“Doc, I’m tired.”

“Did you sleep at all while I was gone?”

“No, I tried but people kept coming into my room.”

“Well, try now, hon. I’ll make sure nobody comes in - except for Oliver. I want him to see you ASAP. ” He gave me a kiss and stood there stroking my hair for a while. I soon found myself fading away.

I slept for a few hours until Dr Hampton came. “I’m sorry to wake you up, Meredith, but Julian and Ivan Quinn wanted me to see you today. I’ve been tied up in my clinic until now.”

“That’s okay, Dr Hampton. I shouldn’t sleep too long anyway.”

“You should sleep as much as you can, young lady.” Ha! I don’t get called ‘young lady’ very often. “Rest is the best thing for you right now.”

“I’m so tired of resting.”

“Just a few more weeks to recover from this incident, and you will be back to your regular life.”

“I can’t wait!”

Dr Hampton took his stethoscope from around the back of his neck. “I need to have a listen, okay?”

“Sure.” I turned onto my back and he lowered my gown to just below my breasts.

“Breathe normally, Meredith. I’ll try to avoid the burn areas.” He seemed to take forever auscultating me. I like it when Doc does it but tolerate it when other doctors do it. Dr Hampton is very nice, though, so it’s not so bad. I lay there pretending in my mind that it was Doc moving the diaphragm all over my chest. He - Doc - was standing on the other side of my bed.

When he was finished, the cardiologist put his stethoscope back around his neck and looked at the monitor. Then he looked at Doc. “I got the readings that you sent, Julian. My oh my, you two sure have been active!”

Doc blushed. “Don’t look at me, Oliver! She’s the one who wanted it so much!”

“And while recovering from two invasive surgeries!”

“What can I say, Dr Hampton? I can’t resist Julian.” Doc blushed again.

“Well, it certainly didn’t seem to harm your heart any.”

“I want that in writing, in case Julian ever uses it as an excuse not to get intimate!” He laughed.

“You can do such activities as long as you feel up to it. But it might be an idea to take it easy for a few weeks. I’m speaking with concern about your surgical area, not your heart. Of course, that’s between you and your surgeon, he might be okay with it.”

“I doubt that”, Doc interjected. “At least not this soon.”

“I am in no shape to be swinging from the rafters right now!”

“No, you aren’t”, the two doctors said in unison. They laughed. I tried not to, unsuccessfully, and winced at the pain.

“I’m sorry”, Dr Hampton said.

“Don’t be”, Doc told him. “She was embarrassing me earlier today. Serves her right.”

“I love you, too, Julian”, I said to him. Dr Hampton laughed.

“Meredith, I’m going to make an adjustment to your medication again. The worsening of the mitral valve prolapse is probably from the anesthesia and/or your pain. And the trauma to your body from being hit by a car. It’s still considered on the borderline of mild to moderate. We are nowhere near looking at surgery, okay?”

“That’s a huge relief, Dr Hampton.”

“And you are still have no activity restrictions due to it - once you recover from your injuries.”

“Oh, good. I’m holding you to your promise of a trail ride.”

“You do that, Meredith. And keep working on Julian to join us.” Doc rolled his eyes. “I’ll stop by tomorrow to see how you’re doing.”

“I feel picked on today”, he said after Dr Hampton left the room.

“Come here, Doc and get a hug.” I reached my arms out to him. He lowered the rail and sat on the bed. As I hugged him, I said “You know I tease you because I love you, right?”

“I do, hon. I was teasing back.”

“Am I interrupting something?” a voice asked. We looked and Alex Carmichael was standing in the doorway.

“No, you aren’t”, Doc replied. “Meredith was just giving me a hug.”

Alex came and sat down beside the bed. “I just wanted to come and touch base with you two. I’m glad you are back home now, but Meredith, I’m sorry that you have to be in hospital again. What happened?”

“I got hit by a car and had to have my spleen out.”

“She didn’t do well in surgery”, Doc interrupted. “She went into ventricular fibrillation and they had to shock her three times.”

Alex had a shocked look on his face. “How are you doing now?” He glanced at the monitor.

“Very sore.”

“How about the MVP?”

“It’s a bit worse but Dr Hampton is adjusting my meds and he thinks it will improve over time.”

“Ok, good. You know that Julian has requested that I see you?”

“Yes. And he agreed to see you, too.”

“That is correct. If it’s okay with you, I’ll come see you in the morning, and I can see Julian in my office after lunch. It’s all off the record, as a professional courtesy to Julian. I owe him a couple favours.”

