The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell(20)

“Change of plans,” I said. “The cabin is rented for the weekend.”

“That’s too bad.”

I noticed a tall, heavyset woman and a young girl sitting in the lobby and smiled at them before continuing down the hall, barely avoiding Mickie, who motored from her office in the direction of one of the treatment rooms.

“Whoa! What are you doing here?” She did not sound happy to see me. Mickie had been in a funk, which was unlike her.

“Couldn’t get the cabin. The rental agency rented it out this weekend.”

She grunted in disgust. “Couldn’t the Con Man have told you that before you made the plans?”

Jerry Conman also managed my cabin in Tahoe. I’d made the mistake of setting him up with Mickie. When he squeezed her thigh under the table at a five-star restaurant in San Francisco, she’d nearly broken his finger. I told him to consider himself fortunate she hadn’t stabbed him in the eye with her fork.

“My fault,” I said. “I told Jerry to rent the cabin as much as possible.”

She crossed her arms. “How is that asshole?”

“He still loves you and wants you to bear his children.”

“I’d rather pull my uterus out through my nostrils with a coat hanger.”

“Nice, Mick.”

I had not intended on being in the office, so I had not scheduled consults for the afternoon, but since Eva would be in Boston for the evening, I offered my services. “How many patients do you have left?”

“Two, but one is an emergency consult. The mother, Trina Crouch, asked for you, actually, but since we thought you were gone, I scheduled her.”

“What’s the emergency?”

Mickie handed me one of the two files. “Seven-year-old girl is going blind in one eye.” I flipped the pages. “She began having trouble reading the blackboard in school three weeks ago after a bike accident,” Mickie said. “The mother had her eyes checked. She’s lost a significant portion of vision in her left eye. No neurological deficit noted. The visual acuity was light perception with poor light projection on both eyes. No other neurological deficits resulting from a head trauma.”

I read another note in the file. The girl had been with her father at the time of the accident. “Divorced?”

“Who isn’t? The mother and daughter are in the lobby.”

“I’ll take it.”

“You’re a god. I can make my five-thirty yoga class.” Mickie’s slim and toned figure reflected the metabolism of a rabbit and her twice-a-day workout regimen—she swam laps in the morning and did hot yoga at night.

“I’m glad I can help keep you in top physical condition.”

“Not as glad as my date is going to be.”

“The golf pro?”

“Please, he was so last week.”

“I thought you liked him.”

“I did, until he brought his short game to bed with him.”

“No driver?”

“No irons at all.”

“Well, thank goodness you’ll always have hot yoga to burn off energy.”

“Laugh all you want, but you won’t get a better workout, especially if you keep dating your roommate.”

“Subtle,” I said.

In our eighteen-year friendship, I’d never known Mickie to have a steady boyfriend, which she said was too much bother. She kept three pit bulls for companionship and maintained a stable of male admirers and wannabe boyfriends whom I assumed she called on to satisfy her inner urges. In her spare time she criticized my love life.

Mickie looked about to say something more—Mickie always had something more to say—but I think making her hot yoga class took precedent. She shrugged and departed. She’d never liked Eva, but she had refrained from ever telling me why. Instead she resorted to snide comments, such as referring to Eva as my roommate, as in, “So, where’s the roommate this weekend?” or “So, when’s the last time you and the roommate did it?”

Since my nurse had left for the day, I greeted Trina Crouch in the lobby. From her red and swollen eyes, she looked to have been crying, or she had terrible allergies. When she stood she nearly matched me in height, perhaps a shade over six feet. She was sturdy, which my mother had taught me was the polite word to describe someone overweight. Dirty-blonde hair pulled back in a tight ponytail accentuated a broad forehead.

“They said you wouldn’t be here,” she said.

“I had some personal plans change this afternoon.” I looked to the little girl and extended my hand. She didn’t accept it. I crouched. “And you must be Daniela. Daniela, I’m Dr. Sam.” I’d worn brown contacts for years. Red eyes had a way of upsetting the children. “We’re going to have a look at your eyes today. Is that okay with you?”

She was tall like her mother, with the same color hair and worried expression, but she was thin—too thin, it seemed—and skittish. She also looked familiar, but I could not place her or her mother. “Have we met?” I asked her mother.

“I don’t think so,” Trina Crouch said.

In my consult room, I asked Daniela to sit up on the table. Her mother stood beside her. I sat on a swivel chair and continued to review the file and to ask questions.

“It started about three weeks ago,” Trina Crouch said. “She hit her head.”