Chapter Nine
Lorelie
After my twelve–hour shift, I finally clock out at eight. I tell myself I will shower at home, change at home, scrub off the sweat and someone else’s vomit at home. No way I am putting my day clothes through that torture.
I am two steps from the exit when a nurse intercepts me. “Dr. Murphy would like to see you in his office.”
Of course he would.
I plaster on a polite smile, that hides the fact that my feet are screaming. “Ok,” I say, even though I want to drop dead right here in the hallway.
Confused and starving, I follow her up the administrative wing. Apparently, management cannot pay us overtime to chat, but they sure can call us back after we are off the clock.
My stomach growls. I’ve barely eaten all day. And I still have Patrick to deal with. I don’t know if he expects me to walk in tonight acting like everything is fine when it is not.
I don’t know how I will act. Why did I say that crap this morning? That’s my problem. I say things and regret them immediately. Usually, Patrick talks me down or gets me out of whatever mess I agreed to just to be nice.
Only now the fight is with him.
Damn it.
Dr. Murphy doesn’t even stand when I walk in. He just keeps reading whatever file is in his hand. I sit without waiting for an invitation. I’m off the clock. He can deal with it.
“Usually, one would wait to be invited,” he says, still not looking up.
“Usually, one would not be expected to stand after a twelve–hour shift,” I answer.
He nods slightly. “Forgive me. I was dealing with some bureaucratic mess.”
I give him a tight nod in return, waiting.
“I noticed you are scheduled to work two shifts back-to-back next week,” he says.
I blink, then remember. Gail’s hiking trip. “Yes.”
“It seems.” He sets the paper down. “You’re covering for Dr. Abbott.”
“Yes,” I say. “We worked it out weeks ago.”
He lifts a brow. “Dr. Boise, there is a reason we have limits on the number of hours a physician is allowed to work consecutively.”
“They are eight–hour shifts,” I remind him. “It’s within union rules.”
“That provision is for emergency situations,” he says. “What exactly is Dr. Abbott’s emergency?”
I shrug. “That is his business. He’s covered for me when I needed to leave early, and other times too. This is me returning the favor.”
“It does not matter if you agreed,” Murphy says. “The hospital did not.”
I take a long, slow breath through my nose.
He continues, “And because of this, I am issuing a new rule. No physician is allowed to leave during a shift unless for an approved emergency. And ‘playing wife’ is not one of them.”
Everything inside me goes silent.
Playing wife.
I stare at him, pulse ticking in my ears. “I’m sorry… ‘playing wife’?” My voice sounds calm, but it could slice through his stupid glasses and stab him in the fucking eyes.
He finally looks up, unfazed. “I’m too tired to sugarcoat anything. Having a husband and kids doesn’t entitle you to any benefits at the cost of others.”
I raise a brow. “And who exactly is it costing? A colleague and I are preventing each other from burning out, since, you know… so many physicians here seem to.”
He gives a dismissive shrug. “Be that as it may-”
“No,” I cut in before I can stop myself. “Don’t brush that off. You don’t get to imply I’m shirking responsibility because I have a family.”
His expression doesn’t change. “It’s irrelevant why you’re unavailable during a shift. Dr. Abbott shouldn’t have come in for you, and you shouldn’t be covering double shifts for him. Personal arrangements between staff interfere with scheduling consistency, and that affects the department.”
I feel heat rising behind my eyes, not from shame, but from anger.
“So,” I say quietly, “the new rule you’re issuing… is because you don’t like the idea of me ‘playing wife’?”
“That’s not what I said.”
“It’s exactly what you said.”
His jaw tightens, but he doesn’t argue.
Of course he doesn’t. Men like this never argue past the line they draw. They just sit there in their pressed suit, acting like efficiency incarnate while calling a woman with a family a burden.
I inhale slowly through my nose. “For the record, Dr. Murphy, I wasn’t being ‘a wife.’ I was being a doctor who knew she was needed at work but wasn’t willing to miss her husband’s promotion ceremony for it.”
He blinks.
“And when Dr. Abbott covers for me, or I cover for him, it’s not because of gender roles or favoritism. It’s because we know what it means to be exhausted down to the bone. And we know no one cares until someone quits.”
His eyes narrow just a little. “That won’t be necessary.”
I stand. I don’t trust myself to keep sitting.
“Oh? Good. Then the next time I have a personal commitment, I’ll just take the whole day off. Since I’m not allowed to leave mid-shift.”
I sling my bag over my shoulder.
“You can’t do that,” he says, like I’m the one being unreasonable.
I shrug. “Then fire me.”
We both know they don’t have the staff to fire anyone. I turn and walk out before he can respond.
And God, it feels good.
On the drive home, I seethe the entire way. How dare he.
I have never asked for favoritism. I have never expected to be treated differently because I am a mom.
What the hell does a piece of shit like him even know about me?
By the time I pull into the driveway, Patrick’s car is already parked in its spot. I check the time. Nine-thirty. He’s probably still awake. Hopefully Milo is too. I know that makes me a terrible mother, but I want my kid as a buffer so I don’t have to deal with my husband immediately.
I push open the front door and step inside.
Patrick is sitting on the sofa in the living room, folding laundry while watching the game.
I stop in the entryway and just stare at him.
Usually, when I come home after a twelve-hour shift, he is on the couch with his feet up, drinking a beer. I do the laundry myself the next day since my shift starts at noon.
But right now, he’s just sitting next to piles of stacked clothes. The basket next to him is nearly empty.
