Potions of Love

Chapter 1
August 27, 2022


Our story begins two years later.

Rick and Kate are starting their 3rd year as lab interns at Mayo Clinic's Alix Medical School of Medicine and Science in downtown Rochester. Rick has completed his 2nd year in the pharmaceutical program and is moving into a semester of intense study on various drug interactions between several highly prescribed medications. With all of the issues surrounding overly prescribed drugs, the college is modifying one of its programs to give students a more intense study of potential drug issues and interactions.

Kate has completed her primary studies for her Medical Psychology Fellowship. She will continue her work with neurological behaviors, including learning how different medications could impact neurological treatments for various brain disorders. This part of her study program has been very close to her heart ever since the loss of her friend, Allison, in 8th grade.

Rick Rodgers and Kate Beckett are aware of each other as they have shared a couple of lecture classes during the past year. They've briefly greeted one another after classes and have had short conversations about their instructors and assignments, but nothing personal has developed.

The study block for 3rd-year students starts the following Monday, so this is the last weekend for students to relax and enjoy some downtime before they get back into a regular class routine. Some of the students will be going off campus for one last fling, others are just hanging out with friends, and some are helping with a local Campus outreach project.

On the 4th Saturday of each month, students from different medical programs at Alix assist a regional Food Box doing various jobs to support the agency's work in local neighborhoods. Today, students from the pharmacy and psychology departments will be helping stock the agency's Food Truck. Students were asked to bring various food items to the agency's large warehouse and help volunteers organize and stock the food truck, so it's ready to go into a local neighborhood the next day.

Rick is working at one of the long tables sorting out canned goods when Kate walks in with a couple of her friends. She looks around and sees Rick, and the two nod to one another.

The sorting continues for another hour, and then it's time to load the truck. Agency volunteers organize the students to form an assembly line, and then the work begins. Boxes of various food items are passed down the line and handed off to students in the truck, who help put them in cabinets for easy distribution the next day.

Rick, Kate, and one of Kate's friends, along with another guy from the pharmacy department, end up in the truck with one of the volunteers. Things are moving so fast that Rick can only say a couple of words to Kate.

When the loading is complete, Rick joins Kate and three others at one of the tables that have been set up in the parking lot, where a few snacks and bottles of water have been provided as thanks to the students for their help.

Conversations were light and primarily focused on the group's work that morning. All involved felt good about the opportunity to reach out and help others in the community. As conversations die down, the three other students excuse themselves leaving Rick and Kate at the table.

There is a minute or two of awkward silence until Rick speaks up and says, "That was fun. I've seen signs about the food truck program around campus, but I've never joined in before. I'm glad it worked out that our two departments could help out today."

Kate nods her head and says, "Yes, it is a wonderful project, and I have been able to help out a few times. It feels good knowing that several people who have some serious needs will get some help tomorrow."

There was another round of silence until Kate said, "Rick, it was good to see you again. I need to head home as I have a ton of work to get done before Monday's classes start back up."

They both stand, and Rick awkwardly stretches out his hand, saying, "Yea, Kate, it was good to see you too. I hope your study time goes well."

Kate is surprised to see his outstretched hand, but she goes ahead and reaches out to accept his handshake. It's crazy, but she could swear she feels a little tickle as their hands touch. "Yes, the same to you. I mean, if you have to study too, I hope it goes well," she answers with a slight anxiousness in her voice.

Rick is happy that she accepted his offered hand and misses the contact when she pulls away. He smiles and says, "Have a good rest of the weekend, Kate. Hope to see you again if we have some of the same classes."

Kate nods to Rick, and then both of them shyly smile at one another, then turn and head home.

It's Monday, and the first two weeks of the new study block involve orientation classes for the course studies that both Kate and Rick will be entering into over the next several months. It's their first opportunity to do a deep dive into what their classes will look like and get a feel for the assignments that will be involved.

With orientation classes focusing on their areas of study, Rick and Kate haven't seen each other since the Food Truck project. And neither realizes that they have been selected to be a part of the new research study on drug interactions.

