New Doc in Town / Orphan Under the Christmas Tree

by Meredith Webber

  They left the café, Tom admonishing Bobby to be good for Lauren, Lauren telling Tom to make sure he went home to get some sleep.

  ‘And don’t detour via the hospital,’ she added, as Bobby wandered off to look in a toyshop window. ‘You know they’ll call you if they need you.’

  Tom hesitated on the footpath, his face serious—frowning, in fact, drawing her slightly away from Bobby.

  ‘I’ve got to detour via the hospital to check some scans and, later, I need to talk to you,’ he said, very quietly. ‘I need you to see someone, if not today then tomorrow.’

  Lauren frowned right back at him.

  ‘You sound as if you’re forcing those words out against your will. You ask me to see people all the time—well, not all the time, but often enough, so what’s different?’

  Before he could reply, Bobby disappeared into the toyshop and with a hurried ‘Sorry! We’ll talk later,’ Lauren rushed after him.

  But the strained uncertainty on Tom’s face bothered her.

  Perhaps it was just tiredness.

  She caught up with Bobby as he began to take a display of plastic animals apart, but it was Jo who stopped the destruction.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Lauren demanded, unable to believe her previously workaholic friend was in a shop on a Monday morning.

  ‘I’m the designated shopper for the refuge, remember,’ Jo replied, detaching Bobby from a seriously large rocket ship at the same time. ‘And now I’ve got an employee I can take time off now and then.’

  Lauren smiled automatically, how could she not when her best friend was practically glowing with happiness? But then another image, Tom’s worried face, the shadows in his eyes, flashed across Lauren’s mind.

  ‘Great!’ she said to Jo as a solution occurred to her. ‘How about you ask Bobby to help you choose the toys? I really need to talk to Tom about something.’

  Jo frowned at her—everyone was doing it!

  ‘I won’t be long,’ Lauren added, all but tripping over the words because suddenly it seemed she had to know what was worrying Tom. ‘Bobby knows the kids in the refuge at the moment and he’ll know what they want. Maybe shop then have an ice cream in the park. He’s fine as long as he’s eating. Phone me if you have a problem, and I’ll be at the hospital or Tom’s house when you finish.’

  She turned to Bobby, who was only too pleased to be able to spend longer in the toyshop, although he did extract a promise from Lauren that they’d get the cowboy hat later.

  Jo raised her eyebrows at the mention of the cowboy hat.

  ‘I’ll explain some other time,’ Lauren promised, then, because she felt she was somehow letting him down, she gave Bobby a hug and a quick kiss on the cheek, refrained from telling him to be good, and hurried up the hill to the hospital.

  Tom was in his office, frowning again, but this time at some X-rays he had up in the light box, but his face lightened as she knocked briefly and walked in, and she felt a rush of pleasure that she could change his mood.

  Or maybe it wasn’t her—maybe he’d just needed a distraction …

  ‘You’ve killed our kid?’ he joked.

  ‘Jo’s got him buying toys,’ Lauren explained. ‘You looked worried when you said you wanted to see me so I thought I’d come up while I had the chance.’

  Where to begin?

  And did he really want to discuss this with her?

  Tom studied the beautiful face of the woman opposite him. Yes, she was concerned—of course she would be, having picked up on his concern earlier—but the smile she’d flashed as she’d talked of Bobby still lingered on her face and he was ninety-nine per cent certain he was going to wipe that smile away and probably replace the questions in her eyes with dark, unfathomable shadows …

  ‘Jo won’t keep him all day!’ the beautiful woman prompted, and Tom sighed, then came around from behind his desk, took Lauren’s hand, and led her to the small couch beside a coffee table that he considered the informal section of his office.

  He sat down, drawing her down beside him, still unable to find the words he needed, so in the end he blurted out the one question he probably shouldn’t have asked.

  Blurted it right out!

  ‘Did Nat Williams abuse you?’

  Instant regret as she turned pale beneath her golden tan, and her fingers tightened so hard on his he felt a stab of physical pain as well as the internal jolt he’d earned from hurting her.

