The Practice of Love By belladonnacullen.pdf

The Practice of Love By belladonnacullen

http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5995388/1/

"There's pizza in the break room, Dr. Swan," Gianna called out as I dashed past

reception.

"Not going to happen, Gianna. Thanks, though."

"Should I tell the rep you're busy?"

Why would she ask that? I was busy. "Who is it?" I groaned, a bit

melodramatically. I supposed that I could pop my head in and at least say hi.

"Cialis," she called back. No, it was definitely not going to happen. Honestly, the

ED reps made me uncomfortable. I know, I know, I was a doctor, for Pete's sake.

And I had no problem standing in an exam room with a patient and talking about

libidos and erections and stamina. But put me in a windowless room with a piece

of pizza and a salesman dying to talk about how reliably he can make a man hard

for hours on end, and I got a little squirmy.

No way was I talking to the Cialis rep today.

"I'm swamped, Gianna. Maybe you could ask Lauren to stop by."

"You got it, Dr. Swan."

Gianna stooped a little to squeeze my shoulder and smile reassuringly. She was

our summer intern: impossibly tall, blond, beautiful and twenty-one. She could

have been a fresh-faced supermodel, but instead, she'd been eyeing me wistfully

for my first three weeks on the job. On my first day, she'd told me that she

couldn't wait to be a physician, just like me. I thought about telling her that I was

no role model. If anything, going about things the way I had should be a

cautionary tale that gets told to first year students. But instead of getting into all

that, I decided to simply respond with a smile. I just hoped she realized that my

life was no episode of Private Practice.

I eyed the clock. This was supposed to be my lunch break, but I still had four

patients waiting. I'd been running behind right from the start today, but that first

patient hadn't been my fault. A little girl named Claire came in with a stomach

bug, and promptly demonstrated how ill she was all over my favorite pair of

shoes: Steve Madden ballet flats. No, not Louboutins or Jimmy Choos; I run back

and forth in an office all day; four inch heels would never work, especially

considering my lack of coordination.

It had been downhill from there, an unlucky combination of the office staff not

being completely used to my quirks, missing charts and lab results, getting stuck

on hold waiting for consults, and the list went on. As usual, it was hard to believe

that much had happened in only four hours. But now, if I could just knock these

next few visits out over my lunch break, I'd be back on track.

I paused in the hallway outside of reception to pull the remaining morning charts.

No problem. I could do this, I reasoned to myself.

I was still a little stunned that Dr. Carlisle Cullen had trusted me with his practice

after only three weeks. In the end, he'd left the decision up to me. He said he

believed that I could easily handle things in his absence, but he would only go if I

were comfortable being on my own. And while being in charge was somewhat

disconcerting, after so many years having countless superiors in the hospital, I

knew Carlisle had his emergency phone with him, and there were plenty of

colleagues that I could consult with, if necessary.

And it was Dr. Cullen's anniversary. He hadn't had time off since his former

partner, Dr. Alistair Eremite, had unexpectedly retired over six months ago. I

knew he and his wife, Esme, hadn't been to the shore all summer. After all, one

of the reasons I joined a small neighborhood family practice was for situations

such as this: helping each other out, and having informal flexibility with

scheduling. Being able to take time off for family was something Dr. Cullen said

was a priority for him and I looked forward to taking advantage of the same

benefit in the future.

Dr. Cullen had been in practice in this neighborhood for over twenty years. I'd

reasoned that there was little damage I could do to his good name in three days.

Yet, after four hours, I was desperately clinging to the hope that I'd been right.

As I was flipping through the charts in front of me, Gianna swooshed by and

dropped another chart off, in a slot without a corresponding room number.

"Gianna, what is this?"

"A chart, Dr. Swan."

I narrowed my eyes at her. "But there aren't any appointments scheduled for

noon."

"Uh, yeah, it's a last minute, emergency kind of thing."

"I have patients in the other exam rooms."

"I put him in the lab. The tech's out for lunch, so you'll have privacy."

"We've got space set aside for emergencies in the morning and evening."

"But, he couldn't come in then."

