Chapter 9
Elina
I lean over the desk in treatment room one. My chair squeaks so loudly that it even hurts my teeth. Nonetheless, I give the middle-aged woman in functional clothing on the other side a friendly nod. "How may I help you, ma'am?"
Her bewildered gaze meets mine, and immediately I feel like I messed up. I glance at Helene, who chuckles amusedly. Great. "My eyes are itchy." The patient crosses her arms.
That could have many reasons. Even though the woman doesn’t seem particularly talkative, I can’t spare her further questions. "Do you have any known allergies?"
She responds with an eye roll. "Only city folk have that fancy modern stuff."
I dare not look at my boss again for help even though that’s what I’d prefer. I’ve been here for over a week now, quietly observing how Helene treats her patients. The woman with the eye problem is my first solo case.
My chance to prove that I’m a good doctor.
I can’t afford to fail now.
Better to ignore the patient’s dismissive behavior and continue taking her medical history. "Are there any other symptoms, such as fever or rash? "
She leans forward on her red chair. "I said my eyes are itchy. That’s it."
Well, it’s official. She thinks I’m an idiot. "Alright, then let me have a look at your eyes. Could you please take a seat on the examination bed?" I point at the patient bed behind her and rise from the chair.
Helene remains seated next to the floor-to-ceiling bookshelf, yet I can feel her watching me closely. She wants to find out if she can trust me to work alone.
My patient follows my instructions. I consider it a partial success. I put on gloves, grab the flashlight, and step in front of her. "Please look up at me."
She does. Thank goodness.
Relieved, I turn on the light and proceed with the examination as gently as possible. Until now, I’ve always used a slit lamp microscope for this, but they don’t have that device here.
"When was your last visit to the ophthalmologist?" I ask as I inspect her eyes. The conjunctiva is red, and there is excessive moisture in the tear duct.
The woman shrugs. "What for?"
"To have your eyesight tested, for example. Undetected visual impairments could be the cause of your symptoms." I try to remain as composed as possible even though I’m close to exploding inside. This woman fulfills every stereotype I’ve ever heard about villagers.
"I have eyes like an eagle." Is that pride I see on her face? Just because she doesn’t need glasses?
"Age-related farsightedness is normal in people over forty." I can’t help but make this comment. "Do you have any new pets?" I ask, not giving her a chance to be offended .
"No. What's the point of this interrogation? Just prescribe me something that helps." Her peeved undertone is unmistakable.
"In order to do that, I need to know what’s wrong with you." I smile at her kindly. What else can I do? At least she reciprocates while I mentally review everything I’ve learned about her condition so far. It’s most likely conjunctivitis. Ideally, I would take a swab to identify the pathogen. But there isn’t a properly equipped lab here.
Great.
How am I supposed to prescribe the right eye drops if I don’t even know whether the cause is bacterial or viral?
I try to recall everything I know about conjunctivitis while examining her eyes once again. Viral pathogens are particularly active during the winter months. It’s late April, and although it’s still quite cold here, spring has already begun. "You have bacterial conjunctivitis; pink eye," I say finally. It is the most likely cause, so I try to sound as confident as possible.
Suddenly, her expression softens. "What can we do about it?"
I take off my gloves and return to the desk. "I’ll prescribe eye drops for you. Please use them twice a day. If there’s no improvement after three days, don’t hesitate to return to the clinic."
A quick glance at Helene is inevitable. She nods approvingly.
Quickly, I enter the information into the electronic patient record and print the prescription.
"Thank you for your help, ma'am, " my patient says after I hand her the printout. During the farewell, she almost crushes my hand. Somewhat puzzled, I watch her leave the room.
"Was she being sarcastic just now?" I ask Helene as the door closes behind the patient, shaking off my fingers.
Once I utter the words, my boss can’t contain her laughter anymore. With watery eyes and a sniffing nose, she looks at me.
"What’s so funny?" I plop down onto the squeaking desk chair, my body feeling heavy.
