Page 66 of The Devil You Know
Barbara frowns at me. “It’s not my job to get you out of the room. I just check in and schedule the patients.”
I take a deep breath, trying not to get frustrated with her. “Barbara, this is really serious. I need you to get me from the room when he comes. It’simportant. He coulddieif he doesn’t get treated.”
She chews on her lip, thinking it over. I swear to God, I don’t see what the big deal is. I’m not asking her to walk to the moon—I’m right down the hall!
“Actually,” she says, “I’m taking a break in a few minutes. So I probably won’t even be around when the patient arrives.”
“Can’t you take a break later?” The exasperation is creeping into my voice.
“The doctors don’t dictate when I get to take my breaks,” Barbara snaps at me. And with those words, she goes back into the waiting room and plucks her purse off her chair. She’s leaving. Oh my God, she’s leaving. What the hell? She hasn’t even finished her nails!
And then something snaps inside me. I may not be able to control what my husband does, I may let the elevator guy humiliate me on a daily basis, but I’mnotgoing to allow this woman to compromise patient care for no other reason than pure laziness and possibly spite. This is herjob.
“Barbara,” I say in an even but firm voice. I stand in front of her to block her from leaving. She’s roughly my height, although I suspect in a one-to-one, Barbara could take me—she looks feisty. But right now, I’m madder. “You’re not goinganywhere. You’re stayingright hereto wait for that patient.”
She squints at me. “It’s not my job to—”
“Actually, itisyour job.” I stare her right in the eyes. “Your job is to wait here and check in patients. And if there’s an issue with a patient in the waiting area, it’s your job to tell me about it. And if you leave here right now when there’s a life or death issue, you’refailing to do your job.”
Barbara opens her mouth to say something, but I cut her off, hissing, “I swear to you, Barbara, if any harm comes to this patient because you left when I told you that you need to stay, that is criminalnegligence. You get me? And believe me, I will holdyoupersonally responsible.”
Her heavily mascaraed eyes widen.
“I will go to your boss and your boss’s boss and everyone in the entire goddamn hospital if I have to.” I squeeze my hands into sweaty fists. “So if you’d like to keep working here, I think you better stay and do your goddamnjob.”
Barbara is staring at me, her lips forming a little “O.” I don’t think she expected me to say all that. She hesitates, clutching her purse to her chest, maybe trying to figure out if I’m serious. Finally, she says, “Well, if it’s a matter oflife or death,of course I’ll stay.”
And then she goes back to her desk and sits down.
I can’t believe that worked! I always thought if I yelled at Barbara, she’d just give me the finger and leave. But she’s now back at her desk like a good little worker. She isn’t even doing her nails!
Wow. Maybe I’ve been living my entire life wrong. Instead of being nice to people, I ought to be threatening them and bossing them around. It sure works for Ryan. It works for a lot of physicians I’ve met. Maybe if I were more forceful with Ben, he wouldn’t be threatening to move out. Maybe Leah would be potty trained by now.
I look down at my hands, which are shaking like leaves. My heart won’t stop pounding and my legs feel like jello. Who am I kidding—this isn’t me. I can whip out Mean Jane for patient emergencies, but that’s just not who I am.
_____
When Mr. Chambers shows up fifteen minutes later, I have to spend another ten minutes convincing him to go to the emergency room. I check in the computer a few hours later to see how he’s doing, and it turns out they found blood clots in his lungs. He might not have been thrilled about going to the ER, but we very well might have saved his life. I don’t get to save many lives outright in primary care, so it’s a good feeling.
After five, things get very quiet on Primary Care C. Barbara leaves at four-thirty on the dot, not a second later, and after that, I’m responsible for making my own check marks. Unsurprisingly, it doesn’t add that much to my workload.
At the county hospital where I did my residency, the hospital would have still been bustling at eight o’clock in the evening. But it’s not like that at the VA. Quitting time is four-thirty, and by four-forty, the VA is a ghost town. Even George the elevator guy has left for the day.
I can’t say I don’t feel the tiniest bit nervous as I ride down in the elevator. Ben once told me I should get a can of mace to carry in my purse. Although honestly, I don’t think I’m a mace kind of person. I can’t believe that if I were ever in a situation where I actuallyneededmace that I’d be able to use it properly. I’d probably accidentally squirt myself in the eyes with it.
Maybe I should get myself one of those really loud horns. You can’t screw up honking a horn.
As a compromise, I grab my car keys and I thread the pointed end between my forefinger and middle finger. I took a one-hour self-defense class once where they said that you could use your key as a weapon if you held it this way, and then you stab your attacker in the belly and yell, “No!” The yelling of “no” seemed to be essential to the defense strategy.
I look down at my key. I can’t actually imaginestabbingsomeone. But it makes me feel better.
As expected, the lobby of the VA hospital is empty. Completely desolate. I walk across the lobby as quickly as I can, but before I get to the doors, I hear a voice:
“Dr. McGill?”
It’s Sam Powell. The guy who thought he got herpes from a newspaper.
“Hi,” I say. I tighten my grip on the key in my hand.
