SPIRAL will be available in just a few days, on Tuesday, July 9th. Below is the first chapter in its entirety--I hope you enjoy it!
Chapter One
Always
do the thing that scares you. That’s
the way to break out of a cage of your own making. My father used to say
that all the time. He died back when I was fifteen and left me with a lot of
bad memories and a genetic dark cloud hanging over my head, but his mantra’s
what I’ve chosen to keep for myself. It gives me a bit of courage when I need
it most.
Like right now.
The automatic doors to the Pediatric
Oncology unit swing wide, and I force myself not to hesitate on the threshold. I
push back a stray tendril of hair that falls across my cheek again a second
later. I wobble a bit on the heels I bought over the weekend in the hopes of
looking professional … and just a bit taller. I smooth my skirt and make sure
the nametag that hangs from the lanyard around my neck is facing outward. It’s
my first week of internship—the final year of training I need to get my PhD in
clinical psychology—and my first day on this rotation. My nametag is the only
way I can prove I’m actually supposed to be here.
Not that Psychology Intern is all that reassuring or impressive to anyone.
But when the patients’ parents get too upset to reason with, the nurses call
Psychology, and it’s Friday at 5:26pm, so I’m it.
I can hear the disgruntled father snarling
from here. His voice is hoarse, like he’s been at it for a while. And as I walk
into the atrium, where colorful fish swim lazily around the circular aquarium
at its center, I see him through the undulating plastic seaweed. He’s a big guy
in a stained t-shirt, sporting a serious case of hat-hair. His face is flushed
and his eyes are red.
At the main desk, a plump, middle-aged nurse
in lavender scrubs looks at me and raises her eyebrows. I walk over to her.
“I’m Nessa Cavenaugh,” I say. “You called for a psychology consult?”
She folds her arms across her ample chest.
“And like I told you on the phone, we’ve got a parent and kid who need some
help.” She nods at the dad and gives me a get
a move on kind of gesture.
My cheeks grow warm as I head for the
big, angry guy. I round the end of the huge aquarium as he grabs for the kid at
his feet, a boy of about four or five. “You will
apologize to your brother, Shawn!” he barks at the kid.
“No!” Shawn shrieks. His face is pink
like his dad’s. “Won’t!”
“He’s sick, and you have to be nice!”
“I don’t care!”
The dad opens his mouth to reply, but
then he sees me standing there. “What?” It comes out rough, a challenge. He
looks like a bull ready to charge.
“My name’s Nessa. Can I be helpful to
you guys?” I wish my voice wasn’t shaking.
The dad looks me over, and his eyes
narrow as he reads my ID badge. “Psychology? They called the shrink? And not
even a real one. Some high school kid!” He rolls his eyes. “Thanks a lot,
Lynette!” he calls over to the nurse.
My cheeks have gone from warm to
freaking five-alarm blaze. I know I look young, but I’m not that young. I stand up a little
straighter, not that it helps much, seeing as I’m five-five in my shiny two-inch
heels. “Maybe she thought you might want to talk? She knew you were having a
hard time.”
He rocks back. “A hard time?” he
whispers, his face twisting. “That’s
what you call it? One kid’s got cancer, the other one’s completely outta
control, and their mother is—” He clenches his teeth.
“No, I’m sorry—I was only—” Making things worse.
He waves his arm, shooing me away.
“Leave me alone. If you think this is
just a hard time ...” He’s shaking his head as he grabs the little boy by the
arm and drags him, kicking, into Room 411. The tag next to the door says “FINN
BEEMAN.” It’s printed in block letters with a blue marker, like maybe the kid
wrote it himself.
I look over my shoulder, and the nurse
points toward the doorway, her mouth tight as Shawn’s sobs echo down the hall. I
draw in a long breath, dread curling in my stomach. I’m stuck—I already messed
up with this dad, and trying to talk to him again so soon is risky at best. But
the nurse is going to tell my supervisor—and worse, all the other nurses and
docs on this unit—if I don’t at least attempt
to fix this.
So I do the thing that scares me most
and head for Finn’s room.
Lying in the bed is a little guy who
doesn’t look much older than Shawn. Finn’s got a red bandana tied over his bald
head, and his sallow skin is lit up by the screen he’s holding a few inches
from his face. His brother is huddled in the corner, wailing, and his dad is on
the plastic recliner chair, his head in his hands. And I think I get it: Shawn
wanted a turn, Finn didn’t want to give up the Gameboy, and Dad feels too
guilty to say ‘no’ to his sick child. As I open my mouth to speak, Mr. Beeman’s
head jerks up. “I told you I didn’t want to talk to you.”
“I understand, but I hoped we could—”
“Get out!” he booms, standing up
suddenly.
I take a stumbling step back, and the
heel of my pump lands squarely on … someone’s toe. “Ow,” says a deep male
voice.
I spin around. Lab coat over a striped
button-down. Splattered with coffee. “Omigod,” I mumble, reaching out like an
idiot to wipe brown droplets from the center of my victim’s chest, vaguely
registering firm muscles beneath the fabric … and the fact that I am smearing hot
coffee over them and (once again!) making things worse. “So sorry.” I lift my gaze to his face.
