Chapter 4. Get a Job
Cameron hadn't been back to the clinic since they'd taken all the patients to the high school the day before when she and House had brought all sorts of supplies and equipment with them, so now he helped her unload what was left in his car. The infirmary also needed to be cleaned up and put back together, the four cots stripped, coffee cups and soda cans gathered, and instruments cleaned and put away. She found some garbage bags and began to collect all of the nonhazardous trash that had accumulated over the past few days, then set to work in her little lab to take inventory of what she needed to replace.
House left her to it, and sat down at the front desk. There hadn't been any patients yet that morning, and he was just as happy that there weren't. He turned on the computer. Technically, he shouldn't even have access to it, but since he had no intention of trying to read any confidential files, he shrugged that off.
No, what he was after was information on the hospitals in the nearest towns. Salisbury was a pretty big city. Snow Hill and Pocomoke were smaller. Maybe he'd be better off at the smallest facility he could find.
He came up with a list of five hospitals within sixty miles of Shelby. Maybe he'd restrict his first overtures to the three closest of them, including the small one in Snow Hill where they'd sent Seth Davis and a few other patients the day before. Now he had to come up with a resume and proposal.
It had been a while since he'd had to create a resume. He certainly couldn't depend on recommendations from his most recent boss. Or for that matter, from any of the bosses who'd fired him before Cuddy gave him a job. So his resume would have to be very convincing. It would probably help that he was a well-known diagnostician, but he also knew he had a reputation as an arrogant doctor who didn't play by any else's rules but his own.
He'd decided that he wanted to propose a diagnostic team, similar to the one he'd had at PPTH. He was comfortable working that way. Maybe he wouldn't offer fellowships. That would require money that most small-town hospitals didn't have. He'd always thought it was somewhat masochistic of the young doctors who wanted so desperately to work for him, but he could use that to advantage.
It would probably be a good idea to include a list of the publications his staff have produced over the years, detailing the cases they'd worked with him. He really didn't have to ask for permission to use them, he thought. But if he did, he knew Cameron at least would let him include any she wrote.
The phone rang, breaking into his thought process. His first inclination was to let it ring, but after three rings, he glanced at the door to the infirmary and picked it up. "Shelby house of ill repute," he said.
The person at the other end of the line hung up and he smiled. Playing receptionist was a piece of cake.
He went back to his resume and proposal, and had made some tentative progress on both when Cameron came out from the infirmary. "I just spoke to my insurance company. They're sending an adjuster to look at the car this afternoon."
House nodded. "Did you call the car salesman?" he asked.
"Not yet," she said, shaking her head. "Have we had any calls?" He shook his head, but then she realized he had the computer on. "What are you doing?"
"Taking the first steps to get back to work," he said.
Cameron smiled. "If there's anything I can do to help..."
He smiled back at her. "Don't think I won't take you up on that!"
But before he could ask her to write him some recommendations, and give him the names of the people to approach at each of the hospitals, the door to the clinic opened and a young woman walked in carrying a baby.
"Dr. Cameron, Josie won't stop crying," she said, sounding frantic.
"Bring her in back," Cameron told her. "House, can you find the chart for Josie Dryer?" She indicated a rack of files against one wall. "They're alphabetical."
As she took the baby and her mother to the back, House smirked at the idea that now he'd been relegated to the task of file clerk. Was that a promotion or demotion from receptionist? He quickly found the baby's records and brought them in to Cameron. She had unwrapped the baby on one of the examining tables, and was checking her vitals. Rather than giving her the file, he scanned the contents and looked at the child.
"She's about seven months old?" he said. "No chicken pox inoculation yet, right? They don't usually give the varicella vaccine until after babies are 12 months old but their immunity from their mother's doesn't last much past six months."
Another doctor might have insisted he hand over the file, but Cameron smiled to herself, thinking it was always good to have House in on a consult. "I don't think it's chicken pox," she said, indicating the rash that was clearly visible all over the baby's body, even in her mouth. "But there's a possibility that it's measles. She hasn't been vaccinated against measles, mumps or rubella yet, either."
"Have you examined the ears yet?" he asked.
"Are you a doctor?" the young mother asked.
"Yes he is," Cameron answered for him.
They finally agreed that it was measles, and sent the baby home with her mother and instructions for her care until the virus was out of her system and the symptoms were gone. For the most part all Josie's mother could do was make the baby more comfortable.
When they were gone, House said, "I suppose you get a lot of that kind of thing."
"I'm finding that first-time mothers are the most likely to bring kids in with childhood diseases," Cameron replied. "I noticed that you were ready enough to help with the diagnosis."
"Yeah, well, I'm not about to make it a habit. It's still too much like clinic and I hate it."
"It is a clinic," she said with a smirk. "And clinics need diagnosticians as much as hospitals do."
"Does that mean I get paid three times?" he asked. In response to her puzzled look he added. "I've been receptionist, file clerk and diagnostician already today and it isn't even lunch time yet."