  ‘Why do you ask?’

  He heard the quiver in her usually placid voice, and felt her fingers grip tighter, then, while he watched, she detached herself both mentally and physically, straightening up, breathing deeply, letting go of his hand and moving a little away from him on the couch.

  Hazel eyes scanned his face, so intensely focussed he knew she’d see any hint of him dissembling.

  ‘The admission last night—or early this morning—was Alyssa Williams.’

  Lauren’s reaction was immediate.

  ‘Was she strangled?’

  Tom was too shocked to reply but his face must have answered for him.

  ‘Dear Heaven! What have I done?’ she cried, springing to her feet and pacing back and forth in front of him, muttering more to herself than to him, wringing her hands in such an agitated manner he wondered if he should attempt to hold her, calm her.

  Or would a man’s touch be too hateful to her right now as bad memories flooded her head?

  Before he could decide, she was speaking again.

  ‘I should have said, should have spoken out, told someone, anyone. Maybe he could have been stopped and who knows how many women he’s hurt since then? Women I could have saved if I’d only said something.’

  Her voice was becoming strident, regret, fear, guilt and memories melding together to throw the usually controlled woman he knew close to panic. Thrusting aside any doubts, he stood up and caught her as she paced, holding her hard against his body, talking, talking, talking …

  ‘You’re a professional,’ he reminded her. ‘How old were you anyway? Had you even heard of this kind of abuse? Who would you have told?’

  He held her close, feeling the emotion that shook her body, while anger grew again inside him.

  Anger solved nothing, he reminded himself, but how else to react to Lauren’s gut-wrenching sobs as the walls she’d erected around the past shattered into sharp, destructive shards?

  He let her cry, talking, reassuring, unaware most of the time of what he was saying, simply letting words fill the air in the hope they might help, and maybe they did for she finally eased away from him, not abruptly, but gently, and this time he took his handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to her.

  She dried her eyes and slumped back onto the couch, pouring herself a glass of water from the carafe he kept there, sipping at it, eyes downcast, breathing deeply again. He sat beside her, not too close, concerned for her and uncertain how to show it, aching for her but knowing he couldn’t show his own emotion.

  Earlier he’d known a hug was needed but now?

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she said, finally turning to face him and resting her hand on his knee. ‘I had no idea all that was going to come boiling out, but I’ve lived with guilt over what happened for so long … ‘

  ‘Guilt? Why should you feel guilt? Guilt’s your emotion talking, not your brain!’

  He couldn’t help it—the words just bulldozed their way out, tight with suppressed anger at the man who’d hurt her, not at Lauren.

  Her touch firmed on his knee and she actually found a smile—a small, feeble effort but still a smile.

  Silence rested between them, not entirely easy, but he guessed she was finding the words she wanted, perhaps needed, to say, so he rested his hand on hers and told himself to keep his mouth shut.

  And ignore the ache that still filled his chest …

  ‘It wasn’t guilt at first,’ she finally began, hesitantly producing the words. ‘It was shame.’

  The memory coloured her cheeks and he had
to remind himself he was there to listen, not to take her in his arms again.

  ‘Terrible shame because I thought it was my fault, or that it always happened with sex and I was just too stupid to know.’

  She looked up at him then, her eyes enormous in her pale face, the pathetic smile wobbling slightly.

  ‘Stupid, isn’t it? All the study I’ve done since, all the women I’ve met and talked to and counselled and advised since then, and yet my own past has the power to affect me like this—to turn me back into my sixteen-year-old self who was so overawed that someone like Nat Williams could like me, I’m a quivering mess just thinking about it! Not only that, but I’m still blaming myself for what he did—taking the ‘it must have been my fault’ line like every abused woman I’ve ever met, although some of the guilt is probably more to do with not telling, but at the time, well, I had no idea it shouldn’t be like that and it was so awful, so truly horrible, I couldn’t even talk to Jo, my best friend, about it, let alone my mother, or Jo’s dad, who was our doctor. I thought he loved me—thought maybe it was normal. I kept thinking—what if that’s what sex is all about? I guess the only thing that I did do right was to stop seeing him, or maybe I wasn’t even strong enough to do that—maybe he went off to a competition somewhere and that was that. I can’t even remember that part, only the—’

  She broke off so abruptly Tom forgot about being there to listen. Anyway, he could listen with her in his arms. He moved so he could hold her once again, wrapping his arms around her, bringing her body against his when she relaxed into his grasp and leant against him, the air and the words that had floated on it going out of her with the suddenness of a pricked balloon.