Whoa.
I’ve stomped on the most gorgeous guy
I’ve ever seen up close. And made him spill his coffee. And wiped it on his
neatly pressed shirt. He’s a few inches north of six feet tall, lean and
broad-shouldered, with dark blond hair and seriously green eyes. A small,
crescent shaped scar just above his angular jawline somehow only makes him
hotter.
He’s gazing down at me like he’s
expecting an explanation.
“Uh,” I say, grasping frantically for
words and coming up empty. Because: his mouth. I can’t stop staring at it. “Sorry.
You’re very … stealthy.”
His eyebrow arches, then he looks over the
top of my head at Mr. Beeman, giving me the chance to read the nametag on his
lapel: Aron Lindstrom, M.D.
Oh,
crap.
“Hey, Greg,” Dr. Lindstrom says. “Got
you a coffee when I was in the cafeteria. Thought you could use it.” He holds
out the cup, now only three-quarters full thanks to my clumsiness, and Mr.
Beeman’s footsteps clonk as he comes to retrieve it.
“I got something for Shawn, too,” Dr.
Lindstrom says more quietly. “If you want to give it to him.” He holds up a
small Dunkin Donuts bag. From inside the room, Shawn’s sobs fall silent.
I step to the side while Greg Beeman
accepts the Munchkins from Dr. Gorgeous.
“Thanks, Doc,” Mr. Beeman says. “Tell
your nurse to call off the shrinks, ‘kay?” He jerks his thumb at me. “I’m not
crazy.”
The doctor doesn’t bother to look in my
direction as he claps Mr. Beeman on the shoulder. “Of course not. Everything
all right now?” Shawn approaches his father cautiously, a fragile, hopeful
smile on his face, and Mr. Beeman chuckles and hands him the bag, like he’s
relieved that he can offer this kid something—and
that Shawn is no longer screaming. Dr. Lindstrom smiles at him.
“Looks like
it.”
They start to talk
about Finn and his IV nutrition, and I back away slowly. The nurse who called
for the consult is riveted to her computer screen, and all I want to do is
shout, “Why did you call me down here if all it took was coffee and some Munchkins?”
I clamp my mouth shut
and walk quickly to the back hallway, toward the booth where I’m supposed to enter
stuff into the electronic medical record. I have to document that I was here
even though I did nothing but demonstrate my incompetence to one and all.
Wishing to God that I’d chosen different shoes this morning, I climb awkwardly
onto the high stool in front of the computer on the counter. My feet dangle several
inches from the floor, and I swing my legs as I type the password and find
Finn’s chart. I click the tab labeled Psychology/Psychiatry.
And then I stare at the screen for who-knows-how-long, my eyes stinging. What
am I supposed to write?
Intern
accidentally enraged parent during emotional situation that was resolved by hot
doctor with donuts.
“Can I get on when
you’re done?”
I almost fall off the
stool. Dr. Lindstrom is leaning against the wall of the booth with a lazy sort
of grace. “Sure,” I say, then clear my throat.
“You’re new,” he
comments, reading my nametag. “Ah. One of the interns. I knew there was another
rotation starting.”
“Yeah.” I’m staring at
his coffee-stained chest, which is making my insides feel fluttery. So I meet
his gaze, which scrambles my thoughts—right when I need every IQ point I
possess. “The nurse called me down. She thought Mr. Beeman needed some help.
But I … then he …”
I look over at the
blank screen. Intern inadvertently
trivialized Mr. Beeman’s suffering, then stomped on Dr. Lindstrom’s toes and
ruined his shirt. I rub my hands over my skirt and wish I was invisible.
“You’re upset because
he yelled at you,” Dr. Lindstrom says coolly. “You need to get over that. These
people are going through a lot. Sometimes it’s too much. You can’t take it
personally, especially—”
“That’s not it at all.” Frustration burns through me as I
raise my head. “I’m upset because I couldn’t help him. Or that little boy. And that’s what I was supposed to do.”
But all I did was make things harder for them.
All my doubts hit me at
once: I don’t belong here. This is
one of the most prestigious internships in the country, and one of the hardest
rotations on said internship, full of docs known for being total hard asses,
and I’m already screwing it up because I can’t think on my feet. Needing to
escape, I hop off the chair—and it turns out thinking on my feet is the least of my problems. My heel gets stuck
in a rung of the stool and I topple over with a yelp.
My face crashes into
Aron’s coffee-scented chest, and his steely arms wrap around me, keeping me
from sliding to the floor.
“Now I’ve got coffee and lipstick on my shirt. What did I do
to deserve this kind of treatment?” he says, but he’s obviously working hard to
keep from laughing. He holds me slightly away from him and looks down at his
chest. Then at my mouth.
And his gaze stays.
Right. There.
