2. Anticipation #2
“I heard that too.”
“Will he make house calls?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“Dr. Painter came to see Richard after his surgery.”
“I remember.”
“He sat right in our kitchen and told Richard if he tried to climb the back steps without help, he’d deserve the fall.”
“That sounds like Art.”
“He scared him into behaving.”
“Richard needed scaring.”
Mrs. Bellamy smiles, but it doesn’t last. “I hope this one understands people here don’t ask for help until they’ve already talked themselves out of needing it.”
That is painfully true. “We’ll give him a chance.”
“You’re right. Where are my manners? Thank you, dear.”
She gives me a hug, then sends me on my way with a reminder that her grandson needs extra patience if he comes in for his sports physical because he gets embarrassed answering questions.
I tell her to have him write down anything he doesn’t want to say out loud. She brightens like I’ve shared a juicy secret.
Two blocks later, Mr. Keller is sitting on the bench near the coffee shop with his left foot at an odd angle and his shoelaces loose.
I stop in front of him. “What did you do?”
He looks up from his newspaper with wounded innocence. “Good morning to you too.”
“Mr. Keller.”
“I stepped off the curb wrong.”
“When did it happen?”
He folds the newspaper slowly. Too slowly.
“Yesterday.”
“Yesterday morning or yesterday afternoon?”
“Does that change your advice?”
“It changes how annoyed I am.”
“Afternoon.”
I crouch in front of him. “Can you move it?”
He rotates the ankle, then winces. “Some.”
“Pain when you put weight on it?”
“A little.”
He grunts but he lets me check for heat, swelling, and bruising. Nothing screams broken, but it deserves more respect than he’s giving it.
“Rest, ice, elevate,” I say. “If it gets worse, if you can’t put weight on it, or if the bruising spreads, call.”
“The clinic?”
“Yes.”
“Even without the new man in yet?”
I sit back on my heels and look at him. “The phone number hasn’t changed, and I am still there.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“No,” I say. “It isn’t. The new doctor, Dr. Bie, starts at the clinic tomorrow.”
He looks past me toward the water. “Art came out when my Martha was so sick. You remember?”
“I remember.”
“She wouldn’t go in. Didn’t want anyone fussing. He brought his bag and sat with her until she told him everything.”
I remember that too. Martha Keller had told me later that Art had known she was worse before she admitted it. He’d also known she needed to confess it in her own time.
That was his gift. He could move quickly without rushing people.
“I can promise you that the new doctor will be able to treat an ankle,” I tell Mr. Keller. “So, you should call if the ankle gets worse.”
He studies me for a long second. “All right, Annie.”
I stand before he can make me smile. “Ice. Elevate. Call if it gets worse.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Have a good day, Mr. Keller.”
He waves me off, which means he heard me and may even obey.
May.
I leave him there with his cane correctly placed and walk toward Front Street, where the water flashes between buildings and half the people pass and say hello.
Mrs. Rogers asks whether her mother should bring the medication bottle to her appointment.
Yes. Always yes.
Trevor from the hardware store wants to know if a rash that itches only at night is weird.
Also yes, and please do not show me on the sidewalk.
And I get one deeply personal question about whether the Boston doctor is married from a woman who swears she’s asking for her niece.
I don’t answer that one because I am not the town’s matchmaker and I have no earthly idea.
Outsiders look at this place and see water, old buildings, and flowers in front of every shop. They see charm.
What they miss is that it’s also intimate in ways that can save you or smother you, depending on the day.
People know when you’re sick. They know when your husband is drinking again. They know when your child is falling behind in school. They know who you’re dating and when you break up.
They know me.
I grew up on this island, and they all watched and helped me along the way.
They knew me when I had braces and bad bangs. They remember when I left for college in Portland carrying too much confidence. And they knew me when moving home became the only thing that made sense, leaving terrible things behind in Portland to face terrible things here.
My parents died.
This town helped prop me up. They brought casseroles and made sure I had someone to talk to. But no one was more helpful than Art Painter.
He was a shoulder to lean on and cry on. He helped me manage my grief and gave me a job that helped me make sense of my life.
Art Painter helped me through all of that. He helped me find my way again.
He was friends with my parents, and the loss hit him almost as deeply as it hit me.
He offered me work, a place to be useful, structure, trust, and boatloads of patience.
He showed me the ropes at the clinic and let me turn my medical skills into truly caring for a town, not a corporate bank account.
The clinic was where I worked.
It was where I became functional again.
That’s why the thought of someone walking in with ownership and city habits makes me worry. I am trying to be open-minded. Truly. William Bie has done nothing to me. He may be brilliant. He may be kind. He may know exactly how to walk into a small practice without crushing its bones.
Or he may think being qualified is the same as belonging.
My phone has three texts I have not answered. None of them are emergencies. Two are neighborhood questions. One is from Mrs. Weaver, telling me the boy from the honey booth found more berries under the table after the market disaster this morning.
I stop on the sidewalk and read that text twice.
The oaf from the market.
I can see him too easily: tall, broad, apologetic in the wrong direction, standing there in boat shoes and khaki shorts with his daughter trying not to laugh and berry juice all over my shirt.
He did apologize.
He looked at the stain for too long.
And also, he was gorgeous.
A small smile tries to break free despite my best efforts.
No. Absolutely not.
Coupeville has had enough change for one season. We have a dead doctor, a clinic changing hands, half the town asking whether a Boston physician will understand them.
We do not need charming oafs, market disasters, or men who make a woman’s heart race.
Hopefully, the new doctor will be easier to manage than him.
Which is not a very high bar.
My house sits two streets back from the water, small and familiar, with porch steps my father repaired badly and my mother painted anyway. The paint has peeled at the edges, and I should fix it.
I should fix half the things around here. There is always another loose hinge, another weed in the path, another memory waiting exactly where I left it.
Inside, I rinse berry juice from my fingers. The house is just me now, but a chorus of other people I miss reside in these walls.
This is why I stay. This ridiculous, aching, nosy, tender town. These people who need too much, give too much, and remember everything. The clinic that became the place where I could redefine the rest of my life after it had dropped out from under me and changed all around me.
Tomorrow, the new doctor arrives.
Tomorrow, Arthur Painter’s clinic becomes Dr. William Bie-from-Boston’s clinic. And he’s bringing whatever ideas he has about how things should run with him.
He will not know all the nuances of the town.
He will not know where Art kept the peppermint candies.
Maybe he can learn.
Maybe I can help him.
I will handle this Boston physician. I have handled worse.
Because the clinic is not just where I work. It is the heartbeat of this town.
It’s my home.
And tomorrow, a stranger gets the keys.