Page 1 of Beg, Borrow or Steal
Chapter 1
Sleepy Girl
Jamie’s gaze swept through the young, eager faces of the medical students in front of him, and he grinned. He loved teaching the newbies. Straight from their first two pre-clinical years, with no practical experience yet and barely out of their teens, they were generally keen as mustard to be in the thick of it. His smile faded as he caught sight of a girl near the back; like the other students, she was facing him and sitting upright in expectation, her pen poised over her notes; the only difference was that her eyes … seemed to be closed.
He frowned and cocked his head to the side. After a few more seconds had passed he realized that she wasn’t just looking down at her paper or taking a long blink; she was asleep. Jamie wound his way through the students’ chairs to get to her, and the excitement on their faces faded to confusion as they followed his progress to the back of the room. Once he reached Sleepy Girl he squatted down so his face was level with hers, and held up his hand to the student next to her, who was about to nudge her awake.
He studied her for a moment: long, dark lashes casting shadows over her high cheekbones, an enormous amount of dark hair piled on top of her head and secured with what looked like a rubber band and various hair grips (almost as though some sort of battle had been waged against it to keep it in check), no make-up whatsoever (unusual, in his experience, in that age group), loose-fitting jumper over what looked to be a slim frame, dark smudges under her eyes, heart-shaped face surrounded by tendrils of the dark hair that had won their battle and escaped from their confines.
She looked too young to be out of school – and the most naturally pretty girl he had ever seen. He cleared his throat and her eyelids fluttered for a moment, but then settled back down.
‘These are not the droids you’re looking for,’ she muttered bizarrely under her breath as she shifted to a more comfortable position in her seat, her head gradually falling towards her friend’s shoulder. The friend had a fair few actual dreadlocks in her hair, threaded with brightly coloured material. Jamie made a mental note to have one of the ward sisters give their ‘appropriate appearance for clinical medicine’ lecture – in all honesty both these girls looked like they needed it, but more would be achieved if they were both awake at the time of delivery. Jamie’s hand reached forward to touch the sleeping girl’s arm, but he thought better of it at the last moment and pulled away to rub the back of his neck.
‘If it’s not too much trouble,’ he said, his deep voice sounding directly in front of her, causing her to start in her sleep, ‘I might not be a hard-arse,’ Jamie lied, ‘but I do at least require my students to be conscious.’
She blinked twice, and he sucked in a breath when her gorgeous bright blue eyes snapped to his. This girl wasn’t just pretty; she was almost breathtakingly beautiful. He felt like he had been punched in the stomach. Her mouth dropped open for a moment before her perfect small white teeth bit into her bottom lip.
‘What the varp?’ she whispered, sitting up a little straighter in her chair and glancing around the room at the other students, before her gaze came back to his. ‘Um … sorry, what was that?’
Her voice was soft and still a little gravelly from sleep, making him think about how she would sound in the morning ... He shook his head to clear it, reminding himself that he wasnota pervert that lusted after the medical students, and rose back to standing so that he was no longer at her eye level. She wassoattractive he actually felt a little shaken by it. Jamie made it a ruleneverto even flirt with the med students. He was thirty-three and a consultant. The age gap alone would make it inappropriate, but the fact that he was in charge of the medical student training for anaesthetics at St George’s Hospital made it downright wrong. And Jamie never, ever did anything to risk his career; work and his reputation meant everything to him.
He turned away and stalked back to the front of the room, now even more annoyed with this girl, not only for falling asleep in the middle of his teaching (he was charismatic, funny – a bloody great teacher, goddamn it), but also for making him inappropriately horny while at least twenty sets of eyes focused on his every move.
‘Right, well,’ he snapped, dragging Sim-Man (the life-sized plastic ‘patient’ they used for simulated clinical scenario training) up the bed and dumping him with a loud thud down at the end. (Probably ill-advised, seeing as Sim-Man cost at least £70,000, but Jamie was beyond clear thinking at this point.) ‘If we are all now fully conscious, I’d quite like to move this along. Who’s keen to try their hand at the first one?’
Silence.
Jamie wasn’t surprised. Simulation training was intimidating and potentially embarrassing; but it was by far the best way to learn. Better a solid fuck-up with a plastic dummy than a live patient. The days of see one, do one, teach one were on the way out in this generation.
