6. Rounds
Chapter six
Rounds
He fucking beat me to the clinic again.
I’m starting to think he sleeps here.
I get out, slam my door harder than necessary, and walk inside with my bag on my shoulder, a pastry box balanced against my hip and a chip on my shoulder.
I needed twenty minutes alone in the clinic.
That shouldn’t be a complicated request from the universe. Twenty minutes to check messages, gather supplies, review the morning list, and move through one familiar piece of my job without William Bie occupying the space like he came with matching throw pillows.
“Morning,” he calls from somewhere near the back.
Of course he hears me come in.
I pause inside the hallway and look up at the ceiling for strength. The ceiling offers nothing.
“Morning,” I call back.
I drop my bag behind the desk, set the pastry box on the counter, and pull out Art’s old canvas medical bag.
The leather handles are worn smooth, and one side has a blue ink stain from a pen that exploded three summers ago.
I know exactly which side zipper sticks, which pocket holds folded consent forms, and where Art used to hide peppermint candies.
I don’t hide candies.
I do, however, pack several. You never know when you’re going to need a bribe.
Medication notes first. Blood pressure cuff. Pulse ox. Wound-care supplies. Gauze. Tape. Forms. Sample cups. A sealed envelope for Mr. Decker’s daughter. The small paper bag from the bakery for Mrs. Weaver, who insists she doesn’t like sweets and then critiques every pastry in town.
This part of the job is mine.
A few mornings a month, I leave the clinic before the phone starts ringing itself into a panic and make rounds to the patients Art and I used to see at home. The shut-ins. The stubborn ones. The ones with bad knees and no transportation.
Art trusted me with them.
Doc appears at the hallway entrance while I’m counting lancets. “Where are we going?”
My hand stops over the supply pile.
We?
I turn.
He’s standing at the mouth of the hall in his lab coat, coffee in one hand, files in the other.
“We are not going anywhere.”
His eyes move over the supplies laid out across the counter. “Home visits?”
I close the bag’s front pocket. “Shut-ins. There are a handful of patients who can’t get into the clinic easily, so several mornings a month I go to them.”
“Who’s on the list today?”
“That depends. Are you asking out of curiosity or ownership?”
His eyebrows lift. “Do I really have to make a distinction?”
I slide the blood pressure cuff into the bag. “Mrs. Weaver first. Then Mr. Buslinger for a medication check. Then a drop-off for Lila Morales after her surgery. Maybe Mr. Schulmire, if his daughter left the porch unlocked.”
“Good. I’m coming with you.”
The zipper catches.
I pull too hard, and it jumps forward, nearly taking the skin off my thumb.
“No,” I say.
Doc doesn’t move. “No?”
“These rounds are mine.”
“Excuse me, but they’re clinic patients.”
“Yes. And I see them.”
“And I need to know how that works.”
“You can read my notes.”
“I’m going to see the route, meet the patients, and understand what doesn’t make it into the notes.”
My teeth grind together.
He sets his coffee on the counter and steps closer, not crowding, just close enough to make a point. “They’re clinic patients. My patients. I’m not letting you carry that alone while I sit in the building and pretend ownership stops at the sidewalk.”
The worst part is, he’s right.
The worst part after that is, he doesn’t gloat.
“I don’t need supervision.”
“I know.”
“I run the rounds.”
“Yes.”
“You follow my lead.”
“Yes.”
“And you don’t call Mrs. Weaver ma’am unless you have a free hour and an emotional need to be humbled.”
He smirks. “Noted.”
I lift the bag and push it into his chest. He catches it.
“Fine. You can be my sherpa today.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
I point at him. “You’re gambling early.”
Mrs. Weaver lives in a yellow house with hydrangeas by the walk and a welcome sign that is the furthest thing from accurate.
She’s eighty-two, sharp, opinionated, and impossible to impress. I chose her first for a reason. If Doc wants to meet Coupeville outside the clinic, he can start with the town’s unofficial admissions committee and biggest pain in the ass.
I knock once and open the door.
“Annie?” Mrs. Weaver calls from the living room.
“And company.”
“I never agreed to company.”
Doc follows me in.
Mrs. Weaver sits in her recliner with a paperback facedown on her lap and a cardigan buttoned wrong. Her walker is two feet out of reach, which means she’s been ignoring it again.
Her eyes go straight to Doc.
No greeting. No smile. Full inspection.
“Mrs. Weaver,” I say, “this is Dr. Bie. He bought Dr. Painter’s practice.”
“I know.” Her gaze narrows. “You’re the berry masher.”
I bend to open the bag so she won’t see my face.
Doc doesn’t miss a beat. “I was involved in the incident.”
“Incident.” She looks him over again. Shoes to shoulders to face. “You’re taller than Art.”
“So I’ve been told.”
“Not as pretty.”
I press my lips together.
