Page 4 of Beg, Borrow or Steal
‘Right, Libby. Sit up on here.’ He gestured towards a stool next to the monitors at the patient’s head end. ‘We’ll go through some of the equipment and what the “inane beeping” actually indicates (without it the patient would be dead). So, contrary to what Testes Twiddler over there thinks, our job is a little more involved than watching porn on my iPhone.’
Libby gave a nervous laugh and sat up on the stool. Jamie had had too many med students pass out in theatre to risk having one who was obviously a party animal standing for an hour.
‘Is that the CO2 tracing?’ she asked, pointing at the screen. Jamie gave a short nod and ignored Pav’s long-suffering sigh as he started explaining the physics behind the tracings and equipment.
‘Jamie,’ Mick interrupted him mid-flow a few minutes later. Jamie looked over at the big bastard in frustration and was shocked to see what might pass for an actual smile on his craggy face.
‘Yes?’ he asked, raising his eyebrows in expectation.
‘Give it up, mate.’
‘Mick, what are you – ?’
‘She’s outters, zonko, dead to the world: you’ve put the poor girl to sleep.’
Pav, who was unfortunately finishing up with the prostatic resection, let out a loud bark of laughter as Jamie slowly turned to face a sound-asleep Libby. She was still perched on the stool, her back surprisingly straight and her pen in her hand poised over her notepad; but her eyes were shut, her long lashes forming shadows over her cheekbones, and her breathing had evened out.
‘I knew you were a boring fucker but this is the first time I’ve seen a female fall unconscious whilst you were mid-sentence,’ Pav managed to get out through his hilarity. Jamie shot him an irritated look before focusing back on Libby, whose hand had now gone lax, causing her pen to drop to the floor. As she started leaning dangerously to the side Jamie caught her arm to stop her from falling, and she scowled.
‘Hands off the merchandise,’ she mumbled as she attempted to slap his hand away. ‘No touching.’
At this Pav started another round of sniggers, closely followed by the rest of the theatre team as they prepared the patient for recovery and cleared the equipment away. Libby continued to fall off her stool, no more awake than before, despite being able to form sentences. Jamie caught her before she could hit the ground and, on instinct, lifted her small body up against his chest, and then watched as her eyes fluttered open to focus on his face. She blinked once, then her body went stiff before she gave a small yelp and struggled out of his arms.
The entire experience, including the feel of her against him, the smell of her light perfume mixed with her shampoo, and the incredible beauty of her eyes close up, somehow short-circuited Jamie’s brain. His arms actually tightened to try to keep her suspended close to him, as his body seemed to have decided that this woman was right where she needed to be. It took a few long seconds for reason to kick in and override his almost overwhelming attraction to her. At that point he let her go abruptly and, much to his horror, she fell in a heap at his feet.
‘Shit,’ he muttered, extending his hand, which she ignored as she staggered upright. ‘Are you okay?’ The theatre had now fallen deathly silent. Pav’s registrar was writing up the notes as Pav watched open-mouthed, his eyes widening as if to question Jamie’s sanity.
‘Fine,’ Libby snapped, looking unsteady and disconcertingly fragile now that she was standing on her own. ‘Sorry, I’ve always been a bit clumsy but I – ’
Jamie, being alittlebit of a control freak, and not relishing embarrassing himself in front of the entire theatre, not to mention his fury at her ability to fall asleep mid teaching session (okay, so he knew the physics behind the anaesthetic machine was unlikely to butter everyone’s bagel but he wasn’t that dull, was he?) was suddenly furious. Nobody had actuallylost consciousness from boredomwhilst he was speaking before. In all honesty he was used to a very different reaction when it came to the opposite sex, and it certainly didn’t involve them falling asleep. He gritted his teeth.
‘You wereasleep,’ he told Libby, holding onto his temper by a thread.
‘Oh no, I couldn’t have been. I’m sure that –’
‘You were asleep and this is thesecondtime it’s happened,’ he snapped. The sharpness of his tone must have cut through even Pav’s amusement because the atmosphere in theatre was thick with tension. Libby lowered her head and rubbed her temples, before clasping her hands together in front of her chest and looking up at him with wide, pleading eyes.
‘I can explain,’ she whispered. ‘You wouldn’t believe what a – ’
‘It may have escaped your notice, Ms Penny, but there is still a patient on the table. Maybe we could finish this up before we get into the gory details of your life?’
The patient was transferred to another trolley in near silence. After he had been taken to recovery, and with all of the theatre staff still milling around on clear-up, Jamie turned to Libby.
‘Ms Penny,’ he said sharply, and Libby appeared to brace. ‘I know you probably think you have a valid excuse for today, but I’ve heard every excuse under the sun for below-par performance from medical students, and I’m afraid that they all equate to the equivalent of “the dog ate my homework”. You are in your third year now. You’re not dealing with lectures and paper; this was arealpatient having arealoperation. I’m keeping him alive during itandtaking the time to teach you. There is no excuse for coming in half awake; there is no excuse for not listening. It’s April, you will have already had one clinical attachment before you started on Anaesthesia and Elective Surgery. All the induction is finished now; it’s time to knuckle down to some real work. You will not pass this rotation if you carry on like this and you certainly will not become a doctor if you keep up this attitude.’
‘But, I – ’
‘Just go. Sleep. And for God’s sake buck up your ideas tomorrow.’
Libby’s mouth closed and her shoulders slumped. She glanced around at the theatre team before nodding, tucking her hair behind her ears and muttering, ‘I’m sorry,’ in a barely audible whisper as she backed out of the double doors.
There was a long pause as they all watched the doors swing shut. Jamie looked over at Mick, who was frowning at him, with his big tattooed arms crossed over his chest.
‘What?’ Jamie spat, stalking back over to his chart as the surgeons backed away from the table.
Mick just raised an eyebrow, as if that said it all for him, and then started to clear away the ventilation equipment.
He turned to Pav, who was also uncharacteristically sombre.
