Page 15 of A Doctor's Promise
Edie tried to hide her sharp intake of breath but the lost look from Finn told her she hadn’t tried hard enough.
“My wife, Rachel, was amazing. She was a lawyer; nothing whatsoever to do with the healthcare system. Then one day I found her doubled over in pain and we rushed to A&E.”
Tears were flowing down Finn’s cheeks now. Edie daren’t breath.
“Imagine our joy at being told Rachel was pregnant ripped away only hours later with the news that she also had ovarian cancer. I felt as though I was cursed, that it was my fault all these wonderful women around me had this awful disease.
“She died. They both died, Rachel and our unborn daughter. And I fled as far away as I could. Built a wall around me and vowed never to get close to another woman again, or ever work in oncology.”
He let out an ironic burst of laughter.
“Now look at me, I’m heading up acancertrial, and working withyou, Edie. Wonderful Edie. Wonderful Edie who I can feel breaking down my wall and removing all my protective surrounding.”
Edie couldn’t help but gasp out loud this time. She drew her hand away from Finn’s as he looked longingly into her eyes.
I do feel the same about you too, Finn Cooper. But I can’t let your heart be broken again, you deserve better than me, better than a woman carrying another man’s baby. Especially after all you’ve been through.
“I’m so sorry, Finn, I’ve got to go,” she whispered, breaking every rule in her therapist’s book—and her heart along with them—as she dashed out of the kitchen and out of Finn’s perfect home.
7
“Ready, everyone?” Finn glanced around at his surgical team.
They all nodded at him, their faces half hidden by their masks, but their eyes showing their fear as clear as day. Finn hoped it was nerves; their need to do well in the first of the trial surgeries. But he had a feeling it was him they were scared of. He’d already shouted at the Operating Departmental Practitioner so much that she’d had to leave the room in floods of tears, and the anaesthetist avoided his eyes as he recounted the blood pressure and heart-rate only moments earlier.
Finn couldn’t help it; Edie had taken a wrecking ball to his wall, so he’d had to build it back, higher and stronger than before. He’d been so stupid, letting her in, opening himself up to a whole lot of hurt because he’d found her charming, and sweet, and bewitching. But she’d run away when things got tough. It had been a surprise. Finn had thought Edie was braver than that. But maybe he shouldn’t be surprised. Why would Edie want to be involved with him when it meant she was more likely to die?
Finn looked down at Georgina Harper, her eyelids taped shut, tubes running from her mouth to keep her breathing and Finn couldn’t blame Edie for running. He didn’t want to be here anymore than he wanted Georgina on the surgeon’s table.
Edie had spoken to Georgina first thing that morning, it had been the start of her trial work too. She had Mr Harper in with her right at this very moment. Finn wondered if she had been as distracted as he was now. Or if Edie could separate work and personal life easier than he could without having to build up a wall around herself to do it?
The team’s fear was slowly being replaced with apprehension at Finn’s indecisiveness as they waited for him to start. Finn swallowed down the ball of regret currently sitting in his throat and held his hand out to the ODP who had finally returned to the theatre.
“Gloves,” he barked.
She flinched but held out the latex gloves as he slipped his hands inside them and snapped them around his wrists.
“I’m going to begin now,” he offered to his team, and they sprang into action, seemingly forgetting his earlier behaviours and concentrating solely on the woman on the operating table at the centre of the room. “Music please.”
A soft concerto filled the space as Finn made his first incision. This wasn’t going to be a straightforward procedure. Heart surgery carried its own risks, sure, but it was also intricate and modular, and Finn was used to the rote work of bypasses. This was a totally different kettle of fish. He needed to open up the heart, find the cancer, and take it out. But before all that could happen, he needed to re-route the blood to an artificial heart so the body wouldn’t perish when the real heart was opened up.
Finn could see the irony in standing here with a scalpel to someone’s heart when he felt as though his was mortally wounded last night.
Why did I misread the signs so enormously?
Finn shook his head.
Concentrate.
“Louder,” he shouted at the assistant who was in charge of the ambience of the theatre.
The music turned up a beat and Finn felt the stress of the last few hours evaporate from his body. With a steady hand and a keen eye, he made his first incision.
It was going smoothly. The blood was re-routed, and Finn had relaxed into the rhythm of the part of the body he knew so well from a physiological perspective. As he started to carve into the thick wall of the most important part of Georgina’s body, he hit a lump that he wasn’t expecting. He’d known her cancer was the most advanced of the three patients, but this was unfounded.
“Get me a fifteen,” he said to the ODP, his voice as steely as his instruments. “NOW!”
But even the blade shaped like a cat’s claw had no luck getting through the cancerous tumour without cutting away most of the surrounding muscle.
