The Village Nurse's Happy-Ever-After

‘Strange or not, it is so,’ he’d been assured. ‘Her husband Lucas is a cardiac surgeon. I’m one of his patients, as a matter of fact. Our son-in-law is also a great friend of Ethan. He and Francine are godparents to our little Lily.’

‘It all sounds very happy and cosy.’ he’d said lightly, relieved that she hadn’t been able to witness the envy in his expression.

Nonetheless, he’d accepted Barbara’s invitation. Having been warned by Ethan about the physical deterioration of his hostess, he had concealed his dismay when he saw her, while at the same time taking note that the razor-sharp mind was still very much in evidence.

After a pleasant evening with his relations, he’d left, promising Barbara that he would keep her informed about what was going on at the practice. At the moment of departure he’d paused and asked, ‘Did you know that the other apartment is occupied, Aunt Barbara?’

Her expression had said she hadn’t known and her husband Keith said, ‘It will be an arrangement that Ethan will have agreed to before he left—probably a member of the staff.’

‘That’s correct,’ Harry had told him. ‘Her name is Phoebe Howard, she’s the district nurse.’

The retired doctor had shaken her head. ‘Although I take a great interest in the practice, I’m afraid I don’t know every member of staff, Harry. She must be someone new.’

‘Yes, I suppose that could be it,’ he’d agreed, and after saying his farewells had disappeared into the winter night.

And now he was back at the apartment and wondering if history would repeat itself, if the door opposite would be opened a crack to observe him. But it remained closed and there was silence all around, which was how he preferred it to be, wasn’t it?

It was two o’clock in the morning and there was silence no longer. He’d been awakened by a strange sound and was lying wide eyed against the pillows, trying to identify it. It wasn’t a cat yowling out on the tiles, he told himself, or someone who’d had too much to drink breaking into song as they went past the surgery building.

He sat up suddenly. It was the loud cry of a baby that was shattering the peace and he was out of bed in a flash, quickly throwing on a robe.

The door opposite was still closed when he went out onto the landing but he had no doubt about where the cry was coming from. Phoebe had a baby in there and from the noise issuing forth, it was not a happy one. The doctor in him simply couldn’t not check if everything was all right.

The crying stopped for a moment and he knocked on the door, but it still remained closed. In case the district nurse had a husband or partner with her who might be bristling at the invasion of their privacy, he called, ‘I’ve no wish to intrude but can I help?’

There was no response and he was in the process of knocking again when the door opened suddenly and he almost fell on top of Phoebe. The baby she was holding observed him with tear-drenched brown eyes as she said apologetically, ‘I’m sorry we’ve disturbed you, Dr Balfour. I’m afraid that Marcus is teething.’

He glanced around the room and still poised on the threshold asked, ‘Are you living alone up here with a young baby?’

Phoebe hesitated and as if on cue the infant in her arms began to cry again. She stepped back reluctantly to let him in and said, ‘Yes, I’m afraid there are just the two of us. If you want to help, could you possibly hold Marcus for a moment while I make him a bottle? It usually soothes him back to sleep. And, Dr Balfour, the reason I didn’t tell you I had a baby was exactly because of nights like this. I didn’t want us to disturb your privacy, but I should have known better.’

Harry had stepped inside and was observing her doubtfully as she held out the baby for him to take from her. She smiled and told him, ‘He won’t bite you. He’s only been protesting because he’s teething. Look, he’s smiling now.’ He looked down at the small warm body that he was now holding close to his. Sure enough, there was a little smile coming in his direction from the child with the same pale skin and wide brown gaze as his mother.

She was moving towards the kitchen to make the bottle, and Harry said in a low voice, ‘Do I take it that his father isn’t around?’

‘Yes,’ she said quietly, not looking at him. ‘We’re divorced.’

He nodded, and looking down at the child in his arms said wryly, ‘And this is the reason why you finish early? Why on earth didn’t you tell me that?’

‘Yes, Marcus is the reason,’ she said steadily. ‘I take him to a nursery in the village before I start at the surgery on weekdays and have to pick him up at four o’clock. I suppose one of the reasons for me not telling you was because I don’t want anyone seeing me as disadvantaged. I chose the kind of life I’m living and have no regrets. It was Ethan’s suggestion that I finish early and I was hardly going to refuse when it gave me some extra time with my son.’

‘So how long have you lived here?’

‘Only since New Year. My maternity leave was up at the end of December. I’d lived with my sister and brother-in-law before that,’ and with a tired smile. ‘So now you have the story of my life.’

‘Not entirely, I would imagine,’ he said dryly. He looked down at Marcus who was getting ready for another weeping bout. ‘If that bottle is ready, now might be the moment to produce it.’ With a feeling that he was out of his depth and had served his purpose, he said, ‘If you’re sure he’s going to settle, I’ll leave you to it.’

‘Yes, we’ll be fine,’ she said hurriedly. ‘I feel that I’ve been taking advantage of your good nature, Dr Balfour.’

‘I haven’t got a good nature to take advantage of,’ he informed her shortly and then pausing in the doorway, amazed himself by saying, ‘Before I go, why don’t I make you a warm drink? Coffee maybe?’

