Excerpt
Chapter One
“Now Sara, we’ve gone over what you need to do to keep this baby as healthy as possible,” said Ben. “But you’re at risk for pre-eclampsia, so I can’t emphasize enough how important it is to follow my directions.”
“Does Sandra have the same condition?”
“It looks like she might. Honestly, Sara, did you and Sandra plan on getting pregnant at the same time?”
“No.” Sara Johanson gave a shaky laugh. “But you know how twins are. We both wanted to start families. That’s why it was so hard to lose the last baby.”
Dr. Ben Taylor didn’t have to be told. He’d known Sara and Gus since elementary school, had worked with them through their infertility problems. “Think positively, Sara. Every pregnancy is different.”
“That may be so, Ben, but I’m counting on you. Please, just help me get this baby born. Losing the last one nearly killed Gus. He—he wants a child so bad, and so do I.”
Ben patted her shoulder. He had to stretch to do this, as Sara was up on the exam table and he was sitting in his wheelchair. “Don’t worry, Sara. We’ll do our best to bring this baby safe into the world. But that’s why I need you to follow my directions. No running a marathon, no weeding the garden, no splitting firewood, no digging ditches…” He smiled at her.
Sara smiled back. “Got it.”
“You’re twenty-four weeks along. When you hit thirty-seven weeks, I’m going to transfer you to the regional hospital. They’re better equipped to handle high-risk cases, and as you can see…” He gestured downward. “…I’m not at my best at the moment.”
Sara nodded. “I expected something like that.” Her eyes were bright with unshed tears. “Thanks, Ben.”
“You’re welcome. Tell Sandra that I want to see her on Monday. Now go home before those hormones have you crying all over my shoulder and making Gus jealous.”
After Sara left, Ben tried to wheel himself into the receptionist’s area of his office by holding Sara’s file in one hand and steering with the other. That didn’t work, so he clamped the file between his teeth while using both hands to push the wheels of his chair. He ended up banging into the doorframe and dropping the file on the floor, where charts and papers fanned out. “Dammit,” he muttered. “About the time I get the hang of this thing is about the time I’ll no longer need it. Lisa…!” he called to his receptionist. “Would you mind picking up Sara’s chart? I’ll need to monitor her closely over the next few weeks. Schedule me to do a follow-up call next Friday…”
“I will. Ben, your Resident is here.”
Ben straightened up. “Dr. Chambers? Good—someone to help us out. Please show her into my office.”
He turned himself and wheeled down the hall to his private sanctuary. He had wanted to avoid the antiseptic environment often found in doctor’s offices, so he hoped Dr. Chambers would be at ease here. Hardwood floors—he had removed the handsome Turkish carpet until he was out of the wheelchair—and walls lined with books, both medical and non-medical. Large rural prints on the walls. Behind his antique oak desk were large casement windows looking out on a stretch of green lawn that surrounded the medical facility in Jasper, Idaho, population 300.
Gypsy, his dog, thumped her tail in greeting. “Hiya, doll,” he murmured, stroking her head. “Be nice to my new Resident, will you? I need her to stay. No no, put the paw down.”
Ben rolled up to his desk, folded his hands on the surface, and waited.
Within a minute, Lisa’s footsteps tapped down the old wooden hallway. “Right this way, Dr. Chambers,” she said, and ushered the Resident into Ben’s office.
Ben’s eyes widened. While his office wasn’t a typical doctor’s office, Dr. Julia Chambers wasn’t a typical senior resident doctor. Somehow the Portland City Hospital resident precept hadn’t gotten around to mentioning that the resident they had sent to Idaho was beautiful.
“Ah, good afternoon, Dr. Chambers,” he said, to cover his surprise. “Come on in. Forgive me for not rising.”
“Pleased to meet you, Dr. Taylor—yikes!” She stared at Gypsy, who had risen politely to greet her. “Is—is that a wolf?”
