LITMIR.BIZ

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Roscoe had said he’d be back some time today. She hadn’t expected him this early.

      He was tall, six two or maybe more. His dark brown hair was a bit unruly, tousled, sun-bleached at the ends. He was wearing casual chinos and a short-sleeved khaki shirt. His deep green eyes were crinkled at the edges—from the sun? As he looked up at her she thought he looked weary.

      He’d have been at Kit’s bedside for most of the last few days, she thought, remembering legions of parents watching over their kids in the paediatric wards of her training days. Some hospitals provided beds for parents, but medical imperatives and the needs of scared, ill or hurting children meant sleep was hardly ever an option.

      There’d be a reason this guy looked haggard.

      And maybe tiredness was a constant state for him. Roscoe had filled her in on his background over the weekend, not because she’d asked—he’d just told her.

      ‘Tom was a surgeon in Sydney until the boys’ mother died,’ he’d told her. ‘Their dad disappeared. Tom’s all they’ve got.’

      The boys were his stepsons. He’d married their mother and then she’d died, Roscoe had told her.

      But how could he care so much for kids who weren’t his? It was beyond her but looking at him now she had no doubt that he did care, and he was exhausted because of it.

      Roscoe’s story had made her feel more than a little guilty that she’d let her prejudice show when she’d first met him. He might be a stepdad, but stepfathers shouldn’t all be tarred by the same brush. It was just the word. Stepfather… After all these years it still made her feel ill.

      ‘Welcome home,’ she said now, trying for a smile. His obvious weariness seemed to be making something twist inside her. Normal sympathy for a tired and worried parent? For some reason it felt more than that, and the sensation made her unsettled.

      ‘How’s Kit?’ she asked, pushing aside her niggle of unease, heading back to talk medicine. Work was always safest.

      ‘Roscoe’s putting him into a bed in the kids’ ward,’ he told her. ‘The surgery’s gone well. Flexor tendons were damaged as well as nerves but the surgeon’s done a great job and he has every hope that there’ll be no long-term damage. If he was an only child I’d bring him home, but he and his brothers play rough. He has a protective plaster so maybe I’m being ultra-cautious, but given how far we are from help I’d prefer him to stay where he is until the stitches are out. He knows I’ll be in and out. Henry and Marcus can visit. It’s good to have him home.’

      Then he gazed around the room again, slowly, as if taking it in. ‘It’s good to be home too,’ he said. ‘Thank you for your care.’

      She followed his gaze, noting with satisfaction that nothing had been disturbed after her clean. ‘You’re welcome. I’m not bad at dusting and polishing.’

      ‘It’s not actually the dusting and polishing I’m thanking you for,’ he told her with a slightly crooked smile. ‘That’s great, but with three kids I’ve pretty much learned not to value them. It’s for starting at the hospital three days early, but mostly it’s for caring for Marcus and Henry—and for Rose too. I can’t tell you how grateful I am.’

      ‘It’s just what needed to be done.’ She shifted uncomfortably. He was thanking her for care rather than cooking and cleaning? She didn’t care, at least not in the emotional sense. She did what she had to do to keep her world functioning as it should, to keep her patients safe, to keep herself safe. She accepted responsibility when she had to, but that was as far as it went.

      Caring was something that had been driven out of her from a time so long ago she could scarcely remember.

      So now…she looked at Tom’s weary smile, seeing the telltale lines of strain around his eyes, and she thought it wasn’t caring to accept a little more responsibility. It was simply doing what needed to be done.

      ‘You look like you could do with a sleep,’ she told him. ‘Why don’t you take a nap now? Roscoe and I have things covered. There’s nothing urgent. We don’t need you.’

      ‘I’d like to see everyone, though,’ he said diffidently. ‘You’ve been out to see Herbert Daly?’

      ‘His son’s bringing him into hospital,’ she told him. ‘He should have been in days ago, but he’s stubborn. I had to insist.’

      ‘He likes his own space,’ Tom said neutrally. ‘But you’re right—he could do with some bed rest. What about the rest of our patients?’

      ‘Frances Ludeman’s still in. Her blood pressure’s still up but only mildly. It was only after her husband brought the other five kids in to visit that I saw why you wanted her to stay.’

      ‘She needs all the rest she can get,’ Tom said. ‘And Roscoe says Xavier Trentham’s in the kids’ ward.’

      ‘Fractured tibia. It’s a clean break but he fell through a hedge and there’s too much swelling to cast it yet. Like your Kit, there’s too much chaos at home for him to be safe without the cast.’

      ‘Chaos?’

      ‘Other kids.’

      ‘Right.’ He gave her an odd, sideways it looked like she didn’t understand. It felt strange, doing what seemed like a medical handover in his living room, but efficiency seemed to be called for. He moved on. ‘Bob’s infection from the cow kick?’

      ‘There’s still some necrosis. He wants to go home but I’ve said another three days.’

      ‘He’ll hate another three days. We can probably organise him to go home with visits from district nursing.’

      ‘He’ll need more than just nursing. He’ll need to be checked, by you or by me.’

      ‘I can do that.’

      ‘Why? It’s much easier to keep him in hospital.’

      ‘Yes, but he has problems,’ he told her. ‘Have you met his wife?’

      ‘I gave Lois an update yesterday. She’s accepted that he won’t be home until Thursday at soonest. He has no choice.’

      ‘He does have a choice. I’ll organise it.’

      ‘Why?’ she asked, startled. ‘You can hardly do house calls. He lives fifteen minutes out of town.’

      ‘I don’t mind. Lois’s stressed herself. She has high blood pressure, and she worries about a daughter living in New Zealand. I suspect they care for her financially and that’s pushing the farm income. I don’t want Lois ill.’

      ‘But it’s Bob who’s your patient.’

      ‘I need to care for them all,’ he said simply. ‘Like I need to go do a ward round now.’

      She stilled. ‘I’ve already done a round. You don’t trust that I’ve looked after them?’

      ‘I’m not saying that.’ He was watching her as if he was trying to understand something that was puzzling him. ‘Rachel, this is a country medical practice. We don’t treat patients in isolation. Every person comes with a story around them, farms that need tending, debts, kid worries, elderly parent concerns. If you ignore them then they come back to bite you. This is your first shot at family medicine, right?’

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘And you’re only doing it because of the scholarship?’

      ‘I’m hugely grateful for the scholarship,’ she said, a bit awkwardly.

      ‘But family medicine isn’t what you want long-term?’

      ‘I’m pushing for radiology.’

      ‘Where you don’t need to look much past the image to the patient.’

      ‘Is that a criticism?’

      ‘Of

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