“Thank you, Alex. Hey, how is Steve doing?”

“He’s fine, though he’s seen a big drop in income since you don’t have your horses right now.”

I stifled a laugh. “Don’t make me laugh, Alex. It hurts too much.”

“That’s got to be murder on you, Meredith. I know how much you like to joke around.”

“She paid for joking around earlier”, Doc said. I nodded.

“Okay, I’m going to get out of here and go home. Your supper tray should be up soon.” I made a face. “Yes, I know, the food here is not very good.”

“I’ll probably get her something from the café, it’s the only way to get her to eat.”

“You look like you’ve lost weight.”

“Yes, I have. Isn’t it great?” I replied.

“No, Meredith. It is not the right way to lose.”

“And I’ve gained a bit of weight”, Doc said. “From sitting around instead of being on my feet in my clinic.”

“You are still very handsome, Julian”, I told him.

Alex said goodbye and was on his way. “Do you really think I’m handsome, Meredith?”

“Yes, Doc.”

“I don’t think I am. Certainly not in the classic sense.”

“Doc, you are handsome to me. Look at me, I’m a Plain Jane, yet you think I’m beautiful and call me Ms Hottie. Beauty is definitely in the eyes of the beholder. Now, tell me about your morning. How did it go?”

“It went well, hon. After getting my car from the police station, I went to the apartment. I had to get a new key from the superintendent as they replaced my door after the fire. They cleaned up the mess and replaced the carpet. There’s new paint in the entrance way and the living room. All I have to do is get new doors put on my stereo cabinet. I checked the CD player out and it seems to not have been harmed.”

“That’s great, Doc! Is there a smoky smell?”

“Not that I noticed.”

“It’s a good thing you pay your rent by the year, Doc.”

“Yes, but the super knew where I was going. If I had to, I’d have paid a couple months in advance before we went to the safe house. We need to talk about whether to keep the apartment or get one somewhere else for when I‘m on call or any other time we need to stay in the city.”

“Moving is a lot of trouble to go to for something we only need part of the time, Doc.”

“It doesn’t matter how much trouble it is, if you are uncomfortable there because of what happened, it will be worth it to be somewhere else.”

“I will be fine, Doc. But will you?”

“I don’t know, I may not be, knowing what happened to you there.”

“Why don’t we wait and see how we feel after staying there for a night?”

“That’s a good idea, hon.”

“I see you got a haircut.”

“I had to, it hadn’t been cut for a month before we went to the safe house and it was really bothering me.”

“I’m glad you didn’t get it cut too short, honey. I think you look great with it a little longer. It’s still nowhere near long. I need to get mine cut, it‘s looking a bit ratty.”

“Just get a trim, hon. I’d like you to grow it longer, if you are willing.”

“How long do you want me to grow it, Doc?”

“As long as you are willing to let it grow. I’d love to see it mid-back or longer.”

“Ok, I’ll grow it out for you. How are things at the clinic?”

“They are fine. Nick hired a new doctor - I had told him to if I was gone more than a week. Seems he and Ms Jamieson had a disagreement over who to hire - she wanted a female since some women are more comfortable with a woman examining them. Nick felt that he needed to hire someone right away and that it would take too much time searching for a woman who would be interested in coming here. There had been a job inquiry from a man who is returning to the province after being away for a number of years.”

“I see both of their points.”

“I do, too, but Nick was right - with me being away and not knowing when I’d be back, there wasn’t time to go recruiting. I met the new physician - Luca Fowler - he seems nice and well qualified. He’s interested in staying on when I go back, which is great as it will free up some of my time so I can be home with you more. The only problem is that I will be spending a lot less time with patients, as I need to use some of the time doing paperwork including bookkeeping, payroll, putting chart entries and test results into the computer etc.”

“Doc, let me do some of that.”

“Do you know how?”

“No, but I can learn.”

“It would take time away from your horses.”

“How much time?”

“All totalled, about 10-20 hours a week.”

“That’s not bad.”

“Like I said, it would take time from your horses.”

“I’ll only have 4, including Lilly, when they come home.” I had insisted on getting her back if it was in time, so that she could foal at my place.

“You’ll end up with more as soon as they start calling you to take them in again.”

“No, I’m going to limit myself to 3 or 4 fosters at a time.”

“I’ll believe that when I see it.”

“Haha, Doc.”

“Why the plan to slow down?”

