‘I can identify with that.’ The words slipped out before Laurie could stop them.
‘How’s that?’ Ross predictably picked up on every chance to ask her about herself.
‘We’re talking about Tamara. I can see that she’s facing some enormous obstacles. How does she feel about the way forward?’
‘The medical aspects of her rehab are just one part of the challenge. Tamara knows she wants to maintain her sporting activities, but the problems she’s been having with her prosthetic have eroded her confidence.’
Laurie frowned. ‘When you get that right she should find that she has a lot of options. Some runners who use blades are faster than those who don’t.’
‘In addition to what we can do for her medically, we’d like to help her explore all of those options. And help her get back to full fitness.’
Laurie closed the folder, clearing her throat. This young girl, trying to make the right choices in life, was uncomfortably close to home and tugging at her heart. She opened the next folder.
‘Adam Hollier.’ He was just a year older than Tamara.
‘Adam’s sustained a stress fracture to his foot...’ Ross stopped suddenly, looking at her as she felt her cheeks flame. Did he somehow know about her father, and the way he’d pushed her? Was Ross actively trying to break her down?
‘Over-training?’ She managed to get the two words out.
‘There’s no indication of that. As with Tamara, we need to address the medical issues, but also resolve how his injury has been caused. He’s a bright kid and he knows that a susceptibility to this kind of injury may hamper him in the future, but he’s so focussed on taking up sport as a profession that he can’t see any alternatives.’
Laurie flipped the cover of the file shut. Slowly and deliberately, giving herself some time to think, she put the folders back onto Ross’s desk. ‘Can we take a break from this meeting? For a moment?’
‘Sure. You want...coffee?’ He took one look at Laurie’s face and shrugged. Clearly he saw that she didn’t.
‘I want to ask you why you chose these two patients. Did you imagine that they’d be the most challenging for me? In which case, I think you should get your motives straight—you’re here for them, not for me. We’ve already agreed that I’m going to take charge of my own treatment.’
He thought for a moment, obviously turning her words over in his mind. ‘Honestly—’
Simmering anger came close to the boil. ‘I find that being honest is always good. Particularly when you’re dealing with a doctor-patient relationship and deciding whether the doctor in question has the resources to help a patient.’
‘You’re suggesting that this is all an experiment? That I’ve chosen a set of challenging patients for you and I’m going to stand back and see what happens?’ His expression tightened into a dark frown. ‘That couldn’t be further from the truth. If you have issues that mean you’re not able to help these kids, I expect you to say so.’
He’d boxed her into a corner. Or maybe Laurie had done that all by herself, but however she’d managed to get here she had to move. As she got to her feet, she felt pain shoot from her hip down into her leg, and almost stumbled. Ross started forward and she glared him back down into his seat.
‘I think...’ She wasn’t entirely sure what she thought, but pacing seemed to help. ‘Did you know that I was over-trained by my father? Well past the point of exhaustion at times. That I had to go to court in order to go and live with an aunt when I was fifteen?’ It wasn’t exactly a secret, the facts were a matter of record, and she’d been questioned about it more than once at press conferences.
‘No, I didn’t know that.’ Something that looked like tenderness bloomed in his eyes, and Laurie ignored it.
‘Well, it caused a lot of problems for me. Kids generally come with families, and I don’t have much of an interest in trying to work out that kind of relationship. It’s not my thing.’
‘Fair enough. I’m not asking you to be a family counsellor, we already have a partnership with a very good one.’ He paused for a moment, as if waiting to see whether Laurie was interested in that kind of counselling herself, and she bit back the temptation to tell him that there was a lake outside and he was welcome to go and jump in it.
‘So what makes me the obvious choice for these two patients?’
‘In my experience, teenagers come equipped with accurate radar. They know who really understands what they’re going through, and they know who’ll fight for them as well.’
‘You’re not trying to make my life easy, are you?’
He had the temerity to smile. ‘Why would I? And if you believe that you can’t help these kids, for whatever reason, we’ll take another look at the list...’
Ross laid his hand on the pile of folders, pulling them back across his desk. In that moment a fierce protective flame ignited in her chest. Adam and Tamara were both facing a difficult and uncertain future, and Laurie knew how much that hurt. She really wanted to help them, and if Ross thought that she could...
‘I didn’t say that.’ She walked back to his desk, grabbing the folders. She had to pull a little before he’d let go of them. ‘I’ll take them.’
‘The meeting’s back on again? That’s your official answer?’ A flicker of I-told-you-so humour danced in his eyes.
‘Yes, it’s official. I’ll read through their histories and come back to you with some ideas. And unofficially...’ She planted her hand on his desk, leaning towards him. ‘You have a lot of good ideas, Ross. But you could try not to be so darned smug about them.’