Doctors in Flight

by Meredith Webber

Mortified, I want to get out of the place as quickly as possible, but GR insists on asking questions, touching me—which, incidentally, causes far more damage than the fall—and generally assuring himself—in a medical way—that nothing’s broken.

  ‘I’m OK. I never fall over. I must have slipped on something.’ I’m lying through my teeth about the slipping but he’s not to know that. ‘Let’s go.’

  The proprietor has joined us, a Chinese woman looking so anxious she might burst into tears any moment. Is she worried I’ll sue her?

  I try to tell her it’s OK, babbling on about it being my fault, though I’ve just denied this to GR. He tries to hush me, telling me everything’s OK, then I realise she’s not looking at me but at her cabinet which now has a long diagonal crack across the glass.

  ‘And I’ll get that fixed—or you get it fixed and send me the bill. The old nurses’ quarters at the hospital. That’ll find me. Will that find me?’

  I turn to GR who’s frowning quite ferociously.

  ‘Stop worrying about the cabinet,’ he says. ‘Mrs Li knows it was an accident.’ He’s still steadying me with his arm around my back, and I realise the only way I’ll escape his touch is to get out to the car. Ignoring the effects of it as much as possible I walk, carefully this time, out the door. It’s only when a stone on the footpath bites into my sole that I realise I’m shoeless. My favourite silver sandals are dangling from the fingers of GR’s left hand.

  ‘I’ll have my shoes back now, thanks.’

  ‘You’re probably safer barefoot,’ he growls, then mutters something that sounds very like, ‘As if!’

  I make it to the car, wait patiently for him to unlock it and open the precious, buckle-prone aluminium door, then climb in. He hands me my shoes and our fingers tangle in the straps. He bends his head to sort things out, and I see his face in profile. It’s just a face—a profile—yet something catches at my heart, and again I think of Pete.

  And Claudia.

  And my mother and the Argentinian.

  And Mrs GR Prentice for surely there would be one…

  Though there couldn’t have been when the other registrar chased him…

  I wake at four-thirty—bet you thought I’d sleep in! Not that waking early does me much good. I fell into bed last night too physically and emotionally exhausted by the experiences of the day to bother unpacking, so now I have to find where I packed some ‘going to work’ clothes.

  They should, of course, be on the top of the second suitcase, because I put that much forethought into my packing, but one trip in the Cessna has reminded me that skirts of any kind are impossible—tight ones crawl up the thighs and full ones blow skyward in the wind that is generated especially for all airports.

  I need pants—preferably cargo because they’re loose enough to be comfortable in all day—and I know I’ve got a pair.

  Somewhere!

  By the time Michael arrives to collect me—well, I assumed when I heard the footsteps coming down the veranda that it was Michael, but the vibrations in the air make me turn and it isn’t—I’ve got clothes strewn around the bit of the veranda that might, by some wild stretch of the imagination, be called the living area. I’m clad in an unexceptional T-shirt—white with a plasticky kind of bird printed on it—and a pair of bikini briefs that aren’t as brief as beach-type bikinis but still probably not correct attire for greeting one’s boss on the first morning of work.

  ‘Two minutes!’ I tell him, hoping he’ll take the hint and depart, but he looks around with the air of a man visiting a museum of modern art. You know, one of those places where you’re not sure if the paintings have been hung the right way up.

  ‘Did you stay up all night to make this much mess?’ he asks, but I’ve found a pair of jeans, and I’m scrabbling into them, hoping the open lid of the suitcase is providing me with some maidenly modesty.

  ‘Aren’t you early?’ I demand, desperately sucking in my stomach in an attempt to get the zip done up. How long since I wore these jeans? Were they always tight or have the panic-easing chocolates I consumed since I heard about Bilbarra gone straight to my hips?

  ‘I realised you hadn’t had time to shop. Thought I’d take you for breakfast first. There’s a transport café out along the road to the airport where Michael and I usually grab a snack and a coffee.’

  Once the zip slid home, the button was easy. Maybe eating nothing but chocolate was a revolutionary kind of diet. I could write a book, make a fortune, retire from medicine—and leave Bilbarra.

