Chapter 11
Mid-August, and her twenty-first week, arrived quickly. Dave was arriving in the next hour after deciding to drive from California to Chicago over the last few days. She'd taken the day off to be at home when he arrived and do what little she could to help him move. Luckily, Morris and Gates had offered to help out, much to her relief. There wasn't much that he needed to bring into the apartment, so he'd rented a storage locker for the rest of his furniture until he found his own place.
She'd spent the last few weeks trying to organize everything in the apartment and putting away the rest of the unemptied boxes in Dave's room. Then packed some non-essential stuff up to make space. She'd tried to do little bits here and there to pace herself, but she'd been so busy with work, that she was now trying to move those boxes into her room out of the way.
Her aerobic fitness had been pretty good previously all things considered. She made a concerted effort to stay healthy to keep her heart as strong as possible for as long as possible. But, since moving to Chicago, she hadn't had the time or the energy to work out properly. Work was certainly easier in San Francisco, but she'd been running the place for two years already, so it was bound to be. Whipping County into shape like she had at SFG was taking a lot more of her time, and energy.
And then there was pregnancy to contend with. She wasn't feeling particularly bad per se, but there was a noticeable difference in her stamina and energy levels, and the bigger her bump was getting, the less room there was for her lungs, so she was starting to notice some shortness of breath already. None of this boded well for what was to come, but she tried to push it to the back of her mind and concentrate on the things in front of her right now.
By the time she had moved everything, she was exhausted and flopped onto the couch to rest before the guys arrived. Before her eyes even had time to close, Dave came through her door all red-faced, carrying a box. "Why is it ninety degrees outside when I'm moving?"
Lucy hoisted herself off of the couch and followed him into his room where he set the box down in the corner and then turned to give her a sweaty hug. "Ewww." She pushed him away as he laughed evilly. "You're disgusting."
His eyes narrowed as he studied her closely. She looked weary, and her eyes were puffy from work and lack of sleep. Lucy turned away from him obviously trying to hide from him, but he had already spotted her rapid breathing which told him either she was pushing herself too much, or she was developing some heart failure.
Lucy saw his eyes narrow as he looked at her. She knew what he was doing, so turned away to go back into the lounge before he gave her a lecture.
"What have you been doing this morning?" He questioned her.
"Just tidying a little, making sure everything was ready for you arriving." Lucy didn't stop and continued into the lounge and fluffed some cushions to look busy.
"Tidying what exactly?"
"Nothing much. You're looking surprisingly chipper for someone who just drove across country."
"Don't change the subject!"
She knew he wouldn't leave it alone, so she just came out with it. "I moved some boxes into my room, and I did some vacuuming."
"And how long have you had the shortness of breath?" He stood in the doorway of his room with his hands on his hips waiting for an answer.
Lucy sighed heavily and turned round to face him. "It's not what you're thinking. My lungs are clear. I just get more out of breath when I'm doing stuff, that's all."
"You need to take it easy, Lucy." He was firm with her knowing how stubborn she was. "You know pregnancy can make it worse."
"I'm well aware…" she quickly shut up as Tony and Morris came through the door carrying more boxes.
"Hey Lucy." Morris greeted her not paying attention to the atmosphere.
"Hey." Tony said cautiously, sensing some tension in the air. They disappeared into the bedroom and came back out to Dave and Lucy still stood in silence.
"You wouldn't believe the drive we had over here from the storage place…" Morris was about to complain about the traffic when Tony grabbed him by the shoulder and ushered him out.
"Don't look at me like that, Dave. I'm not a child."
He moved towards her and softened. "I know you're not. You've managed a stressful job with a heart condition for two years, but now pregnancy on top! I just worry about you, that's all."
"Well, it's a good job you're moving in then!" She smiled at him, knowing he could never stay mad at her for too long. "I just need to use the bathroom, then I'll be down."
"No, you're not. You're going to sit on that couch with your feet up and supervise." He instructed.
"I think I can manage…" She began, but he cut her off.
"No arguments." He gave her a stern look and she didn't argue anymore.
An hour later, he was all moved in, and the guys were all lounging around in the cool central air, swigging a beer. Lucy had done as she was told and only moved from the couch to open the beers for them. As much as it pained her to do as she was told, it was nice that Dave cared. At least someone did.
A few days later and Dave had his second first day at County. Lucy was busy with admin stuff all day, so it was just Morris and himself as the attendings. He'd already spent time with Morris, so he'd been able to suss him out quite quickly. It was going to take longer to figure out the other doctors and their names, but at least the nurses were pretty much the same. Though, he hoped he could redeem himself a little and show them he had changed from the last time they had worked with him.
As for being back at County, it was strange. Things felt eerily familiar but also different. It would take time to get to grips with the way County worked again and where everything was, but he was happy Lucy had got InnoMed partially up and running because at least he knew that system inside out.
The ER had been uncharacteristically quiet that morning and Dave sloped off to check in with Lucy. Following the incident with Morris walking in on her dressing, she now had a sign on her door to indicate whether she was free, busy, in the ER, or out of office. Despite being able to hear her talking on the phone, the sign said she was free, so he tapped on the door and waited. "Come in." He heard her respond from the other side of the frosted window that had her name and title emblazoned in the center.