  Tom held her, not talking now, not wanting to talk, but his mind raced along tangled paths that became clearer as all she’d said slotted into what he knew of Lauren. Her empathy with battered women came from deeper down than study, while her detachment—in particular, her avoidance of relationships with men—had grown from an experience of something that should have been passable at least, good, or even wonderful at best, but had been horrifying and painful and—

  He couldn’t think about it, simply tightening his arms around her and holding her for as long as she needed to be held, comforting her, reassuring her.

  Just holding her …

  For ever?

  Now, where had that thought come from?

  Not for ever, just several minutes, then the Lauren he knew returned, smiling at him, a better effort this time, mopping at her face with her handkerchief once again then leaning over to kiss him quickly on the lips.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said, simple words but he knew they were heartfelt. ‘You need to grab some sleep and I need to rescue Jo from Bobby, but I’m okay now and I’ll definitely see Alyssa whenever you think she’s ready for a visit.’

  She hesitated, cocking her head to one side and studying him before adding, ‘I’m okay, Tom, I really am. I guess all that stuff had to come out, but I can be totally professional with Alyssa, please don’t doubt that.’

  Tom thought his heart might break, so badly did it hurt just listening to Lauren’s assurances, which he knew covered the fragility she must be feeling. He cupped her head with the palms of his hands and looked deep into her eyes.

  ‘Of course you’ll be professional—I never for a second doubted that!’ he managed, but the words were gruff, roughly spoken, blurted out because he wanted to do so much more for her but had no idea how to begin to help her or even if she needed, or would want, his help.

  But he had to try.

  ‘And being a professional you must know that regrets are wasted. Do you really think you might have stopped him—Nat Williams, king of the Aussie surfing world, a testosterone-filled young man who thought he was God?’

  He pressed his lips to hers, very gently, before adding, firm now, authoritative, ‘None of this is your fault, Lauren, none of it, and you’d better believe that!’

  And he kissed her again—just a kiss—a friend’s kiss with maybe a hint of the would-be lover in it so she’d know the man who’d kissed her by the waterfall—the man she’d definitely kissed back—was still there for her …

  And that thought hurt his heart again …

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  I REALLY have to stop crying all over Tom!

  Lauren shook her head as the random thought echoed in her brain. Of all the things to be thinking!

  It was obviously a symptom of her shattered state and her state was shattered, her insides like mush for all she was pretending everything was okay.

  Perhaps thinking about crying against Tom’s chest was her brain’s way of avoiding what she should be thinking about—although thinking about the past and in particular her past with Nat was hardly going to achieve anything right now.

  She shivered in the summer sunshine as she hurried down the road, glad she had a job ahead of her—shopping with Bobby—knowing later she’d have to sit down and have a proper think—about the past, about professionalism and Alyssa Williams, and probably about what poor Tom must be thinking of his houseguest right now.

  He was right, of course, about her rushing into words when she was anxious or confused, but to have rushed all those words out to him—to Tom of all people.

  Her mind balked and she knew it was because of the way she’d been feeling about Tom lately—about the stupid coils of heat—and now he knew about her past, about Nat Williams, well, the heat-coiling stuff should stop right now because Tom was probably …

  Probably what?

  As if she had a clue how anyone would react to revelations of past abuse, let alone how Tom might react! If anything, given his experience with the refuge, he’d probably be more understanding than most, but when she’d tried, that one time, to explain to a then boyfriend why the idea of sex terrified her—

  She blanked that memory out and turned her mind to Bobby. His welfare was far more important than her attraction to her host.