  Realising this isn’t going to happen in time for me to get out of going to work today, I slide my feet into sandals—red and not quite as high in the heel as the silver disaster-causing ones from last night—grab the white coat and stethoscope I discovered early in the unpacking frenzy and prepare to follow GR out to his car.

  ‘That’s it?’

  He’s looking at me in a most peculiar manner.

  I check I’ve got my jeans on even though I distinctly remember the struggle with the zip.

  ‘I’m assuming they’ll have pens and paper and prescription pads and whatever else I’ll need at the hospital,’ I tell him, puzzled by his reaction, but even more disturbed by the fact a good night’s sleep hasn’t changed the effect his presence has on my body.

  ‘But no handbag? No receptacle full of the paraphernalia women consider essential to daily life, so have to cart around with them?’

  ‘You are the most judgmental man I’ve ever met,’ I tell him, mentally banging my head against a wall. ‘While as for generalisations…!’

  I let him fill in the blanks and stride ahead of him. Of course I should have grabbed my handbag. There’s floss in it, and nail clippers and a blister pack of paracetemol, which I’ll probably need because this man’s sure to give me a headache before the day is over. And some moisturiser, essential in the dry air out here—although most hospitals have great moisturiser the physio uses for massage and the nurses use on patients to prevent their skin drying out in the air-conditioning—and nearly a whole block of fruit and nut chocolate if I remember rightly…

  And my wallet and credit card! I’m wailing silently to myself by now. I hate going anywhere without my credit card. I’m not a shopaholic—mainly because of chocolate, as I believe being two kinds of ‘-aholic’ would be overkill and definitely show addictive tendencies. And I’ve already explained my inherent miserliness in things like paying unnecessary rent, but I have to admit I’ve small spending weaknesses in other areas.

  But there’s no way I’m going back for my handbag and, what’s worse, I’m now stuck with six months of not carrying a bag, if only to prove this man wrong. I’ll have to tuck things into my pockets. I definitely need to find the cargo pants—cargo pants have great pockets—and probably buy a few more pairs.

  I must have groaned because GR catches up with me.

  ‘What was that?’ he asks, opening the car door and peering over it at me. His chin is freshly shaven so his skin has a shiny look, and I really, really want to run my hand across it to see if it feels as smooth as it looks.

  Handbags, or lack of same, I realise as I climb aboard, are really very minor irritations compared to the major stuff going on inside me.

  I ignore his question and he doesn’t repeat it, settling into the driver’s seat, buckling up, speaking quietly as he goes efficiently about the business of getting us on the way.

  ‘Blythe and Callum Whitworth are the doctors at Creamunna—husband and wife medical team, not long married. Both good, caring doctors.’

  Once again small talk consists of the imparting of information GR feels I should have. I resist the urge to ask whether she’ll be less good and caring when she’s breast-feeding her first infant. Five-thirty in the morning isn’t the ideal time to be starting an argument.

  ‘They’ve both done obstetric short courses and are happy to take uncomplicated pregnancies through to term.’

  He’s pulling up at a dusty-looking roadhouse as he speaks, but t
he remark is puzzling enough for me to query it.

  ‘You say that as if it’s unusual. I know GPs in the city refer pregnant patients on to specialists, but I thought, out here, they would all do some obstetric work.’

  ‘They do to a certain extent, but in a lot of country areas the women then go to the nearest city to give birth. I’m at Bilbarra, and there’s an O and G specialist in Mount Isa, but generally speaking women go across to the larger hospitals on the coast a few weeks before they’re due.’

  ‘But that’s terrible. What about their friends and family? How can they share the excitement if the newborn is hundreds of kilometres away?’

  The little quirk of a smile appears and disappears so quickly I wonder if I’ve imagined it, but I’ve remembered his conversation at the restaurant.

  ‘Surely that’s an argument for more women coming out to you as registrars. You marry them off to locals and, voilà, once they’ve had their own families, you’ve got O and G services in the bush!’

  Definitely no smile this time. I get the frown again.

  ‘You’re deliberately misunderstanding the situation,’ he grumbles, hauling his long, lean body out of the car and striding around to open the door on my side.

