed and informal atmosphere than he was used to…but he definitely liked it. All around Deni he’d found the same sort of outlook. They were a community. Whether you were a retired headmaster in charge of building tables or the person who baked the best cupcakes in the world—everyone was still equal. And Henry realised that if Tanya had asked him to bring up some more blood, he most certainly would have done it.

  In Sydney, he’d been the big cheese. The guy at the top. And everyone had bowed and scraped to him to the point where he’d become so used to it, he’d half expected it. Not here, though. He was Henry. He’d helped set things up for the festival, he’d hammered and sawed, he’d drunk lukewarm tea and chatted with people whose outlook on life was hardly complex. Happiness. That was the main thing he’d found here in Deniliquin—happiness. And he hadn’t been happy in a very long time.

  The wind outside started to pick up again and once more the lights flickered but held. As he walked into treatment room one, there was an almighty crack, like that of thunder, but it was followed by a loud rumble and the ground even shook a little.

  ‘What was that?’ Tanya whispered.

  A moment later, someone came racing up the corridor. ‘A tree’s fallen on the storage area.’

  Henry’s mind processed the information as his feet started taking him in the direction of the area the young man had pointed to. The storage area. Where they kept the blood supplies. The area where Rayne had gone.

  He started to run, heading down the corridors, fear and trepidation on his face. Other people were behind him, following to help out where it might be needed, but none of that meant anything to him. Rayne had been in that part of the hospital. The part that a tree had collapsed onto.

  His heart was pounding wildly with anxiety and pain. This couldn’t happen. It wasn’t fair. He couldn’t lose Rayne. He’d already lost one woman he’d loved and he wasn’t going to lose another. He quickened his pace as he rounded a corner, his mind picturing many different scenarios. His breathing was shallow and he forced himself to swallow, to calm down. If Rayne was indeed in any danger, he needed to have all his faculties to ensure he saved her.

  He wanted her. He needed her. He loved her.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  EVERYTHING seemed to happen in slow motion when he finally came to the part of the hospital that had collapsed. There was debris everywhere and the people around him started to dig, started to clear it. Henry was stunned, unable to move for a few minutes as he took in his surroundings. If Rayne was beneath all that…

  Henry’s heart constricted with pain.

  People were talking, moving things, working their way through and asking him questions. He blinked. ‘What?’ His daze began to clear.

  ‘Henry? Are you all right? You’re as white as a sheet.’

  ‘Rayne. Has anyone seen Rayne?’

  A few people said they hadn’t seen her. Others just kept on working their way through, clearing piece after piece. A few orderlies were getting a tarpaulin set up to keep the rain off the area but it would all take time and they didn’t have much of it, not if they were going to find Rayne.

  Henry shifted, his gaze frantically searching the rubble as he stood there getting wet and not caring in the slightest. ‘There.’ He pointed and rushed to the place where he’d seen a glimpse of a foot beneath some plasterboard. People were beside him, helping him dig, moving things out of the way to get to the person trapped beneath.

  As they shifted a larger piece, Henry noticed a belt buckle. He moved more stuff out of the way, his heart plummeting as he realised it wasn’t Rayne. It was a policewoman he’d seen in the hospital earlier on that evening. It wasn’t Rayne.

  He continued to help get the woman out, still wondering what had happened to Rayne. Where was she? Was she trapped further back? If so, it would take them quite a bit of time to get to her, and if she was injured… bleeding… He closed his eyes for a second and blocked out the mental images.

  ‘Henry?’ Tanya asked. ‘Are you sure you’re all right?’

  Henry nodded. As the policewoman was now almost ready to be moved, he needed to assess her first. He concentrated on his job but once she’d been taken to the A and E department, he stood up and desperately scanned the area.

  ‘Henry?’

  He turned as he heard his name called, heard it called by the one woman he was desperate to see. ‘Rayne?’ There she was. Perfectly fine. He picked his way back through the rubble and gathered her into his arms.

  ‘Where were you? I thought you were in there. I thought I’d lost you.’

  ‘Iwent to the ward first,’ shetold him, but her mouth was muffled against his shoulder so she wasn’t sure he’d heard her properly. No one seemed to give them a second glance
as they held each other close, as Henry pressed his lips to hers.

  ‘Don’t do that to me. Don’t scare me like that again.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I had no idea you thought I was in there.’

  ‘How could I not? You’d gone to the supply area. This…’ he swept his hand in the direction of the area ‘…is the supply area.’

  ‘You’re mad?’

