With the doctor's help, Emily carefully moves the patient from the bed to a wheelchair and quickly exits the room.
Higgins is not mistaken: from behind the ajar door of Clark's office come the voices, among which Gilmore's bass and the neurosurgeon's own laughter are easily recognized. Emily shifts from foot to foot, chest full of air, and knocks.
– …practicing on a chicken, remember, Laurie? The bald one, the skinny one.
– How's your wife?
– Ex-wife… Come in!
Emily's wrong. There are three people in the office. Clark half-lounges in his huge chair, his legs in tight jeans on the armrest; opposite her stands Gilmore – a white robe carelessly thrown over one shoulder, a pack of cigarettes unashamedly peeking out of his pocket; on the couch in a lotus position sits Charlie – not even dressed in uniform yet, except that the badge swinging on his chest.
Clark-woman points the tip of her pen at Emily and declares loudly:
– Whatever you want, I'm not moving.
– I'm not here to see you, uh… Dr. Clark.
– Good for you. – The neurosurgeon puts his pen down and straightens up. – You want what?
– Dr. Gilmore," Emily doesn't know where she gets her courage, "Dr. Higgins would like you to come to Procedure Room 7. We need to get the bandages off of one patient. Or one. I'm not sure yet.
– Isn't that the third monkey? – Charlie interrupts her. – The mute one," he explains, catching the incomprehensible stares.
– What manners! – Gilmore throws on a white robe. – How did you find out about her?
– Higgins called me in early this morning for a psych evaluation. – Charlie stretches himself. – I told him there were no options. How am I going to talk to a mute? – The psychiatrist exchanged his hands.
– What makes you think," Clark-which-neurosurgeon puts his elbows on the table and puts his head down on his hands, "that she's mute? Doesn't she have a tongue?
– That's right, sister," Charlie nods. – A bloody mess in her mouth – and in her head, too. Apparently, something went wrong at some point, and they just cut off a piece of her tongue.
– God," Emily blurted out.
All three of them look at her as one.
– Miss Johnson, are you still here?
Of course I am, Emily thinks. Dr. Clark hates nurses.
– I'll wait…
– Look, Charlie," Gilmore lets Clark's remark pass his ear, "but come with us. You never know what's going to happen.
– Nah. – Clark rises lazily from the couch. – I've got a band-aid lady in half an hour, and I've got to go. I'm not sure I want to piss her off," he whispers in Gilmore's ear. – She's six times my size.
– Maybe she's just not very neat. – asks the surgeon cheerfully.
– I wish," Charlie sighs. – They're for weight loss. By the way," he ducks out the door, "Miss Johnson is doing a fine job as a personal therapist!
Gilmore just smiles and shakes his head, looking after him, and then gathers his thoughts and looks at Emily:
– Come on, Johnson. We have great things to do.
Emily sighs: Being a personal psychiatrist is the last thing she wants.
Chapter 7
I'll give up poetry and tobacco and learn everything I've wanted to do for so long.
They are collected in the evening right in the middle of the ward, just after visiting hours. A motley crowd of staff, united only by their white robes and bags under their eyes, surrounds two frail girls in strict pantsuits. A little away from them stands Melissa, her whitened knuckles crumpling the edges of her blue-green uniform.
Clarke slips through the crowd – white hair mussed, cheeks flushed with an unhealthy blush, heels clomping loudly on the parquet – and disappears into Moss's office.
Silence falls, interrupted only by the sound of raindrops on the glass.
Melissa strides forward as if her legs could not bend, and, staring into the void in front of her, reports in a voice not her own:
– Dr. Donald Ray, head of the neurology department, passed away this evening. There will be a solemn funeral tomorrow afternoon, anyone can come… Go back to work, please.
Some whisper, some theatrically cover their faces with their hands, some shrug. Emily digs into her memory, pulls out an image: a black jacket, a kind look, "you did a good job.
The mind, overwhelmed by inner complexes, grasps at every praise, every good word said to her, so "you did a good job" sounds in the professor's voice in her head.
Together with the others she walks out into the corridor leading to the wards; there is one last check-up, two notes for the three of them, and it will be time to go home.
Sometimes Emily starts to think it's easier to bring a blanket and a pillow to work – maybe that way she can get a good night's sleep without spending an hour each way. Sleeping on a bus in bustling London was impossible, even when the bus was deserted: the constant music in the cabin and the ambient sounds outside the window made it hard not just to doze off, but to concentrate on one thing at a time.
Emily walks down the corridor, her stride brisk, her soft crocs making a barely audible squeak as she places her foot on the tiled floor.
Higgins flatly refused to transfer the unidentified bandaged patient back to the ward, leaving her in ICU for the night; and under the bandages was a pretty little girl's face, though with her tongue cut out and such a mess in her head that she was put on tomorrow's neurosurgeons' surgery list. Neal's or Clark's, Emily doesn't know, but Riley let it slip that Clark's second nurse is still looking.
Somehow Johnson isn't at all surprised by this – with the way she treats people like her, a neurosurgeon risks not having a nurse at all.
BOOM!
For a second, there is a continuous silence in the corridor, with no room to breathe in; and then someone turns on a fast-forward, and a barrage of sounds falls on the nurse's head.
The rustle of scattered sheets, the soft rustling of a robe, the sharp clatter of heels and the plastic thumping against the floor.
And as Johnson bends over the scattered papers, muttering "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry," her brain does go back a second, aptly displaying an image of Emily clawing her shoulder as she walks toward Clark. She had yet to manage to run into a single person in a wide, empty hallway…!
