Comfort Zone

Chapter 47

"My guardian Angel," Miriam had cried, thinking for the first time ever that he was aptly named.

"I saved my doctor's life," he kept repeating proudly. "She saves mine and I save hers. How 'bout that?" The most remarkable thing about the whole experience, Miriam later thought wryly, was that Angel completely forgot the reason for his impromptu visit that night. As he informed her days later, she'd forgotten to sign his narcotic prescription and he'd come back to get her signature and ask for a few more pills. That was the time to tell him she'd help him get off the medicine, because that's what good medical care meant.

It had been a very long night. After the police questioned Miriam at length, after a dazed and damaged Richard Quest was taken away, after the media got their story, after a successful manhunt was launched for Louis Grant, and after an unsuccessful attempt to wash the blood from the carpet, Miriam finally went home. She'd sustained only a small scratch on her arm, like a paper cut. Be positive, she thought as she wiped away the blood.

Belle was scrubbing off the wooden fish the next day when Miriam came through the door.

"What are you doing here? Don't you know when to take a day off?" Belle said between feverish hugs.

In truth, if she didn't come to the office immediately, Miriam doubted she'd ever be able to push herself through the doors again. But Belle understood that, so she answered instead, "What are youdoing? And I can't believe the cops didn't take that thing. Throw the bloody thing out!"

"How could you possibly throw out this fish?"

"You didn't see it with CEO brains plastered to its hot pink gills."

"It was just a scalp wound. Besides, the fish saved your life. It allowed you to carpe diem, seize another day! Carp diem," she repeated, looking fondly at the fish.

"Angel saved my life too. Why don't you strip him, paint him garish colors and prop him up on the counter?"

"You know naked men aren't my thing," Belle said.

"Speaking of naked men," she went on, "I have a postcard for you."

It was from Malcolm Pollard. He would likely win a multi-million dollar settlement against the electrical company, but he wouldn't get a penny of it, of course, because the damn lawyers would get it all, the thieves. In the meantime he'd gone off to Texas to live with the one sister who he didn't know well enough to hate, and who didn't know him well enough to protest.

"Dr. Gotlin,

My sister's cooking's literally to die for, and this town's so dull I could shoot myself. Texas sucks as bad as Florida and my sister is the meanest bitch alive.

Malcolm Pollard"

There was a P.S. in tiny letters. "My sister said I should thank you for saving my sorry ass and I guess even a broken clock is right twice a day."

The front of the card had a picture of an old man mooning a cow.

Miriam handed it back to Belle to read. She looked over it without any expression.

"Our patient satisfaction score must be through the roof this month," she finally said, giving a thumbs-up and going off to tack the card on the wall.

Over the next week, Miriam didn't enjoy her celebrity status at all, because it slowed down her office visits and hospital rounds considerably. There were seemingly endless, repetitive interviews with law enforcement and the news—and endless worried calls from her mother, the rest of the family and friends.

Everyone wanted to hug her, to comment, ask questions, tell a story, or offer some words of gratitude and encouragement. Or tell her a cool headline they saw, including Miriam's personal favorite, "Evil plan thwarted, Angel strikes down CEO with fish!"

Miriam tried to keep the euphoria of surviving a near-death experience alive, but little nuisances and worries kept nibbling away at it. Furthermore, she added to her list of concerns the safety of the drugs she was prescribing her patients. The Quest/Grant scheme might be over, but what about its thousands of counterparts worldwide?

There was a plethora of investigative articles in the news media about counterfeit medications and other fraudulent, harmful activities, detailing possible solutions, referencing the DQSA and its offshoot, Drug Supply Chain Security Act, and that the FDA would be partnering with their overseas counterparts in the coming years.

So there was some cause for optimism, despite the "flexibility" of Quest and his ilk, and their propensity for finding and exploiting pharmacy vulnerabilities. Miriam worried, too, about how safety and privacy would balance out, and thought also about plans to make EHRRs interoperable, so patient information could be shared more easily. Safer, yes, but could privacy be guaranteed?

A few sessions with Edna helped Miriam cope, and when she got the bill from the landlord for rug cleaning, she and Belle dissolved in such laughter that for the moment everything seemed alright.

Testifying and other legal unpleasantness would come later, but for now it was back to work as usual, or, as a depressed-looking Ezzy said in the doctors' elevator, "SOSDD." Same Old Shit, Different Day. Ursula Taylor was also in the elevator, sporting her cast, and she and Miriam got off together to talk in private.

"SOSDD. Of all the acronyms, I think that's the worst," Ursula said.

"Agreed. I've noticed we complain a lot—"

"--but what do we do to fix things? We have to learn to use the changes to our advantage," Taylor interrupted, sounding eerily like Richard Quest. "And we also have to organize. That's why you should join the medical association. I'll send you the application."

Great, another expense, and a meeting to go to in my spare time. Me and my big mouth.

"Anyway, thank goodness you're as healthy as we both thought!" Miriam chirped, hoping to distract the other woman. "Can I finally finish the pre-op for you so you can have your surgery?" Maybe she'll forget to send me the application.

Dr. Taylor gave a bark of laughter. "I've had enough of surgical procedures, thank you very much! Enough of being on the receiving end of medical care! Soon as my wrist heals I'm going to go hiking in Zion National Park for a week instead, and I'll try not to tumble down a cliff or get a parasite from a contaminated stream.

"Maybe give some of the facelift money to a worthy cause."

"It couldn't hurt," Miriam said, and they both laughed.

"So glad we didn't lose that mischievous smile permanently. It'll take a while before I can forgive myself for being manipulated by Quest into suspecting you. I can only hope you're more forgiving."

The distraught look in Taylor's eyes prompted Miriam to assure her she did, and Ursula continued.

"You know, despite my ordeal, I still do regular pre-ops and exams. I just diagnosed a serious heart condition in a patient with a routine EKG. Probably would have killed him. You know I'm a huge fan of evidence-based medicine, what do we do if good quality studies don't exist? I suppose we'll have better research and perfect studies one day to answer all our questions and rescue us from our biased human judgment. Who knows, I guess like everything else it's all in the balance."

Maybe biased human judgment, the so-called art of medicine, would always get to the deeper truth, Miriam thought about saying.

The two women continued to talk, until Taylor was called away by an urgent call, her parting words trailing behind.

"By the way, I could really use your help on one of my committees..."