Page 25 of Endurance
Dr. Miller lifts one finger to tell me she’ll be another minute and gestures for me to take a seat. She’s been working in London for over ten years, but her American accent is clear as day as she soothes a worried patient over the phone.
Looking at her objectively, you’d never know she’s the miracle maker the whole medical industry marvels over. She’s got more of a cosy, cake baker look about her than a baby saving, surgical bad arse look. She’s around sixty years old and wears trainers with a pencil skirt every single day. The only doctor-labeling characteristic about her is the white lab coat that pulls tightly around her thick arms.
Not only does she look sweet and cuddly, but she acts like it, too. I expected her to be harsh and demanding when I first started here, assuming she’d bark out requests only Einstein could accomplish. This industry doesn’t have time for patience and she needs to pass the torch. But Dr. Miller has a soft, quiet way of empowering a person. She leads with her kindness and it’s inspiring on many levels.
She hangs up the phone on her desk and her round blue eyes look softly at me. “Sorry, hun. I had to call that mother back. She’s a worrier.”
I smile. “Most of them are.”
Her brows climb. “Rightfully so. Our tiny patients are completely dependent on their mothers. So, by relation, the mothers are our patients, and mothers are worriers.” She laughs awkwardly and a strange pull begins around her mouth. Her smile turns to a frown and a garbled cry gushes from her throat. In seconds, she cups her face in her hands and launches into full on hysterics.
I quickly rush over to her side of the desk.
“What is it, Dr. Miller?” I place a gentle hand on her shoulder. “What’s happened?”
She sniffles and then clears her throat, sliding her hands off her face and smoothing them over her dark bob, stacked up short on the back of her head. “Nothing. Well, nothing yet. I erm…I have some happy news.” She plasters a smile on her face and it looks off. “I’m going to be a grandma!”
My jaw drops and I force a similar off-putting smile, confused by the moisture in her eyes. “Well, that is happy news! Why the tears then?” I step back to give her some space, crossing my arms over my chest awkwardly.
In the two months I’ve worked here, I’ve never seen her break down like this, nor have I ever touched her in comfort. And that’s even after losing one of ourtiny patients, as she lovingly refers to them as.
“Sit down, please. We have to talk,” she says, shaking her head and aimlessly shuffling some papers around.
I make my way over to the chair. By the time I look up at her face again, I see her resolve climbing back to the surface.
“There are two important matters to discuss. The first is that I want you to do a 4D ultrasound on my daughter.”
“Okay,” I say slowly, feeling like this is an odd request.
“I know we don’t specialise in standard obstetrics anymore, but I need this.” She swallows hard and rushes out, “She’s pregnant with triplets and she’s terrified.”
“Triplets!” I exclaim with a gust of air rushing out of me. “Wow.”
She turns away from me with closed eyes, almost as if my reaction pains her. She wrings her hands over and over as she adds, “She’s eleven weeks along and has already had one scan. They saw no complications. However, since she was a preemie quad, we are decidedly uneasy and would like a high-level scan to ensure there are no abnormalities or early markers of any problems. You are the only fellow I trust with this.”
My jaw drops. I’ve researched this woman. I’ve researched her like crazy. All I found was that she had one daughter, a deceased husband from many years ago, and was recently remarried. How the fuck could I have possibly missed the fact that she’s a mother to quadruplets?
I open my mouth to speak but she cuts me off. “Reyna was the only survivor. I lost the other three in the NICU.”
I pull my lips into my mouth and nod, unsure if I should give her sympathy or professionalism. I’ve witnessed immense sadness in the medical field, but seeing a doctor lose three of her own babies would be near the top of my list.
“I understand how important this is to you.”
She looks at me and nods slowly, comforted by my response. In this moment, she’s no longer the bad arse foetal surgeon the world knows her to be. She’s a mother. A worried mother, whose daughter is venturing into a high-risk pregnancy.
“I will not be present for the scan. Reyna won’t let me. So I need you to do this well, Dr. Ryan. It has to be thorough.”
Her chin trembles and I want to reach across the desk and clutch her hand. Whatever history Dr. Miller has with her daughter must be heavy for her to deny her mother this. My relationship with my mother is extremely lacking, but would I refuse her this? I don’t know.
“I will do my very best, Dr. Miller.”
“Thank you. Now, on to other items.” Her face turns back into the woman I’m more accustomed to seeing every day. “The PR department sent me some very interesting and very recent public photographs of you.”
My heart drops. I knew it was coming. Hospital gossip is always strong, but there was a delusional part of me that hoped maybe I would get by unnoticed considering the world of football and the world of medicine are two very different places. No such luck.
“You are welcome to do whatever you’d like in your personal life, Dr. Ryan. I cannot stop you. But you did sign a morality clause in your contract. We operate here with a code of honour that we have to uphold. Our hospital has to maintain a good reputation. We have families that depend on us. When mothers and fathers walk in our doors, it’s because they have exhausted all their other options and they are looking to us to perform a miracle. Those tiny patients of ours need us to be mature.”
“I know and I am so sorry,” I stammer, feeling utterly small. “The media twists things. They portray things in the worst way.”
