attempting to concentrate on the image. ‘There was fuel in metal drums that exploded while they were trying to save a shed. This looks like a sliver of metal, embedded in the cornea but not penetrating. His sight’s blurred but maybe that’s just the reaction to the pain and a bit of debris that’s on the surface. The eye won’t stop watering. There’s a couple of nasty lacerations around the eye itself that’ll need stitching but it’s the metal I’m worried about. It’s very near the optic nerve. If he moves while I’m trying to manoeuvre it out… Well, I don’t think I can cope with this under local anaesthetic.’
Hugo nodded. He crossed to stand beside her and they stared at the screen together.
‘It’s not touching anything crucial. I think we could do it.’ He stared at it a bit longer. ‘Maybe you’re right, though. It’s going to be fiddly.’
‘But under a local anaesthetic?’
‘I’d rather not.’ He looked down at her and smiled. ‘Like you, ophthalmology isn’t my speciality. It looks straightforward enough as long as he doesn’t move, but there’s a bit of repair work to do and I’m not super- confident. Eyes aren’t my area of expertise and if I have to fiddle and curse I’d prefer that the patient was sedated while I did it.’
‘That makes two of us.’ She looked at the X-ray some more and even managed a shaky smile. ‘We couldn’t evacuate him to the city?’
‘It’s a very small sliver. It’s not penetrating. Evacuating means bringing a helicopter from the city and visibility is making things dangerous.’
‘Yes, but-’
‘But we do have two doctors,’ he went on inexorably. ‘Even if one of them looks like she just came out of a welfare shop.’
‘From a home for battered women actually,’ she said with dignity. ‘I’ve had one offer to take me there in a squad car already tonight.’
‘Have you?’ The ready laughter she was starting to know flashed into his eyes. ‘The fire guys tell me they nearly ran you down.’
‘Yeah, but then they let me drive their fire engine,’ she told him. ‘Which was really cool.’
The deep smile lurking in the back of his eyes strengthened into the beginnings of something that looked like pure admiration. And surprise. She flushed but his eyes were sliding down to her legs, breaking the moment. He’d seen her bloodstained knee. ‘That graze wants washing.’
‘And we all need dinner and a sleep and it’s not going to happen,’ she told him, still strangely flushed. What was it with this man that had the capacity to unsettle her? She had to move on. ‘Our firefighter has an empty stomach which means he’s ready for anaesthesia now,’ she told him. ‘His eye isn’t going to get better on its own. If we’re going to operate there isn’t a better time than now. Is there?’
‘Nope.’ He sighed. ‘I guess not. Lead on, Dr Harper. Do you want to operate or do you want to do the anaesthetic?’
‘I’m choosing anaesthetics,’ she told him. ‘Two anaesthetics in one day! I think I’m starting to specialise.’
It took longer than they had thought it would.
By the time they finished and the firefighter was recovering in the ward, neatly stitched, foreign body removed and intravenous antibiotics preventing complications, Rachel was swaying on her feet. She hadn’t felt it at all while she’d been in Theatre-adrenaline again, she supposed-but when she emerged she sagged. Her stocks of adrenaline must be at an all-time low. She crossed to the sinks and held on, and if she hadn’t held on she would have sunk to the floor.
It’d pass. She’d worked exhausted in the past. After nights on duty when Craig-
No. Don’t go there.
In a minute she’d start considering the complications surrounding her but for now…
For now she held on.
‘Hey.’ Hugo had hauled off his gown and was watching her, his eyes narrowing in concern. ‘Are you OK?’
She thought about it. OK? People kept asking her that and the concept was ludicrous. ‘If you’re offering to take me back to my women’s refuge, the answer is yes.’
‘Women’s refuge…’
‘Any sort of refuge,’ she muttered. ‘As long as it serves dinner. Bread and dripping would be fine. Come to think about it, bread and dripping would be fantastic.’
‘You’re hungry.’
‘You stole my hamburger-remember?’
‘So I did.’ He was looking at her as if she’d just landed from outer space. ‘That was-what-eight hours ago?’
‘It feels more. And I didn’t eat it then. Penelope finished it for me. Someone took her off to feed her when I arrived. I bet she’s had a really good meal. Doggos or something. Something really delicious.’
‘What did you do between operating on Kim and now?’ he asked and she rolled her eyes.
‘I walked. I walked in these really stupid sandals which, by the way, are about ten sizes too big. I walked back to the pavilion to find Michael hadn’t left me the keys to his car. I brought his stupid dog from the pavilion and I walked into town searching for a cafe to discover the whole place has shut. It’s like a ghost town. I walked back to the motel to discover the place has been booked out by the Boys’ Own Fire Brigade and their restaurant doesn’t serve meals. And their candy-vending machine is broken. I walked back to the showgrounds to discover the gates had been locked. I started to walk back here but the fire engine nearly ran me down. I came in here, I washed out a few eyes, I sewed up a gashed leg and now I’ve operated on an eye. So… I think maybe I’ve reached my limit. I’m wearing Doris Keen’s Crimplene, my feet hurt, my stomach’s empty, I don’t even have a dog box to sleep in and I’m very, very close to hysterics.’ She eyed him with caution. ‘And if you dare to even twitch the sides of your mouth with the suggestion of laughter, Dr McInnes, I intend to lie down on the floor and give way to a full-scale tantrum. They’ll hear me back in Sydney.’
‘I’m not…’ His mouth definitely twitched but it was hauled back under control fast. ‘I’m not laughing.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
‘I’m definitely not.’ He bit his lip, pushed the laughter resolutely to the backburner and eyed her with a certain amount of caution. ‘OK. It appears you need some help. Where shall we start?’
‘Food,’ she told him.
‘As bad as that?’
‘Worse.’
‘Let’s go, then.’ He smiled. ‘It fits with what I need to do,’ he told her. ‘I’m hungry, too.’
‘You haven’t had dinner?’
‘One of my very elderly patients had a stroke. I’ve been out there with her. She died an hour ago.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t be,’ he told her. ‘Annie was a ninety-six-year-old farmer. She’s run her own farm since her husband walked out on her sixty years ago. She didn’t miss him a bit. She’s had a great life; she was healthy and happily living in her own home until the end, and I wish all endings could be as happy.’
‘Mmm.’
It was a happy ending. But his words had caught her unawares, twisting her thoughts back to where her thoughts always ended.
Craig…
She swallowed. She looked down at her hands and found her hands had clenched into fists. Craig…
For some stupid reason her eyes were filling with tears.
Which was ridiculous. Surely she should be used to this by now. It was just that she’d never been away. For eight years…
Food. She needed food. That’s why she was reacting like this. Hugo was watching her with concern and she blinked and sniffed and got on with it.
‘Sorry,’ she told him. ‘I was just…reacting to the day or something. Did you say you knew where we can find some food?’
He was still watching her, still with that look that said he saw far more than she wanted him to, but he accepted that she needed to move on.