Why is she laughing at me? I didn’t do anything wrong. Or did I?
Suddenly, she comes closer and puts her arm around my shoulder in a friendly manner. "A little tip: don't call people ma'am or sir."
Ah, that’s why the patient had been giving me strange looks right from the start! "You could have told me earlier."
"I thought you knew. After all, I address all the patients informally too." She shrugs and takes off her glasses to wipe her tears of laughter with the sleeve of her white coat.
No. It wasn’t clear at all. Not at all. Immediately, I feel the urge to justify myself. "You’ve been living here for a long time. It’s not surprising that you would have an informal relationship with them already."
Her warm gaze meets mine. "Don’t worry. No one will hold it against you."
Yes, of course. Pink-eye lady will certainly regale her story in the pub about the peculiar doctor from the city who uses unnecessarily stuffy language and asks a thousand questions. It will surely provide plenty of laughter .
"Let’s focus on the important things." Helene’s tone suddenly becomes more businesslike. "You should have worked faster, but your diagnosis was correct. You asked the right questions and chose the appropriate examination method."
My heart fills with warmth. Even though I know that my performance was by no means Nobel Prize-worthy. To diagnose conjunctivitis, you don’t even need to have studied medicine. "Thank you," I say nonetheless.
"Starting tomorrow, you’ll be treating patients independently, and I’ll only be reviewing your work. If you get a case where you’re uncertain, just ask me." Her motherly expression lets me know that I can always count on her help. "However, emergency patients come to me exclusively."
"Understood." I nod with a smile. Of course, I’ll do my best not to burden her. I’m already looking forward to tomorrow. Now that I know how to address the patients, there will be one less pitfall for me to step into.
"But for now, it’s time to call it a day. We’ve earned it." Helene stands up, takes off her coat, and hangs it on the hook on the wall.
I imitate her and smooth out the fabric of my doctor’s coat. "If that’s okay, I’ll stay a little longer. I promised Clara I'd help with the admin work."
"Go ahead," she says, enthusiastically marching toward the door. "See you tomorrow."
As I find myself alone, I feel a great weight lifted off my shoulders. Even though this isn’t my dream job and never will be, at least I’ve earned appreciation for my work. Nothing is more fulfilling than that .
Humming to myself, I leave the examination room and head toward the reception area, where Clara has already stacked five black folders on the wooden counter and is eyeing them with doubt.
"This is complete chaos," she says apologetically. "But it’s been so hectic the past two weeks."
I reach for the top folder and open it. "Where should I start?"
She briefly explains the system for organizing the records in the patient files and informs me of the additional data I need to enter into the computer system. Then we begin together.
"Can you tell me about Vienna?" she asks wistfully.
Since our first meeting last week, she has been incredibly fascinated by the big wide world. But so far, we haven’t had the opportunity to chat about it. After work, she always disappears immediately as if she has urgent obligations that just cannot wait.
"What is it like to live there?" Clara’s question pulls me out of my thoughts.
I let out a sigh instantly. "Like paradise." A deep longing washes over me. "You can order takeout anytime. Greek, Asian, Mexican, Italian, vegan. Everything you can imagine," I say dreamily. These are the things I’ve missed the most. Instead of enjoying delicious food, I’ve been surviving on microwave meals these past few days.
Clara looks at me with excitement in her bright green eyes. "And there are concerts every day, right?"
I nod. "More than one."
"That’s so cool," she says, awe filling her words.
I close the folder I just finished processing. "And you can always go clubbing. At the Danube Canal, in the city center, there are a lot of clubs." Tears almost well up in my eyes as I reminisce about the wild nights I’ve experienced there. The dancing, the atmosphere, life in its purest form. "Would you like to see some photos?"
She immediately stops working. "Absolutely."
I pull out my mobile phone from the pocket of my white work pants and unlock the screen. "Here I am with my friends at Flex." We all raise our wineglasses, grinning widely into the camera as if we were on cloud nine. The vibrant lights add to the magic.
