“Have you got time for a quick lunch?” he asked, trying to sound casual.
“I'm sorry, Coop. I can't get out of here. I'm the senior resident in charge here. I'm stuck for the duration.” She was on duty until the following morning. “I can't leave the building.”
“You don't have to. Why don't I come by for a cup of coffee?”
“Sure, that would be fine, if you don't mind my being stuck here. Is something wrong?” He sounded all right, but he had never offered to come by the hospital before. She wondered if he missed her.
“No, I just wanted to see you.” The way he said it almost made her nervous. He had said he'd come by at noon, and as soon as she hung up, an emergency distracted her. She was still tying up loose ends and signing forms when the technician at the front desk told her there was someone to see her.
“Is that who I think it is?” the woman asked when she called Alex in her office. Her voice was filled with wonder, and Alex laughed as she answered.
“I guess so.”
“Damn, he's pretty,” she said admiringly, just out of his earshot, and Alex smiled as she put down her papers.
“Yes, he is. Tell him I'll be right there.” It was a good time to take a break, and she hurried out in her scrubs with her white coat over it. She was wearing socks and clogs, with her stethoscope at a crazy angle around her neck, and a pair of rubber gloves hanging out of her pocket. She was wearing her hair pulled back in a braid, and as usual, she never bothered to wear makeup when she was working. She looked like a teenager in costume as she hurried out to see him.
“Hi, Coop,” she said breezily, with a big smile, as people hanging around the ICU tried to stare at him discreetly. She was used to it by now, and he looked as impeccable as ever, in a tweed sport jacket and a beige turtleneck, with perfectly pressed khaki slacks and brown suede loafers. He looked like he'd stepped out of a fashion magazine and she felt like she'd been dragged through a bush backwards.
She told the tech at the front desk that she was going to the cafeteria to grab something to eat, and to page her if they needed her. “If I'm lucky, they might even give me ten uninterrupted minutes.” She stood on tiptoe to kiss his cheek, and he put an arm around her as they got into the elevator to go to the basement. Alex smiled as the doors closed and she saw everyone staring at them. He was quite a vision. “You just increased my importance around here by about four thousand percent. You look terrific.” He pulled her closer to him affectionately as she said it.
“So do you. You look very official with all that stuff hanging off you.” She was wearing her pager, her stethoscope, and there was a clamp she had forgotten clipped to her pocket. The tools of her trade made her look more like a grown-up. Or if it was a Halloween costume, it was a very good one. It impressed him to see her there, and the easy way she had breezed past the desk and instructed one of the nurses before she addressed him. She was really something. Which made him even more nervous as he contemplated what he was about to tell her. He had no way of knowing what her reaction would be. But he knew he had to tell her before someone else did. Thanks to Charlene, things could get dicey.
They both selected sandwiches and put them on a tray, and Alex poured them each a cup of coffee. “This stuff is pretty dangerous,” she warned him, pointing to the coffee. “Legend has it there's rat poison in it, and I believe them. I'll take you over to the ER after lunch, if you think you need it.”
“Thank God you're a doctor,” he said, as he paid for their lunch, and followed her to a small corner table. Mercifully, there was no one else around them, and no one seemed to have recognized him in the cafeteria so far. He wanted a few minutes of peace with her. And she was already eating her sandwich, before he had unwrapped his. He took a few minutes to assemble his composure, and she saw that his hands were shaking when he poured sugar in his coffee.
“What's up, Coop?” She was calm and quiet and sympathetic, and her eyes were gentle.
“Nothing… no… that's not true… something came up this morning.” She watched his eyes as she waited for him to explain it. She could see now that he was worried. He hadn't touched either his sandwich or his coffee.
“Something bad?”