“To spend more time with you. And have it be quality time, not me lying around because I’m in too much pain to do anything. That cyst is gone and once I recover from my current injuries, it will just be my arthritis to contend with. I need to keep moving a certain amount, but I shouldn’t overdo it. The arthritis pain has been a lot better, though not gone, since I have been away from the farm.”

“I love the idea of you backing off a bit, hon. I just don’t know if you can do it when all is said and done. I’m willing to let you give it a try with helping with bookkeeping and other paperwork, but not until your injuries have healed.”

“I’m fine with that, Doc. Besides, I have to rest up. Haying season will be here in a couple months.” We were now into April.

The look on his face was priceless. “That is a hard NO, Meredith. Absolutely no haying!”

“I have to help out! They give me hay for my horses!”

“Buy it from them.”

“They wouldn’t take anything for it last year when I couldn’t finish out the season.”

“We’ll find a way for you do something in exchange, Meredith. Maybe you could charge them less for the rental of the fields.”

“I’m already charging them a minimal amount, but I could drop that to $0. If Walt will accept it.”

“I’ll talk to him and make it clear that you can’t participate in the work and that you feel bad taking the hay from them. Oh, here‘s your supper tray.” A food service worker came in and set it down.

“I’m not hungry.”

“You have to eat something.”

“Ok, Doc. Why don’t you go downstairs and get something for yourself?”

“I think I’ll do that.”

“Stay down there and eat. Get out of my room for a bit.”

“I was out this morning, remember?”

“It won’t hurt you to be away from me for a bit tonight. We have to get used to it, you’ll be going back to work soon.”

“Not until after you’ve healed, which will be a few weeks. I don’t buy that that’s your motivation. What are you up to, Meredith?”

“Would I be up to something?”

“Yes. I wouldn’t put it past you to get out of bed and flush your supper down the toilet.”

Damn, I was caught. “You’re on to me, honey. Guess I can’t fool you.”

“No, you can’t, Meredith. I don’t understand why you even try. Now, eat up. I‘m going down to the café and before I go, I‘m leaving orders at the nursing station that I am to be notified if there‘s any interruption to your cardiac monitor. They will know if you turn it off or take the leads off to get out of bed. I‘ll also move the garbage can out of range of how far you can go with them on.”

While he was gone, I choked a bit of my supper down. I couldn’t even eat a quarter of it, though. When Doc came back, he looked at what was left and said “You ate something, but it’s not enough, hon. I got you some lasagne.”

“Can you put it in the fridge for tomorrow? I can’t eat any more.”

“Well, I know you truly are not hungry if you are turning down lasagne. Of course, I can put it away for later or tomorrow. What about the coffee I brought up?”

“I’ll drink that!” He laughed.

Later, Doc read a magazine while I dozed. He had brought a couple back from his clinic. I think he subscribes to every medical journal there is. I felt like I should get online and let people know where I’d been, but I did not feel up to it. Besides the pain, my stomach was upset. Dr Quinn had warned me that the antibiotic he was putting me on might cause nausea. After a while, I knew I was going to upchuck. “Doc, can you please get me an emesis basin?” I asked. He got one from under the sink in the nick of time.

“I’m going to clean this up, then order you some Gravol, hon.”

“Can you do that, Doc?”

“Yes, I can. I’m listed as your GP and I have hospital privileges. There‘s no point bothering the on-call surgeon.” A nurse brought the bag of Gravol in when it came up from the pharmacy and hooked it up to my IV. She also brought my evening medications.

“Are there pain pills in that mix?” Doc asked her.

“Yes, there are.”

“Take them out. I’m going to order IV pain meds. She’s hurting pretty bad tonight.”

“Yes, Doctor.”

“Julian, can it wait until bed time? It makes me so drowsy.”

“It is bed time, Meredith. You need all the sleep you can get.”

“Oh, Marnie”, I said to the nurse. “Could you please get Julian a pillow and blanket?”

“I sure can.”

While we waited for the medication to come up, Doc put cream on my burn marks. He was doing it morning, afternoon and night. It seemed to me he was taking longer than he needed to rubbing it in. He was being so gentle, it hardly hurt at all.

After giving me the pain medication, Doc lay down with me until I fell asleep. He said he was going to get up and read some more after I drifted off. I didn’t even wake up when he got back into bed, though I did wake up in the night and noticed he was lying behind me with his arm around me. I lifted his hand, which was on my abdomen at my belly button and set it down over my breast. I had to shift my position a bit so that his arm did not rest on my incision. While I wanted him to make love to me, I knew there’s no way he’d do it in my hospital bed and I was in no shape to be doing it anyway. I couldn’t wait to get home!