My fingers grip his waist,
which is ridged with muscle. Aron
Lindstrom clearly works out, I think stupidly. He leans over, making sure
my right foot is stable on the floor before tugging my left heel from the evil
clutches of the stool. His fingers skim over my bare ankle and raise
goosebumps. “I’ll bet it was a long walk from the Psychology Department in
those shoes,” he comments.
“You’re not kidding.”
He chuckles as he
straightens up, and as he does, his shoulder brushes my breasts, just a
barely-there touch. I gasp, nearly losing my footing again as my nerves send
frantic more more more messages
zinging through my entire body. I cross my arms over my chest because: nipples. I’m pretty sure he could see
them through my shirt if he bothered to look.
His fingers tighten
over my bicep, and I glance up at him in time to see something stir in his
eyes. Did he bother to look?
“Is
your ankle okay?” he asks. I don’t think I’m imagining the strain in his voice.
“Yeah.” I’m breathless.
I want to press my entire body up against his, which would probably not come
across as professional.
“My name’s Aron,” he says, finally letting me
go. “I’m one of the fellows.” Which explains why he only looks a few years
older than I am. He’s still finishing up his training.
“I’m Nessa. And, er …
you know what I am.”
His lips quirk up. “I’m
not sure I do.”
He takes my place on
the stool in front of the computer and types something on the Psychology/Psychiatry page. Then he clicks
to the General Medical section and writes something else while I stare at the
scar on the left side of his slightly stubbly jaw. I’m imagining what his skin
would feel like beneath my fingertips—rough, deliciously warm—when he gets up
and gestures at the stool again, offering it to me. His gaze slides from my
nametag all the way to my face, and I feel it on my skin as it moves, a path of
heat that makes me shiver.
Please
touch me again. That is my only thought.
He flashes a
devastating grin, like he knows. “Nice meeting you, Nessa. I’ll send you my dry
cleaning bill.”
He walks past me before
I can respond. I inhale the crisp, grassy scent of his cologne before turning
my attention back to the medical record. My hands shake as I click back to the
Psychology section and see:
Intern
Cavenaugh assisted Dr. Lindstrom in resolution of family conflict and began an
assessment of parent stressors and needs.
“I couldn’t have said
it better myself,” I mutter, closing Finn’s record and turning in the direction
of Aron’s voice. He’s in one of the rooms down the hall, talking to a patient,
judging by his gentle tone. I sit for a minute and listen. He’s got a very faint,
hard-to-place accent, yet another thing that renders him hotter than can really
be considered fair. I clench my fists and tell myself to focus. I can’t spend
my Friday evening stalking Dr. Aron Lindstrom through the pediatric cancer ward
at The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia like a crazed fangirl. I have other
things to do, like ...
…
an assessment of parent stressors and needs.
Right. Exactly. I tuck
my hair behind my ear only to feel it slide across my cheek yet again as I
start walking back toward Finn’s room. I’m a few doors away when Mr. Beeman
comes out. I can hear Shawn laughing from here. “Sounds like you got him
settled down,” I offer, bracing myself for a hostile response.
Instead, Greg Beeman
runs a hand through his hair and looks sheepish. “Listen, I’m sorry. About
earlier, you know.”
“You don’t have to
apologize. I’m not here to add to your stress, and I’m sorry that I did. It
wasn’t my intention.” I lean forward. “And I don’t think you’re crazy. I think
you’re extremely strong, to be handling all of this.”
He gives me a weary
smile. “Thanks. Sometimes I wonder …” He looks back into Finn’s room and sighs.
“Mr. Beeman, can we
start over?” I offer my hand. “I’m Nessa Cavenaugh. I’m a doctoral psychology
intern, and I’m here to help parents manage under all this stress. You don’t
have to talk to me or tell me anything, but I want you to know that if you do
think of a way I can help, whether it’s talking to your boys or problem-solving
or whatever, I’m available, and I’d be honored.”
He blinks at me, then shakes
my hand. His is rough and callused. I wonder what job he had to take a leave
from so he could be here. “You can call me Greg,” he says. “And thanks. I’ll
think about it.”
“I’m glad. Take care.”
I head for the exit to the unit, grateful for this one tiny victory. Aron
strides around the corner and stops to talk to Mr. Beeman, and I hover near the
double doors, mesmerized. While they converse in low tones, Aron smiles, and it
lights up his perfect face and shows off his straight, white teeth. Before I
look away, he glances up and catches me staring.
His grin grows wider.
I hustle myself off the
unit before I forget why I came here in the first place.
But then I practically
skip down the wide hospital corridor. Considering the string of humiliations I
just experienced, my first trip to the oncology unit was a little bit awesome. I started to clean up the mess I made with Mr.
Beeman, and I met one of the fearsome onco docs, who miraculously didn’t seem
to hate me. In fact, he seemed to like
me, despite the fact that I faceplanted on his shirt. He was kind. But also
really scary … in an I’ll-steal-your-heart-if-you-let-me
kind of way. I can’t afford to let that happen.
I bite my lip as my
dad’s mantra runs through my mind before I can suppress it.
Always
do the thing that scares you.
