Page 5 of Elanie & the Empath
Her only response was to double-time it away from me.
“Wait!” I shouted, on the move, speed-walking after her down the hall. I wasn’t sure what I was doing, but I couldn’tjust let her go. She needed help, and that’s what I did. I helped. “Um, Sunny said you had some concerns. Some questions,” I called out when she wouldn’t slow down, “about your puberty!”
I was known to, on occasion, put my foot in my mouth. As a passing group of long-limbed and milky-eyed Ulaperian guests swayed to a crawl, wincing at me while a tidal wave ofyikesenergy rolled out from them, I realized I might be up to my knee this time.
She turned around slowly, her eyes narrowing. “Excuse me?”
Smooth move, genius. “Sorry.” I scratched my head. “I shouldn’t have shouted that.” I took a step closer, lowering my voice. “But it’s true, isn’t it?”
She didn’t answer, but her shoulders dropped a bit from her ears.
I took it as a win.
“I want to help, if I can,” I said, keeping my arms at my sides, trying to appear friendly, or at the very least unthreatening. “Now or later. I’m here for you. Foreveryone, I mean,” I corrected, louder than necessary, shoving my hands deeply into my pockets while heat surged up my throat. “I’m here for every being on this ship. In a doctorly way. As a doctor. A physician. A professional practitioner of the…medicinal arts.”
“Are you finished?” she asked, definitely unimpressed. Something told me this was typical for her, being unimpressed. I wondered, for some inexplicable reason, what it might take to impress her.
I shook my head, took a step back. “Yes.”
She stared at me, through me.
Saints. I’d blown it. But if she wouldn’t let me help her, maybe I could at least refer her to LunaCorp’s holohealthnetwork. I usually tried to avoid sending my patients there. Call me old-fashioned, but I still believed in the healing power of in-person interaction, face-to-face, eye-to-eye, hands-on?—
“There’s something wrong with my breasts.”
Every cell in my body wheezed. “There’s…something…”
“Wrong with my breasts,” she finished for me, frowning and completely serious. “Are you hearing impaired? Sunny didn’t tell me.”
No, I was not hearing impaired. I was just used to my empathy cuing me in to when a patient was about to talk about their breasts. Her words had caught me so off guard they might as well have been uttered in some outer-rim language even my VC couldn’t translate.
Absolutely not looking at her breasts, I allowed myself a long, steadying blink. “I hear fine. I heardyoujust fine, I mean to say. Why don’t we go back to my office, and you can tell me all about your—all about them.”
I had scalpels that were smoother. But by some small miracle, she nodded and walked with me back down the hall and into my clinic.
Pointing at my examination table, she asked, “Do I sit there?”
“Please.” I leaned over to pull out the sliding step. Through sheer force of habit, I offered her my hand. And after staring at it for a moment, she slid her delicate fingers over my palm and let me help her up. Her skin was unfathomably soft, because of course it was. Because bionics were designed to be perfect in every way. Perfect hair, perfect eyes, perfect skin…
Turning away, I walked to the counter. While I washed the feel of her soft skin from my hands, I asked, “What do you think is wrong with your breasts?” over my shoulder.
She made apuhkind of noise. “Isn’t it obvious?”
After drying my hands, I turned back around and said, “I’m afraid not—” then froze. Half-gasping.Again.
“Doctor?” She sounded mildly alarmed while I spun back around and gripped my sink. “Are you all right?”
“You…already took off your shirt,” I stammered.
“Isn’t that what I’m supposed to do?” she asked flatly.
“Oh, sure. Right. It’s just…I usually step out while my patients undress.” Ducking into a drawer, I pulled out a paper examination top.
When I turned around to hand it to her, she reached back to unclasp her bra, removing it in the same perfunctory manner I might use to kick off my shoes at the end of the day. But instead of aching blue, webbed feet, her efforts revealed the most flawless pair of breasts I had ever seen. One of my knuckles twitched, threatening to rise toward my mouth so I could bite on it.
I thrust the paper top toward her.
“What’s this?” she asked, holding the flimsy blue top out in front of her, a blessed barrier between her breasts and my eyeballs. Eyeballs that needed to get their professional game faces back on immediately.