What the hell is happening?
And why does he look so… nervous?
My mouth opens before I even register the thought.
“Oh my God,” I blurt. “She’s pregnant.”
Patrick
No. God, no.
“What the fuck, Lore?” I yell, then remember Milo is asleep upstairs and drop my voice to a harsh whisper-shout. “I never slept with her.”
She just shrugs like the whole thing is logical. “Can you blame me?”
“Yes,” I fire back. “Yes, I can blame you for thinking I impregnated another woman.”
She flinches, but I keep going. “Look…” I force a breath in, then another. “Clearly you won’t get over it. I’m guessing you regret saying you would by now.”
She doesn’t answer. She doesn’t have to. I know my wife.
Lore agrees to everything even when she shouldn’t. Like the time she agreed to watch our neighbor’s Great Dane for one month, and I had to rescue her by claiming I was allergic to dogs. Now we can’t get a dog unless the neighbors move or I die.
Lore finally whispers, “Yeah. I do.”
My chest goes tight. I take her hand, and by some miracle she lets me. I thread her fingers between mine and open my mouth to say-
Only her stomach interrupts us.
It lets out a growl so loud it could challenge the Dane.
Her face goes red. “I’ve only eaten a granola bar and oatmeal.”
My jaw drops. “Lore.”
She cringes like she shouldn’t have admitted it.
That’s it.
I pull her gently toward the kitchen. “My dad sent home sloppy joes.”
She doesn’t argue, which tells me how bad today must’ve been. I sit her down, pour her a glass of juice, and start assembling the food. I’m muttering under my breath the whole time.
“I’m packing you lunch from now on… you’re on your feet all day… what if you passed out and hit your head… and what about the baby…”
I slide the plate toward her when I’m done, but she doesn’t take it. She just stares at me.
“What?” I say, pushing it closer. “Eat.”
She finally drags the plate close but says quietly, “This.”
“What ‘this’?”
“This is why I thought I’d get over it.” Her voice trembles at the edges. “You love me. You take care of me. But I can’t just… forget.”
I swallow hard, staring down at the table because looking at her hurts too much.
“I know you can’t forget,” I say. “I can’t either. I hate myself, Lore. For what I did. And for blaming you.”
I force myself to meet her eyes.
“I quit drinking,” I say softly. “I know it doesn’t erase anything. But… I don’t know what else to do to show you I’m sorry.”
“That’s a start,” she says hesitantly.
“A start?” I ask.
She avoids answering by stuffing a giant bite into her mouth. I let out a laugh as she struggles to chew, cheeks full like a chipmunk. I watch her finish the whole thing, then immediately reach for the second sloppy joe.
She takes a sip of juice, then looks at the plate and mutters, “You do have a drinking…” She glances at me.
“…thing.”
I laugh, but her expression stays dead serious.
“You’re not joking?” I ask.
She shrugs. “You don’t have a problem, per se. But you do drink when you’re stressed. And it’s not just one or two. You drink until you pass out.”
My mouth falls open. “I fall asleep after drinking. That’s not passing out.”
She levels me with a look. “Patrick. You fall asleep with a bottle in your hand. Or on the floor. Or spilled on the sofa.”
My jaw works but no sound comes out.
She keeps going, softer this time. “You think I don’t notice? Every time you’ve had a bad case? Or someone died? Or something at work hit too close to home? I always know when you drink too much. The smell. The way you stumble to bed and how you flinch the next morning when Milo jumps on you.”
I swallow hard. She’s exaggerating. Has to be.
Lore wipes a bit of sauce from her lip and sets it down. “I don’t want you to give it up because I’m mad. I want you to give it up because it hurts you. And it hurts us.”
I sit there, staring at her, suddenly feeling ten years old and being lectured by my mom.
“I didn’t… I didn’t realize it was that bad,” I say quietly.
Lore looks down at her plate. “Tell me honestly. Would you have done what you did if you were sober? I know I wouldn’t have.”
My jaw clenches. “So, it wasn’t a date.”
“No,” she says immediately, forceful. Then softer, “No. I… uh…” She runs her thumb along the rim of her glass.
“When you cancelled our date, I was going to stay home and catch up on sleep. But my friends told me to come out for just one drink. I wanted to say goodbye to some classmates before they left, so I agreed.”
I feel every muscle in my body lock up, but I stay quiet.
“We started drinking. And dancing. And…” She looks up at me, eyes full of shame. “It was just dancing with some guy from my class. And then…”
“Stop,” I say, holding up my palm. “I don’t want to hear this.”
“But you have to,” she says softly, but firmly. “We didn’t make love, Patrick. We had quick, regretful sex. I went home right after.”
My throat tightens.
“I cried myself to sleep,” she whispers. “Because even though it was my choice, I still couldn’t understand how you could do that to me.”
My head snaps up. “I wasn’t-”
She lifts a hand and stops me. “I know you weren’t. I know that now. But at the time, I thought you were out with someone else. I thought it meant you didn’t feel the same way I did.”
Her voice cracks.
“So, I decided I would break up with you the next morning.” She sucks in a shaky breath. “Only… you told me you loved me. You said all the right things, and I thought, graciously, that I should put the past behind us.”
She looks away, blinking fast.
“But now I realize I shouldn’t have swallowed it,” she finishes. “Just like now.”
She looks me dead in the eyes. “I need to know everything.”
I swallow hard. She has no idea what she is asking for.
None.