Chapter 6
Tap. Tap. Tap. Sarah lazily drummed a pen against the clipboard in her hand. She was back at work again and tending to people's health. Not that they really had missed her to begin with. No one really had seemed to notice her absence. Although, to be honest, Sarah had even debated not returning to work and calling it quits. But Sarah Spencer wasn't a quitter. She couldn't bring herself to quit anything. Quitting was something her brother did and she certainly was not her brother.
Today, it was the people of the walk-in clinic she would be treating. She stood back at the nurse's station as Gloria's finger clacked against the keyboard at the nurse's station. Sarah continued to stare at the oddity on her clipboard. As she studied the words on the page, she absently brought the pen to her mouth and began to chew it. It was a nasty habit, but most of the time she didn't even realize she was doing it until it was too late.
Gloria raised an eyebrow at her and cleared her throat. Sarah removed the pen from her mouth and looked down at the clipboard rather sheepishly, her face practically aflame. "I don't need to give you the germ talk, do I?" Gloria teased.
Sarah rolled her eyes and ran her fingers through her ponytail. "I can't help it," she muttered to herself before she turned and walked toward her next patient. Apparently, this guy had asked specifically for her. Odd. But not completely unusual. It couldn't be any weirder than Walter, the sweet old guy who came in biweekly with some complaint or another, but usually just wanted another chance to ask her out. Said she reminded him of his wife. It was sweet, but Sarah turned him down every time. But there was something about this guy she couldn't tell why, but it just seemed weird.
Sarah knocked on the door before she opened it and stepped inside. She was not expecting what she saw. Her eyes widened as she backed against the wall. There was a man sitting there in a Dumbledore costume, but when she caught a glimpse of the twinkle in the man's eye, she immediately knew. "Shawn?"
"Sare-Bear!" Shawn greeted emphatically, tugging his long beard down under his chin and smiling at his sister. Sarah rolled her eyes at her childhood nickname given to her by her brother.
"I should have known," Sarah groaned. "C.U. Peigh wasn't sitting right with me." Shawn laughed immaturely at his sister because she said see you pee when pronouncing the name. Sarah rolled her eyes again. "What are you doing here, Shawn?"
"You haven't been answering my calls."
She folded her arms across her chest. "I can't answer them when you haven't called me."
Shawn pushed the long Dumbledore hair away from his eyes. "Touche."
Sarah rolled her eyes and threw her arms up in the air in frustration. "Seriously? Seriously? What do you want, Shawn?"
"Can't a big brother just want to see his little sister?"
Sarah cocked an eyebrow. "Dressed as Dumbledore?" She paused for a moment. "Hang on, where did you get the Dumbledore costume?"
Shawn grinned. "You wouldn't believe the things Gus has in his closet."
Sarah rolled her eyes. Of course, he would steal it from Gus. Although, Gus probably should never expect to get it back unless he decided to man-up and brave Shawn's apartment. But that's neither here nor there. She was working and her brother needed to understand that. "Shawn, unless you seriously have something wrong with you, there are patients here who actually need my attention. Next time, maybe try texting me."
She sharply turned on her heel to leave when Shawn shouted, "Oh, all right! I need help with a case! My medical knowledge isn't as vast as yours."
Sarah stopped and turned to look at her brother over her shoulder. "You do realize Gus is a pharmaceutical rep, right?"
"His knowledge is more focused on butt creams. I need more of a medical professional and you're the person with the second most extensive medical knowledge I know behind WebMD." Shawn grinned at his own joke. His sister, on the other hand, wasn't amused. "C'mon, Sare-I'll owe you."
"Yeah, because I've never heard that before," Sarah scoffed.
"Someone's crabby today."
"Because you barged into my place of employment in a freaking Dumbledore costume to get medical advice. Do you not see how weird that is?"
Shawn shrugged his shoulders and Sarah groaned. "Fine. The sooner I do this, the sooner you're out of here."
Shawn grinned at his sister. "So, there's this lady looking for her husband. Gus and I tailed him, but when we found him, he had a French accent. So, we thought it was totally fake, right? We tried everything to get the guy to stop. We tried scaring him, surprising him, everything-but no change. The woman is certain that it's him-like the birthmarks are in the right spots and everything. Gus even verified the one on his butt. WebMD told me…"
"Foreign Accent Syndrome. It's rare, but it can happen. It's usually caused by a traumatic brain injury or stroke. If I was you, I'd see if any ERs in the area admitted any John Doe's around the time he went missing and…" Sarah stopped and sighed. "...and that's really why you need me, isn't it?" She threw her hands in the air and groaned. Shawn smiled at his sister. "You do realize I could lose my job for something like this, right?"
"Follow up? I mean, the guy went missing right around when you started here. There's a good chance you were an attending."
Sarah folded her arms across her chest and sighed. "If I do this, I'm gonna have a list of demands."
"Okay, shoot."
"First, you are never allowed to come into my ER dressed as a Harry Potter character again."
"What if I get hurt at a Potter-con-thing and this is the closest ER and I'm naked underneath? You know-because of the breeze. Would you really want me to come in naked?" Sarah arched an eyebrow at her brother. "Okay, no Potter costumes. Check."
