The Cloud Reader

Ann

Ann Hairston looked up from her desk and caught just a fleeting glimpse of Doctor Steadman crossing the corridor and into his office. She finished her notes, filed away the material she was working on and followed after him.

"You didn't say you would be back tonight." She went to his desk and leaned on the edge watching him pull on his whites and grab his stethoscope from the pocket. His once brown hair, worn longish in the back, was mussed looking and streaked with grey and Ann felt her skin prickle when he turned and tossed her a lopsided grin.

"No. I just want to do some more poking around that soldier." He shrugged and looked embarrassed.

"The others are pretty upset with you, Doctor."

"Since you're calling me Doctor I guess you are too." He picked up his clipboard and paused, watching her.

"Don't be silly. You know I agree with you in this case. Exploratory surgery is too easy, too inconsiderate of the patient."

"Yet doing nothing could be just as costly. I don't have any special insight into this case, Ann."

"Frank, all the tests have been done, nothing registers. What else can you do? Let the psych department handle it, you should be home with your family or at the very least getting some rest."

He managed a grim smile and started for the door. "It's not really much of a family, Ann." He waited to let her go first, as she seemed to be leaving as well.

"It could have been." she blurted. Immediately she flushed red and tried to hurry past.

"Hey! Wait!" He reached out and grabbed her arm but she shook it off and kept going. It was not the first time Frank Steadman had felt more than a collegial interest toward his assistant, and it created a hollow feeling in his chest that conjured up a guilty remorse.

Ann slipped into the nurse's room and closed the door, leaning against it as though to prevent entry. She was ashamed and embarrassed, hurt, desperate, helpless and unreservedly in love with her boss. Tears streamed down her cheeks as she wallowed in her misery and then, realizing how stupidly she was behaving, with a determined sigh she scrubbed her face dry with a tissue, swallowed and returned to her desk, thankful that he was nowhere in sight.

When Nadine Steadman had died, Ann was a brand new ER nurse in awe of all the surgeons in the hospital. It was only a short time after being there that she realized which of the doctors represented the ideals she had embraced in school and during her internship.

The loss of Frank Steadman's wife created a blip in the continuity of the surgical timetables and when the opportunity arose, Ann eagerly stepped in to tackle the extra workload and plug the temporary paperwork gap. When he returned to full time, he was more than pleased to have her remain as his assistant and the necessary strings were pulled without much ado.

For two years Ann made herself as helpful as possible, shouldering responsibilities that were previously his to assume, both professionally and personally. She met his family, taking an instant liking to Garret and finding a satisfactory level of approach to Jean and spent an inordinate amount of time helping him schedule their lives.

Then Frank Steadman remarried.

The woman was much younger and nothing at all like she imagined he would choose. His daughter was only five years younger, she thought angrily, realizing with acute shame that she was not much older herself and making her even angrier. Ann continued to perform her duties, devoted to the man she admired professionally and desired in futile secrecy. The fact that he was burning himself out had only spurred her to try and do more, and now here she was, miserably bawling her eyes out once more over what could never be.

*****

Doctor Steadman studied the charts and went over the notes with the shift nurse, questioning everything that had been recorded. It became a ritual and the attending nurses started to worry for his own health until one morning his name rang over the hospital loudspeaker and he raced to the ward where the soldier was being kept.

The patient had shown a sudden jump in improvement and a thrill of vindication slipped through his body as each item he had been monitoring daily was verified. Sliding back into the room, he did another examination and repeated some of the minor tests to his excited satisfaction. Each day after that the patient kept improving on his own despite the fact that he seemed to remain in a semi-conscious state.

Ann looked up from her desk as he barged into the office, face beaming brighter than she had seen in years. They had remained professionally aloof since her crying jag, which he knew nothing about; he thought that it was his manner that had created the strain between them. But now, with such surprising news, he forgot all about it and blurted out the miraculous turn around of the soldier patient named Howe. Before Ann could respond he was around the desk and pulling her to her feet, wrapping her in his arms and swaying giddily.

"We were right! If we had operated who knows what chain of events might have been started."

Ann freed herself and while still smarting from her depression she couldn't help but feel the excitement of the moment.

"That's wonderful news, Fra- Doctor. His family will be ecstatic."

"I need these notes compiled into a full report for the board, I'm not going to gloat but I'm going to just love watching my pals eat crow." He took her arms and squared her around to face him. "Ann, whatever I said or did can we just- forget it? I'm too fond of you to have us bumbling around like this. I apologize for whatever but please, can we?"

She felt her cheeks warm and her eyes began a teary betrayal so she quickly pulled away and began shuffling papers. "Of course. I don't like the way things have been lately either. It's childish."

"Great! That's great." He slapped his leg with the clipboard. "When you're done what say we grab some dinner, sort of celebrate our diagnosis?" Ann held her breath, eager to respond positively but afraid to accept something quite so intimate. "C'mon, whatta ya say? Just you and I, toasting our brilliance over a thick steak."

Just you and I. She looked up and smiled a small smile, nodding.

"Great! As soon as you're finished then." He almost danced from the room leaving her resting on her shaking knuckles over the desk.