‘Er, yes, please, that would be lovely, and do make one for yourself,’ Phoebe said meekly, wanting to pinch herself to make sure she wasn’t dreaming. She couldn’t remember what it felt like to have someone do something for her, and of all people it was the unpredictable new head of the practice who was waiting on her in the middle of the night.

Marcus had been fed and changed, and was now sleeping peacefully in his cot. On the point of finally going back to his own apartment, Harry said, ‘Just one thing—if ever you need any help like tonight, feel free to call on me.

‘I would rather you did that than me having to lie there imagining you struggling on your own. And by the way, Nurse Howard, why is this place so much less attractive than mine?’

‘I’m not sure,’ she told him, ‘but it isn’t going to be like this for long! And I will only ever disturb you if it’s an emergency—when we move house we can’t choose our neighbours, can we? They come as part of the package.’

Harry wondered if that was in the form of an apology, or letting him know that she wasn’t all that keen on having him living so close.

But if she’d been expecting a reply, there was none forthcoming and as tiredness took hold of her, she wished him goodnight and bolted the door behind him.

When she went back to bed exhaustion was there, but not sleep. Her mind kept going over what had turned out to be the strangest of days. It has been full of highs and lows between Harry Balfour and herself, then had ended with him knocking on her door and offering to help with Marcus. She’d been so tired and frayed at the edges she’d welcomed him with open arms and thrust her little one at him.

Yet there was no way she was going to take him up on his offer by using him as a standby in times of stress. The odds were that he wouldn’t have taken the apartment across the landing if he’d known that his neighbours were going to be a single mother and her baby.

Despite his offer of help, he hadn’t exactly seemed very comfortable around Marcus. Lucy, the elderly practice nurse, had told her on the day he had been due to arrive that he hadn’t any family to bring with him, which maybe explained his reluctance to hold Marcus and his eagerness to be off once he had been satisfied that calm had been restored.

Yet he’d lingered long enough to make her the hot drink she’d been gasping for, and had made one for himself, as she’d suggested. But those had been things unconnected with her child…A last thought struck as her eyelids began to droop. Maybe his reaction on discovering there was a baby living only feet away wasn’t all that strange, as it clearly wouldn’t be every man’s idea of heaven.

Across the landing Harry’s thoughts were moving along different channels. Seated in a chair by the window, looking out bleakly at a starlit winter sky, he was remembering a time long ago when a baby precious to him and his parents had been lost, and how nothing had ever been the same afterwards.

Only small himself, he’d been left lonely and unloved while they’d tried to cope with their grief by spending all their time in their business, running stables in Bluebell Cove. Ever since, he’d been reluctant to take on the responsibility of bringing a child into a world where nothing was certain and loss could bring with it such pain and loneliness.

So family life wasn’t something he was familiar with due to his childhood. Marriage to a woman who had been in no hurry to start a family had also left his wariness of it unchanged.

Yet Phoebe across the landing had opted for it without the support of a husband or partner and seemed content, so which of them had the right idea?

Breakfast and getting Marcus to the nursery went smoothly the next morning, and Phoebe was at the surgery in good time, although with an uncomfortable feeling inside whenever she thought about her nocturnal meeting with Harry.

She shuddered to think what she must have looked like in a crumpled cotton nightdress with an old robe over it and her hair all over the place, yet it didn’t really matter. He’d been in her apartment for just one thing and there’d been nothing sensual about it. He’d come to assist in the hope of bringing back the peace that had prevailed before Marcus had begun his tantrum, and she’d do well to remember that!

Leo Fenchurch, the other doctor in the practice, had been out on an early call and appeared while she was making the usual big pot of tea for the staff before the day commenced. He brought a blast of cold air in with him and while warming his hands around a mug of the welcoming brew he said, ‘So, what do you think of the new guy, Phoebe?’

He was a fair-haired six-footer with a charm that appealed to most women, but not to her she thought. He was an excellent doctor but a bit lightweight for her to succumb to his charms.

‘I’m not sure,’ she said in answer to his question. ‘I feel that he isn’t going to be an easy person to get to know, that he is very much his own man. Yet I’m sure he will be good for the practice, even if he can be somewhat unpredictable on occasion.’ And of that I have on-the-spot experience, she thought.

‘But, Leo, we have to remember that Harry has lost his wife in tragic circumstances. I’m not sure how, but it was an accident of some kind, and for a marriage to end like that must have been horrendous.

‘Mine fell apart because of a huge divide in our priorities, but we at least we had a choice, not like Harry.’

‘Wow!’ he exclaimed. ‘That summing-up comes after him having spent just a short time among us? You must have seen more of him than we have.’

She wasn’t going to enlighten him on that and almost dropped the mug she was holding when Harry’s voice said from behind her in the passage, ‘Is there any tea on offer, Nurse Howard?’

As she reached for the teapot, Phoebe was praying that he hadn’t heard her discussing him with Leo. It would be just too embarrassing if he had, but his expression was serene enough, and once she’d poured him the tea, he returned to his room without further comment. As the rest of the staff were appearing in varying degrees of haste for their early brew, she tried to put the incident out of her mind.