Just The Way You Like It - Under Construction

Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven

Blake woke up groggy, and with a killer headache. Ugh, this was going to be a rough one. He rose off the cot in the lounge and began to pour himself a cup of coffee from the nearby kitchenette. He desperately needed to use the bathroom and brush his teeth. With a full cup of hot coffee, Blake made his way back into the locker room, and into the adjoining restroom. He was almost finished when there was an urgent rap at the door. “Dr. Hansen? Are you in there?” A woman's voice called out to him from the other side of the door.

“Yes, I'm here Meredith.” Blake recognized the voice as that of Meredith Hatly, one of the nurses on staff, and she always made Blake think of a mouse. Meredith was small, and usually appeared to be a bit skittish, jumpy. But she was a good nurse, always responding quickly to doctor's orders.

“Dr. Hansen, you need to come down to ICU right away sir. Its Nurse Tess.” Blake quickly finished his business, and met Meredith in the locker room. She was sitting on one of the many benches that ran between the rows of lockers. Meredith looked as fidgety as usual, but there was a look of panic in her eyes.

“Meredith, what's going on?”

“It's Nurse Tess, Doctor. She found out the other doctors were running some standard tests on Jane Doe, and . . .”

“What!” Blake couldn't believe his ears. After handing Nurse Tess his responses to all those notes he received last night, and they had ignored him? Alice was his patient, and the other doctors were not respecting his wishes. “Why did no one page me?”

“We did Doctor, but you never answered.” Meredith answered meekly, looking more nervous by the second. Blake dug around in his pockets, before realizing he had left his pager in his coat he was wearing the night before. He moaned, pushed pass Meredith, and flew out of the locker room, almost hitting Dr. Thomas with the door.

“Dr. Thomas, what the hell is going on?” Blake was roaring, and in no mood for any of this.

“I'm sorry Dr. Hansen. I'm afraid most of this is my fault.”

“You had better explain quickly Doctor, I'm not in the mood right now.”

“Well you see, Dr. Hansen, I was on my way up to your office this morning to see if you had gotten my note, when I ran into Wallace. He said that you gave him the go-ahead to see Jane Doe. When I heard he had permission, I just figured we all did, so I scheduled my tests. The other doctors heard about it, and then all hell broke loose.” Dr. Thomas was shuffling his feet around nervously, and Blake almost felt sorry for him.

“I never gave Wallace permission.” Blake said, trying to think of a reason Wallace would have given out such untrue information. It wasn't like Wallace to lie, and then Blake remembered, as if it had been in a dream. Wallace had asked him to go see Alice, and Blake had tried to wave him off. Now Blake could see how that wave could have been interpreted as a go-ahead. Blake moaned a little, and returned his attention to Dr. Thomas. “Well, anyhow, don't worry about it. Next time though huh, just make sure you ask me, not Wallace.”

“Yeah, Dr. Hansen, you have my word. I feel terrible, that poor girl seemed really scared.” Dr. Thomas had just let it slip. He wasn't planning on telling Blake about Jane's panic attack, and amazingly, he never had to. Dr. Hansen was already down the hall, pushing open the door to the stairwell without so much as a 'goodbye.'

Blake flew past Dr. Thomas. He couldn't get down to ICU fast enough. Poor Alice, how many doctors had already done their worst to her this morning. Blake felt terrible, there he had been, sleeping like a baby as Alice was probably going crazy with all the commotion. It wasn't like these doctors to act so foolishly. This was a good hospital, with good doctors. So what in the hell was going on?