Chapter 18
They sat there talking for a while, eating the grapes.
“………So when I bought home this kestrel with a broken wing, nursed it back to health, my uncle said, that’s about a dozen animals you’ve saved, isn’t it?”
“I didn’t tell him about the loads I’d helped that I couldn’t bring home, but then he put it into my head about becoming a vet. I was 16 at the time, and study was about as much as I was about, a real geeky swot I was!”
Buffy grinned and said,
“You – a geek – I don’t believe it!”
“True, I had this real ‘fro going on with my hair, went round in ripped jeans, always got my nose in a book…anyway, I find out that to be a vet, I’d have to study for seven years, but to doctor humans, I’d only have to study for five, so I chose to become a doctor instead…surgery fascinated me.
Do you remember an athlete called Audley Akibua? – He was a small wiry Ethiopian, he ran bare foot - he was a distance runner, he was my first operation, I had to repair his hamstring…I operated on him and then I had to go somewhere else, and quite by chance, I saw him about six weeks later, he came and hugged me, and told me thankyou he was now better, it was the few English words he’d learnt – I felt like crying, it just felt so good to help a fellow human being, you know?!”
Buffy smiled and nodded
“Oh goodness, I’ve eaten all your grapes!”
“Don’t worry…” Buffy was in a quandary, wondering whether to bring up Christmas again…
“Buffy, about what you asked me earlier, about Christmas”
Buffy’s stomach leapt to her throat and her heart missed a beat; she was holding her breath, waiting for the disappointment…
“The thing is…”
“You have other plans?” (Oh god Summers, shut up, Shut Up, SHUT UP! Keep calm and just listen to him will you!) Buffy mentally chided herself.
“No, and I’d really LOVE to come to you and your mother’s house………”
Buffy KNEW there was a ‘but’ coming…
“But?” She asked, not being able to help herself
“But, well you’re my patient, if somebody here accidentally found out, I could get struck off – patient/doctor, it’s a no-no”
Buffy knew this, but it still didn’t stop her feeling crushed
“But, well…it’s MOM inviting you to dinner, it’s HER house, she’s not your patient”
Buffy stated, looking hopefully at him
William thought about this, he quirked an eyebrow and said,
“Look, leave it with me, I’ll see what I can do, okay?”
Buffy let out the breath she seemed to be holding and she felt all excited and could hardly keep still.
“Do me a favour though, tell no one about it, will you?”
“I promise!” Buffy beamed and William stood up
“God, is that the time – I better be going – well, goodnight then, and I’ll see you tomorrow, and remember (he mouthed ‘not a word’)
Buffy smiled and nodded and said goodnight. When she heard the door shut and the lift go down she felt like punching the air! Okay, there could still be snags, BUT…he didn’t say no!!!
***********************
The Following Morning……………
“There you are, I’ve been looking all over for you!”
William looked up from his book as Dru placed her tray opposite him at the table in the cafeteria. She put her coffee cup on the table.
“Why, got a problem?”
“No, I just thought about that rain-check, to reschedule that dinner you missed last week”
William frowned briefly, then looked at his watch
“Oh god, is that the time! – There never seems to be enough hours in the day to-“
“Whoa, there, hold your horses, another five minutes won’t kill you!”
Dru had grabbed his arm when he’d stood up, and resignedly, he sat back down
“Sorry, but you really must be quick, I was due with Dr’s Inkerman and Travers five minutes ago”
“Well, I was thinking –“
“Dr Carling – Dr Carling!”
William turned his head and saw Dr Travers’ secretary looking around the canteen
“Here, just coming – sorry Dru, I’ll try and catch up with you later!” William stood, picking up his book, notebook and pen and his phone
“Don’t forget!”
“Is he annoyed with me?” William asked Betty, Travers’ secretary as they walked down the corridor
“Truth? – He’s not in the office himself yet, but when Dr Tate came in looking for you…I know she’s got a habit of keeping people talking”
“So you came and rescued me – aren’t you an angel!” As they turned the corner to the office, the two doctors were walking towards them.
“Good, we can get on, I was just saying to Dr Inkerman that you are not available after Tuesday, is that right?”
“No, Monday really, I fly Monday night, get to Munich on Tuesday” William said
“Only we have a nagging back-log of day surgeries that we could use your help in clearing…”
The meeting went on for over an hour, so he was late doing his rounds.