  ‘No. No. I’m so utterly relieved. I thought I’d lost you.’

  ‘So you said.’

  ‘No, Rayne. You don’t understand.’ He held her back a little so he could look intently into her eyes. ‘I thought I’d lost you, like I lost Natalia. I thought you’d been taken from me just when I’d found you. Rayne, I love you.’

  Rayne wasn’t sure what to say. What to do. Henry… loved her? Was it true? Could it be true or was it simply adrenaline talking?

  ‘Don’t say anything now. I didn’t tell you in order to pressure you or to have you say you love me too. That’s not what this is about.’ He held her close and tenderly kissed her head. ‘I thought you were in there and you’re not, and right now I feel like the luckiest man alive because you could well have been in there.’

  ‘I heard there was a policewoman in there.’

  ‘Yes. We got her out.’

  ‘Do I need to assess her?’

  ‘She had a fractured arm and leg. Blood pressure and neurological observations were fine. There was a loss of consciousness for only a few minutes. She was stable but I’ve sent her for X-rays to have everything checked.’

  Rayne smiled up at him, her arms still firmly around him. ‘You’re quite a man, Henry Harcourt. Worried about me. Digging through debris. Treating patients on the fly.’

  ‘That’s what I’ve been trained to do. Well, the treating-patients part, not the digging part.’

  ‘And the worrying-about-me part?’ Rayne waited expectantly for his answer. Had she dreamed he’d told her he loved her? It was as though she needed to test it, to make sure it had been real and not just part of her fanciful daydreaming.

  He smiled down at her. She was now almost as wet as him but neither of them seemed to care at all. ‘I haven’t been trained to do it per se, but it’s something that is now a part of me.’

  ‘Because you love me?’

  ‘I do.’ And as if to prove it, he kissed her soundly.

  ‘Are you two gonna stand around kissing, or are you going to help?’ Tanya asked. They smiled at each other before letting each other go.

  ‘Sorry,’ they said in unison.

  ‘Ah, don’t worry,’ Tanya remarked with a grin. ‘We all enjoyed the show. Just make sure you take good care of our Rayne. Although we might be inundated with the other kind at the moment, this Rayne is the only one we have and we really need her.’

  ‘Noted,’ Henry said with a nod, and winked at his Rayne.

  She wasn’t at all sure what to say so she said nothing and set to work. Thankfully, there was no one else trapped beneath the debris and once the tarps were up, they were able to close off that section of the hospital, salvaging what they could in the way of supplies.

  Henry and Rayne treated more patients, although the stream was starting to thin out, but they all knew that once the sun was up, there would be more people wanting medical attention. The policewoman escaped with clean fractures, which would only require casts, and thankfully her temporary loss of consciousness appeared to have had no ill effects.

  ‘How are things going?’ Rayne asked Tanya a while later.

  ‘Settled. For the moment. The smaller cases will start to come in now that the sun is up. The damage to the areas of the town that were worst hit will be assessed better but, from what I’ve heard, the muster site was the main one. People who didn’t want to bother us during the immediate aftermath will all be in for checks. Why don’t you head on home, have a shower and get refreshed? Spend some time with Jazzy and come back in a few hours’ time?’

  ‘All right. First, I want to check on Rocky. Has his transfer to Wagga been organised?’

  ‘I just need Henry to sign off on some paperwork and then it will all be settled. How did the surgery go?’

  ‘It was long…exciting but long.’

  ‘You really enjoy surgery, don’t you?’ Tanya asked rhetorically. ‘You should do surgery, Rayne. The afterglow definitely suits you…or is it the dashing surgeon who suits you?’

  Rayne laughed, not sure what to say. The fact that Henry had confessed his love for her was still overwhelming, making her all happy and excited every time she thought of it. It also brought so many questions. Did that mean he wanted to stay here in Deni? Was he going to leave Sydney for good? Where exactly did she fit into his life? Did she really fit at all?

  Questions. Doubt. Confusion. They all warred within her and she decided not to think about it until she’d at least left the hospital.

  She went and checked on Rocky’s situation, pleased when he was able to talk for a few minutes even though he was still very groggy from the anaesthetic.

  ‘Henry says I’ll be fine.’

  ‘Told you so,’ Rayne remarked with a smile. ‘We’ve done our bit—now you need to do yours.’

  ‘Which is?’

  ‘Stay still and do what the nurses tell you.’

  Rocky started to laugh but then moaned in pain.

  ‘Are you all right?’ Rayne reached for his chart to see what analgesics Henry had prescribed.