“Meredith!” he said to me when I woke up.

“Yes, Doc?”

“Are you responsible for where my hand was when I woke up?”

“Hmmmm….maybe. I notice it’s still there.”

“You are something else, Ms Hottie.”

After breakfast, Dr Quinn came to see me. Doc told him about me being sick to my stomach the night before. “That’s probably the antibiotic”, he said.

“Yes, and she’s had a lot of them lately, so that probably contributed.”

“I’m sure it did. You can have Gravol any time you need it”, he told me. He looked at my incision and said it was looking good. After he left, Doc changed the dressing, then left to go to the apartment to shower and change clothes.

While he was gone, Alex Carmichael came around. “Hi, Meredith, how are you feeling today?” he asked.

“Very glad to be done with that nightmare, Alex.”

“How are you physically?”

“Sore, but I will be for a while. I was sick last night but Dr Quinn said it’s from the antibiotic he has me on to try to prevent an infection.”

“Yes, they can do that to you. Do you feel like talking for a bit?”

“Sure, but I’ll warn you - once I start talking about this ordeal, I may not stop for a while.”

“That’s okay, Meredith”, he said with a chuckle. “I don’t have any appointments today, so I have lots of time.”

“I shouldn’t be taking up your down time.”

“It’s not down time, I just didn’t have any appointments. If I wasn’t here, I’d be in my office doing paperwork. I’d rather be here.”

I laughed, then grabbed my side.

“Ouch”, Alex said.

“Yeah, I know better than to laugh.”

“Want to bring me up to speed on what has happened since I last saw you?” I filled him in on the last few weeks, leaving out certain activities he did not need to know about. I finished with telling him about Doc forcing me out of the safe house and me walking away from him and getting hit by a car, then Jane getting into my ER room.

When I finished, he said “That’s quite an ordeal you two have been through.”

“At least it’s over now. Well, except for testifying. That will be nothing in comparison, though.”

“How did you cope?”

“How? I had no choice, I just did.”

“What was the worst that happened?”

“Julian getting shot in the ER room.”

“What was the worst that happened to *you*, Meredith?”

“You mean besides seeing the love of my life get shot?”

“Yes. What was the worst Jane has done to *you*, not Julian.”

“Threatened my horses and friends and Julian.”

“I mean something she did to you.”

“What are you fishing for, Alex? Her doing those things affected me.”

“I know, but I want you to name something she’s done directly to you. Not something she’s done to someone or something else that affected you.”

“You mean like punching me where she knew my cyst was and rupturing it?”

“Yes, that’s exactly the kind of thing I want you to name.”

“I’d say the snake incident.”

“Why is that the worst? You weren’t hurt.”

“Physically, no. And the physical wounds I got from and because of her will heal, but I don’t know if I will ever truly feel safe again.”

“Not even with her behind bars?” I shook my head no. “What if she gets a life sentence?”

“Not even then. She could get parole or she could escape before she’s eligible for parole.”

“What would make you feel safe again?”

“If she were dead.”

“She’s young - relatively - and healthy. I don’t think that’s about to happen in the near future. So, we need to work on getting you to feel safe again.”

“Good luck with that, Alex.”

“I’m up for a challenge. Other than not feeling safe, how are you feeling about what happened?”

“The physical pain I can deal with. But I’ll admit I get really pissed off at Jane when I think about what’s she has done to us. I want to face her in court at the bail hearing, but Julian says I can’t go. I have to testify by video link-up, and that won’t be the same.”

“Why not write it down?”

“Write what down?”

“All the things you want to say to her. Write them down. You may not ever get to say them to her, or have her see what you write, but it might help release some tension.”

“I’ll try that.”

“How do you feel toward Julian?”

“I love him. With all my heart.”

“Do you blame him for any of this?”

“NO!” I almost shouted. “Why would I?”

“Some people might if they were in your situation.”

“Absolutely not! None of this is his fault. He feels it is, and I’ve tried and tried to get him to see it’s not. Jane is the only one who is responsible. Alex, when you talk to him, can you please try and get him to see that?”

“I can’t tell him anything you’ve told me, Meredith. He will have to bring it up.”

“You can tell him, I give you permission. Anything we talk about, you can tell him, unless I specifically say I don’t want you to.”

