Page 32 of Doc Hollywood

She tuned back into the conversation at the table. They were laughing hysterically over their potential team names. A few of them had argued that they should keep the same name every week, but it had been decided that the choosing of the team name caused far too much entertainment to constantly keep the same one. This week they were deciding between the ‘Code Blue Crew’ or the ‘Suture Superstars’.

Clara rolled her eyes. They couldn’t be the ‘Code Blue Crew’, as it wasn’t a big town, and the chance of one of them having resuscitated a relative of someone in the pub seemed pretty high, making the name seem very heartless.

“Suture Superstars. We can’t be the other one,” Clara called across the table to Mike, who was doing the writing that week.

“When did you last do any suturing?” Mike, who was a surgeon, teased her.

“And when did you last go to a Code Blue?” she fired right back, a wide grin pulling at her cheeks.

“I’ll have you know I’ve been to many Code Blues,” Mike claimed, pulling himself up straight and giving her a broad smile.

“Yes, you have. Although just being present in the theatre doesn’t count. How many have you run?” Clara watched him open his mouth before she added. “In the last ten years?”

Mike grinned again and tipped his head to her. “Okay, she has a point.”

Laughter spread around the table, which trailed off as their eyes swivelled to just by Clara’s shoulder.

She realised someone was standing next to her. Turning in her seat, her eyes travelled up, and up, and up. Until she got to theface of the tall man with the large beard, who had walked in the door a moment before.

A small frown tugged at her eyebrows before she started with surprise when her eyes met those of the man. A very familiar pair of bright blue irises stared back at her from behind black-rimmed glasses.

A flush immediately rose up her cheeks, and she dropped her gaze, trying to compose herself, pinching her own thigh to stop any wayward thoughts.

“Hi,” Taylor said and lifted a hand in acknowledgement to everyone at the table.

“Hi.” Clara hesitated before she gestured to Taylor. “Everyone, this is T—“

Taylor cut her off smoothly and interjected quickly, “Tom.”

She blinked in surprise. Even his voice sounded different from normal.

“Tom. This is my friend, Tom. He’s going to do the quiz with us,” Clara informed them.

She didn’t mention him pretending to be a medical student, as it would lead to questions he couldn’t answer—simple questions like, what year was he in? And what medical school was he attending?

“Hi all,” Taylor greeted them, smiling warmly at everyone, but his normally megawatt smile was hidden by his bushy beard.

“Right, we need to find you a chair.” Clara jumped up and peered around the room.

“I’ll go find one.” Using his superior height, Taylor spotted one and headed off.

Sadie grabbed Clara’s hand, dragged her back down onto the seat next to her, and leaned over to whisper, “Is that Taylor?”

Clara’s eyes darted to follow the tall man, who was at another table asking about taking a chair.

“Yeah.”

“What’s he doing here?” Sadie hissed.

Clara shrugged. “It’s a long story.”

“Thirty-second summary?” Sadie demanded, leaning in further as Ethel, usually known as Hel—because she wasn’t a ninety year old nanna, thank you very much—sitting next to Clara on the other side, gazed at them with interest.

“He’s been in theatre with me every day. We finished at two am Monday, so he stayed in my spare room. Then Tuesday, he stayed over again as he was too tired to drive.”

“He’s stayed in your spare room twice?” Sadie’s voice rose a little, and Clara shushed her.

She debated lying to her best friend for a moment and saying yes, but she realised she would tell Sadie eventually, so she might as well get it out of the way.

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