"Wow." Clara leans closer to me, her red braids tickling my forearm.
I show her more pictures from that night. With each photo, the mood becomes more exuberant. Eventually, I come across a snapshot of me backstage at a concert two days before the club visit. I’m wearing loose-fitting trousers and a tight white top. "Oh, you’ll definitely like this," I say with a grin, moving on to the next picture. "Do you happen to know the man next to me?" I hold out my phone so Clara can get a better view.
Without a second’s hesitation, her eyes widen. "Oh my God! You’ve met Joshua Friedberg?"
"More than that." I can’t help but feel a warm surge of pride filling me. "He’s my best friend Maya’s boyfriend." And what a couple they are... A longing sigh escapes my lips. When they first met, nothing was easy between them. Nothing at all. Yet they found their way to each other, just like in a Hollywood movie, and today, their love is so strong that no storm could ever shake it.
That’s what I wish for too. A man like Josh by my side. Someone who’s always there for me, no matter what. Someone I can confide in. Someone who loves me without me having to constantly fight for it.
"Elina?" I suddenly hear Clara ask. "Are you okay?"
Quickly, I straighten up. Indeed, my eyes are so moist that I have to blink to see my phone screen again.
"Yeah, sure." Clearing my throat, I swipe to the next picture. It’s from last summer, showing my life as it used to be. Before I ruined my career. I strike a pose in a glamorous glitter jumpsuit on a bright red sofa. The sewn-on crystals are fake, but they look fabulous in the photo. "This is the Red Room . This cocktail bar is legendary. You can’t get in without the right outfit." Nostalgia fills me, especially when I see the next picture. There’s the guy I met there. He was extremely hot.
And married, as I found out three months later.
I move on to the next picture. "In the summer, there’s an open-air film festival at Rathausplatz. See the food stalls?" I point out the wooden chalets, with the crowds of people squeezing past.
"Mm-hmm." Clara seems to be at a loss for words.
"There, you can try all sorts of unique dishes. Every year, we get a portion of everything and share it while watching the film. Usually, they screen grand operas." In my mind, I hear the captivating melodies of La Traviata once again, and I can still feel the hot kisses of the passionate tapas chef on my lips, who I was there with last year. In the brief moments of pause, he promised to never let me go.
Only to tell me three months later that he was in Austria illegally and would be deported if I didn’t marry him.
He was never really interested in me as a person. And I, the idiot, didn’t realize it because of my stupid craving for love and attention.
That’s over. Once and for all. No matter how much I still crave the same, I must not give in to it anymore.
"I want to experience that too." Clara sounds as melancholic as me when I move on to the next photo.
It shows me at the aquarium in front of the shark tank. Funny enough, it looks like one of the sharks is swimming toward me with its mouth wide open. "This too?" I ask, forcing a smile on my face.
"All of it," she says, her legs fidgeting with excitement. "And I want to ride the Ferris wheel, go shopping on Graben, and see the Lipizzaner horses at the Hofburg."
I nod in agreement. "Vienna has so much to offer. There’s nothing you can’t do there."
"Why did you leave?" Clara leans on the reception counter with wide-open eyes.
Suddenly, my dreamy mood dissipates into thin air.
She asked the worst possible question.
As casually as possible, I shrug. "I didn’t have a choice," I say, trying with all my might not to think back to that one specific memory.
I’m working on getting that back. That’s the only thing I allow myself to focus on. Since my arrival here, I’ve sent out five more applications to clinics in Salzburg, Vienna, and Graz. Because nothing is ever lost as long as you don’t give up on it. It’s as simple as that.
"Why?" Clara pouts, pushing her lower lip forward. "In Vienna, you have so many more opportunities than here in the middle of nowhere."
"It’s a long story." I make a laborious attempt at a smile. Then I put my phone back in my pocket and look around, pretending to be focused. "We should carry on, don’t you think?"
She wrinkles her nose. "If we must..."
Yes, we must. If only to prevent her from asking any more probing questions that no one wants to hear.