Page 14 of The Love We Deny
When I finish with the chart, I look up to find him watching me without judgment, only concern.
“I know,” I say with a sigh of my own, deflating a bit.
“Now, I ain’t tryin’ to get all up in your business—”
“No, I get it.” I set the chart down and lean against the counter, giving him my full attention. “And I know people are going to talk. But he’s family, Earl. I can’t turn my back on him.”
Earl sits there a while, quiet, like he’s chewing on the words, before he nods once. “Seems about right to me. Don’t let ‘em get you down, Doc. They’ll come around and if they don’t, to hell with ‘em.”
“Right,” I say, standing up straight, remembering that I’m the doctor and I shouldn’t be complaining to my patients. “Now, what brings you in today?”
Between patients, I can hear Will at the desk.
I’m trying not to keep too close an eye on him. I don’t want to make him think I don’t trust him, even though I’m sure he knows on some level that I don’t. I tell myself it’s okay for the fifth time this morning. It’s answering phones.
He needs this.
The past is the past.
But sound travels. So when I allow myself to listen in, I’m just monitoring the situation. Making sure he’s okay out there.
What I didn’t anticipate was for it to be this entertaining.
“Murphy Family Medicine,” Will says, and somehow, he makes those three words sound more awkward than anything I’ve ever heard. “Yeah. Mhm.” He pauses, shuffling things around. “I don’t… Okay. Hang on.”
I hear the phone being set on the desk and the chair scraping against the floor, so I jump into action, pretending to be looking through a folder when Will appears in the hallway, clearly frazzled.
“Someone wants to know if you’re taking new patients.”
“Not currently, but the new patient forms are on the desktop. You can email them, and I’ll get back to them when I can.”
He frowns. “I don’t know how to do that.”
“You’ll figure it out.”
My second patient of the day is a young woman I’ve been seeing since she was a child, like most of my patients these days. She’s healthy overall, and the appointment goes by quickly after a discussion about her anxiety meds.
“The guy at the desk,” she says when she gets down from the table. “He’s cute.”
I purse my lips. I guesseveryonein town hasn’t heard about him. “He is?”
“Definitely. Do you know if he’s single?”
“Um.” I pause, looking around for help out of the situation I’m currently in. When it doesn’t come, I force out, “I don’t know. You’ll have to ask him.”
I could have just said yes.
“Will do, Doc.”
I can hear Will on the phone through the wall while I’m catching up on charts.
“Murphy Family Medicine.”
“Ma’am, I understand that, but I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“That’s not making it clearer.”
“I’m gonna have to have someone call you back.”
