will …”
Did she think she had claims on Trevor Montgomery any more than Julie did?
There was no way Julie could know the answer to that, but one thing was sure: she’d bring her lunch tomorrow and skip eating at this café in the future.
The afternoon appointments were all fairly routine, and, since Julie needed time to tackle the computer charting, Trevor suggested she spend the rest of the day with Lotte and Rita. A relief to Julie, since being forced to watch Trevor all morning had caused a list of unwanted reactions, none of which were proper, so she took the assignment and ran.
Except he showed up in her office looking torn. “I’ve got an I and D in Exam Room Three. You want to take care of it?”
She understood this was an opportunity for him to evaluate her on an incision-and-drainage procedure. “Sure. Is it a boil or an abscess?”
“A boil.”
She dropped what she was doing with Lotte and Rita, and followed him down the hall. He introduced her to Molly Escobar, a fifty-six-year-old librarian who had formed a ping-pong-ball-sized boil in her right armpit. The area in question was red, angry-looking and weeping pus.
Following protocol from her prior clinical experience for this minor surgical procedure, Julie first cleansed the skin with antiseptic and injected topical anesthetic to numb the area before using a scalpel with a sterile blade to make a small incision to allow the pus to flow out. As she worked she kept in mind that a regular boil looked the same as MRSA and the only way to tell the difference was if the usual antibiotics didn’t help clear the infection. She’d save time and start with a broad-spectrum antibiotic active against both staph and strep just in case.
Once she’d drained the boil, and thoroughly cleaned the area, it looked clear of infection and had healthy tissue at the base, so she placed four sutures. Then she put on a thin layer of sterile gauze followed by a sterile dressing, which would need to be changed daily.
“I’m going to have our nurse show you how to change the dressing, and I want to see you back on Monday for a follow-up visit, okay?”
Dr. Montgomery had been as quiet as an overgrown barn mouse watching her every move, connecting with her glances whenever she looked up during the procedure, blinking his approval, evidently never feeling compelled to make any suggestions.
After Charlotte came to take Ms. Escobar to the procedure room, and they were alone, Trevor looked at Julie and smiled. “You have a gentle touch, Julie,” he said, their eyes lingering briefly longer than necessary, and causing an unwanted reaction behind her breastbone.
“Thank you.” She needed to step away from him. Now. “I’ll go input the notes in the computer,” she said, and sailed out of the room.
By 5:00 p.m. the clinic closed, and Julie walked with Lotte and Rita to the parking lot. Trevor was on his way out, too, and, without knowing, Julie had parked next to his car. She glanced at him, disturbed to find his gaze already settled on her, as she opened her door.
“Dr. Montgomery?” a man’s voice called from across the parking lot.
Trevor looked up, smiled, and waited for the middle-aged man to approach. Julie moved around the car to put in her trunk a ream of paperwork given to her by Lotte to study that night. She dallied out of pure nosiness.
“What’s up, Connor?”
As the man got closer Julie realized the guy was dressed shabbily and looked down on his luck.
“I was wondering if you can give me some advice about—”
Lotte spoke up from two cars down; evidently Julie hadn’t been the only one to linger out of nosiness. “Mr. Parker, you know you’re supposed to make an appointment for those kinds of things.”
“That’s okay, Charlotte, go ahead and go home,” Trevor said, dismissing her in a kind way.
Julie was thinking the same thing—the guy should make an appointment, not hit up the doctor for a parking-lot consultation—but decided to keep her mouth shut if she wanted to stick around to find out what was going on, and if she valued her new job.
“Thanks, Doctor. With the cold weather and all, feet in boots all day and half the night—I’m working a second job as a security guard at Turner’s Hardware—I’ve developed athlete’s foot and I was wondering if you have any samples of that cream you gave me last time?”
“I don’t, but I’ll share a little trick. What you can do is urinate on your feet in the shower. Plug the drain so you can soak your feet in it for a minute or so. Doesn’t cost a penny. Let me know how it works.”
The man looked perplexed, but grateful and willing to give the old wives’ tale a try. “Thanks, Doc. I’ll be sure to let you know how it works.”
As the man walked off Julie folded her arms, no longer able to keep her thoughts to herself. “You don’t expect that to cure his athlete’s foot, do you?”
“My grandmother swore by using urine on her cracked feet, even kept a jar of it for her winter-cracked hands, and folks have been recommending urine for foot fungus for years.”
“Topical antifungals have something like forty percent urea in them, and urine has … what? Two point five percent tops?”
“Your point?” One arm on the roof of his car, looking over the top, he nailed her with a perturbed stare.
“Your treatment won’t be very helpful for him. He might need a strong topical fungicide, or possibly an oral-medicine prescription.”
He took his time to inhale, as though patience was his biggest virtue. “Look, the guy’s health insurance has such a high deductible he can’t afford to make appointments. Let alone buy medicine on the chance it may or may not help, or, worse yet, try oral medicine that can cause liver and heart issues as a side effect. The man’s got six kids and a wife with a lot of physical problems. You heard him—he works two jobs. I’m just trying to save him some money, that’s all.” His brows formed a V as he dared her to challenge his wisdom.
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