******************
Buffy had been counting the hours since she last saw Him. The hours, the minutes and the seconds, now all the hope she’d been harbouring for a ‘yes’ to Christmas was evaporating quicker than a snowflake on a hotplate, it was gone lunchtime, and he still hadn’t showed……………
“Ya didn’t like your lunch, honey?” Pearl asked, taking the barely touched plate of ham salad.
“Oh, not hungry…that’s all”
“Have you seen Dr Hottie this morning?”
Buffy sighed and shook her head.
“No, neither have I, something’s keeping him busy, I usually see him at least twice on my rounds – and I haven’t seen him once!”
“Well Pearl, join the club!”
“It’ll be that doc Travers, working him too hard, you mark my words, trying to get as much out of him as he can before he moves on again, well see you later honey-chile”
“Uh, oh, yeah, bye…”
The words ‘moves on again’ struck Buffy like a knife to the stomach, she hadn’t thought about him leaving LA, especially not before Christmas…oh god – he’d be out of the country, not only would he not be in the same room as her at Christmas, it was doubtful that he’d be in the same state, country or even continent!
Buffy threw herself on her side, her back to the door feeling as miserable as sin………
“Buffy…are you asleep?”
She turned and looked over her shoulder.
“No, come in!”
“I didn’t want to disturb you”
“You’re not!” William came into the room
“So, let me see, how are you this afternoon?”
“I feel fine” Buffy sat up while William checked her chart at the end of the bed.
“And the foot?” Buffy nodded
“Good, oh boy, have I been busy this-“
“THERE YOU ARE! – You are SO hard to track down!” Drusilla came into Buffy’s room.
“Hello, you’re the skater that was in the plane crash, right?”
“Um, yes”
“Oh, er Buffy, this is Dr Drusilla Tate, an old friend of mine as well as a colleague, Dru, Buffy Summers” The two women exchanged smiles, then Dru said,
“Don’t leave the hospital before you’ve seen me, I want to make arrangements for that dinner”
William looked bored, but said,
“Okay - but I’m staying late tonight, so I don’t know what time I’ll get to seeing you”
Drusilla was just about to say something, when she was paged, and she said goodbye and left.
“Sounds cosy” Buffy said, trying not to sound like a green-eyed monster………
“Hmm, what’s that?” Spike looked up from her chart.
“That dinner she wants you to go to”
“Oh that – there’ll be other doctors there too, least I hope so – but then I might not be here, I’ve got to go to Munich on Monday night – I shan’t be back in LA until at least Friday”
That statement had answered two of Buffy’s questions, no, he obviously didn’t fancy Dru, and two, he was coming back next week!
“We were at med school together, well not together, we were there at the same time, same place in London, had two different circles of friends, and we sort of overlapped the two circles and made one big circle - we used to have a laugh, big crowd of us, we’d do things like take off for Brighton for a weekend, one of the guys and one of the girls used to go get a room each in one of the cheap bed and breakfast hotels, and then we’d all sneak up and sleep on the floor or in a chair, we could fit five of us in a double bed if nobody turned over!”
“Did you ever get thrown out?”
“Oh loads of times, we’d be half drunk, start giggling and we’d get found out – many is the time I’ve slept in my car!”
Buffy grinned and said,
“Sounds like fun!”
“Dru seems to remember it with rose-tinted glasses, I remember it as a time of living on toast, baked beans and dried pasta, and not too much sleep as somebody always seemed to have music blaring…
Right, I want to look at your stitches, so I’ll just pull the curtains…I suppose you call them drapes…” William pulled the curtain round the bed shut, and said
“If all is well, and I don’t see why not, you can have a smaller dressing on, we can fore-go all these layers of bandage, okay?”
Buffy was only half aware of what he was saying, she was concentrating on his full soft looking kissable lips………
“Buffy………Buffy? – Buffy are you – oh-hmm-mmmmmmmmmmmmmm!”
She just couldn’t help herself, and she closed her eyes and pressed her lips to his – an electric current (or so it seemed) zinged down to her toes and them settled in her tummy, sending the butterflies flapping ten to the dozen!
She broke the kiss and lazily opened her eyes with a slow grin
“Been wanting to do that for ages!”
