Billionaire Beast

I’m not sure if I respond or not, but we’re walking down what I’m sure at one point was a familiar hallway, though I don’t remember it being so eventful.

About 30 feet ahead of us is an older woman trying to corral six children into one of the rooms, while just a little farther down the way is a teenager endlessly combing his fingers through his hair.

That gravity bong stuff is bananas.

After an indeterminate amount of time, I’m in a small room, changing into a hospital gown.

When I come back out, Jace directs me to the MRI and I lie down.

I’ve never been claustrophobic, but I think Yuri must have gotten into my head, because I’m closing my eyes, not quite ready to be scanned.

“All right,” Jace’s voice comes tinny through the intercom, “just stay still and we should have you out of there in no time.”

“All right,” I answer, and the MRI springs to life.

The only real difficulty I’m having once the test starts is trying not to laugh. I guess I wasn’t having secondhand claustrophobia, after all.

When the test is over and I’m slid back out, I just lie there, waiting for Jace to tell me what to do next.

Before long, I’m back in that little room, changing back into my spritz-drenched clothes.

Jace tells me to head back up to his office, so I start on my way, though I have to make a quick call to Yuri to get back to more familiar territory. Once I get near the elevators, it all starts coming back to me.

When I get to the office, I’m smacked in the face with the smell of Yuri’s spritz. Apparently, she decided to “freshen up” a bit more while I was gone.

“What do you think?” she asks after I sit down in my customary spot.

“About what?”

“About Dr. Churchill?” she asks.

“He seems like a good doctor,” I tell her.

“That’s not what I meant, but I think you know that. I think he likes you.”

“He’s in a relationship with what’s-her-skank,” I answer.

She smiles politely at my attempt at cleverness, but shakes her head. “One of these days, he’s finally going to grow a pair of balls and he’s going to leave her,” she says. “I think you two would make a cute couple.”

Suddenly, I’m very self-conscious.

“Yeah, but he’s my doctor, and that’s kind of weird for me,” I tell her.

“I don’t see why,” she says. “As long as all he’s doing is running scans and giving you prescriptions, what’s the harm?”

I’m sure there’s an easy answer to that, but right now, I’m having a little trouble getting past the statement that he likes me.

“He is very attractive,” I concede, “but I really think it would be way too complicated to make any kind of move on him right now.”

“Sorry,” she says. “I get a little nosy sometimes when I’m baked.”

On the word “baked,” the door to the waiting room opens and Jace walks in, saying, “Grace, would you like to step into my office for a moment?”

“Sure,” I answer, and I follow him into his office.

He pulls up his computer and finds my file. For a minute, he’s looking at different shots of the inside of my head.

Finally, he says, “Well, in comparing your scan today with the earlier one, it looks like your oligodendroglioma hasn’t grown. That’s the good news.”