Doctor Millionaire

“Paging Dr. Little to Dr. Roberts’s office.”

Doug Little refrained from bouncing his head off his desk at the hospital-wide announcement. The bruise had finally faded from the last time he gave in to his frustration. Besides, if he hit his desk too hard, he would knock the coaster loose from under the leg, and it would start wobbling again.

The only reason he was being paged to the office across the hall was because Hopewell Hospital’s senior doctor on staff was showing off for his patient. Doug checked his wall calendar—twenty-two months and three days of servitude left in his hometown before he could return to his life in the city.

It was past noon. So technically, two and a half days.

He stepped into the hall and was almost taken out by a four-year-old chasing a runaway dinosaur on wheels. “Whoa, there, Crash.”

“Hi, Dr. Doug. I get my arm back today. See?” A battered fibreglass cast barely missed Doug’s nose.

“Let’s try to keep from breaking anything else before that happens.” Doug captured the little boy’s hand in his and led him back to the waiting room. “I’ve caught a Toddosaur. Who would like to take this slightly dented specimen home with them?”

A pregnant redhead heaved herself to her feet. “Todd, what did we say about running away?”

“I didn’t do it. Dino ran away. I was trying to bring him back,” Todd whined.

“How about we get you to Jackie for another X-ray, and then we can see about taking your cast off,” Doug suggested.

Todd led the way, and Doug trailed behind with Barb Poulin leaning on his arm. “Is it medically possible for a woman to be pregnant for fourteen months? Because I’m pretty sure it’s been that long,” she asked.

“I assure you that all medical science says it’s only been seven months. You can’t double it because you are carrying twins. You’re doing great.” He wished all his patients were like Barb. Unlike almost everyone else in town, she’d moved to Hopewell after he left, so she knew him first as a doctor. Not as…

“Paging Dr. Little to Dr. Roberts’ office. Again.”

“You’re popular today,” Barb said. She patted his arm. “I can find Jackie and Radiology on my own. You’d better go see what he wants.”

He waited until she was holding onto the handrail that ran the length of the hall and then he backtracked along the worn tile. The hospital had been built in the sixties, and the late-eighties facelift it had received had worn off long ago. It was more than the tiles, the dilapidated desk, and the peeling paint in the corner of the patient day room. It was everything in the building. It was the building itself.

And he was stuck here.

Doug knocked on Dr. Roberts’s door and waited for the call to enter.

“Dr. Little, how good of you to join us.” Dr. Roberts shared a grin with his patient, who sat in the chair opposite him.

“Barb Poulin caught me in the hall,” Doug offered in explanation.

“Is she okay?”

“She’s fine. She and Todd are here to get his cast off, and she had a question.” Knowing he hadn’t been called in to chat, he turned his attention to the waiting patient. “Good afternoon, Mr. Sawchuk.”

“Are you sure we didn’t interrupt your coffee break? I know you drive over to Virden for those frappe-lattes. I don’t know why, when you can get a large coffee for half the price at Ruth’s Place.” Doug remembered the old man being cranky in his mandatory shop class, but he hadn’t realized how close his teacher had been to retirement at the time. Nothing had changed. Simon Sawchuk hadn’t liked him when Doug had been his student. Things hadn’t improved since his return to Hopewell.

“No offense to Heidi, but her coffee is horrible.”

“It’s supposed to be horrible. It keeps you regular. You’re never too young to start worrying about your colon, Dougie.”

Doug smiled and jammed his fists into his white coat pockets. “What brings you in today, Mr. Sawchuk?” He crossed his fingers, hoping it wasn’t colon related.

It wasn’t, which put Doug in a much better mood.

He worked his way through the rest of his own afternoon patients. Barb knocked on his door on her way out. Her son was ecstatic about his newly regained freedom. “I’m going swimming this afternoon. Hayley Kent has a pool at her house.”

“Have fun, Crash. Just remember that your arm will be stiff, so don’t get too frustrated if you are a little clumsy and slow, okay? You haven’t used it in a while. It’s out of practice. That’s normal. But if it hurts, you should tell your mom or dad.” He’d already given Barb the entire checklist for post-cast treatment.

He enjoyed a whole two minutes of quiet before there was another knock at his door. “It’s open,” Doug called.

His favourite face in the hospital appeared. “I have Henry Ronald’s foot X-rays loaded for you. He’s in the waiting room with Andie,” Jackie Dunn reported. “Do you need a minute?”