  She’d concentrate on Bobby.

  ‘You’ve been a long time.’ Bobby’s accusatory glare was rather spoiled by the fact that the words were spoken around a double ice-cream cone. ‘We’ve been waiting for ages!’

  ‘At least three minutes,’ Jo added, though Lauren sensed relief in the words.

  ‘Trouble?’ she queried quietly, while Bobby chased a pigeon off a park bench.

  ‘Not really,’ Jo assured her, ‘but he’s certainly a full-attention job.’

  She paused, peering closely at her friend.

  ‘Bad news? Had Tom heard from Children’s Services?’

  Lauren shook her head.

  ‘I’m the bad news,’ she muttered, shaking her head as she remembered her total meltdown. ‘But I’m okay now or I will be soon and one day I promise I’ll explain, just not today.’

  Jo knew her well enough not to push, contenting herself with a kiss on Lauren’s cheek and a quick shoulder squeeze before chasing Bobby around the park bench, threatening to kiss him.

  ‘No sloppy kisses!’ he said, standing at bay, then, to Lauren’s delight, he added in a very embarrassed mutter, ‘Except for Lauren.’

  The past didn’t exactly vanish but the day grew brighter and she bent to hug the little boy, thanking Jo for minding him and promising to get together soon.

  ‘Now we can buy the cowboy hat?’ Bobby asked, and she had to laugh at his persistence. The past would definitely have to go back into its box for a while. As Jo had said, Bobby was a full-attention job!

  ‘Now we’ll buy the cowboy hat,’ she agreed, and hand in hand they walked down the road to the clothing shop, Lauren hoping that taking Bobby shopping would be challenging enough to blank the past from her mind, for a while, at least.

  He soon proved he was up to the challenge. Tact, that’s what was needed, tact and patience. But as she discussed his choice of clothing, she couldn’t help but remember her own behaviour when she’d shopped as a child with her mother, always wanting something too extreme, too trendy, too poor
in quality to last.

  Who had shopped with Tom?

  The grandmother?

  Foster-mother?

  Some well-meaning woman from Children’s Services?

  Tom!

  What must he be thinking of her? Dumping all that angst on him like some hysterical teenager …

  ‘This shirt?’ Bobby was holding up a shirt with tassels on the pockets, Western style. Lauren brought her attention back to the boy she was with, tucking all thoughts of Tom—boy and man—away in the back of her mind.

  ‘But I’m a growing boy.’ This was Bobby’s next protest when, having agreed to the tasselled shirt, she stood firm and bought the jeans that fitted him, not the pair with fancy studs and stitching that were two sizes too large.

  ‘We’ll buy you new ones when you grow,’ Lauren promised him, then heard her own words and hoped that someone, if it wasn’t her, would keep her promise to the child.

  She paid for their purchases and led him out of the shop, keeping to the shade as they walked up the hill to the hospital and the sheltering house beside it.

  Tom managed to grab an hour’s sleep, and woke, if not full of energy, at least refreshed. The house was quiet so he assumed his guests were still shopping.

  A long, hot shower, shaving under the hot water, refreshed him enough to dress then phone the hospital, pleased to hear that the full-body scan he’d ordered for Alyssa Williams had been carried out and the film sent through to a radiologist in Port Macquarie, the large regional town down the road.

  ‘We’re waiting to hear the results but Mrs Williams wants to go home,’ Tom’s colleague told him. ‘What do you think?’

  ‘Definitely not until we hear the radiologist’s report. I’m concerned about oedema in her head, damage to her larynx, torn ligaments around her shoulder and other internal soft-tissue damage. She’s also pregnant, which complicates things. Keep reassuring her the children are okay—their grandmother is looking after them.’

  ‘Are you reporting it?’

  Not until I’ve discussed it with Lauren, he thought but didn’t say, then wondered if his hesitation was because of Lauren or his patient.