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“How’s the arm?” I ask, nodding to her injury.
She clucks, “It’s fine! I don’t know why I gotta keep coming back for more X-rays! I’m a busy woman and I just need to get this cast off already so I can get back to my cucumber patch. It’s going crazy and I don’t have enough hands to haul it all to the farmers market this weekend.”
I know for a fact that she broke it by falling off a ladder while trying to install a cistern on her own, so that arm is anything but “fine.” And if Dr. Allen says she needs to keep the cast on, then by god, that’s gospel in my eyes.
“I’ll be happy to stop by and pick up your veggies for you so you can rest.”
“I don’t need a rest,” the older woman snaps.
With a chuckle, I reply, “I’ll even share my table at the farmers market with you and split the profits. You won’t have to lift that arm.”
She points at me, “Split the profits my eye! You know damn well my cucumbers are the best in three counties. Don’t you dare.”
“Just teasing, Ernestine.”
With a gleam in her eye that her stubborn ways can’t hide, she sniffs again and says, “Sixty-forty.”
“It’s a deal.”
Satisfied that I’ve done my duty to help the elderly in the community, I look around the room, wishing that Trisha would call my name already before I bamboozle myself into another job to do.
“Is the boy feeling alright?”
I thought the older woman had gone back to reading, but when I turn toward her, she’s peering at me over the top of that paperback.
“Yes, ma’am. Why do you ask?”
“You’re here about as much as I am, if not more.”
I shrug.
“I like to take precautions. I get up in my head with questions about toddler milestones, and Dr. Allen is much better at putting my mind at ease than Google.”
Ernestine squints at me. “You don’t say.”
I smile awkwardly.
“The previous doctor would just send me away and tell me to stop worrying. Having a decent doctor in town feels like … I’m making up for all the information I missed out on with the old doctor. Or something like that.”
Ernestine studies my face for a moment, her expression undressing. “No. That’s not it.”
“It’s not?”
“Son. Can you think of a reason why you seem unsatisfied with the Google?”
I like how she says “the Google,” but I resist the urge to tease her about it.
“Graham had a rough start to life. I want a human doctor to reassure me I’m doing okay. That’s it.”
This is only partly true. But I’m not about to tell the town busybody the real reason I’m here.
“Son, the only thing you are in danger of messing up is missing your chance with Dr. Allen.”
I blink at the older woman, then bark out a laugh. “That’s not it.”
In fact, that is it. She hit the nail on the head and I’m now a bald-faced liar. I guess old Ernestine heard all about what happened on New Year’s Eve. There’s nowhere to hide in Fate, I suppose. I just wish everyone would get over what they saw that night.
“If you say so,” I say dumbly, wincing at the cramp in my lower back from sitting on this hard floor for more than two hours now.
