Dr Southwell stepped back and indicated she do the same. Ellie listened to the lub-dub, lub-dub of a normal organ, the in-and-out breaths that were equal in both lungs, nodded and stood back.
He was right. She’d been putting off asking someone to sign her off on this. Before Wayne, she would have been gung-ho about adding neonatal checks to her repertoire. A silly lack of confidence meant she’d been waiting around for someone else to do it when she should really just have done this instead. After all, when she had the independent midwifery service this would be one of her roles.
By the time they’d run their hands over the little girl, checked her hips didn’t click or clunk when tested, that her hand creases, toes and ears were all fine, Ellie was quite pleased with herself.
As they walked away she had the feeling that Dr Southwell knew exactly what she was feeling.
‘Easy,’ he said and grinned at her, and she grinned back. He wasn’t so bad after all. In fact, he was delightful.
Then it hit her. It had been an action-packed two hours since he’d walked in the door. This physically attractive male had gone from being a stranger standing in her office, to coffee victim, to birth assistant, to frog remover, to midwife’s best friend in a couple of hours and she was grinning back at him like a smitten fool. As if she’d found a friend and was happy that he liked her.
Just as Wayne had bowled her over when they’d first met. She’d been a goner in less than an evening. He’d twisted her around his finger and she’d followed him blindly until he’d begun his campaign of breaking her. She’d never suspected the lies.
Oh, yes. Next came the friendly sharing of history, all the warm and fuzzy excitement of mutual attraction, pleasant sex and then bam! She’d be hooked. The smile fell off her face.
Not this little black duck.
Ellie dragged the stethoscope from around her neck and fiercely wiped it over with a disposable cleaning cloth. Without looking at Sam, she held out her hand for his stethoscope. She felt it land and glanced at him. ‘Thank you. I’ll see you tomorrow, then, Dr Southwell.’
She watched his smile fade. Hers had completely disappeared as she’d looked up at him with the same expression she’d met him with this morning. Polite enquiry. He straightened his shoulders and jammed his hand back in his pocket to jingle his keys again.
‘Right,’ he said evenly. ‘I’ll go check into my guesthouse.’ Without another word, he strode away to the front door and she sagged with relief.
Lucky she’d noticed what she’d been doing before it had gone too far. But at this precise moment she didn’t feel lucky. She felt disheartened that she couldn’t just enjoy a smile from a good-looking man without getting all bitter, twisted and suspicious about it. Wayne had a lot to answer for.
She did what she always did when her thoughts turned to her horrific marriage that really hadn’t been a marriage—she needed to find work to do and maybe Josie or her baby could give it to her.
THREE NIGHTS LATER, alone in her big oak bed on top of the cliff, Ellie twisted the sheets under her fingers as the dream dragged her back in time. Dragged her all the way back to primary school.
Her respirations deepened with the beginning of panic. The older Ellie knew what the dream Ellie didn’t. Her skin dampened.
Then she was back.
To the last day of compulsory swimming lessons she’d used to love. Now school and swimming lessons made her heart hurt. Mummy had loved helping at swimming lessons, had even taught Ellie’s class the first two years, but now all they did was remind young Ellie how much she’d lost, because Mummy wasn’t there anymore. Daddy had said Mummy would be sad that Ellie didn’t like swimming now, but it made her heart ache.
And some of the big boys in primary school were mean to her. They laughed when she cried.
But today was the last day, the last afternoon she’d see the grey toilet block at the swimming pool for this year, and she pushed off her wet swimming costume with relief and it plopped to the floor. When she reached for her towel she thought for a minute that it moved. Silly. She shook her head and grabbed for it again so she could dry and get dressed quickly, or she’d be last in line again and those boys would tease her.
Something moved out of the corner of her eye and then she felt the cold shock as a big, green frog leaped towards her and landed on her bare chest. She screamed, grabbed the clammy bulk of it off her slimy skin and threw it off her chest in mindless revulsion, then fought with the lock on the change-room door to escape.
The lock jammed halfway. Ellie kept screaming, then somehow her fingers opened the catch and she ran out of the cubicle, through the washroom and outside through the door—into a long line of stunned primary school boys who stared and then laughed at the crying, naked young Ellie until she was swooped on by a scolding teacher and bundled into a towel.
She wanted her mummy. Why couldn’t she have her mummy? It should be her mummy holding her tight and soothing her sobs. She cried harder, and her racking sobs seemed to come from her belly, even silencing the laughing boys...
Ellie sat bolt upright in bed, the sob still caught in her throat, and shuddered. She didn’t know why frogs were so linked with her mother’s death. Maybe it was something she’d heard about her mother’s car accident, coupled with her childhood’s overwhelming sense of loss and grief—and of course that incident at the swimming baths hadn’t helped—but she couldn’t hear a frog without having that loneliness well back up in her again. It had become the spectre of grief. All through her childhood, whenever she’d been lonely and missed her mother, she’d had the frog nightmare. She’d eventually grown out of it. But, after Wayne, it had started again.
She hadn’t had the dream for a while. Not once since she’d moved here a year ago—and she hoped like heck she wasn’t going to start having it repeatedly again.
She glanced at the window. It was almost light. She’d have time for a quick walk on the beach before she’d have to come back and shower for work. Find inner peace before the day.
Then she remembered the new doctor. Sam. Day four. One more day and then she’d have the weekend off and wouldn’t have to see him. Was that why she’d had the dream? The problem was she liked him. And every day she liked him more. He was lovely to the women. Great with the staff. Sweet to her. And Myra thought the sun shone out of him.
Ellie didn’t want to like Sam. Because she’d liked the look of Wayne too, and look where that had ended up.
* * *
Of course when she went down to the beach the first person she saw was Dr Sam. Funny how she knew it was him—even from the spectacular rear. Thankfully he didn’t see her because he was doing what his father had done—watching the ocean. Sam’s broad back faced her as he watched the swells and decided on where to swim. Then he strode into the water.
She walked swiftly along the beach, her flip flops in her hand, waves washing over her toes while she tried not to look as his strong arms paddled out to catch the long run of waves into the shore that delighted the surfers.
She couldn’t even find peace on ‘her’ beach. She stomped up the curve of sand and back again faster than usual, deliberately staring directly in front of her. If she hadn’t been so stubborn she would have seen that he was coming in on a wave and would intercept her before she could escape.
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