“Okay, but I’ll need to get you to sign a release.”

“That’s fine.”

“Is there anything else you want to talk about today?” I thought a moment. Should I tell him about the events in the OR? Or should I keep it to myself? I couldn’t decide.

“You’re hesitating, Meredith. What are you afraid to say?”

I sighed. “Alex, I don’t want you to commit me. Though I‘m doubting my own sanity.”

“Why do you say that?”

“Something happened and I can’t make head or tail of it.”

“Where did it happen?”

“In the operating room when they were taking my spleen out and I went into v-fib.”

“What happened?”

“Alex, this is one of those things I don’t want you to mention to Julian. I need to tell him when I’m ready to.”

“Okay, Meredith.”

I took a deep breath. “I saw myself on the table.”

“While you were out?”

“Yes.” I told him of what had happened, of seeing my body being shocked, Doc watching and crying and of seeing my family and Doc’s parents.

“Meredith, you had what is known as a Near Death Experience, also called NDE. You aren’t alone, many people have described something similar when they have been close to death and then brought back.”

“Really, Alex? You mean I’m not going around the bend?”

“No, you aren’t. You should do some reading online, I think there’s support groups out there for people who have gone through it.”

“That is such a relief. I thought I was losing it.”

“You aren’t. Do you still want me to not tell Julian?”

“Yes. I will tell him. I’m not sure when, but I have to. I have to pass on the message from his parents. I just hope he doesn’t think I’m losing it.”

“You can tell him to ask me about it if he doesn’t believe you. So, to recap - we’re going to work on getting you to feel secure again and you are going to write down what you want to say to Jane. Is there anything else you want to work on?”

“Yes. I feel so ugly with all my scars. I’m afraid Julian will be repulsed looking at me.”

“You mean the scars from the splenectomy and the ruptured cyst clean-up?”

“And the ones from the defibrillator paddles and the one from my broken ankle and broken leg from last year and the one here on my arm from when I got thrown from my horse.” I showed him my arm. “Julian doesn’t have any scars, though he will have two now from the bullet.” I didn't tell him about the scars on Doc's back – that wasn't my place. It was up to Doc whether to tell Alex or not.

“Your latest scars are there because doctors saved your life, Meredith.”

“I know, people tell me that, including Julian. I still feel self conscious about them.”

“Then we will work on that.”

“Alex, you were only going to see each of us once as a professional courtesy.”

“We’ll work something out, Meredith. Maybe you can teach me to ride, I’ve always wanted to learn. Here’s something for you to think about, though. I know you want our sessions to be off your medical record.” I nodded. “Why?”

“I don’t want it to interfere with any medical care I would need.”

“Why would it?”

“I met a woman online from another province who is disabled. She spent a lot of time in her youth in and out of hospital - the psych hospital. Turned out in the end she was misdiagnosed, and she had to eventually move out of her area to get medical care because doctors would see her history and assume her problem was in her head. They didn’t believe her that she was misdiagnosed.”

“Meredith, I can’t speak to what happened to her, but you are only hearing her side of the story. You don’t know what the other side is.”

“This is true.”

“I can assure you that your medical care here will not be affected because of you talking to me about the ordeal you’ve been through. Anyone would understand that you might need help dealing with it. The benefit to starting a chart on you - and Julian as well - would be that if you gave permission, the Crown could use it when presenting their case for sentencing. I could even testify as to how what Jane did to you both affected you - of course, with your permission.”

“I never thought of that, Alex.”

“It’s something to think about. It could really help the judge make a decision on how much time to give her. I‘ll be seeing Julian this afternoon, and I‘ll be back to see you tomorrow, but just to check in and see how you are doing. We‘ll set something up for a longer chat in a few days or so.”

After he left, I decided to check my email. I hadn’t checked it since before going to the safe house. I opened the new notebook Scott Fletcher had given me and saw that he’d set up the mail program for me. I downloaded my email and looked at the list. Everything was sent before Doc and I had left, except for the last one. It had been sent yesterday and the “From” field said “Me”. The subject line said “Hello Meredith.” I opened the email and read:

Dear Meredith,

I’m passing on a message from a mutual acquaintance. She said to tell you that she may be down, but she’s not out.

Me

OMG, Jane! Rage and fear went through my mind. I wanted to throw the notebook against the wall from frustration, but it was just a loaner until I got mine back, or so I thought. So I picked up the water jug, which was about 1/3 full, and threw it, simultaneously screaming. It hit the wall with a loud thud.