Chapter 51
Garrett
I made my way down the hall to the unit manager’s office in a series of long strides, but before I could get there, Nora stepped out into the hallway. She crossed her arms and cocked an eyebrow, making clear that the ED gossip network had reported to her before I got there.
“Garrett..” Her lips formed a thin line. “So nice of you to join us. Wasn’t sure if you still wanted to work for the hospital?”
Some days I wondered about that too, but my situation was different to people like Gloria’s. I didn’t have a permanent position, having worked here on a series of long-term contracts, waiting for a permanent placement to open up.
Which meant I needed to suck up to Nora.
“So I just want to apologise?—”
“For leaving us short staffed when we had a record number of patients walk in through the door?” she said, and I let out an almost silent sigh. “When we were forced to bring some of the other ward nurses down to cover you?”
“I asked Gloria?—”
“You were assigned to that shift, Garrett.” Her eyes hardened as she looked me up and down. “You were, not Gloria, not the other nurses that had to leave their own patients to come down here to deal with the chaos. You?—”
“Covered at least three shifts this week.” Hell, I hadn’t meant to say that, but the words just came out. There were still more to come. “More during flu season. I’m the first one everyone calls?—”
“Because you don’t have a wife or kids.” Nora shut me down with a reproving look. “I thought you were a team player.”
“I am.” Why the hell was I explaining myself to her? “And I have a girlfriend. She was who I was out with last night. We had a chance…” At something amazing, that’s what I wanted to say, but Nora wouldn’t understand. Didn’t want to, I amended. “To go out with… friends for once, and I didn’t want to cancel on her again.”
“Well, this is new.” By the way Nora crossed her arms, it wasn’t a good thing in her book. “Obviously I can’t advise you against getting into a relationship?—”
“Because that would be a gross overstep and something our union rep would need to look into.” Helen wandered over to come stand by me, the grin she shot my way helping dissipate the tension. “So you finally found a girl to put up with your shit? Thank god. I was starting to think I’d have to ask my son to find some poor girl to take pity on you.”
“Yes, well, be that as it may—” Nora huffed.
“The shift manager is responsible for staffing,” Helen said bluntly. “They schedule and are responsible for ensuring all nurses don’t do more than the agreed number of hours set out in our award. Yesterday was the last day of the week. Garrett not coming in saved you from having to answer some awkward conversations about overtime.” She turned to me. “C’mon, we’ve got a full house and I need a decent set of hands on my end of the ward. That new intern…”
The woman had seen more hours in the ED than I had hot dinners, as Helen often liked to tell me, and in this case, it worked in my favour. She could’ve easily been the unit manager. Only a complete disinterest in management meant Nora got the position. I walked away from our boss gladly and right into the madness of a packed emergency department.
The exhaustion that hung over me like a grey cloud dissipated as I walked over to the first bed, consulting with the chart. Familiarise myself with the patient’s situation, follow procedure, ensure people get the best quality of care possible, and then move to the next person. Rinse and repeat until Helen stepped in some time later.
“Break time.”
“Hang on, I just need to?—”
I was finishing off a set of observations, having taken the patient’s blood pressure, and now I needed to record their heart rate and temperature.
“Sylvia will take over.” Helen gestured imperiously at one of the trainee nurses, who scurried forward, probably glad for something to do. “You need to eat something, drink something, and sit down for a moment.” I sucked in a breath to argue, but she cut me off. “I bought some of that soup you like.”
“OK, you had me at soup.”
I had a brief conversation with Sylvia, then let the patient know what was happening before joining Helen in the breakroom.
“So a girlfriend, huh?” She unpacked her thermos and poured the contents in two bowls. I’d given up protesting that she shouldn’t make me food. It was always important in my family, a way to bring people together, show affection, and Helen was the same. “Is this serious?” Helen shook her head. “No, you’ve only just started seeing her.”
“I think it is serious.” She pushed my bowl towards me and handed me a spoon, and for a second, I just breathed the savoury scent in, only to find Helen sitting opposite me, waiting expectantly. “I mean…” How the hell did I explain this? Usually I was wary, taking a while to warm up to people, deciding whether or not they were worth investing in, but Katie? “Sometimes you just know, y’know?”
Helen snorted at my clumsy wording, then shook her head, her spoon dropping into the soup.
“That right there is the dulcet sound of a man in love.” She had a mouthful, then considered what she was saying. “Or infatuated. How did you meet this girl?”
“At the dog shelter.”
I couldn’t help but smile, remembering the way Katie looked that first day.
“How am I only hearing about this now?” Helen nodded to my bowl. “Eat up and then spill the tea. That’s what kids say today, right?”
That had me laughing, but it was clear she would not be dissuaded.
“Right. So I went into the shelter wanting to adopt a cat…”
“Damn, how the hell does that work?” Helen was hung up on our unusual relationship dynamic. “Like, what’s in it for Katie? I mean, I get you three think access to your pee-pees is reward enough, but she’s signing herself up for a life of never having the toilet seat down.”
