Have you heard...?

Decline her, be declined

 

The next morning, Gage returned to the hospital quite early in hopes of catching up to Katie, who hadn't been answering his continuous calls and have a friendly talk with Nash about Greeley...

But he instead got directed over to the chief of surgery's office where to his turn, he received a right tell off for operating on the man yesterday.
    Gage tried to tell him that had he not operated, The man would've died....a coma was damn near half a level better than death in his book.

But Chief LaBeau  brushed right past that.

" This a hospital, not a holiday care center, Intern," The small balding  man exclaimed. " THERE ARE RULES AND RULES ARE MEANT TO BE FOLLOWED! YOU OPERATED WITH NO LICENSE, NO CHIEF DOCTOR PRESENT,  AND NOTHING BUT BOOK KNOWLEDGE UNDER YOUR BELT! IF THIS GETS OUT, WE COULD GET SHUT DOWN OR WORST, PENALIZED AND IF WE GET PENALIZED, ANDERSON- NOBODY DOES BUSINESS WITH US, NOBODY COMES HERE ANYMORE, I COULD GET FIRED FOR CHRIS' SAKE- THEN WHERE ARE WE?! WHERE DOES THAT LEAVE US, ANDERSON?"

"Out of a job-"

"OUT OF A JOB AND DELICENSED! THREE STRIKES, ANDERSON- THAT WAS THE BONUS RUN, NOW YOU'VE JUST THREE. DO YOU HEAR ME, ANDERSON?"

"Yes,Chief LaBeau."

After that delightful conversation, Gage was sent off straight to his rotation room where a Dr. Bimza was filling in for Greeley who had yet again missed another shift.

" I heard LaBeau tore you a fresh one." Lin whispered to him as they worked on the same dummy with another girl who Gage had dubbed a mute after she'd turned red and answered his request for the scalpel from the tool layout beside her with a squeak.

Gage looked up at Lin over his face mask. "News travels fast here, huh?"

Connecting an IV to the dummy, Lin shrugged. " Well no, the intercom in the Nurse's meeting room was on cause he'd been talking to us before you came in, he must've forgotten to shut it cause he flew right off- you sounded disappointed, did you cry?"

Gage made a face under the mask, he would never have admitted it but only one person could touch him with a tell off and it was his mother. "No, of course not."

Lin's face gave a weird motion up from under the mask and her voice came out quite weird as if she was curbing her laughter. " Oh, come on then, it's okay to cry."

" Lin shove off, I didn't cry."

Gage did 6 more hours of rotation before the interns were allowed lunch and Gage went up to floor 3 and ate with Nash who also had heard about Gage's tell off- though, from her fellow research doctor who had heard it from LaBeau's secretary.

"You know what, don't even worry about him-" Nash said between a prolonged chew of her chicken salad.

"I'm not." Gage replied distractedly as the sound a plastic bag ruffling came about while Gage prowled through it for his sandwich.

After both forgetting to bring lunch in their haste to get to work, Nash and Gage had ordered delivery from their favorite food place both; Au bon pain.

Nash had ordered her usual of Chicken cobb avocado and Gage, who had made it his mission to try out every item of the menu at least once, had ordered a Newport turkey sandwich, a couple of palmiers and a double expresso.

"He's just grumpy, LaBeau," Nash explained as she pulled her hydro flask towards her. " He and his wife? They're doing that renewing vows crap and she's pulling this whole no-sex-until-after-vows nonsense. The way Martha puts it, it's driving him crazy!"

Gage made a face at Nash as he pulled out his sandwich, and unwrapped the top. " You know like everyone's spouse here; Where do you meet these people?"

Nash shrugged as she picked up a  piece of chicken that had fallen on her desk with her hand. " We go to the same country club, me and the LaBeaus, and the Navignes, the Nonsos, The Cassios and the Reckfesters. Greeley comes from time to time too."

" You," Gage bit into his sandwich and chuckled. " Are so white."

Nash grimaced. " Zip it."

" Speaking of Greeley," Gage said as he placed the bag of Palmiers on the desk for Nash to enjoy as well, which the older woman did. " is he alright? He's not been in-"

Nash rolled her eyes." He was fine enough to beat my ass at mini golf Saturday. Nothing's wrong with him, He's just slacking and nobody important's caught him at it yet. Besides, word around the hospital is he's hiding from someone."

Gage stopped his assault on the sandwich. " Hiding?"

Nash tore her Palmier apart and bit the left part before nodding. The Nash woman looked Gage right in the eyes when she said. " Oh yeah, personally- I think he's dodging that nurse, Jacklyn. Jesus, I heard she left her husband for him; they had a big fight in the Rec room on Wednesday. All I know is that  Greeley wasn't pleased and he hasn't been seen here since."

Gage returned to work after lunch and when he finally got a moment's peace, he glanced at his phone and saw several missed calls from King Kylie.

Gage felt a pang in his chest as he stared at the amount of missed calls and even more when she called him yet again right at that moment...he let it ring and slipped the phone into his pocket.

He was being a coward...yes, he knew...but how was he to face her now?...how was he to hope that she would look at him the same again after he'd kissed her in her most vulnerable state?...Gage felt dirty for the way he saw it, he'd taken advantage of her...

And for that he felt filthy.

But he knew what he had to do...he knew how he would have to go about it; he had a girlfriend and he had to respect her- he was fortunate enough that Katie had forgiven him and he ought to devote himself to her...yes.

Kylie was his patient and he'd gotten too involved with her; taking her to his family, to see Ginny's school play...even taking her to the store was starting to look particularly incriminating now, and Gage had tried to ignore it but no more could he do so.

Could it be that he was the reason that Kylie's boyfriend had asked for a break? Could he have caused the separation of two people expecting a child?

It wasn't too far fetched, Gage had eyes- or rather Ginny did....she had often called Gage that month to tell him that he was on the news with Kylie as a mysterious Unknown male companion spotted out with Kylie.

The media had made it out to be that Gage and Kylie could have been together and Gage had stupidly kept on with the visits and late night phone calls and the whole lot.

No, Gage would have to now keep it all professional.

After his shift ended, Gage went straight down to the children's ward to look for the ever elusive Katie but when he finally spotted her turned back, a kid spotted Gage at the same time, screamed his name and Katie took off.

Katie sped walked her way out of view so quickly that by the time Gage rounded the corner, she had gone.

Gage was now sure that Katie in fact was avoiding him, the new question was; why?

Gage went floor to floor to look for her and when he'd gotten tired of it, he went home and continued to call her as he took notes on the Trauma section on onlinemeded.org.

Even as he was in the shower, he was calling her;

" Siri, Call blond smurf." Gage ordered over the water.

"Calling blond smurf, red heart, crown, peace sign." Siri recited in its usual robotic voice.

Gage fell asleep calling her and even when he rolled out of bed at 3 am when his beeper started going off, Gage was still calling her...

Even as he hurriedly pulled on his scrubs and looked for his shoes...as tired as he was...he was still calling her but to no avail...

Gage had been getting sent to Katie's voicemail for a while now...and this was no different