“No, no!” Ben chuckled. He liked getting startled reactions to his enormous white dog. “She’s a Great Pyrenees/Irish Wolfhound cross. Yes, she’s big, but she wouldn’t hurt a fly.”
“Big! She’s nearly up to my waist!”
“Just let her sniff your hand and she’ll be your friend forever.”
Julia ventured out a timid hand, and sure enough Gypsy nestled against her begging for pets. The woman still looked a bit alarmed, so Ben called the dog over to sit behind his desk.
“Sorry if she startled you,” he explained. He held out his hand. “I’m Ben Taylor.”
“Julia Chambers.” She placed her long, elegant hand in his.
If ever a woman looked out of place in a little place like Jasper, it was Dr. Julia Chambers. She had flawless rosy skin and her head seemed tilted back from the weight of a huge mass of luxuriant dark hair pinned up. Ben had a sudden, entirely unprofessional vision of releasing that hair and running his hands through it.
Good thing he was in a wheelchair.
Her eyes were a startling green—were they tinted contact lenses?—and looked guarded even though she was smiling. She had dark smudges under her eyes, as if she hadn’t slept well for some time. Her slacks and thick wool sweater were tailored and urban.
“I’m pleased that you’ll be joining us at the Jasper Medical Clinic, Dr. Chambers. Ah, may I call you Julia?”
“Of course.” She pulled out the worn leather chair and seated herself. “If I may call you Ben, that is.”
Ben smiled. “I don’t think anyone here calls me Dr. Taylor. Even the little kids—children of my high school buddies—call me Dr. Ben. Of course, I grew up in this town, so that helps.”
“You grew up here, and you’re still here practicing medicine? How…cozy.”
Ben frowned, not liking the slightly patronizing tone he heard in her voice. “I like to think of it as dedication. Loyalty, if you will. You see, the town banded together to put me through medical school. Naturally I’d never turn my back on them.”
“Really. All the way through medical school?”
Ben nodded. “Todd Anderson, the older town doctor, was starting to think about retiring, but he knew there wasn’t much of a chance of attracting a younger doctor to a small and isolated spot like this. I was in college and was interested in medicine. Dr. Todd talked me into going to med school with an idea toward taking over his practice when he retired. The town pitched in to cover the costs, and seven years later, here I am.”
“Wow.” Guarded respect crossed her face. “Quite an effort for a small town.”
“Yes. But then last month I ran into a moose…”
“You ran into a moose?”
He grinned. “Yep. On my motorcycle. Took a nasty tumble and broke this leg so badly that I’m in the wheelchair for another month. So as you can see, we were in dire need of help. I appreciate your coming, Julia.”
“A moose…” She shook her head with an amazed expression.
“There’s a few around here. We’re pretty rural.”
“Yeah. I noticed.”
That slightly condescending tone was back. “Do you have a problem working in a rural facility, Dr. Chambers?” he asked coolly.
“Uh, no. Of course not.”
“Good. Because I think you’ll find that the folks in Jasper are warm and friendly toward outsiders who are friendly back. Or, of course, you’ll find they’re stand-offish and cliquish to those who act the same. The choice is yours, Dr. Chambers.”
He saw her eyes chill. “Thank you for the lecture on human behavior, Dr. Taylor.”
He grinned. “Welcome to Jasper.”
****
Julia exited the rinky-dink little hospital facility with clenched teeth. Of all the rustic backwater nightmares to which she could be assigned…well, Jasper, Idaho beat all.
The medical center could best be described as primitive. Oh sure, it was spotlessly clean, but it was located in an old converted building with worn floors and odd rooms. Nothing like the up-to-date facility in Portland, Oregon that she had just arrived from.
And the town…! No movie theater. No cafes. No boutiques. No mall. Hell, there wasn’t even a Starbuck’s in the two-block “business” district. She was surprised the place had a medical facility at all, except this Dr. Ben Taylor told her it was necessary in order to serve a large section of the extraordinarily rural county in north central Idaho. Julia was surprised to find a place so thinly populated in the continental United States.
