Unlocking the Doctor's Heart

‘Afraid I am.’

‘I was hoping—’

‘Well, you’re out of luck,’ he cut in. ‘The other consultants are saints compared to our Hannibal Harrison.’

The lift stopped on the third floor, the doors opened to an empty lobby and after a prolonged wait slowly closed again.

‘Why do people push the button for every lift on the floor?’ the lanky man growled, before giving in to a lopsided smile. ‘Better watch my temper, I’m starting to sound like Harrison!’

Beth breathed a heavy sigh. This man had just confirmed the rumours she had overheard when she’d visited the human resource department only minutes before. She had tried to dismiss it as idle gossip.

‘That’s just wonderful,’ she said. ‘I start work with him this morning.’

‘So you’re the newest victim.’ He smiled sardonically, rubbing his hands, then offered one in friendship. ‘Just joking, it’s a bad habit of mine that you’ll have to get used to. I’m Dan Berketta, and you must be our RMO exchange from London. Let me be the first from Cas to welcome you to the Eastern Memorial.’

Beth met his handshake. ‘Beth Seymour.’

The lift stopped again, this time on the first floor.

‘This is where I get off,’ Dan explained. ‘I’ve been sent on an errand by the man himself. I’ll catch up with you later.’

The doors closed, leaving Beth and her thoughts alone as she travelled down to the ground floor. Somehow she had to make the best of it, despite Dan’s bleak report and terrible impersonation. She had no choice, she mused as the lift came to a stop. In vain she tried to tuck back a wisp of hair that escaped from her chestnut plait. She sighed when another frizzy strand fell across her eye. The humid Australian summer weather was playing havoc with her curls and that was just what she didn’t need. She feared frizzy curls around her face made her look even younger and she wanted desperately to appear every bit of her twenty-eight years today.

After a few moments struggling with the rebellious wisp, she conceded defeat and stepped from the elevator into the commotion of the A and E department. It was only eight o’clock on a Monday morning, but the tone of the day ahead was evident.

The hallway was lined with chairs and each one was taken. The cries of a colicky baby were almost drowned by the abusive yelling of an elderly drunk, who was being escorted to the exit door by two well-built orderlies. A barouche, attended by three hospital staff and clearly heading for Emergency Theatre, rushed past, forcing Beth to take two steps back.

‘Chin up, Beth Seymour,’ she muttered to herself. ‘No matter what, this is definitely where you want to be.’

Beth had worked too hard and waited too long for this day—travelling halfway around the world in the process—to let anything dampen her enthusiasm. Not even an A and E consultant with a supposed foul temper.

No one could be that bad, she decided. Or could they, she wondered, as she spied a man drumming his fingers impatiently on the reception desk. She checked her watch, even though she knew she wasn’t late, then berated herself silently for letting him intimidate her before they had even met. She had made a pledge to herself to appear the consummate second-year resident, confident and totally professional.

She had recognised Dr Harrison from the description given by the girl in Personnel. Tall, late thirties, wavy dark hair and deep blue eyes. He fitted the description, although she wouldn’t have called him exceptionally tall. Height was such a personal thing, she decided as she drew closer. She couldn’t help but notice his white coat was a little worse for wear as she breathed a sigh and stretched out her hand.

‘You must be Dr Harrison. They told me I’d find you here. I’m Elizabeth Seymour, the new exchange resident. Everyone calls me Beth. I’ve been assigned to A and E.’

The man didn’t meet her handshake. He stared blankly as he rubbed his chin. ‘Listen, lady, I’m no doctor, I’m a dental technician. I work down the road at the dental hospital and I’ve been waiting for an hour for someone to take a look at my rash. I have a truckload of dentures and crowns I gotta get back to, so can you cop a squiz and give me somethin’ for the itch?’

Beth dropped her hand. She was stunned into an embarrassed silence.

‘Well, you heard the man,’ came a voice from behind her. ‘Bay four is empty, so show the gentleman in there and check out his rash, Dr Seymour.’

Beth spun around, and was forced to raise not only her eyes but her face, in order to meet the deep blue pools belonging to the voice.