It's been an intense couple of weeks with all of the orientation classes, and they are both looking forward to the weekend, but they have three more days to get through before they can take a break.

It's Tuesday evening, and Kate joins some of her friends at a planning meeting for the upcoming Campus Mixed Bag Talent Showcase. Kate notices that her friends are acting a little funny. She looks over to Lanie, one of her closest friends, and asks, "What's up with you guys?" Lanie looks to the group, and they all shake their heads. Now Kate knows something is going on and says, "Okay, you guys, what are you up to this time?"

Her friends all turn to Lanie, who takes a deep breath and says, "Um well, we sort of signed you up to play your guitar at the Showcase on Friday night at the park."

"You did what?" asks Kate. Even Lanie looks uncomfortable, but then Tori nudges her, and she explains how it all happened.

"Kate, you know how important the showcase is for so many of the kids in the neighboring hospitals, and we just thought you could brighten their day," explains Lanie.

Finally, Tori and Roz chime in with Roz saying, "Yea, Kate, you are awesome, and maybe you could even play a few songs that the kids could sing along with you?"

"Oh, now you have me playing my guitar and singing? Geez, guys, you could have given me a little heads up on this one?" states Kate. She sits there staring at her friends, trying to decide what to do. The show is Friday night, and it's already Tuesday, and she's sure the posters announcing the event have already been distributed to the area hospitals, so she really can't back out.

Kate looks around to the circle of her so-called friends, giving them one of her pattened glares, and says, "Okay, you know I really can't back out this so close to the event, but I have a plan." Kate is smiling now, and that is scaring the group even more.

"If I am going to be doing this playing and singing gig, you all are going to join in with me on the singing. After all, we don't want to disappoint all of those children, do we?" Kate has a smirk on her face as she delivers the news to her friends. They sit there, shocked but realizing they don't have a choice.

They look at one another, and again Lanie is the spokesperson for the crew and says, "Okay, Kate, you have a deal. We'll plan to meet you at the park at 6:00 pm. And Kate, thanks for doing this; it will be a great time for all of the kids and their parents."

Kate is quiet for a few moments and then says, "Yea, I know. Those kids have been through so much, and this is the least WE can do for them. I'll see you all at 6:00 at the park." She smiles again at her friends and stands up to leave. "Sorry to cut out on you, but I do have an early class," and she heads for home.

It's Friday night, and it has been a strange week, and Rick is bored. He can't exactly pinpoint why he feels so out of sorts but knows he needs to get out of his apartment and do something different. He remembers seeing a poster in the Commons area at Gonda Hall about some talent show being held at the park down by the Science Center tonight. What's to lose, maybe a couple of hours of his time? He decides to give it a try. It will be something different for him.

Rick hops up, feeds his cat, and heads to the shower. He has just enough time to get cleaned up and get to the park by 6:30 p.m.

Rick hasn't seen anything of Kate for the past two weeks, so he is surprised to see her sitting up on the stage playing the guitar and singing along with some other girls and several kids from the audience. He sits by himself, a little off to the side, so she doesn't see him. As he watches and listens, he is blown away by her talent and her incredible voice and even more determined to get to know her on a deeper level.

It's Monday morning, orientation classes are over, and lectures and labs are starting, including the new drug interaction research program. Assignments for the study have been given, and the professor assigned study partners. Knowing Rick and Kate's learning goals were drastically different, the professor thought they would make a solid team with their drug interaction research.

The two had received their study partner assignments the day before and were very surprised to find that they had been paired together for the project. Kate arrived early and chose a lab table toward the front of the room. Rick came in a few minutes later and saw that Kate had already arrived and was sitting at a table near the front of the class. Rick would have preferred to sit further back, but Kate's selection didn't surprise him as he knows she is very studious when it comes to her coursework.

