Second First Kiss

Chapter 29

Jasher

Jasher could barely concentrate on Mrs. Ferguson’s laceration as he finished the final stitches while in Parrish Medical Clinic. He couldn’t stop thinking about Sage and her dismissal of him last weekend.

“And then I told Yolanda, no, no, love. Be a good girl for mommy, but that’s when she bit me. I was in shock!”

“This has happened before, though, Mrs. Ferguson.”

“Just the once.” Mrs. Ferguson tapped her chin and looked at the ceiling. “Or twice—if I count the thing in the park at Raspberry Days.”

If she counted the time she’d nearly bled to death? Holy spider monkey syndrome.

“You were so great to help me relocate Yolanda that day. Do you know, the Fish and Game Department wanted to keep her, to not let me have her back? Imagine!”

Yeah, imagine.

“I’ve told everyone in town what a superior doctor you are. Of course, at first they didn’t believe me. They kept saying something about basketball. Do you know, Yolanda just loves basketball. She’s broken all the windows in my sun room by throwing her basketball.” A proud chuckle. “Eventually, though, I’ve been able to convince people that you’re not just good, you’re quite possibly the best. Maybe you’ve seen Mrs. Calchik and Mrs. Irving come in for their—ahem—conditions.”

Actually, yes. Both of those women had recently become patients. Jasher didn’t have a chance to respond because another story of Yolanda the spider monkey ensued.

“You’re going to need to take this antibiotic until the prescription is all gone.”

“If Yolanda doesn’t get to them first!” Mrs. Ferguson burst into a cackle. “She’s so naughty when it comes to my pills.”

Jasher blinked a few times. Mom’s mantra popped into his head. You can’t argue with crazy. You can’t argue with crazy.

Mrs. Ferguson left, but the mantra remained, playing on a loop.

Jasher hadn’t argued with Sage, even though the stuff she told him sounded suspiciously like crazy. There were no curses in life. No such thing as bad luck. Just events. Sometimes they were bad, sometimes they were good. They were a function of mortal existence. As a doctor, Jasher had seen his share of unfair outcomes—of things that downright didn’t make sense. Lives snuffed out too soon. Lives restored miraculously—sometimes without plausible reasons.

But in all his albeit yet-short life, he’d never seen anything to support the idea of a curse. Not even Sage’s litany of stories of exes gone wrong.

Those weren’t her fault—any more than Babbage’s arthritis flaring up was Jasher’s fault. And she’d insisted on that fact herself.

Jasher smashed his hands together under the hot water of the sink in the examination room.

Another patient was waiting for him. What was coming next? In a way, the variety of running Parrish Medical had its upside. He never knew what the next in the day would bring.

If I take the job at the Knighton Knee Clinic, I’ll always know. All day. Every day. Maybe forever.

Up to now, that had sounded steady. Appealing.

Except that during the past couple of months, he’d had a taste of the rush of emergency medicine. That box-of-chocolates-you-never-know-what-you’re-gonna-get that only came from running a rural health clinic. The adrenaline surge when something urgent happened, like that accident on Highway 23. The challenge of diagnosing Pal Barlow’s lead poisoning—and the sheer relief when he’d been right—and he’d saved the life of a young father.

That would never happen in a life of doing knee surgery day after day.

Nor would standing across the operating table from a pair of violet eyes that urged him to greater heights of precision as he performed complex and delicate surgeries on friends or foes—people he knew personally.

Oh, my lands—I might want to stay here.

Marlee, Dr. Parrish’s physician’s assistant popped her head in the room. Jasher shut off the water. His hands had been clean for a while now.

“Hey, Dr. Hotchkiss? Don’t you have a surgery scheduled for two o’clock?”

His neck cracked as he swiveled his head to look at the clock. One forty-five! “Thanks.” He ripped a paper towel from the holder. “I’d forgotten.”

“That’s not like the usual you, Dr. Hotchkiss.” Marlee followed him down the hallway. She was a fast walker. “Are you all right?”