Prologue
“Justine, when you get a minute, can you come to my office?”
Justine Keller turned to her boss, Joyce Conroy, who had walked behind the counter. “Sure,” Justine said. “I’ve got a backlog here.” She looked at her computer. “Maybe an hour.”
“I’ll be in my office,” Joyce said, nodding minus a smile, and walked away without another word.
Justine let out a sigh. She’d been working in the hospital pharmacy in Boston for three months after she relocated from Indiana.
A life change was what she needed to get away from the mess happening back home.
She thought she was strong enough to handle it all, but in order to do that, she needed her father.
He was gone.
Without him, her escape plan had been to run and hide.
Avoidance was something she excelled at.
And by the tone of her boss’s voice, she was formulating where she could seek shelter.
Not that she thought she’d done anything wrong or made a mistake, but she’d love nothing more than to do her job and be left alone to grieve in silence and try to coexist.
Didn’t look like that might happen today.
As much as she wanted to drag her feet filling these orders, she also knew it was best to get this over with.
Forty-five minutes later, she said to another pharmacist at the other end of the room, “I’m going to see what Joyce wants. I hope to be back in about five minutes.”
Tim laughed. “Good luck.”
She frowned. “What does that mean?”
She hadn’t been here long enough to catch onto anyone’s jokes or serious banter. She’d never been that great at picking out the difference either.
“Nothing,” Tim said. “Could be five minutes, could be fifty minutes. Depends on Joyce’s agenda is all. That’s why I said good luck. The no smile on her face could mean anything. I picture you as a get-in-and-get-out type of person.”
Just great. Nothing like making her more nervous.
“That’s me,” she said, leaving the pharmacy and making her way through the hospital and down the hall to where her boss’s office was.
She knocked on the open door.
“Come in, Justine,” Joyce said, stone-faced yet again. “Close the door.”
Crap. She was just getting settled here and, though money wasn’t an issue and she knew she could find another job easily, she didn’t want to have to even think of those things.
“You wanted to see me,” she said as pleasantly as she could.
“Have a seat,” Joyce said, her hand gesturing toward the chair that looked decades old.
She forced her tiny size six feet to move across the cheap carpet in her boss’s office to the black fake leather chair in front of the desk and placed her butt down to the crinkling noise of the material and held back the gulp over the news she was going to hear.
She’d never been much of a nervous person, but with everything that had happened in the past three months of her life, she felt as if every phone call, every conversation, and even every look was going to drop piles of stinky poop on her head.
“Lay it on me,” she said, trying to force some bravado. Her father would be proud to see it. If he were even around to do that.
Don’t cry, she internally told herself. Suck it up!
Joyce smiled and it caused the release button holding her stiff shoulders in place to let go. Phew.
“I like you,” Joyce said. “A lot. You’ve got a great work ethic. You come in, put your head down, do your work. You’re great with any of the patients if they have questions, you’re friendly and well liked, but you keep your nose clean.”
“I’m paid to do a job,” she said, nodding. “That is what it’s about.”
Joyce kept her grin in place. “If only everyone thought that way. And it pains me to do this when you’re one of my best and fastest in the department.”
Oh shit. Here it came. She was looking for tissues to wipe up the crap that was going to drop. She just hoped her tears didn’t go with it.
“How painful is this going to be?” she asked, trying not to cringe.
Hopefully the worst case was she was only changing shifts. That she could handle. Not a big deal. It came with the job.
“Not horrible. At least I hope not. You’re the lowest person on the ranking chart. I could ask if anyone wanted to volunteer for this, but I know no one will. The rest have families here and have turned their noses quickly in the past.”
She frowned. “Here? Am I being transferred to another site?” She was only a few months into her twelve-month lease. Good lord.
“Yes,” Joyce said. “Not far.”
“Oh,” she said. “Okay. It happens. Where?”
“Amore Island,” Joyce said.
“Huh?” She knew about the island off the coast of Boston. There wasn’t even a bridge for her to drive over. “I’d have to take a ferry to get there?”
“That’s the thing,” Joyce said. “It’s not feasible for you to do that daily. They need someone on the island and we are going to try this for six months. We have housing for you. It will be paid for. It’s not going to cost you anything to live for the six months and you’ll have your place here when you return. I know this might not be what you wanted to hear, but it happens. It’s hard for them to fill positions there and we are always sending staff over to cover for a week or more. It was decided to put someone there for six months and see how it goes. Maybe you’ll like it and want to stay.”
It was the laugh that came at the end of the sentence that made her think that was a joke.
Justine took a deep breath in and out.
There could be worse things in life than getting to live on an island for six months.
She could come home on her days off if she needed to.
The biggest complaint she had right now was packing again. That hadn’t been fun.
“When do you need me to start?” she asked.
“April seventh,” Joyce said.
She looked at her watch. It was March nineteenth.
“That’s not even three weeks,” she said, wincing. Though, she could have been told she had to start next week, so should be looking at the bright side of it. Too bad the sun wasn’t shining so well in her life.
“No,” Joyce said. “I’m sorry. I’m buying as much time as I can. I’m sure this is the last thing you wanted to hear.”
“I’ve heard worse in the past few months,” she said sadly. “This should be easy enough.”
“Again, I’m sorry,” Joyce said when she stood up.
“It’s fine. I’ll get back to work now.”
She left Joyce’s office and returned to the pharmacy.
“Well?” Tim asked. “That was fast. How bad was it?”
She forced a smile on her face. Might as well act happy about it so no one talked smack behind her back to her boss.
“I get to spend six months on an island.”
Tim’s jaw dropped. “Oh man, Justine. I’m sorry. That sucks for you.”
Great, more comments to make her look forward to one more major upheaval.
How bad was this going to be?