He sighed – then caught sight of Sleepy Girl stretching in her chair. At this stage he would have hoped that the students would have grown out of the selfish-brat mindset enough not to party all night and come in hung-over and tired.
Suddenly a hand in the front row shot up and Jamie dropped his gaze to the stocky guy who had volunteered, giving him an encouraging smile. ‘Okay …’ Jamie glanced at the chap’s ID, ‘Toby. Well volunteered. Come up here, mate.’ Toby stood next to Jamie, then crossed his arms over his chest, exuding confident-little-shit vibes in abundance.
‘I just need one more …’ Jamie trailed off, and then a slow grin spread across his face as his gaze came to rest on Sleepy Girl. ‘You,’ he barked suddenly, causing most of the room to start in their chairs. He took in the horrified look on Sleepy Girl’s face with satisfaction as she realized he was pointing straight at her. ‘Yup, you; semi-conscious burning-the-candle-at-both-ends girl. Up you come. Time to learn medicine now.’
At the back of his mind Jamie knew he was being a bit of a knob, but somehow he didn’t seem to be able to claw back his normal controlled attitude. Sleepy Girl stood up slowly and made her way to the front of the room with obvious reluctance. She wasn’t that short, but next to Toby, and swallowed by that awful jumper, she looked tiny.
‘Okay, guys,’ Jamie said, laying his hand on Sim-Man’s shoulder and dragging his gaze away from Sleepy Girl. ‘This fella here is going to be our patient. He’s not like the Resus Annies you’re used to: he can breathe, he can talk, he can demonstrate clinical signs, and we use him to train you lot; because if you’re going to make mistakes it’s better that they’re with this chap than on the real thing.’ He moved to the computer monitor by Sim-Man’s head and started programming in the first scenario. An image of Sleepy girl’s serene unconscious face flashed through his mind, making him clench his jaw in frustration. Unfortunately he let his anger choose the scenario for him.Let her try and sleep through this one, he thought to himself with an evil smile.
‘Right. Toby. And …’ Jamie looked for Sleepy Girl’s ID.
‘I’m Libby,’ she said, tucking some of her hair behind her ears and shifting nervously on her flat shoes. Toby a.k.a. Cocky Little Shit was still cool as a cucumber.
‘Okay, Libby and Toby. I’m the ward nurse and I’ve fast-bleeped you to the acute medical unit. It’s two in the morning. You come into the cubicle and this is your patient.’
Jamie pressed the button on the monitor and Sim-Man started convulsing on the bed, causing even Cocky Little Shit to jump with surprise. Libby blinked, before looking at Jamie with a panicked expression. An uncomfortable ten seconds passed whilst Jamie suppressed the urge to roll his eyes.
‘It’s shaking,’ Toby said, frowning down at Sim-Man. Jamie pressed another few buttons and foam started coming from Sim-Man’s plastic mouth. ‘What the fu – ’
‘Age? Medical history?’ Libby’s now-alert voice cut Toby off. She had come to stand next to Sim-Man’s head, opposite Jamie, and had started to check the airway.
‘Forty, diabetic, alcoholic,’ Jamie rattled off, watching as she efficiently tilted Sim-Man’s head back and lifted his chin.
‘Um …’ Libby hesitated for a moment and colour swept high across her cheekbones as she bit her lip. Jamie’s breath left him in a sudden whoosh as he took her in; she was insanely beautiful. Control was important to Jamie and he was annoyed to feel it slipping as he looked at her. Coming out of her trance, she felt in Sim-Man’s neck for his carotid pulse. ‘We need to do a BM and I need some rectal diazepam.’ She turned to a frozen Toby. ‘Can you help me roll him?’
Toby snapped out of his inertia and stepped forward to help roll Sim-Man so that Libby could give the rectal diazepam.
‘Okay that was a good start, you two,’ Jamie said after they had both been working on Sim-Man for a few more minutes: he had stopped fitting and had a Gudel airway in place. ‘Libby, nice effort for your first time. Toby, don’t worry, a lot of people freeze up in the first scenario with Sim-Man; you’ll get used to him.’ Toby’s face was flushed and his mouth was set in a hard line, but he gave a short nod. ‘Can one of you tell me what you forgot though? What do you want to be happening now?’