“Buffy, are you mad? – If we get caught, then I’m struck off, and I’d never get to see you again!”
Buffy immediately felt remorse, of course she didn’t want him to get struck off! She could feel the colour rise up her neck and she mumbled her apology…
“Buffy, babe…don’t think that I didn’t want…oh so god help me -!” And with those words, William’s lips were on hers again, his cool tongue plundered her mouth, softly massaging her tongue, footfalls in the corridor had him breaking off the kiss and walk to the end of the bed, without looking at her he began to undo the bandages.
Buffy just stared at what he was doing, thinking, ‘he’s undoing the bandage – he kissed me!’
William wondered what on earth had come over him to take leave of his senses like that, one whiff of scandal, and his career would be over before you could say, ‘gross professional misconduct’…what was he on about – of COURSE he knew what had come over him, that sexy little blonde child-woman, that 19 year old pocket-Venus with the most gorgeous green eyes he’d ever seen had come over him, that’s what – she filled his every waking moment – he wondered how long it would be before she was in his dreams…
“W-well, um, every-everyth-thing seems fine – yes, fine…you won’t s-see a scar. Okay, I’ll just beep for one of the nurses to um, to come and er, dress it again for you…”
“William, do you mind if I call you William?”
“N-No, not at all!”
“Before you press that button to call the nurse…”
“Yes?”
Buffy pulled him towards her by his tie and gave him another big luscious kiss that left them both breathless.
“Buffy!”
Oh god, he could do with sitting down, thank god this white coat of his was baggy, that’s all, else everyone would have seen what effect she had had on him…
Snatching one more quick peck on the lips, William warned her he was now going to open the curtains and call one of the nurses.
He did as he said, and within thirty seconds, Jen came in, all bright and happy
“Hello! What can I do for you?”
“I want you to redress this wound for me please, just a light gauze dressing and a tubigrip sock to the knee, just in case of a DVT” Jen left to get the dressings cart.
William wrote on her chart and then said
“You okay?”
“Wonderful…you?” Buffy eyes shone and she stretched luxuriantly, like a cat
“More than fine, but we’ve got to be – “
Jen backed into the room, the cart in front of her.
“Okay then Miss Summers, I’ll see you later before I go home, and we can discuss when you can start your physiotherapy”
“Thankyou doctor, bye!” he left giving her a sly wink and Buffy was on cloud 30 million and nine………
“Isn’t he all kinds of gorgeous!” Jen said smiling as she pressed a piece of surgical tape in place to stop the gauze falling off the stitches
“I suppose he is!” Buffy said
“You SUPPOSE?!” Jen asked, incredulously
“Well, I hadn’t really thought about it!” Buffy lied, slipping crossed fingers under the cover!
“Not that he’d notice me in a million years………that Dr Tate is always hanging around him when he’s here”
“Whose that?” Buffy asked, again feigning that she didn’t know
“That woman doctor, she’s got these mad looking eyes…well I think they’re mad looking…long dark hair, talks with a British accent”
“Oh yes, I know her. But then, he’s a Brit too, isn’t he – perhaps they know each other from England – or you know all ex-pats together sort of thing, that Dr Travers is a Brit too, isn’t he?”
Yeah – hey, I’d never thought about it like that, maybe there’s hope for me yet!” Buffy smiled and thought,
‘Not a chance!’
“There, how does that feel – its not too tight, is it?” Buffy wiggled her toes and shook her head no, it was fine she said.
“Good, I’ll just go get the Tubigrip stockinette” a minute later, Jen re-appeared with what looked like a bare lampshade and the stockinette bandage stretched around it. She slid the ‘lampshade’ bit up Buffy’s leg and asked her to hole the top of the tube bandage in place. Buffy did this while the intern gently lowered the frame, and stopping at her toes, she began slide the frame back up, to cover the first layer of elasticated stocking right up to the knee, to stop the danger of Deep Vein Thrombosis.
“If your foot goes numb or your toes go blue, bell me and I’ll come and change it” Buffy nodded and thanked her and she left, leaving Buffy to dream her day-dreams…she’d decided NOT to tell her mother of these ‘new developments’ – it might put her off letting William stay over Christmas, because once he was at Revello Drive, Buffy had got some ideas how to keep him there…
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