She smiled, her brown eyes crinkling at the corners. The pretty radiologist was his only real friend at the hospital. He was at least a decade younger than the other doctors on staff, and the nurses still had him on unofficial probation until they decided if they liked him or not. He and Jackie had hit it off immediately.

“I’m good, thanks.”

He walked with Jackie to the waiting room and watched her head back to her lab. When he turned to call his patient, he saw Mr. Ronald and Andie already on their feet. Andie lent her grandfather her arm and they limped together down the corridor. Once she had him settled in the office, she rejoined Doug in the hall.

“Have you asked her out yet?” his former classmate asked.

“Who?”

“Jackie!” Andie hadn’t changed a bit since high school. She still had the biggest, broadest smile he’d ever seen, and her blonde hair was in its perpetual ponytail that he’d never seen her without.

“I can’t ask her out. She works for me.” That’s what he kept telling himself.

“She works for the hospital, same as you, but she doesn’t report to you. Come on, Doug, you know you want to.” Andie Ronald was a pain in the way only an old friend could be. Ten years of being in the same grade, and a lifetime of growing up in the same small town didn’t leave a lot of secrets between them.

“Your knee is bad today,” he said in a desperate attempt to change the subject.

“The pain comes and goes.”

As a professional hockey player, Andie might be used to working through an injury, but it didn’t mean she had to suffer with it. “Do you want me to take a look at it?”

“No, thanks. I have an appointment in the city next week anyway.” She shrugged. “We’re here for my pops. He’s been looking forward to this.”

He had too. Mr. Ronald had specifically requested a consultation, although he’d been Dr. Roberts’s patient for years. It felt good to be a choice, rather than the doctor people had to be forced to see.

Fifteen minutes later, he was done. “It may take a couple days to kick in, Mr. Ronald. Your toe could be very sore in the meantime.” Doug dropped the used needle in the sharps’ container. “But if it works, you should be walking, pain-free, for several months.”

The old man on the examination table smiled. “My toe is already sore. If this works, I’ll take another day or two of pain.” He grunted while he pulled on his sock. “I didn’t know you could treat arthritis with a shot. Doc Roberts never said anything.”

Doug was afraid of that. He was a new guy bringing new treatment options into the hospital. The last thing he needed to do was turn the town’s established physician against him. “Different doctors use different methods. Some people prefer topical ointments.” That sounded diplomatic enough. But Doug’s way was better.

“Six hours of relief versus six months? Not an option I’d choose. Do you need me to come in for a follow-up?” The senior winced as he flexed his foot, but he didn’t stop wiggling it around.

“Only if you haven’t noticed any improvement, Mr. Ronald.”

“Will do, Dougie. Doctor Doug. Doctor Little.”

At least he was trying. “You can stick with “Doc” if you like.”

Mr. Ronald shook his head. “That’s not respectful. You earned your title. And what did I say about calling me Mr. Ronald?”

“Back at you with the respect thing, Mr. R.”

“Okay, we’ll go with that, Doctor Doug.” Andie’s grandfather eased over the edge of the table until he was standing solidly on both feet. “I’m going to send Andie in. Can you do anything about her knee?”

“I already asked. She’s seeing a specialist next week.”

“Ask her again for me, would you?”

Andie pushed his door back open a second after her grandfather closed it. “Hi, Doug. Pops said you wanted to see me. Is something wrong with him? Did he have a problem with the cortisone shot?”

“Not at all. He wanted me to talk to you about you. He’s worried.”

“I’m fine.”

“He cares about you. Do you want to talk about it?”

She shook her head, her blonde ponytail swinging wildly. “Absolutely not.”

“If you change your mind, I’m here,” Doug said.

“If you change your mind about Jackie, she’s just down the hall. For now. Don’t wait too long, Doug. I’d hate to see you miss out on a good thing.”

“I’ll see you later, Andie.”

“You bet. I can’t wait!”

He could. Tonight was his high school class’s ten-year reunion. All his fellow graduates were coming home.

It was going to be terrible.

Doug had been the little guy in high school. A little, studious guy who never quite fit in after skipping a grade. He’d left Hopewell the week he graduated, and aside from visits to his family, had never returned. He’d reconnected with a handful of old friends since he’d returned, but most were still relative strangers.

On the plus side…

“Doug, I’m off. Have you scheduled anything I need to know about for next week?” Jackie asked. She fixed her ponytail while he checked his calendar.

“Not so far.”

“Great. Then I’ll see you later tonight.”