She’d bet her medical training that all the people were nothing but…well, hicks. Backward, redneck, you-know-what-kicking hicks.
And she had to live here for three months.
But then she had wanted a place to hide her face and—hopefully—recover. That being the case, she supposed there were few better spots than Jasper.
She unlocked her car door and paused as she saw Dr. Taylor roll himself out of the facility in his wheelchair. That monster dog trotted next to him with her leash looped over the chair’s handle. Dr. Taylor didn’t see Julia because one wheel clipped a pole on his way out. The man had no experience with a chair, that was certain. She lingered a moment by her open car door, watching. She had to admit that he was rather good-looking—boyish face, curly brown hair, brown eyes, and an easy smile. Still, she hoped his bedside manner was better than his attitude toward “outsiders.”
He didn’t head toward a car in the parking lot. Instead, he simply rolled his wheelchair on the gravel sidewalk and headed out of town.
Since “town” was about four blocks long from start to finish, this didn’t take long. He must live nearby. Pretty handy if you can’t drive your car, she thought. She shook her head. Whatever.
Julia got in her car and drove three blocks to the little furnished rental house that was supplied to her as part of her residency arrangement. It was a single story, squat and old-fashioned, with nothing striking about it. She sighed as she got out and locked her car. The front porch actually had a rocking chair on it, like something out of Appalachia. Imagine.
God, her ex-fiancé wouldn’t know whether to laugh or sneer if he saw her now. But fortunately—Julia firmed her lips—he wouldn’t see her.
She unlocked the door, and the stray cat that seemed to come with the house instantly darted inside. “Oh, for cryin’ out loud, you little beast, go back outside,” she muttered. But the cat—an orange-and-white number—simply sat down in a corner with its tail curled around its feet and stared at her with large green eyes.
“Okay, fine. You can stay.”
The cat blinked.
“I suppose you’ll want me to get some cat food and feed you,” she told him. She supposed he might be a useful diversion in this remote place. “Well, I’ll add it to the grocery list.” The list was getting longer as she thought of the staples she needed to purchase to stock the house.
The little house came equipped with everything she needed as far as furniture and appliances, but it was depressing and cheerless in the chilly April afternoon. Boxes of her possessions were scattered about. She hadn’t yet figured out how to use the woodstove that seemed to be the only source of heat.
“A lot colder here than in Portland, isn’t it, Cat?” she added, and leaned down to scratch the animal under the chin. An outsized rumble issued from the cat’s throat. “And more primitive too. I hope I’m up to this.”
She spent an hour unpacking boxes and putting clothes and books away. But her stomach was grumbling, and she knew that grocery shopping would have to be next on her list.
“Mmmmrrrr,” said the cat. Surprised at his muffled tone, she looked down and saw a dead mouse hanging from the cat’s jaws. Julia gave a small shriek. “Crap—get that thing out of here!” She opened the front door and shooed the cat into the night, wondering uneasily where in the house he’d caught it.
Okay, enough. She was getting out of the house, with its mice and cold air, at least long enough to buy some food.
She locked the door to her house and unlocked the door to her car. Though the town’s modest-sized grocery store was mere blocks away, she figured she’d better drive because she anticipated a lot of purchases.
Parking in the store’s gravel parking lot, Julia noticed a small diner across the street—Betty’s Café. Impulsively she locked the car door and walked over. Might as well have a hot meal first.
Betty’s was a no-nonsense place with Formica-topped tables and cracked-vinyl stools in front of the counter.
“Hi!” said a friendly gum-cracking waitress. “You here for dinner?”
“Please,” said Julia. “Table for one.”
“Why don’t you join me instead?” said a voice.
Julia pivoted and saw Dr. Ben Taylor at a small table in the corner. He put down the newspaper he had been reading and smiled at her.
She nodded. “Thank you.” She slid into the chair opposite him.