"Chocolate. You will bring me chocolate once a week for the next 6 months and none of the fake crap. I want chocolate chocolate."
Shawn appeared to think it over before he nodded his head.
"And my third demand will be determined at a later date."
He shrugged his shoulder and held out his hand. Sarah sighed and extended her hand for the SS handshake: hand clap, back hand clap, fist up, fist down, fist bump, and slide. Sarah walked over to the computer on the desk and sat down. She pulled up the file login screen before she turned the keyboard to Shawn.
"You make this too easy," Shawn chuckled before he placed his fingers on the keyboard. He quickly typed something and pressed enter.
ACCESS DENIED.
Shawn's brow slightly furrowed. "Oh, that was the last password," he said easily rolling it off his shoulders. He tried again.
ACCESS DENIED.
"Give up?" Sarah smirked. "Just so you know, it locks me out of the system after 5 failed attempts."
Shawn mimicked her words in his falsetto before he tried again.
ACCESS DENIED.
ACCESS DENIED.
Sarah smirked. "You have a choice to make, Shawny-boy. Admit defeat or lock me out of the system."
Shawn muttered under his breath before he turned the keyboard back toward his sister. Sarah chuckled.
"When I came up with this password, I thought to myself what will Shawn never think of? Well, he thinks I'm intelligent and sentimental. So nothing personal and something very dumb. I thought for a moment and then I had it. PASSWORD." Sarah typed in the word PASSWORD and hit enter.
Shawn's jaw dropped.
Sarah couldn't help but smirk. She had outsmarted her brother. Usually, he was smug and a smartass about being more observant than her, so she always relished the opportunities to rub it in his face. "Just so you know, that password is getting changed the second I leave this room."
Shawn waved her off before he took control of the keyboard again and began filling in the parameters for his search. "You can leave, you know," Shawn said.
"No, I can't. You're logged in as me. As much as I would love to say that I trust you not to mess with hospital files, truth is: I don't."
Shawn rolled his eyes. "I'm harmless. The worst I would do is give Gus a terminal disease."
"My point exactly."
"My point exactly," Shawn mimicked childishly. "You're no fun anymore."
"I've been told near death experiences will do that to a person."
"You're seriously not over that yet?"
Sarah folded her arms across her chest. "You might just be able to get over things by going to Jamba Juice, but I can't. I don't work like that. Not to mention there's nothing medical behind it."
"You're just not giving Jamba Juice therapy a fair chance. When the medical field recognizes it as a valid practice, I want full credit." Shawn then put his pen down and glanced at his sister. "You were the attending, by the way. What can you tell me about him?"
Sarah's brow furrowed and turned the screen back toward her to study the file. "The file was pretty straight forward on this one. Stroke victim found on a bench on the pier. I'm surprised you didn't know about it. It happened almost right outside your office."
"There was a What Not To Wear marathon on that day. I know that because I wanted to watch Gremlins but Gus put the remote down his pants and I wasn't going there because he had the worst gas ever.."
Sarah rolled her eyes. The shenanigans those two got up to...there was no sane way to classify them as adults. She shook her head, but then her brow quickly furrowed. "Hang on, he had a Psych business card in his shirt pocket. I went to put his clothes in a bag and it fell out."
"He was on his way to see me? Huh. This just got a whole hell of a lot weirder."
Sarah then pressed the power button on the tower. "Which you can figure out back at the Psych office. Now, if you'll excuse me, there are people here who actually need to be seen for medical issues. The nurse will be in here to discharge you in a bit." Sarah unplugged the tower and picked it up in her arms. There was no way she was leaving Shawn alone now that he knew her password. She would make up some excuse like it had a bug or something.
She opened the door with her elbow and stood in the opening. "Good luck, Shawn." Sarah kicked the door closed behind her with her foot before she approached the counter. She set the computer tower down and received a confusing look from Gloria. Sarah grabbed the file from the top of the tower and began filling out some paperwork.
"Mr. P needs a full workup and several very invasive procedures too. He's gonna be here for awhile. Oh, and make sure to put a note in the file that under no circumstances should billing accept a card in the name of Burton Guster." Sarah smirked and Gloria looked up at her curiously. "Thank you, Gloria. You're a gem." Sarah flashed the woman a smile.
"Whatever you say, honey," Gloria chuckled. "Whatever you say."
Sarah couldn't help but grin. Shawn wasn't the only Spencer who could mess with people. When they were little, Gus would say Sarah was more like a fart: silent, but deadly. She didn't get even all the time, but when she did-she got back good.
Author's Note: Question-what would you think of down the road, Sarah having a quarter-life crisis and decides to switch professions and opens her own bakery? Thank you to everyone who has read this. There will be some Sarah/Lassie interaction next chapter. Shawn and Sarah angst got the better of me this chapter. Sorry it's been so long. It was a rough school year and then I moved across the country. I'm in the process of trying to get into my place and then starting the new job, so we shall see how things go. Thanks again for reading/reviewing/following/favoriting! It means the world to me! :)