I sighed, exasperated. First of all, what was Gianna, the intern, doing making

appointments? And secondly, if this patient couldn't make it during the

designated emergency timeslots, then either it wasn't an emergency, or he

should have gone to the local hospital's emergency room.

"But, Dr. Swan, he's -"

I shushed Gianna with a wave of my hand, pulling this new, thick chart out of the

waiting slot, examining the name and date of birth, and walking swiftly away. Her

excuse didn't matter. It wouldn't change the fact that now there was a thirty-two

year old male waiting for me in the lab, in a thin cotton gown. I could hardly ask

him to leave.

I juggled all of the charts that were laid out on my desk, making a mental note to

broach the topic of electronic charting when Dr. Cullen returned. Then I checked

the on-line schedule. The patients held over from this morning were in for high

cholesterol, a lingering cough, hypertension and hypothyroidism. But, under the

thirty-two year-old's name, it simply said: emergency. A mystery emergency

man. Great.

On an impulse, I decided to get this last minute appointment out of the way. If

my acute visit times weren't convenient for this guy, well, this appointment time

wasn't convenient for me. I'd have him in and out as quickly as possible. Then I

wouldn't have it hanging over my head, making me angrier as the minutes ticked

by.

I looked skeptically at his rather thick chart as I made my way to the lab,

knowing that I should flip through it. But I didn't have the time, and if this was an

acute case, there was a good chance there was no point. What good would it be

to know he'd had his appendix out at twelve, if he stepped on a rusty nail this

morning? Okay, okay, I know my old supervisors back at CHOP would have given

me hell for a statement like that, but I wasn't in the mood.

I took a few seconds outside the door of the lab to make sure my skirt was

straight, my hair was pushed behind my ears, and I mentally berated myself

again for not getting out of that stream of vomit earlier in the morning. Luckily,

I'd had my gym bag with me, so I had some substitute footwear. But I couldn't

help feeling a bit sheepish about wearing track shoes with my navy linen skirt. I

protectively tugged my white coat around my body and raised my hand to knock

on the door. But before I could knock, my stomach nervously flip-flopped. Maybe

I should have grabbed a bite of pizza.

I glanced at the chart in my hands, flipping quickly through the pages. I saw

notes from physical, after physical, after physical, every six months for at least

ten years. This man loved getting physicals. Hmm. According to Dr. Cullen's chart

notes, this mystery guy was always in peak health. His heart rate hovered near

fifty, his blood pressure was in the optimal range, and his weight hadn't changed

by more than a pound in the past ten years. I didn't look in any detail after I

noted all that, deciding it truly must have been some random accident that

brought mystery man in today. According to the chart in my hands, I was about

to come face to face with the picture of perfect health.

I tapped lightly on the door, forcing myself to knock loud enough for the man on

the other side to hear. I was shy by nature, and it took some effort on my part to

feel comfortable in the role of authority figure. It was something I'd been working

on ever since my internship at CHOP.

I heard a deep male voice clear his throat on the other side of the door and I

shivered in my track shoes. Huh, that was odd. I took one last look through the

chart as I pushed the door open and stepped into the lab.

"You're not Carlisle."

Those three simple words evoked the sensation of raw silk running over my bare

skin. The man's words were gently probing and authoritative, all at once. And

velvety. Yes, that was the word: velvety.

I held my breath, waiting for my nerve endings to stop firing. In reality, the

feeling passed the second he'd stopped speaking, but it left me feeling off-kilter.

Maybe it was because we were meeting in the lab. Maybe because I skipped

lunch?

I closed the man's chart. "No, Dr. Cullen is out of the office today. I'm his new

associate, Dr. Swa -"

Oh. My. God.

In some distant part of my brain, I realized that I'd stopped walking, stopped

talking, and was holding the door ajar, not have completely made it into the

room. But, one glance at the mystery emergency man in front of me had made

all coherent speech and muscle movement impossible. Both somatic and

autonomic muscle movement, by the way. I was holding my breath again, and

damn it if my heart hadn't stopped beating all together.