“I saw you park in the grocery store lot. Stocking up the house?”
“Yes. It’s pretty bare.”
“You locked your car door.” He folded the paper and slipped it next to him in the wheelchair. “Don’t bother. You’re not in Portland any more. If you’re worried about car theft, put your mind at rest.”
“Habit. Hard to break. It’s going to take me awhile to get used to such a small place… thank you,” she added, as the waitress handed her a menu.
“Ben, do you want me to hold your food back until hers arrives?” the waitress asked.
“Sure. Oh Sally, this is Dr. Julia Chambers. She’s the new Resident at the medical clinic.
Sally cracked her gum and grinned. “Nice to meet’cha. Be back in a minute to take your order.”
“So…how’s the food here?”
“Surprisingly good. I eat here a fair bit. Cooking for one gets boring after awhile.”
Julia glanced at his left hand and saw no ring. “I know the feeling. Can you cook in that wheelchair?”
“After a fashion. Since my accident, I depend a lot more on microwave meals. Yuck.”
Julia nodded. “For my wheelchair-bound patients, I’ve found their entire houses are modified for their needs.”
“I’d modify my house as well, but with luck it will be only another couple of weeks before I’m out of this thing. That’s my hope.”
“So what happened to the leg?”
“Snowy road. Big moose. Compound fracture of the femur and tibia. There was a lot of devitilised soft tissue and a lot of embedded road gravel because it was a high-velocity trauma.”
Julia winced. “Ouch.”
“Yes. The moose wasn’t in such good shape either. Ralph Finnigan, the guy who found me, had to shoot the moose. I was knocked out, thankfully. He hauled me into the back of his truck and high-tailed me to Gritman Medical Center in Moscow.”
“That’s Moscow, Idaho?”
“Yes. It’s a small university town with an excellent hospital, about fifty miles from here. Spent a week dealing with the pain and learning how to use a chair.” He grinned. “It certainly made me appreciate what some of my patients are going through!”
“Talk about a trial by fire.”
“Yes. Anyway, the hospital in Moscow is where we send people whose health problems exceed our abilities. I’m a GP, so anyone requiring surgery or anything more complex than I can handle gets referred there.”
“You do no surgery here?”
“As little as possible. Our operating room is small and we have no anesthesiologist. We recently purchase an anesthetic machine, so that’s a help, but I prefer to send people to Moscow for anything complex.”
“I see.” Backwater outpost, she thought.
He must have read her mind, for his expression hardened. “I hope you’re not having a hard time dealing with our limitations.”
“Of course not.” Of course. She had no desire to be here at all. “Rural people need healthcare as much as urban people.”
“I’m glad you see it that way. You’ll learn a lot here.”
“I intend to.”
“Good. I think you’ll find, Julia, that our medical center has a different…well, I guess you could call it a different work ethic here than you might find elsewhere. The population is scattered, and I do a fair number of housecalls for elderly or handicapped patients. If you’ve spent most of your life in Portland or another big city, it’s hard to comprehend just how spread out the population in this county is. Tamarack County has something like nine thousand people in an area nearly the size of Rhode Island.”
Julia’s eyes widened. “You’re kidding!”
“I’m not. Now obviously I can’t cover that entire territory and still man the medical clinic—especially since my accident—but it gives you some idea of the scope we’re working with. Fortunately we’re not the only medical facility in the county, but we certainly cover quite a territory. It takes an extremely dedicated doctor to practice here. Doctors aren’t attracted to such small places because of low pay.” A quick smile came and went. “Except that my pay includes the prettiest scenery in the world, and some of the nicest people I’ve ever worked with.”
Julia glanced out the window where the swollen clouds looked threatening. “I’ll have to take your word on whether this place is as pretty as you say.”
“Most of the snow just melted, so it will take awhile for the plants to poke out of the mud. Just wait a month or so. This is about the only place I’ve ever seen dandelions so big and beautiful that they’re elevated to the status of landscape plant.”