  I beat him to it, not because of feminist issues but because I don’t want him standing too close to me again. Mental note—buy cargo pants in size larger than normal, I’m going to need a lot of chocolate to get through the next six months.

  I’m also going to have to rethink the heeled sandals, I realise as I try not to stumble in and out of the potholes littering the ground between me and breakfast. I know I swore—back when I left home—that I’d never wear elastic-sided boots again, but out here they’re sensible footwear.

  Essential shopping list now reads cargo pants and boots—and the chocolate I brought with me won’t be nearly enough so add that as well. And I really should get some bread and butter and a few tins of baked beans—beans on toast being my staple diet when left to feed myself.

  GR has not only caught up with me by now, but overtakes me. Mercifully, he refrains from commenting on my unhappy progress.

  Until we’re seated at the table, breakfast ordered—bacon, eggs, sausages and tomatoes for him, a slice of raisin toast and cup of coffee for me. The single slice is only because I realise I need to keep a few hundred calories up my sleeve for some recovery chocolate when I get back to the quarters.

  ‘Didn’t you give any thought to a suitable wardrobe when you were told you were coming out here?’ he asks.

  It’s one of those times I wish I could raise one eyebrow. Raising both just doesn’t have the same effect.

  ‘I tried not to think about it at all,’ I tell him, which is true. Some things I think about too much and end up so confused I wish I hadn’t started. So I’m retraining myself. It’s a coping mechanism. Don’t think about it and it might go away.

  It never does, of course. Not thinking about Pete meeting Claudia didn’t make her go away. Though Pete did…

  ‘Good grief! What’s wrong now? I only asked a question. It’s not as if I berated you.’

  The words don’t make sense until I realise he’s leaned across the table and is using a pristine white handkerchief to mop at my cheeks.

  I’m crying?

  But I never cry!

  Well, maybe a little when Grandad died.

  And when I see newborn babies.

  And sometimes when a sunset is particularly beautiful….

  And when—

  I sniff and shake my head, not wanting his hand so close to my face.

  ‘I’m not really crying,’ I tell him. ‘It’s just my eyes leak sometimes.’

  Where this has come from I’ve no idea, but once it pops out, it doesn’t seem too bad an excuse.

  ‘Oh, I see,’ he says, tucking the handkerchief into my hand—no doubt because of the sniff, and I do need it, that’s something else that was in my handbag—then leaning back in his chair. ‘Leaking eyes? You’ve seen someone about them?’

  I blow my nose—hard—on his handkerchief, then realise I can’t give it back. Try to ram it into my pocket, but the panic-chocolates have made the pocket almost nonexistent. I slide my hand inside the neck of the T-shirt and tuck it down my bra instead, thinking I can transfer it to the pocket of my white coat when I get back to the car, but throughout this process I can feel GR’s eyes on me—watchful, puzzled, wary.

  Fortunately Michael arrives, dead-heating with our breakfast. He orders coffee and a toasted sandwich to go, though, after seeing him on the plane yesterday, I wonder about his choice.

  ‘I don’t eat it,’ he whispers when GR gets up to speak to someone at the back of the restaurant, ‘but the boss seems to think we should all eat something before we leave, so I order it to keep him happy.’

  ‘If ordering a toasted sandwich to go guarantees keeping him happy, maybe I should order a couple of dozen,’ I say, and Michael laughs, though I can see he’s wound as tightly as a spring.

  ‘Why are you doing this job when you suffer motion sickness?’ I ask, but GR’s back at the table and Michael doesn’t answer.

  Does he think the man he calls ‘the boss’ doesn’t know he almost pukes every time he gets in a moving vehicle?

  CHAPTER FOUR

  WE HEAD out to the airport in separate vehicles, and join Dave at the plane—well, I think it’s Dave until GR does this ‘Bob, Blue, Blue, Bob’ routine again.

  ‘I’m Dave’s twin,’ Bob says as he shakes my hand, grinning at what must be my obvious confusion.

  ‘Are you OK with being called the wrong name?’ I ask, knowing I’ll never get them straight.