At first, all I saw were two piercing, emerald green eyes and a mop of messy

just-been-fucked copper colored hair. On further inspection, I became certain

that a nubby, white cotton gown had never done so much for a man. I could see

the contours of his defined pecs, the long, lean musculature of his biceps, and his

strong quads peaking out at the hem. Thin golden curls covered his legs. He even

had attractive feet, and I wasn't necessarily into that kind of thing. And, I

couldn't be sure, because maybe Ben, the lab tech, had used some sort of

sunshine-scented cleanser in the lab, but I believed this man smelled

mouthwatering.

And he was peering at me with a lopsided grin on his face.

"Dr. Swa?" he chuckled. The sound of his half laughter had my heart palpably

thumping in my chest, and I felt an unmistakable twinge between my thighs. I

also quickly realized that he was poking fun at me. Well, sure, mystery man must

have stopped women in their tracks on a daily basis.

Move your legs and speak, Bella, I commanded myself. It was time to act like a

physician. But I couldn't. Instead, the knowledge that my reaction had been very

inappropriate popped into my head, about thirty seconds too late, in my

estimation. Sure, at school and during my residency, I'd seen classmates ogle

patients, hook-up with patients, even have relationships with them. And while

this was strictly unethical, and against the rules, it was far from unheard of.

But I had never been so much as tempted. I prided myself in acting

professionally while at work, and keeping my private life private. When I heard

the rumors about classmates hooking up with someone they met at the clinic, it

all sounded sordid and nauseating. I remembered confronting my friend Rose at

CHOP just a couple years back.

"But Rose, it's just wrong," I argued over a cup of coffee.

"That's the best you've got Bella? It doesn't feel wrong. It feels pretty good," she

said knocking back her iced caramel macchiato. Rose did everything

extravagantly, even her coffee beverages.

"Can't you just wait until your rotation is over? Then he won't be your patient

anymore. Problem solved."

"If no one finds out, then there's no problem," Rosalie said, daring me to act on

the information.

To that I only shook my head. I certainly wouldn't report her, but that didn't

mean someone else wouldn't notice. "You could get kicked out of the program,

you know. It doesn't seem worth it, if you ask me."

"Just wait, Bella, one day you'll get yours, then you'll understand. It is, most

definitely, worth it."

Royce dumped Rosalie well before she finished her cardio rotation. She still

wasn't over it, over a year later. At the time, I'd figured it had actually been the

other way around. Instead of me, she'd gotten hers.

But here I was. Was Mr. mystery emergency man mine? I didn't mean 'mine,' I

just meant my opportunity to wrestle with emotions and ethics. This man was

certainly not mine. Why couldn't I stop putting mystery man in the same

sentence with the word 'mine'?

Mystery man cleared his throat and I jumped, like I'd been pleasantly shocked,

and I felt that little twinge again. If I was being truthful, it was more than a little

twinge.

And it was wrong. On so many levels.

I took a deep breath, smiled a strained smile, and looked the man in his beautiful

face. Did I mention that he had a really strong jaw, and that when he smiled at

me again, his teeth were movie-star straight and gleaming white?

"Err, sorry about that Mr…" I looked at his chart, "Mr. Masen. My name is Dr.

Swan. You're a last minute addition to the schedule, and I don't usually see

patients in the lab."

"Yeah, sorry about that," he smiled, looking like he'd been caught stealing

cookies out of a jar. My heart fluttered again, and I reached my hand out and

gripped the countertop.

Dazzling, he was dazzling. I could easily see how he'd gotten the appointment.

"I may have pulled some strings," he confessed, biting his bottom lip. Suddenly, I

wished he were biting my bottom lip. And I wished he'd keep talking. His voice

did more for me than my bullet had been doing lately.

This is wrong, DR. Swan! Now speak!

"Well, it seems you made it past both Gianna and Angela without a note as to

why you're here." I looked over the nurse's notes. "As usual, your blood pressure,

weight and temperature are all perfect. I don't see any signs of major trauma.

So, what brings you in today?" Did I just giggle after I said that? Yes, I just

giggled. Holy crap, get a hold of yourself, Bella.

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