Julia shivered. “But it’s so cold here still, and it’s late April…!”
“Well, when it’s cold, you just throw another log on the fire and cozy up to the woodstove…”
Julia chewed her lip and looked away. “Oh sure.”
“What’s the matter?”
“I, uh, haven’t figured out the woodstove yet.”
He stared at her. “So you’ve been without heat since you got here?”
“Yes.”
“For heaven’s sake, no wonder you don’t like it here!” He slapped the table. “After dinner I’ll go to your house and show you how to use it.”
“You don’t have to do that!” She gestured toward his wheelchair.
“Can’t have my resident doctor freezing to death. After dinner, then.” He gave a decisive nod.
The waitress arrived to take her order, and Julia realized she hadn’t even glanced at the menu. “Any recommendations?” she asked Ben.
“Try the soup. Betty makes all her soup fresh, so it’s excellent.”
Julia had her doubts that somewhere like Betty’s Café could have anything excellent, but she ordered cream of broccoli soup and salad.
Once the waitress left, Ben leaned back in his wheelchair. “Are you unpacked yet?”
“Are you kidding? Not a chance.” Julia folded her hands on the table and prepared for polite chitchat. “It’s a nice little house,” she lied. “I’m sure I’ll be very comfortable there. So…what’s Jasper like as a community?”
“Not bad. Of course, growing up here, I might be biased. Jasper is full of folks who can be gruff. They may take awhile to warm up to newcomers. But their hearts are big, and you couldn’t ask for a better group in an emergency.”
He embarked on a tale of a nasty winter storm where the power went out, and how the community banded together to help those who needed assistance. By the time he finished his story, the waitress had arrived with the food.
Julia picked up her spoon and took a tentative sip of the soup. She was starving by now, and would have eaten it even if it resembled paste. But the delectable taste spread through her and her eyes widened.
“My gosh, this is fabulous!” she exclaimed, and began to devour her food.
“You must have been hungry,” commented Ben.
“Nothing since breakfast,” she mumbled around a mouthful. She swallowed and said, “I’m surprised that somewhere like this would have anything good. I didn’t expect much, but this soup is nothing short of gourmet.”
Ben laid down his fork. “Look, Julia, I’ll be blunt. You seem to have a problem being here in Jasper. Why?”
Julia sighed and her delight in the soup fled. She looked out the window at the street running through the center of town. It was a bare, unattractive, no-frills type of town, with little or no effort to beautify it. In the darkening April evening, it looked bleak.
“Maybe I am,” she admitted. She returned her eyes to Ben. “It’s so different here. Much more than I expected. Even things like not having to lock my car doors or having you introduce me to the waitress. It’s just…different.”
“Maybe so, but it’s not a bad difference. And as one professional to another, let me give you a bit of advice: don’t let your attitude color your impressions of us. We’re not Portland, or San Francisco, or Seattle, and a lot of people in Jasper are grateful for that. We don’t have the amenities of the city, but we don’t have a lot of the problems, either.”
“Yeah, yeah.” It was a phrase of frustration, and the moment it left her lips Julia wished she could undo it. Ben’s expression cooled.
“Why on earth did you come here?” he asked.
There was no possible way she was going to tell him the truth. “I wanted a different atmosphere,” she replied. She gave a self-deprecating laugh. “I certainly got my wish, didn’t I?”
Ben gave her a long look, as if he didn’t believe her. “Then what’s your problem? Are you missing the amenities of the city?”
“Not yet.”
“Do you think you’ll be bored in your off-time?”
“I doubt it.”
Are you worried that you’ll be rubbing shoulders with a bunch of uneducated yokels?”
“No, of course not…” But her stained cheeks revealed that the last barb had struck home.
This Dr. Taylor was astute enough to realize the truth, too. He lifted a glass of water to his lips. “I see. Tell me, Julia, how do you deliver a calf that’s stuck?”