“Right. See you then.” Jackie wasn’t part of his graduating class; she’d been a year behind them. He wondered who she was going with.

“By the way, you have a walk-in.”

Doug groaned.

“I think he walked in all the way from California,” she added with a grin.

His frustration vanished. He’d see that walk-in any time. “Did you get his autograph?”

“No.” She smiled bigger. “I got a selfie. I’ll send him down to you.”

“Yes, fantastic, thanks. I’ll see you later.”

“Hello, Dr. Little.”

“Wow, it’s Dr. Angel Eight-pack,” Doug gasped. “It’s a huge honour to have such a famous surgeon in my office.”

“Really, Doug? Are you going to do that every time?”

“I am, as long as you’re playing Dr. Michelangelo Aiken on Santa Monica E.R.”

Cameron Irvine leaned against the door frame. At four inches taller than Doug’s five-foot-ten, he filled the entire space. “You’re just jealous because I’m Chief of Thoracic Surgery after three years of drama classes, and you needed eight years of med school to get your licence.”

“Totally jealous,” Doug agreed.

Cameron had played Dr. Aiken for two seasons, and the show had just been renewed for a third. The Hopewell native had moved to Toronto as soon has he’d finished high school. He and Doug roomed together briefly when Doug arrived there for medical school before Cameron left for Los Angeles. After a couple years of bit parts and a vampire movie, Cameron hit the big time with his role on Santa Monica E.R. as a hunky doctor.

Doug liked to mock his on-screen surgical techniques, but he was proud of his friend’s success.

“Who was that?” Cameron asked.

“Who was who?”

“The pretty brunette. Braces.”

That was an extremely poor description of Jackie, but Doug didn’t correct him. “Jackie Dunn. Radiologist. She went to school with us.”

“That was Jackie?” He leaned into the hall and looked down the corridor again. “Wow.”

Cameron should not be wow-ing over Jackie. He had an entire city of actresses to wow over. He didn’t need to expose his light California tan and sun-bleached hair all over the place, especially when Doug’s daily bike ride to work still hadn’t provided much of a tan to his winter-white skin.

Besides, it wasn’t like Cameron was going to be in town long enough to do anything about it.

The thought prompted Doug to check his watch. “Do you want to see Dr. Roberts before we head out? We have time to get changed before we need to be at the school for the dinner Scarlett arranged.”

“Why not?”

Mr. Sawchuk was gone, leaving the grey-haired man alone in his office. They knocked on the open door twice before he looked up. “Dr. Little. Cameron Irvine. Do you two need stitches again?”

“That was one time, Dr. Roberts. Besides, Cameron has his own plastic surgeon on speed dial these days.” Doug jumped out of the way of Cameron’s swat.

“Are you in town for the reunion?”

“Yes, sir,” Cameron said.

“It’s good of you to come home to see your old friends. Scarlett and Tyler have been working hard on it.”

“I thought Jason was on the committee too?”

Dr. Roberts scoffed at the idea that particular classmate of theirs would help.

“It’s been almost entirely Scarlett and Tyler,” Doug said to Cameron. “We need to get going.” He could show off his rented apartment and still be ready to go in half an hour, but it was better than hanging around the hospital.

“Yes. Go. Reminisce. Rub your success in the faces of everybody who said you were too big for your britches when you swore you were going to get out of here and be a hotshot actor.” Dr. Roberts looked at both of them. “I’m glad to see you didn’t forget where you came from. Although I hear Colleen won’t be attending,” he added pointedly.

“That has nothing to do with being too big for her britches. She’s in the middle of a two-month shoot in New Zealand. She couldn’t get away without shutting down production,” Cameron said, a hint of pride in his voice. According to Cameron, his sister was always either filming a new movie or on a tour to promote one that was coming out.

“And you aren’t?”

“I’m on hiatus. We start season three next month. It was good to see you, Dr. Roberts.”

“You too, Cameron. Now go have some fun.”

Cameron waited till they were in the parking lot. “Man, some things never change. He never liked that Colleen and I were into acting. He suggested my parents put us in therapy to, and I quote, straighten out our heads. My mom and dad were not impressed. It was the first time I ever heard him apologize.”

Doug grinned. “Just so you know, he never misses an episode. He’s the first one at the water cooler the next morning giving the staff a full recap, so I wouldn’t take his disapproval too seriously.”

“Please tell me he doesn’t refer to me as Dr. Eight-pack.”