Doc glances at me. I remove the blood pressure cuff with professional dignity and very little mercy.
Mrs. Weaver’s attention returns to me. “Nice eyes, though. You could do worse, Annie.”
Heat jumps straight into my cheeks. Traitorous, immediate heat. Doc shifts beside me. I look up at him and he’s beet red as well.
“Blood pressure,” I announce, already moving. “Before you start shopping for wedding venues.”
“At my age, a woman has to work quickly.”
“At your age, a woman should use her walker.”
“That thing is ugly.”
“It’s also useful.”
“So was my second husband. I didn’t keep him within reach all day either.”
Doc makes a strangled sound.
I don’t look at him.
The visit settles once I get the cuff on her arm. Mrs. Weaver complains about the cuff, the weather, the neighbor’s dog, her left knee, and the fact that the bakery has become inconsistent with lemon glaze. Doc sits in the chair I point to and lets me run the history.
He doesn’t take over.
When he asks questions, he asks Mrs. Weaver directly. “Dizzy when you stand up, or after you’ve been walking?” he asks.
Mrs. Weaver eyes him. “You expect a lot of details.”
“I’d appreciate it.”
“Hmph.”
He smiles, and I look away from his mouth before my brain makes poor choices.
Too late.
The memory flashes through me.
His hand at my waist. Easy, I’ve got you.
I reach for the zipper on the bag and miss it.
Doc notices. Naturally. “You all right, Annie?”
“Fine.”
When the visit ends, Mrs. Weaver accepts the bakery bag with suspicion, then points at Doc. “You can come back.”
“Thank you.”
“I haven’t decided if I like you.”
“I’ll respect the process.”
She gives him one approving nod. “Good. You learn.”
Outside, I take the porch steps faster than necessary.
Doc follows with the bag.
“That went well,” he says.
“She called you less pretty than a dead man.”
“Okay, maybe not perfect.”
“She likes you.”
He opens the back door and sets the bag inside. “She trusts you.”
I reach for the driver’s door. “She trusts the clinic.”
“No. She trusts you.”
The rest of the rounds move in a faster rhythm.
Mr. Albright has his medication bottles lined up on the kitchen counter and one refill missing because he tucked the new bottle into a coffee can for safekeeping and now can’t find it. Doc doesn’t lecture.
At Mr. Decker’s, we leave the envelope with his daughter and end up looking at a foot that is “probably nothing” and absolutely isn’t nothing.
By the time we’re done, Doc has seen lots of porch steps, medication lists written by daughters in other zip codes, neighbors who know too much and not enough, and patients who tell the clinic one version of the truth but present with another when we’re standing in their kitchens.
He’s quieter on the drive back.
That should feel like victory. Instead, I’m too aware of him in the passenger seat. His hands loose on his thighs. His shoulder a few inches from mine. His questions start to come carefully.
“How do you decide who stays on the home list?”
“Need. Mobility. Transportation. Risk. Whether they’ll actually call before something gets ugly.”
“And you reassess monthly?”
“Usually. Sometimes weekly, depending on the ornery level.”
“Art wrote the original list?”
“Art started it. I maintain it.”
He nods. Just information accepted and filed away.
I keep my eyes on the road.
“Those visits are a lot of the heart of this clinic,” he says after a minute.
“Yes.”
“I’m glad I was able to come with you today.”
“I’m sure you are.”
“Thank you for showing me.”
The simple thank-you bothers me more than the forced company did.
I pull into the clinic lot and park. “You didn’t give me a choice.”
“No,” he says. “I didn’t.”
I turn the engine off. For once, I have nothing clean to push against.
He looks toward the clinic, then back at me. “Would you recommend someplace for lunch?”
“Why?”
“I’d like to buy you lunch.”
“No. I have work.”
“We both have work. We also skipped lunch yesterday.”
I reach for the home-visit bag. “I don’t need a reward for showing you home visits.”
“I didn’t offer one.”
“I don’t need to be managed.”
“I’m not managing you.”
“Then what is this?”
His eyes meet mine. “Lunch.”
“Front Street Grill.”
“That’s a yes?”
“That’s a restaurant.”
“Great. Let’s go.”
Front Street Grill is busy when we arrive, which helps. Busy means witnesses. Noise. Normal people eating normal lunches and not noticing that my professional life has turned into one long exercise in resisting the urge to throw something at my new boss.
We get a table near the window. When the server leaves, Doc folds his hands near the edge of the table.
“So,” I say. “Is this where you ask about the rounds and pretend the lunch was work-related so you can write it off?”
“No. I was hoping to get to know you a little and answer any questions you might have about me.”
“That’s worse.”
“Perhaps. Depends how guarded a person you are, I guess.”
I pick up my straw wrapper and twist one end. “What about me?”
“How did you end up in Coupeville, Washington?”
“I grew up here.”
“Really?”
“Yep. Through high school. Then college in Portland.”