“Excuse me. My mother made sure all us boys learned to put the seat down. The lid as well.” I shook my head. “I’ll put electric dog collars on the other guys’ necks and zap them every time they leave it up, if that’s what it takes.”
“Shit, you do have it bad.” Helen seemed inordinately amused by this. “So what’s the plan? Woo her on Tuesday, have her moved in by Thursday? I mean, you adopted her favourite dog.”
“I didn’t adopt Bronson just to impress a girl,” I replied.
But that was at least part of it. Some part of me wanted to see Katie smile, and she did the minute I said I’d take him. The scars, the mistreatment, each was enough to tug at my heartstrings, but her… I shook my head and couldn’t keep the smile off my face, something that had Helen crowing.
“But you want to. Damn, I’ve never seen you this messed up over a girl. Well, not since that Natasha girl.” I frowned slightly, not really wanting to talk about her in the same sentence as Katie. “OK, so what’s your next move, loverboy?”
I looked down at my phone and saw a new message had popped up, and it felt like my breath seized in my chest when I saw it came from Katie.
“Meeting her parents.” I swallowed hard, my mind already racing, trying to work out the best way to deal with that situation. “Try not to fuck things up.”
“That’s a motto that will get you through most days,” Helen said, moving to collect up our bowls, but I got there first. “Every day you wake up, pledge to find a way to do that and you’ll be fine.”
I carried that piece of advice with me until the end of my shift, then thought upon it as I drove home. It got tossed aside when I pulled up out the front of our place and saw a familiar car. Not Rhett’s, not Rhys’, but hers.
Opening the door I was hit by the familiar scents. The sandalwood candles I set up in the lounge room, the faint stink of dog, and then something much more savoury greeted me as I walked down the hallway.
“Stop…”
Katie said that with a giggle, not really meaning it as Rhys crowded in. He was trying to ‘help,’ his arms around hers, his hands taking over cutting the vegetables on the chopping board. “I need to do this right. Garrett?—”
“Is here.”
Rhys looked up as Bronson came skittering down the hall. How the hell had I thought cat would suit us? I knew they could be affectionate, but would they whine happily while dancing around and around in circles, eyes shining with love?
“Hey, fella!”
I picked him up, the dog letting out a grunt and then licking the side of my face enthusiastically as I moved closer.
“You’re home early!” Katie protested. “We were trying to get dinner on the table before you got home.”
“You didn’t need to do that.”
And she didn’t. The fact she’d thought about me, planned something, and worked with Rhys to put it together was the exact way I wanted to end this day, so I gave Bronson a scratch and then set him down. The dog didn’t know who to look to as I leaned forward and kissed Katie. The way the knife clattered on the chopping board and she turned and fell into my arms was all I really wanted.
Well, that and to rescue her from trying to slice up the capsicum.
One kiss, then another, it took serious effort for me to stop myself from getting lost in her lips, but I managed to move her to one side and then grab the knife.
“So what’re we making?” I looked at the ingredients on the bench. “Beef stir fry?”
“We’re supposed to be making you dinner for once,” Katie said, her hands going to her hips, and that was almost enough to distract me. I knew them now, their shape, the way her skin dimpled under my fingers as I gripped?—
“Told you not to bother.” Rhys grabbed Bronson’s lead from where it was hanging up, and the jingle of his collar had him barking. “Garrett’s got some kind of OCD about food prep.”
“I like to cook.” My stomach tensed as I felt a couple of hands slide around it, then I blinked as I felt Katie lean into me. “You’re good.” My hands covered hers. “There’s not much that will distract me, but you…” I picked her up and set her on the edge of the bench, staring at her smile. “Are more than enough.”
I wasn’t sure what I said exactly, but her smile faltered for a second and something else rose. Soft, vulnerable, open, I treasured every second of it, right up until Katie mastered herself and her grin widened.
“So the oyster sauce and cornflour slurry is a good idea, but we might add a bit of garlic and ginger…”
I had plans, many of them, but when Katie tilted my head her way, my voice trailed away. Never had I waited for someone else’s response to a meal before.
“Sounds amazing.” She reached out and touched my lips. “You’re amazing.”
“Ugh, two Tauruses in the kitchen.” Rhys rolled his eyes. “That’s my cue to GTFO, hey boy?” Bronson replied with a couple of sharp barks. “Alright, mate, let's go for a bit of a run and see if we can build up an appetite.” Katie leaned back over the counter and I managed not to swallow my tongue as her shirt stretched tightly over her breasts as she kissed Rhys goodbye. “Kisses for B Dog too.”
He had the dog up in his arms, something that alarmed Bronson at first, but then his tail was wagging furiously as he licked at her face.
“OK, have fun,” Katie told them. “Now.” She dropped off the counter. “How can I help?”
Just by existing, I wanted to tell her, but I couldn’t.
“Grab a bottle of wine from the fridge and pour the two of us a drink,” I said and then started chopping.