He didn’t, but Doug wasn’t ready to let Cameron off the hook yet, not after his comment about Jackie. “I didn’t say that.”

Jackie Dunn tossed her scrubs into the laundry hamper in the corner and pulled on her violet, terry robe. “He smiled right at me. I think he was flirting,” she shouted through her bedroom door.

“Cameron Irvine?”

“No, Doug. Why would Cameron flirt with me?” Doug Little had smiled at her. Jackie had suffered from a terrible crush on him in high school. She’d been positive she was over it until he’d come back to Hopewell in April. Then it returned in full force. Jackie had thought it was bad being in a couple classes with him. That was nothing with having to work with him, day in and day out, with him barely acknowledging her. Until today. Maybe.

She headed to the bathroom, ducking past her roommate, who was leaning against her own bedroom doorframe, sipping from a can of soda. Her best friend was already dressed in a white blouse, black slacks and black shoes.

“Didn’t you ask Doug to prom?”

“We aren’t talking about that.” The memory of his rejection still burned. She’d been utterly heartbroken for weeks.

“Who did you end up going to prom with again?” Patricia asked.

Jackie made a face. “Jason Nickel.” When her roommate fake-gagged, Jackie gave her a shrug. “I was desperate, and it was slim pickings around here. It still is, but you’ll notice I haven’t repeated my mistake.”

She was closing the bathroom door when she heard Patricia say, “You know Jason asked me out last month.”

Jackie opened the door again. “Why? You’ve been out since we graduated.”

“Because he’s Jason?”

“I’m sure he’ll grow up someday. Not anytime soon, but someday,” she said as she closed the door all the way.

It was a good thing the water bill was included as part of their rent. Jackie showered twice a day. Once before she started her day as a radiologist, to wash off all the germs she’d otherwise take into work, and again when she came home, to eradicate anything she’d picked up at the hospital, and to get rid of the institutional smell that permeated her clothes. On days like this, she might take a third one before she went to bed.

Her second job was more demanding than her first. She was the boss, head chef, marketer, main server, and dishwasher in her own catering company. Jackie never knew if that made Dunn Home Cooking her second through sixth jobs, or if they all counted as a single really big one. She didn’t mind any of them; the business was her baby.

The only problem was, at the moment, neither job paid enough for her to live on individually. When she’d started at Hopewell Hospital, she’d been just shy of full-time. A year and a half later, they’d reduced her hours to half-time, with more budget cuts rumoured to be around the corner. Unfortunately, she couldn’t lower her student loan payments by the same amount. She’d be constantly losing ground without the two or three catering bookings Dunn Home Cooking brought in a month. Even then, she was only breaking even.

The thought of her next loan payment made her more grateful for the jobs she had on the calendar. Tonight’s was an especially good one. She had to prepare and serve two dozen four-course meals at the high school. She’d be ahead by half a payment by the end of the night. Only eleven-and-a-half to go after that.

Jackie twisted her brown hair back into a bun. Between the spray, the bobby pins, and the hair net, it wouldn’t move until she wanted it to. She donned her own white blouse and black slacks and added a white apron which covered everything.

They took separate vehicles to the school. Although it was a short drive, it still took close to forty minutes to transfer everything into the home economics room and get organized. Scarlett St. James bustled into the room as Jackie slipped the first trays into the oven. The deceptively named strawberry-blonde, who had graduated a year ahead of her, dropped her bags onto a table and then came to the counter to examine their organized chaos. “Are we good?” she asked.

“We’re good,” Jackie said. “The salads are in the fridge. The bruschetta topping just needs to be spread, topped with cheese, and reheated in the oven. The china and flatware are ready to be set as soon as you tell us the tables are ready.”

Scarlett pointed to her bags. “I have the tablecloths and decorations in there. Jason is supposed help me set up.” She checked the clock on the wall and the minute hand inched over the six.

“Don’t worry. Everything will be perfect,” Jackie assured her. “I saw Doug and Cameron already. You’re going to have such a fun time tonight.”

Scarlett’s face perked up, her pale skin already flushed with exertion after running around the school. “Cam’s in town? Excellent! After Colleen had to cancel, I wasn’t sure he’d still come.” She hefted the largest of the bags, and the tail of a silver Mylar banner slithered to the floor. “I should get started.”

“Let me know when you’re ready for us.”

Patricia slapped the lid on a large blue cooler and slid it under a table. “I caught a blast of chopped raw onions. I need some air.” She shook her head, sending her short blonde hair flying, and scrunched up her nose. “The food is all in the fridge. I’ll see if Scarlett wants a hand, unless you need me.”