Rick approaches the table and says, "Well, hi, fancy meeting you here." Kate looks up from what she is reading, gives Rick a slight smile, and replies, "Yea, I wasn't expecting us to be paired together for this study project." As soon as the words were out of her mouth, she knew they came out wrong and saw an immediate sense of disappointment on Rick's face. "Oh, hey, I didn't mean that like it sounded. Sorry. I just meant since you are in the pharmacy program and I'm in psychology, I was surprised that Professor Andrews paired us up."

Kate watches Rick and waits to see what he might say. Rick continues watching Kate and pauses for a minute before answering. He heard the sincerity in her apology, so he relaxed and said, "Yea, me too. I had figured I'd get one of my classmates, and I was praying it wouldn't be Sam. He is one strange dude." With his lighthearted response, they both seemed to relax, and Rick took his seat beside Kate as they waited for Professor Andrews to begin the class.

Their first lab went well, and they ended up spending an hour talking after the class ended with brainstorming on a plan for their next session. This lab would be held weekly on Mondays and Wednesdays, and they wanted to coordinate their other class times if they needed to communicate between labs about the professor's assignments. They also learned that they would have two lecture classes together again during their scheduling discussion.

Kate says, "Thanks for working things out with me. I think Andrews sounds like he could pile on outside readings for this lab since it's a new approach for the University's research work." "I agree," Rick replies. "I knew this might be a hard lab since it appears they may be fine-tuning the study as they go. But it's an important study, and I am happy we will be working together." Kate looks at him for a couple of seconds but nods her head in agreement. They wish each other a good evening and go their separate ways.

Since it was rather late, both Rick and Kate headed off to their separate apartments. Rick went to the student parking area and picked up his Jeep, while Kate decided to walk home.

Kate thought that her conversation with Rick had been rather interesting, especially his closing comment about them working together. Maybe she's reading more into his simple statement, but she feels there may be something more there than just a lab partner relationship.

Rick seems like a nice enough guy, and if she is honest with herself, he is very easy on the eyes. He's also a good listener and seemed excited to hear her ideas as they were developing their study plan. Kate felt that this could turn out to be a fun lab session. She just smiled as she continued her walk home and found herself thinking about Rick more than she probably should be. After all, she is in a relationship with Josh Davison, the sexy surgical intern from Mayo's main campus hospital.

As Rick drove home, he found his attention was focused on Kate. Their lab had turned out to be so much more than he ever expected. He was going to thoroughly enjoy the time he would be able to spend with her. This would be different from their lecture classes, where they only had passing conversations. He also never realized how truly gorgeous she was! Wow! She was a fox and drew the attention of many guys around her, but spending some quality time with her also brought out her inner beauty. She is beautiful, along with being super bright and so easy to talk to about anything. This was becoming his favorite class.

Rick made it home and went inside his apartment to be greeted with what was turning out to be a very repetitive event. When he first arrived in Rochester, he was a bit lonely, so on a whim, he had gone to the local AR shelter and adopted a not-so-good-looking cat named Neddie. She wasn't the prettiest cat in the shelter, but she had been attracted to Rick right off the bat and had followed him around the entire time he was there. It was nice to have someone to come home to, but lately, she had developed a nasty habit of opening the cupboard door and spreading the garbage across the kitchen floor. And not to disappoint, she did it again today.

Rick sighed and went about cleaning up the mess all the time, chastising Neddie about being a "bad kitty" as she sat on the countertop and glared at him. He needed to figure out a way to secure that cupboard door. Maybe one of those childproof things would work. After he finished, he put down some more food and fresh water, and she seemed to cheer up. After feeding the cat, Rick dug through the refrigerator and found some leftover pizza from the night before.

He grabbed a beer and his pizza and headed into the living room, turning on the TV and settling down to watch the news. About 10 minutes later, Neddie came in and hopped on the back of the couch, and began swatting at the back of his head until he set his plate on the side table so she could jump down and crawl into his lap. Once she settled down, she immediately started her "I'm happy now" purr and went to sleep. Rick just shook his head, thinking about his exciting nightlife, and continued watching the news until it was time to hit the books and prepare for tomorrow's classes, all the time having fleeting thoughts and wondering what Kate was doing. He knew she had a boyfriend, but he couldn't help it. He was very attracted to her and hoped he would have a chance to get to know her even better.

