Chapter 81

Anna came back down almost an hour later. She had a smile on her face as she sat down at the admit desk, this time she had a bowl of ice cream. Coburn had given her a script for the nausea and a peak at the baby. It was just this little jelly bean looking thing right now but she was happy none the less. She put her feet up looking at the board, "hey am I an ER doc today or a pediatrician."

Doug lifted his head up. He had been trying to get rid of his hangover for awhile now. Good thing the ER wasn't packed today. "Take your pick. There aren't any patient's anyway." he said closing his charts. "Hey I'm going to get some lunch in a second if you want to come with me...or i could just take an order. I'm a pretty good service boy and I
could use a tip." he said trying to joke. He didn't want to make Anna talk to him if she didn't want to, but it seemed like she had something important the other day.

Anna's eyes lit up, "ohh food, yes count me in... but hey it's on me. Because I am so starving." She grabbed her wallet, "I will meet you over at Docs." She said as she zipped out the bay doors. She found a booth and sat down. She was really starving now. She ordered not wanting to wait for Doug unsure of how long he would be. Now would be as good of time as any to tell him. They weren't in the hospital so no one would overhear them. She started to sip at the milkshake trying to decide what would be the best way to approach this.

Doug finished his last chart and walked over to docs. It felt good to actually walk again. Once inside he looked around until he saw Anna at a booth. Doug went over and sat down. He picked up a menu as he as she had already ordered. "Guess you were hungry..." Doug looked over the menu quickly before the waitress came over. "Hey, can I have a burger and fries with just water to drink please." she said handing her the menu and focusing on Anna. "Milkshake huh?" he said with a smile. It was hard to believe he would be at home without her to be with anymore.

She smiled, "yeah," she wasn't sure, "everything okay with you?" She asked, "I gave your name and number to my insurance agent about the accident. They should be getting a hold of you; I guess they didn't have all the right information to process the claim...sorry about that, I mean I don't even know your birthday."

Doug grinned. "May 6th...but no parties ok?" he joked as his food came out. He stuck a fry in his mouth thinking on the rest of her question. He didn't want to tell her he felt crappy for sleeping with some woman he had just met and that now looking at her, he felt totally guilty and stupid. Or if she had read his letter. "well...besides the fact I might have to sell my house and take my girls out of private school...I'm still paying off loans from college and the screwy PT docs want to have me quartered everything's great." he stated sarcastically, biting into his burger. He let out a deep sigh. "But you know...that's life I guess. Or at least mine. Bad karma sucks." he said with a grin.

"I'm sorry," She said, she couldn't tell him now. He had enough to worry about. She couldn't just say hey guess what I'm having a baby and you're the father. This was not the right time to drop this in his lap on top of everything else. "Ahh your karma is not all that bad. We're still friends, right?" She shoved a bite into her mouth. She couldn't believe that she was this hungry and that she was putting it away so fast with a guy sitting in front of her.

The smile faded off of Doug's face. "Well...actually I wasn't sure. You haven't exactly given me straight signals the past few days...and..." he didn't want to ask in case she hadn't but he had to know. "I didn't know if you'd gotten a chance to see the note I wrote you. It was kind of important."

Anna choked on the French fry that she had just put in her mouth. "I did." She put her head down on her hand her fingers wrapped in her bangs. What did he want her to say, that she wanted to be nothing more than to be friends that she was sorry she had been a hormonal nightmare but being pregnant makes your body retaliate in ways you couldn't imagine. That her heart wasn't ready to let her move on yet. "I understand," was all she could bring herself to say.

"Yeah I'm sure" Doug said scratching the back of his head nervously. The silence was enough to kill him. "so." he said trying to change the subject as he went back to eating. "What did you want to talk about the other day? It seemed like it was bugging you."

She threw her head back against the back of the booth, "ohm you really don't want to know, I'm pretty sure you really don't want to know."

Doug made a face at her. "hey...the more you say that the more I want to know...especially if its something juicy...I'm the king of the gossip mill." he said with a laugh. He tossed a French fry her way. "Come on, I'm going to steal your milkshake in a second." he liked teasing her. It felt like they were really friends again. Whatever she had to tell him couldn't be that bad if she could joke around with him. Maybe he was just over reacting.

She shook her head as she pulled her milkshake closer to her. "King of the gossip mill huh. Well..." She paused for a minute, "how about them bulls."

Doug grinned and shook his head. "Oh that's rough" he said tossing another piece of fry at her. "You're killing me smalls! And speaking of the Bulls...they totally sucked last night. I need to pick a better team to root for." he tilted his head to the side and tried to read her face. He hadn't ever been good at it and it wasn't working now. "oh come on...you were dying to tell me yesterday and now you wont...come on, I need some good news." he said with a smile.

'Make something up Anna, anything.' She said to herself. "Did you find those Courtside tickets that I left for you in your box? I got those and thought instantly of how much you love the bulls and I would feel so out of place sitting there rooting for the phillies sitting courtside behind the bulls bench."

Doug smiled. It was good news after all. "Yeah I did. I was looking for a good time to thank you...so thanks Anna. That was really sweet." He was feeling awful now after what he had done last night. He could see in her face that she still held something for him, but he couldn't go through that again...not now. "There are two tickets though. I don't know who I'm going to take. Alli..." Doug bit his lip as he tried to correct his mistake. "No one I know likes basketball as much as I do. I've never been courtside either. Too bad you're a philly's fan." he said with a fake smile.

She grimaced, "whose Alli?"

Doug sat there with a horrified look on his face. His mind wasn't working fast enough to come up with a response. "Uhm I uhm...just someone I had drinks with the other night. No big deal...she doesn't even like sports I mean...who doesn't like basketball right?" Doug spoke quickly, wishing he hadn't said that. He knew Anna was too smart to buy it. Allison on the other hand didn't even notice when he called her Anna on three different occasions last night. "She's just a friend Anna...its nothing." he said, digging at his hand. "Ok... so it was a date...i mean you went out with Susan and that guy too. And we're not going out so it doesn't matter anyway." Doug felt bad trying to explain away everything. It shouldn't matter...but it did. He thought seeing someone else would make him feel better if she was jealous but that didn't work either. Even though he spoke confidently and in his smart ass cocky tone he was torn up inside.

"You know what you're right. It's not like it really matters who you're seeing." She felt her hormones start to swing rapidly once again, "You know what that other guy that everyone seems to think that I am dating, seeing, or even sleeping with is my brother's best friend, his bloody ass team mate!" She stood up throwing money down on the table for lunch. "I am not seeing anyone not now not ever! God does everyone think that I am some sort of freaking slut!" She stormed outside.

Doug closed his eyes as she started to yell at him. As soon as she left he whispered "perfect" to himself. He opened his eyes to see everyone staring at him. With a quick smile he got up and followed her outside. "I didn't say that! Jesus Anna! Thanks for embarrassing me in there, that's real nice." he yelled back, walking quickly past her and into the hospital. He didn't need this crap today. He was trying to be nice and she had to go turn it all around and twist everything up. "Figures" he said out loud.

She walked inside her eyes toward the floor as she threw her wallet back into its place and walked into the bathroom. She leaned against the stall door. She couldn't do this, she couldn't handle this, it was all too much right now. She let the tears go, she was alone and was going to have to get used to it. He moved on, he didn't need her, and she didn't need him...but she wasn't even fooling herself with that.