“Go. I’ll text you when we’re ready for stage two.”

Jackie didn’t mind the solitude. It gave her a moment to get her head in the game. Cooking was both an art and a science, but few people realized it was also a lot of time management to ensure everything was ready when it was needed. Nobody wanted a cold steak because it cooled off waiting for the baked potato to be ready, or a thirty-minute delay on dessert because the apple blossoms were late going into the oven.

Had she packed the apple blossoms? She didn’t remember seeing them as she loaded the trunk.

She checked; the apple blossoms were on two cookie sheets in the second fridge. Patricia must have packed them. Crisis averted.

She checked for the vanilla ice cream. Just in case. It was in the freezer.

“Hey, Jackie.” A lanky dirty blonde with a thick beard and mustache paused in the doorway. He glanced down the hallway and back at her. “Have you seen Scarlett? I have the chairs she wanted in the back of my truck, but she told me to meet her in the parking lot and she’s not there.”

“She was here two minutes ago. She said she was heading to the gym, Jason.”

“Thanks. It smells great in here. Do you need a taste tester? I’m available.” He waggled his eyebrows at her.

“I’m fine. Go find Scarlett. She’ll be glad to see you.”

Jason Nickel, on time and ready to work. Jackie was surprised. Maybe the reunion would be good for him.

Patricia returned a couple minutes later. She was no longer crying, and her blue eyes had only a residual tint of pink. “People are starting to show up. Scarlett booked the small gym, so they’ll have some privacy. She has a self-serve bar in the corner. I’m supposed to tell you she’s ready for us to set the tables.”

“Is privacy an issue? There’s only going to be twenty-four of them.”

“Fifteen. Four couples cancelled, and Cameron didn’t bring his plus-one, which was probably who the privacy was for. Guess who gets Chicken Kiev, Parmesan green beans, and mashed potatoes for dinner tomorrow?”

Patricia’s chipper view on the dropouts made her smile. It was true. The meals were paid for. She’d likely send six home with Scarlett to give her a couple nights off from cooking for her mom and brother, but that still left three for them.

“Who’s here?” Jackie had a copy of the original guest list, but there were some notable people she knew better than others, and she didn’t know who had cancelled.

“Freddy Turnbull, although not in uniform.”

“I thought I’d seen him around town, but I haven’t talked to him. Is he on leave?”

“No, he’s totally out of the military now.”

“Who else?”

Patricia scratched her head. “Andie Ronald is on a break from her women’s hockey training in Alberta. I wonder if she brought any medals to show off. I’d like to see them.”

“That would be fun.” She didn’t know the professional athlete very well, but she heard a lot about her from Scarlett.

“Jonathan and Francine. We just got his newest release into the store.”

Jackie didn’t count Jonathan Gilbert as notable. He’d had four mystery novels published since he graduated from university, but he still lived in town and worked as one of the English teachers in the high school. Besides, he would be the first to laugh if she’d called him famous. “That doesn’t count. He’s always here.”

“Most of them are local,” Patricia scoffed. “Oh, Cordelia Ito is supposed to attend.”

That was news. “I haven’t seen her in years.”

“Me, either. Of course, the big news is Cameron.”

Cameron Irvine was actually famous, but she’d missed her chance to check him out at the hospital. The shock of seeing Doug smile at her had been too much.

If she were being fair, and she really didn’t want to, Doug—Dr. Doug Little—had made a good name for himself too. He wasn’t a celebrity, but becoming a doctor was impressive on its own.

When she thought of the guests in those terms, she realized it was a weighty list of accomplishments over the last decade for such a small group.

Ten years. Jackie was only a year younger. She was a single, almost twenty-seven-year-old with no significant other in sight, and dismal prospects for the future if she didn’t make some major changes to her life soon.

She gripped the whisk and whipped her frustration into the salad dressing she was mixing. Her student loans wouldn’t be around forever. If she buckled down and doubled her monthly bookings, Dunn Home Cooking could pay them off by the end of the year. She’d be debt-free by the time she turned twenty-eight. Twenty-eight was still young enough to find a man, settle down, and start a family before hitting the big three-oh.

She whisked faster.

That was in the long, distant future. She had two dozen meals to cook to perfection first. Then she had to serve them without falling on her face and embarrassing herself further in front of Doug Little.

Maybe she should make Patricia serve him.