  ‘I’m fine. Just shouldn’t laugh. Everything feels…I dunno…heavy down there.’

  ‘Fair enough. Well, if you’re sure you’re not in pain, I’ll leave you to rest. Your transfer to Wagga should be all organised soon so you’ll be up, up and away in no time.’

  ‘Thanks, Rayne.’ Rocky tried to reach for her hand and Rayne immediately took his. ‘Seriously—thanks.’

  ‘It’s Henry who deserves the thanks.’

  ‘And I’ve already told him.’

  Rayne patted his hand. ‘Sleep.’

  Rocky did as he was told and Rayne went to get changed out of her theatre scrubs. It had certainly been an adventure and one she was sure wasn’t quite over yet.

  As she walked out of the hospital, she stood in the early morning light and shook her head at the aftermath of the storm. Branches, twigs and leaves littered the streets, as though someone had dumped a huge bag of rubbish on the entire township. Paper and other litter added to the mess and yet, with the sun shining down through the clouds, giving it a clear golden glow, Rayne knew everything was going to be all right.

  ‘What a mess,’ Henry said softly as he came up behind her, slipping an arm about her waist.

  ‘But still…pretty.’ She indicated the sky, and Henry agreed.

  ‘Looking at the sky, you’d have no idea what it looked like only a few hours earlier.’

  ‘The world keeps turning,’ she murmured softly.

  Henry looked at her and she at him. ‘That it does.’ He took her hand in his. ‘Let’s go check on Jasmine.’

  ‘No doubt she slept through the whole thing. She’s such a heavy sleeper.’ Rayne chatted happily about Jasmine as they navigated the streets. A water main had burst on the road so they had to take a detour to Rayne’s house.

  ‘You’re here,’ Jasmine squealed when they finally pulled into the driveway. ‘Rayne, there was this big storm and I woke up at five o’clock in the morning and Granny and Grandpa were asleep on the lounge together so I woke them up because you weren’t in your bed and they told me you’d gone to the hop-sital with Henry so I knew everything was going to be OK, and it is.’

  ‘Yes, it is,’ Rayne said as she held the little girl close. No sooner had Jasmine given Rayne a hug than she launched herself at Henry.

  ‘Come inside. Granny’s cooked up some bacon and eggs.’

  ‘Mmm. Sounds good.’ He gave Jasmine a kiss on her cheek. ‘But you taste good, too. Maybe I’ll have Jazzy for breakfast instead.’

  She giggled. ‘You can’t eat me, Henry. If you did, you w
ouldn’t be able to kiss me tomorrow.’

  ‘Exactly right.’ He gave her tummy a little tickle and headed inside. Rayne loved the way he loved Jasmine, the way he’d brought a light back into the little girl’s eyes just by being himself. She closed her eyes for a moment and prayed he would stay here in Deni, that he would stay in her life. Sure, she had questions but surely they could work everything out. Couldn’t they?

  She had to keep brushing aside the feeling that Henry wasn’t like all those men who had come and gone in her mother’s life. He was one of the good guys, the ones you could trust. The ones you could bring home and let them become a part of you, of your life. He loved her. He’d told her so straight out and she also appreciated, given what he’d been through, that that would have been a difficult thing for him to say, but he’d said it. He’d found a way to move on with his life and she admired him for that. He wasn’t looking back. Not any more.

  ‘There’s a lesson there, Rayne,’ she murmured as she opened her eyes and headed into the house.

  They ate breakfast together as a family and this time Rayne noticed Henry was more open, more animated in his discussions. It was as though in declaring his love for her a weight had been lifted from his shoulders and he was free to be exactly who he was. What you saw was what you got…and that meant she could trust him. There was no false dignity, no pretence whatsoever. He was her Henry, through and through, and as he laughed with Jarvis and received a mock scolding from Earlene, Rayne marvelled at the happiness he’d also helped to bring to her little family.

  Everyone was smiling. Everyone was happy and healthy. Another picture-perfect memory and one she hoped would last longer than a moment.

  * * *

  As they’d promised Tanya, the two of them returned to the hospital after Henry had gone back to Sylvia’s for a quick shower to refresh himself. He’d insisted once again on collecting Rayne and when he did, he held her hand as they made their way back to the hospital.

  The road workers had been hard at it and a considerable amount of debris had been cleared since they’d taken this route. The A and E was quite full when they arrived and so they set to work immediately, seeing patient after patient, but the numbers didn’t appear to dwindle. As one left, another arrived.