Startled at the odd question, she answered, “Well, I don’t know…”
“How do you jump-start a tractor that’s stalled?”
“I—”
“How do you take down a tree that’s fallen in a dangerous position, without killing someone?”
“Well—”
“How do you make gourmet soup out in the middle of the howling wilderness?”
She glared at him. “Are you done yet?”
“Almost. My point, Julia, is that if you don’t know the answers to these questions, I might just want to call you an uneducated yokel. These people know how to get by out here, and they know stuff you don’t. Just because your degree came from fancy universities and their degrees came from the School of Hard Knocks doesn’t mean you can look down at them.”
She crossed her arms. “A little defensive, aren’t we?”
“Only when the occasion calls for it.” He took a bite of his dinner and chewed. “But we’re going to have to work together for the next several months, and I won’t have someone in my clinic with a snotty attitude.”
“I don’t have a snotty attitude!”
“Could’a fooled me. Okay, lecture’s over. Finish your salad, and then we’ll go figure out your woodstove.”
Fuming, Julia attacked the salad, shoving it untasted into her mouth. “I need to go grocery shopping first.”
“Fine. I can meet you at your house afterward.”
The meal finished awkwardly. Julia paid and got out of there as soon as possible and walked across the street to the grocery store.
The grocery store may have been modest in size, but it was extremely well-stocked and rather cramped in an attempt to fit as many products as possible inside. Another surprise for Julia. She concluded that, since this store was apparently the only grocery store within fifty miles or more, it needed to be well-stocked in order to service the widely-scattered population. Even the prices were competitive, more or less.
Julia walked up and down the aisles with the cart, yanking items off the shelf in accordance to her list. Somewhere near the dairy section, with her hand on a carton of milk, she stopped and sighed.
Ben was right—she was taking out her feelings of shame and failure on this little town. Her trite statement in the restaurant—that rural people need healthcare too—came back to haunt her. That’s why she’s gone into medicine, wasn’t it? To make sure that people who needed health care would get health care?
And there, in the dairy section, Julia had her epiphany and emerged out of the grocery store with a better attitude.
She drove the short distance home. It was dark now, and she wished she’d left a house light on. Her rental was cold and dark and depressing. But she was here, and she might as well make the best of it. She began unloading the bags from the car. When she was done, she hesitated…and left the car unlocked.
While she started putting things away in the kitchen, she wondered what kind of doctor Ben was. A small smile cracked her face. After all, anyone who hung around Gypsy the Abominable Snowdog couldn’t be all that bad. She hoped.
In ten minutes, she heard her doorbell ring.
“I’m afraid you’ll have to push me up this step,” he said, when she opened the door.
“No problem. Hang on.”
Julia felt odd having her boss come into her home. The moment his chair was over the step, he wheeled himself inside and looked around.
“Brr. No wonder you’re miserable. “You’ll love this type of woodstove; it’s as good as fireplace because you can see the flames.” He grinned at her. “Very romantic, too.”
She became guarded. “Let’s keep this professional, shall we, doctor?”
“Sure. Whatever you say. Got some newspapers?”
Julia grabbed a stack from the pile inside the kitchen door that was left by the people who had moved out. Together they crumpled the papers and stuffed them into the stove. He showed her how to layer the fire with first small, thin sticks with larger sticks on top, the use of dampers and how to bank the fire for the night. Within ten minutes of his coming in the house, they sat back and watched the flames lick upward. Already she could feel the heat radiating from the cast iron.
“You’ve got at least a cord of wood outside,” Ben told her. “More than enough to last you until the weather warms up.”
“Seems like a pretty primitive way to get warm,” commented Julia.
“I like to think of it as elemental. Properly used, a woodstove is very efficient. Plus the fuel is free if you cut it yourself.”
“I can tell things will be more comfortable tonight,” she commented.
“Spring takes longer to come here than it does on the coast,” said Ben. “It can stay chilly into mid-June sometimes.”
“In Portland, there are already blossoms on the trees.”