Kate had made it home, tossed her messenger bag on the table by the front door, and headed to the bedroom to change clothes. It would be another fun evening for her. Find some leftovers to heat up, watch a little TV, then start reviewing her notes and assignments for the next day's classes. But tonight was a little different. As she ate her leftover Chinese and watched the last few minutes of the local news, she found her thoughts drifting back to Rick. It seemed like it had been a long time since she had such a relaxed conversation with a guy.

Even with Josh, no matter what topic their conversation started on, it always ended up focusing on him and how his work was going, how exciting it was to be learning from the top Cardiothoracic heart surgeon at Mayo, and on and on. Kate would try to share about her classes, especially her behavioral neurology course, and he would try to act like he was listening, but she could tell nothing much was registering with him. That hadn't been the way her conversations with Rick had gone. He listened!

Oh no, here she goes again, thinking about another guy. What was her brain doing to her? At the same time, there was a knock at the door, and she had a good idea who it was, Josh. He had been doing some extra rounds at the hospital, and they hadn't seen much of each other over the last couple of weeks.

Kate answers the door, and sure enough, Josh is standing there with his usual smirk and leans in to kiss her. She accepts his kiss and steps to the side so he can come in. "Hey Kate, have you missed me?" He doesn't even really listen to her answer; he just walks into the living room and flops down on the couch, patting the cushion beside him, wanting her to come and sit with him. She stands still for a minute, watching him and trying to decide what to do.

She stalls and asks if she can get him something to drink? "He says, sure, a beer if you've got it." Kate nods and heads to the kitchen to get a couple of beers. She's trying to figure out what is different about tonight. This is their usual routine, but Kate is not that excited to have him over right now. She walks back into the living room, hands him a beer, and sits down beside him.

He immediately begins talking about his day and an upcoming clinical rotation he will be doing the rest of the week at a hospital in Minneapolis.

Kate's taken aback by the news about the rotation and says, "You hadn't told me about your rotation."

Josh looks at her and says, "Sure I did, Babe. I told you two weeks ago."

Kate looks at him and is about to argue with him, but knows it would be a waste of time, especially since he's already moved on and is telling her about a new resident that just started on his shift at Mayo. Kate just sits there giving short one-word answers now and then so he would think she is listening.

Things get quiet after about 15 minutes, and then Josh begins kissing Kate, trying to get her as worked up as he is. They finally move into her bedroom, where Josh immediately gets down to business but isn't taking care of any of her needs.

Sure enough, shortly after he's satisfied, he rolls out of bed, gets dressed, and leans over to kiss her goodbye. "Babe, it's always so good with you. I can't wait till the next time." Kate gives him a fake smile and tells him goodbye, never commenting on what he just said.

Josh doesn't even wait for her to get dressed and walk him to the door; he just says, "Fly high, Kate, and I'll see ya next time." What the heck does 'fly high' mean, she asks herself? He's been saying that for the last couple of months as he leaves after his late evening visits.

After putting on her robe, she walks out into the living room, locks the door, turns off all the lights, and then goes back into the bedroom.

Her time with Josh hasn't always been satisfying, but tonight was worse than usual. Kate isn't sure if she can continue like this with him.

Instead of working on her notes for tomorrow's class, she drops her robe on the floor and heads into the bathroom for a warm shower. When she's done, she just crawls into bed and tries to go to sleep, but again her thoughts are drifting back to Rick. She sighs, closes her eyes, and hopes she can get some sleep since she has a full day of classes on Tuesday.

A/N - The Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine and Science is real, along with the study programs listed for our two main characters. The two activities used for this story, the Food Truck and the Mixed Bag Talent night, are also listed as campus activities on the school's website. But for this story, the Food Truck activity was expanded to include 3rd-year students. The labs and exercises used throughout this story were based primarily on my ideas and imagination.

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