Dave tentatively opened the door and peaked in to see Lucy pacing up and down her office with a hand on her lower back as she spoke. She ushered him in and he closed the door and took a seat. Staring at her desk as she spoke, he was reassured to see there was a packet of half-eaten grapes and the discarded wrapper of a protein bar.
"The funding is in place, I'm just waiting on the board to review the contract bids and pick one…I've no idea…Soon, I hope…Ok…I'll get back to you once a decision has been made and we can go from there…Alright. Bye." Lucy set the phone down on her desk, let out a frustrated groan, and flopped down into her chair behind the desk.
"The board still haven't made a decision?" He knew Lucy had had a meeting that morning to talk about the contract to refurbish trauma two.
"Nope. They're taking their sweet ass time and it's pissing me off. They closed the applications last week. And still they haven't decided who to award it to…How has your morning been?"
"Surprisingly slow. But it's given me a chance to try and figure things out as I go. You free for lunch soon?"
Lucy looked at the clock behind Dave's head above the door determining if she had enough time. "I desperately need to tackle this paperwork." She gestured her eyes to the tray on her right that was piled high with patient records and other seemingly important paperwork. "Make it a late lunch? Two hours?"
Two hours later and Lucy had emerged from her office bearing lunch for the two of them. Wandering into the ER, she was struck by how peaceful it seemed. Dave was at Admit busy inputting information onto the computer.
"Did Chicago hear you were back and decide not to come?" Lucy questioned Dave as she approached them.
"Probably." Dave glanced over to her holding up their lunch. "Give me five minutes. I'm just finishing up a discharge."
"No problem." Lucy grabbed a computer herself and had a look at InnoMed at the patient stats for the day so far. There'd been twenty-five patients through the ER, with eighteen discharged, three admissions, and four awaiting results. Another four were waiting to be seen and two to be triaged. She was surprised, especially given the weather which usually meant plenty of heat strokes, sunburns, and water incidents. Chicago really was behaving themselves today!
Dave peered over her shoulder now finished with his discharge. "Weird, isn't it?"
"Definitely. Means Simon and Gloria are probably in for a rough night." She closed down the screen and they headed into the lounge to eat.
They settled down in the lounge and unpacked the food Lucy had had delivered. She'd opted for a baked potato with cheese and coleslaw and Dave had a meatball sub. Ready to tuck into her food, the fork was midway to her mouth when Dave asked about the email.
"So. You sent that email to Carter yet?"
"Two days you lasted. I'm surprised." She'd been waiting for it ever since he arrived. Ignoring the actual question, she shoved the food into her mouth anyway.
"I thought I'd keep you in suspense. You can't avoid it forever you know!"
"I'll give it a good try." She shovelled in another mouthful noticing that Dave hadn't even touched his food yet. She knew there was no getting out of this conversation, but she waited to buy some time for someone to come in the lounge so they couldn't talk about it. The silence persisted as no one came to her rescue and Dave waited patiently. "You know I haven't, or you wouldn't be asking." She rolled her eyes at him sideways.
"Don't roll your eyes at me, Lucy." His tone wasn't scolding like a teacher or parent would be. It was more exasperation at his friend than anything else. "Time is going fast and before you know it, Bean will be here. I know you. You put hard things off for as long as possible. But sometimes that makes the situation worse. And leaving it too long to tell him, is only going to make this worse. All you have to do is click send. Hell. I'll click send for you if it helps."
Lucy pursed her lips considering what he said. Logically, she knew it was just the click of a button. It was so simple, yet why did it feel so insurmountable? Getting Dave to press send would be the easy option. But even the thought of Carter reading the email gave her knots and a wave of nausea in her stomach. She dropped her fork into the food, her appetite now gone.
"I know it's simple, Dave. You have no idea how much time I have spent arguing with myself to just send the email. I run an ER, but I can't send one. Damn. Email. Just thinking about it makes me feel sick. I can't. I just can't." With elbows on the table, Lucy put her head in her hands.
As much as it frustrated him that she hadn't told Carter, he didn't want to cause her anymore stress than she was already giving herself, so he dropped it. He finally began to feed his grumbling stomach.
That afternoon, Lucy was going through the votes for the renaming of the MacArthur Grant. She had put her choice up to the vote, and there were a few others; some serious, some just plain silly. She'd discounted the silly ones for the vote thinking the board wouldn't be too pleased with Granty-McGrant-Face or Money for Nothing.
Lucy counted up the votes for the three options: County Medical Research Grant with two percent; The Medical Excellence Research Grant, or MERG, with ten percent; but overwhelmingly with eighty-eight percent of the votes, The Mark Greene Research Grant. Lucy felt all warm and fuzzy inside seeing how much Mark still meant to everyone, but it also brought with it a wave of grief that she wasn't prepared for. She'd only worked with Mark for around four years, but he'd been a huge influence on her as a doctor and as a manager. As much as she cared for and respected Kerry Weaver as a friend and mentor, Mark and Kerry had very different management styles, and Mark's certainly gelled more with Lucy's personality. He was patient and always had time for her, listened to her moaning about Carter and gave great advice on how to communicate better with him. It was an enormous loss for the ER and its patients, as well as the friends and colleagues he'd left behind.
Lucy pulled up Word and started typing out the name change proposal document. Once she'd finished, she reread it to check for typos, and then emailed it to the chair of the grant committee for approval. Now they just had to wait.