  ‘We’re both used to it,’ Bob assures me, and reaches out to help me climb in.

  GR makes a hmphing noise behind me, but I’m getting used to his unspoken comments now and ignore it. Though ignoring him is harder, especially when he turns towards me as we taxi, no doubt to check I’m buckled in. I wait for him to say something, but all he does is look at me then frown, as if he can’t remember who I am or why I’m in the plane with him.

  Creamunna from the air looks fresh and green so they must have a good water supply. The man who collects us from the airport talks cattle to GR, so I have time to look around. There’s a wide brown river—the source of the water?—flowing sluggishly beside the road on the outskirts of the town, with fat-trunked gums throwing dark shadows on the water.

  ‘There’d be lobbies in that river,’ I tell Michael, thinking of the little freshwater crayfish I caught in dams as a child. ‘Boiled up with lots of salt and an onion, they’re delicious.’

  Michael shudders as if shellfish are as nauseating as flying, then I realise it’s the mention of food that’s upset him.

  ‘Do you take something to help it?’ I ask him, and he shrugs then lifts his shirt. He’s got a brown paper bag strapped to his stomach.

  ‘Mrs Jenks, my landlady, suggested this. It hasn’t worked any better than ginger tablets, heavy drugs or wearing garlic on my person.’

  ‘You’d have thought the garlic would have worked,’ I tell him, as we turn into a circular drive in front of the hospital. ‘If only because whoever was flying would have put you out of the plane.’

  He manages a weak grin, and we both disembark. I’m anxious to see the hospital and no doubt, now the flight’s over, he’s anxious to eat something. I hope it isn’t the greasy toasted sandwich.

  A tall, well-built woman with wavy blonde hair comes out of the building, and greets GR with a kiss and a hug.

  ‘And how are you?’ he asks, easing her back to arm’s length and examining a body that’s thickening with pregnancy.

  ‘So well Cal says it’s obscene,’ she says, glowing good-naturedly at GR.

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ GR says quietly, but I hear the words, and I must admit I’m surprised. Not a man to be showering compliments around at will, I wouldn’t have thought.

  ‘I’ve come to ask you all to lunch,’ she continues, tho
ugh there’s a pinkness in her cheeks from his compliment. ‘It will be salads and cold meat so any time that suits you. I know you’ve got Grandchester this afternoon, but you have to eat.’

  GR accepts for all of us, introduces me, though this time uses my name.

  ‘Hillary’s an unusual name,’ Blythe says, smiling warmly as she shakes my hand. Then she pats her tummy. ‘As you might guess, I’m name-conscious at the moment.’ She turns back to Gregor. ‘I like Gregor, too—it’s a good strong name for a boy—but Cal growls every time I mention it.’

  She winks at GR. ‘Which perhaps I do a little oftener than necessary.’

  I get a warm feeling that, this time, has nothing to do with the presence of the boss. It’s because this woman oozes such blissful contentment, it permeates the air like a glorious perfume.

  I blink, but it’s the dry air—nothing more—that makes me think my eyes might leak again.

  Then we’re on the move once more, Blythe heading out towards the car park while we enter the hospital. A nurse in a soft aqua uniform greets GR and Michael, more introductions, then she, Pam, waves the men away and leads me down a corridor.

  ‘This is the consulting room. The trolley’s set up for you, but if there’s anything else you need, give a shout. That’s the patient list and files,’ she adds, pointing to a list on the desk and a tray of files beside it.

  She smiles, then adds, ‘If I’d known we were finally getting another woman O and G registrar I’d have asked Blythe to make an appointment for me.’

  ‘You’ve a problem?’

  She shrugs as if it’s not important, hesitates, then finally says, ‘It’s probably nothing, but just lately I’ve been finding intercourse very painful. I’ve tried using creams—actually, I got my sister to send me some because no way was I walking into the chemist here in town to buy something like that.’

  ‘How old are you?’ I ask.

  ‘Thirty-eight. I thought of early menopause, but Blythe did a blood test and my oestrogen levels are fine.’

  ‘How busy am I this morning?’ I ask her, and she shakes her head.