Second Chance With Her Army Doc

“Sounds like it’s working,” Matt said.

“It is. It’s a slow process, but little by little it’s helping me define who I am again.”

He and Matt had been trapped in a cave in Afghanistan when, for whatever reason, he’d snapped. Left the cave and run head-first into gunfire. He’d got hit pretty hard. Lost a kidney and a spleen as a result. Damaged his other kidney as well. Matt had risked his life to leave the relative safety of that cave to save him.

“It’s a bear rescue facility. I’ll work with bear cubs—rescue them if they’re abandoned or injured, take care of them and, if they’re able to return to the wild, get them prepared to do that. That’s the hands-on part of the program. The first part was doing pretty much the same thing for myself—retraining for life in the world again. Making sure I have what it will take to work with the bears later on. It’s an amazing program. Gives you a different kind of responsibility and helps you find yourself inside that responsibility.”

Matt whistled. “Bears... I would have never guessed.”

“Just the little black bear variety. Not ready to tackle the grizzlies yet.” Carter chuckled. “And I’m the one who never even had a dog.”

“Well, it seems to be agreeing with you.”

“I hope it is,” Carter said in all seriousness. “I can’t live my life never knowing when something’s going to trigger me. It’s hell. It’s also why I had to leave Sloane. She was always there, ready to help me. Maybe too much. Plus, I was breaking her heart.”

Carter looked over Matt’s shoulder, out the roadhouse window to the vast expanse of desert beyond them. So big, so empty. So—lonely. That was how he’d felt most of the time. Especially in the early days. Now, while he still wasn’t better, he could see clearly enough to make distinctions about the reality of his situation. It wasn’t great, but with another year or so in therapy it would improve. That was what he was aiming for, anyway.

“Anyway, I’m hoping that you can give me something to do for a while.”

They were sitting in a corner booth at the Forgeburn Roadhouse, Matt drinking a beer, Carter drinking fizzy water. Booze had become a real problem in the last year. So had drugs. And while that was part of his past now, since falling off the wagon meant getting kicked out of the program, there’d been a few times he’d come close. But so far he hadn’t indulged in those things since he’d left Sloane.

What was the point? Getting drunk only drove him deeper into depression. And getting high, while it may have caused him to forget momentarily, always sent him crashing back to reality, usually feeling worse than he’d felt before. It was a horrible feeling, always knowing how close to the edge he was and afraid of what might push him over.

“I don’t come with a lot of guarantees these days, but I’m still a damned good doctor. That’s probably the only thing I can count on.”

“It’s what I’m counting on too, Carter.”

“Anyway, if you still think I’m worth taking a chance on, I’m yours until I get the call from The Recovery Project. And, like I mentioned when I called you last week, if I graduate from the program and you want me back, I’ll be here.”

No, it wasn’t general surgery. But he wasn’t up to that yet. Too many things to go wrong. Too many lives depending on his wavy blade. But being a good old country doctor would keep him in the profession and, hopefully, keep him out of trouble.

“Do you really think you can make the transition from being a surgeon to being a GP?”

“There are a lot of things in my life I have to change—including my attitude. And while in the long term I don’t know how well I’ll adjust to life outside the OR, in the short term I know I can’t go back to that right now. Maybe never again. I don’t know yet.”

“You’ve come a long way,” Matt said, tilting his mug back for the last sip of beer. “Last time I saw you, you were yelling at Sloane because you couldn’t find your boots. It was pretty intense.”

“She took a lot of abuse from me.”

That was something he couldn’t forgive in himself. He’d loved that woman more than life itself, but because she’d always been there she’d become the target for all his pent-up emotions. The anger would build up in him, and Sloane would be the one who took the impact of it.

“And it kept on getting worse.”

“Any chance you two could get back together?”

Carter shook his head. “PTSD is a life sentence. I may learn how to cope with it, even divert it, but there’s never going to be a time when it’s not waiting just below the surface. I can’t take the risk of hurting her more than I already have.”

“But you feel confident you can take on the part of my practice we’ve discussed? Because I can’t keep an eye on you all the time. Like I told you before, my practice is growing, and I have a family to take care of. You’re like a brother to me, but I can’t look over your shoulder every minute of every day. So I need to feel good about turning you loose on the tourists, because that whole part of my practice can be a problem. You won’t be treating permanent patients but rather patients who are here for only a few days. You won’t have medical histories on them, and you might run into pre-existing conditions that they haven’t divulged to you. There’ll be all kinds of obstacles in taking on the tourist segment of my practice, and everything’s going to be up to you. I’ll be around if you need me, but for the most part you’ll be on your own. Can you manage that?”

Doctor to the tourists in the many resorts near Forgeburn, Utah. He’d never been a GP, so it was going to be a challenge. But since he never backed down from a challenge this would probably work for him. He hoped so. Because he was ready to turn his life around. This living from moment to moment was killing him.

“My counselors think I can, or they wouldn’t have sent that recommendation to you.”

“But what do you think, Carter?”

“That I’m going to try my damnedest. Like I’ve told you already, I can’t predict anything—can’t even make any solid promises. But I want this to work, Matt. For you, because I owe you my life. And for me, because I want some kind of life back. A lot of people with PTSD don’t get the opportunity you’re giving me, and I don’t want to mess that up.”

“And what about Sloane? I know you two aren’t together now, but have you talked to her about any of this?”

“No. The less involvement she has with me, the better it is for her.”

That was the half-truth he always used to convince himself he’d done the right thing in leaving her. She’d taken care of him in the early days. Or tried, when he’d let her. She’d been patient and kind. But he’d given up. Backed away. He hadn’t left her any choice other than to accept what he’d done—which was to leave.

“After she waited all those years for you, you’re not going to try and get her back? Because, next to my Ellie, Sloane is probably the best woman I’ve ever known. I can’t believe you can simply walk away from her the way you did and never look back.”

“Oh, I look back—but all I can see are regrets. Mine. Hers. I can’t go back, Matt. She deserves better than that. Better than me.”

“And she’s told you that?”

No, she had not. But it was what he’d known almost from his first day home.

“I was beating her down. You could see it in her. Day by day, piece by piece, I was taking everything she had away from her. I mean, she’s a brilliant heart surgeon, and such a good person, but I was sucking the life out of her and I hated that. But for Sloane it was like the poet Poe said in his Annabelle Lee: ‘And this maiden she lived with no other thought than to love and be loved by me.’That’s all she wanted, Matt. To love me and have me love her back. But it wasn’t in me anymore.”

“Sorry to hear that.”

“Me too—in more ways than I probably even know.”

And in so many ways that he did know. Ways that kept him awake at night. Ways that reduced him to tears when his thoughts wouldn’t be shut off.

“So, like I said, she’s better off without me.”

“And you? Are you better off without her?”

“It doesn’t matter, as long as she’s not part of my life anymore.”

“What is your life, Carter? Other than the job I’m giving you here, what is your life?”

“Damned if I know. But when I figure it out, you’ll be the first to know.”

“That bad?” Matt asked.

“That bad,” he said in earnest. “Hopefully getting better, though.”

“Because of your bear rescue program?”

Carter smiled. “Because of what I hope I can do to make my little part of the program successful.”

“Well, that’s the attitude I’m looking for.” Matt extended his hand across the table to Carter. “So, welcome to Forgeburn’s only medical practice.”