“We have a more Rocky Mountain climate here.”
Julia glanced out the window. “I’m trying not to think about this place as bleak and dreary.”
“At the moment, maybe. The snow just melted, there’s mud everywhere. Give it a month and you’ll change your mind. The wildflowers around here peak in June, and they’re spectacular. The lake is gorgeous, and it has some nice beaches for swimming. It’s a good thing it’s Friday. You’ll have the weekend to look around Jasper and explore.”
“I’ll probably stay huddled inside, unpacking.”
He glanced around the room. “Takes awhile to settle in, doesn’t it? Hey, who’s this guy?”
“A stray that seems to have adopted me.” Julia nudged the cat with her toe. “I got some cat food at the store—let me get some for him.” She opened the bag of cat food she had just purchased, and scooped some into a bowl.
An awkward silence fell as they watched the cat attacked the food with alacrity.
“What’s his name?” asked Ben at last.
“I haven’t given him one. I doubt I will, either.”
“Why not?”
“Well, why should I? He’ll stay here after I leave. No sense getting attached to him. Er, would you like some coffee?” she finally thought to ask.
“Do you have your coffee maker unpacked?”
“Are you kidding? What resident doctor doesn’t live on caffeine?”
“Then sure.”
He rolled himself into the kitchen as she set about making coffee. While the coffee machine wheezed and groaned as it started heating the water, Julia busied herself putting away the last of her groceries. But her conscience preyed on her. She poured the coffee and handed Ben his mug.
“Look, I owe you an apology for what we talked about over dinner,” she said. “I have had a snippy attitude since coming here, and it’s not reasonable. I should be giving Jasper a chance.” She managed a small smile. “I’m a city girl at heart, and can’t help thinking that I’m in exile for the next three months. That I’m just marking time until I finish this rotation and can get back to Portland. But since I’m here, I’ve got to make the best of it. Having a working woodstove will help. Being cold all the time isn’t the best way to keep a good outlook.”
“I see.” Ben looked thoughtful. He stayed quiet as he stirred sugar into the coffee. Then he nodded. “Well, it’s big of you to acknowledge it. And that’s all I ask—give Jasper a chance. I wouldn’t stay here if I didn’t feel an enormous affection to this area. The people make it all worthwhile.”
“This place is pretty isolated. How do people make a living?”
“Some commute into Moscow or even Pullman, Washington. But not many. The roads get too treacherous in the winter. I’ve had to hammer a few people back together after their cars slid into ditches or trees after hitting black ice.”
Julia sipped some coffee. “Does this area get plowed?”
“Sure. Jack Trelaine is our snow plow driver. Very dedicated. Most of the jobs in this town are related to logging, though. There’s a sawmill on the north side of town. People either make their living in the woods or in the mill. Or in support services like restaurants or the grocery and hardware stores.”
“What kind of hours do you keep? It doesn’t look like my residency is going to be as intense as in Portland—no thirty-six hour stretches without sleep, that kind of thing.”
“No. Not normally, at least. But like me, you’ll be on call twenty-four/seven, because if something happens there’s no other doctor to take over.”
“Don’t you ever get time off?”
“Yes. We have a circuit doctor who comes and stays on-call for four days every other weekend. His name is Dan Kendall, though we jokingly call him InstaDoc. Depending on our workload, you might get the same days off when Dan comes through. You’ll find that Jasper is going to offer pretty intense GP training. Not intense in terms of hours, necessarily, but intense in terms of breadth of cases.”
“Even though we’re this far out?”
“Because we’re this far out. I requested a Senior Resident to help me through until I’m back on my feet, but you can rest assured that by the time you go back to Portland you’ll be as well trained a GP as anyone.” He finished his coffee. “I should let you get back to unpacking. Thanks for the coffee.”
“Thanks for the woodstove lesson.”
“Remember, bright and early Monday morning.”
“I’ll be there.”
She helped him down the step and watched as he rolled into the night.
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