It was painfully clear—in fact, Beth thought she could almost bet her future medical career on it—that this voice and these very deep blue eyes belonged to the real A and E consultant. A quick glance down at his ID tag confirmed her nightmare. The name Matthew Harrison was glaring back at her in bold print from beneath his photograph.

‘Is this a hearing problem or an attitude problem, Dr Seymour?’ he asked dismissively, as he sifted through some case notes on the desk. ‘I said you can take this patient into bay four and begin the examination, unless of course there’s some quaint English tradition that prevents you working before ten in the morning.’ His eyes lifted from the case notes before him and he met Beth’s stunned gaze.

‘And if that’s the case, Dr Seymour, you’d better see me in my office, because I don’t need a second-year resident working for me but abiding by her own set of rules.’

With that he turned away, gathered an armful of files and proceeded down the hall and out of sight.

Beth bit the inside of her cheek as she looked around. The waiting room was full. People without seats were leaning against the walls. Then there was the queue she had passed moments before in the corridor. And all of them, she felt certain, had heard the dressing down she had just received.

‘Here are his notes, Dr Seymour. I’ve just completed them now,’ said a nurse, who Beth couldn’t have recognised five minutes later in a line-up if her life had depended on it. Her normally clear reasoning had deserted her the moment Matthew Harrison had attacked.

Somehow she managed to hear the end of the instructions ‘...and the bay Dr Harrison suggested is second on the left.’

‘Fine,’ Beth replied, as she took the file and tried to focus on the name. ‘Well, then, Mr Somers, if you’ll follow me, I’ll see what I can do.’

With a bowlegged gait, he followed her. ‘I sure hope you can give me something to stop the itching. It’s been driving me mad for near on four days.’

With her back to the patient as she led him into the bay, Beth rolled her eyes and gave a little sigh. This was not how it was supposed to happen. The fantasies of her first day on the job in Adelaide had been very different.

She put down the notes, closed the curtains and crossed to the washbasin. Quickly but thoroughly she washed her hands and slipped on some latex gloves. Then she turned back to catch her patient drop his pants to the floor and bend over the examination table. She swallowed hard as she approached the splayed figure.

‘Where exactly is the problem, Mr...? Mr...?’ Oh, God, she couldn’t believe she’d forgotten his name. Her eyes were levelled at a man’s naked backside and she had no recollection of his name. Whether it was the sight before her or the run-in with Dr Harrison that had blanked her mind, she wasn’t sure.

‘Somers,’ he called over his shoulder, ‘Barry Somers. But my friends call me Bazza.’

‘Yes, of course. Mr Somers,’ she repeated, but had no need to ask where the problem was, as she watched him raise his hand to the afflicted area.

‘It’s just here. I was out shooting with me mates when I got nature’s call and ducked behind some bushes. Well, seems like I backed into some prickly pear. I was a bit embarrassed to come in, I thought maybe it’d go away but it hasn’t.’

Beth proceeded with the delicate examination. Upon completion she removed her gloves and wrote out a script.

‘You can have this filled down the corridor at Pharmacy,’ she explained. ‘Apply the cream to the irritated area three times a day and you should be fine in a few days.’

He stared at her without answering.

‘Mr Somers, did you understand me?’

‘Yep,’ he said. Dismissing everything else she had previously told him, he continued, ‘You know, Doc, you sure are pretty. Has anyone told you that you have beautiful brown eyes?’

‘Mr Somers, please get dressed.’

‘Are you single?’

Beth chose to ignore the question. ‘I don’t mean to hurry you up but we’re very busy so if you could please put on your trousers and make your way to Pharmacy.’

‘Can’t blame a man for asking,’ he said, as he tucked in his shirt and finished dressing. ‘You’re from the UK, right? Been out here long?’

‘Yes, I’m English and, no, I’ve only just arrived.’ Beth answered the less personal questions. ‘Now, unless there’s anything related to your treatment, I think you can go.’

‘Me and me mates, we’ve got a shack on the Murray River... Have you ever been water-skiing?’

‘I’m not a watersports kind of person,’ Beth replied, as she filled in the last of the case notes and closed the file. She moved to the curtain, pulling it open. ‘Now, I really do have a lot of patients to see.’