The kid nodded and pressed his lips together. He was trying to be brave and, she guessed, might be more scared than hurt.
“Trace O’Halleran.” The cowboy introduced himself, extending his hand, his gaze focused on the name tag on her lab coat, which read: DR. ACACIA LAMBERT. His hand was big. Calloused and strong. His face was tanned, weathered from the sun, his brown hair showing streaks of blond, again, she assumed, from hours outside. His eyes were a startling shade of blue, his jaw hard, his nose appearing to have been broken at least once, probably twice, and he couldn’t scare up the ghost of a smile. “I’m Eli’s dad.”
She shook his hand, then let it fall. “So, what happened?”
“Playground accident,” Trace said. “Tell her,” he said, prodding the boy gently.
“I got pushed off the jungle gym.” Anger flared in the boy’s brown eyes.
“Why don’t you tell me about it while I look at your arm? That’s okay, right?”
Eli glanced at his dad, who nodded. “I guess.”
After quickly washing her hands at the small sink located in the room, she dried them with a paper towel, then pulled on a pair of latex gloves as she stepped closer to the boy. Gently, she removed the sling and splint, some cotton padding, and a small ice pack, all the while watching as he blanched even further. “Hurts, huh?”
Eli couldn’t speak but nodded, his eye filling with tears, which seemed to embarrass him further.
“So how did the accident happen?”
“Cory Deter pushed me off the jungle gym.” Eli was blinking rapidly now, and his jaw tightened. “He’s a jerk!”
“Well, I guess so, if he did this,” she agreed. “So, then what happened?”
“I fell! And… and I put my hands out like this. .” He extended his arms, winced, and sucked in his breath. His left arm fell back to his side as he turned ashen again.
“Okay, so you broke your fall by stretching out your arms.” She was nodding. “When?” She glanced at the dad.
“Don’t know exactly,” Eli’s father said. He was staring at her hard, as if trying to figure her out. “I got the call about forty minutes ago, so I assume it was right after it happened.”
“Okay.” She said gently to Eli, “Now, I’m gonna need to take a look at your arm a little more closely. Okay?”
From beneath his beetled eyebrows, the boy glared up at her suspiciously.
“It’s okay,” his father said, placing a big hand over the kid’s, but his expression was as concerned as his son’s.
“ ’Kay,” Eli finally said.
Gently she examined the boy. Testing his movements, running her fingers along the muscles and joints, watching his reaction. All the while, Trace hovered.
“I don’t think it’s broken,” she said finally, “but we can’t be sure without X-rays. There’s always the chance of a stress fracture.”
A muscle in Trace’s jaw worked. “That’s what the nurse at the school said, and she also said he was running a fever. He’s had a cold he hasn’t been able to shake.”
“Since you’re here,” she said to Eli, “let’s double-check that temp, then take a look at your throat and maybe your ears.”
Reluctantly, Eli agreed. His temperature was 100.1, his lymph nodes were slightly swollen, his eardrums were red, and his throat was so inflamed, she swabbed it to check for strep. “Looks like you probably need some antibiotics,” she said. “I’m betting your throat is pretty sore.”
“Really sore.” Eli bobbed his head emphatically.
Trace frowned. “You didn’t say anything.”
“Didn’t hurt before,” his son said.
“It can come on fast. Looks like a double ear infection, and I’m betting on strep throat,” Kacey said to Trace before moving her gaze to his son. “But you, Eli, should feel better in a couple of days,” she promised. “So, now, let’s get an X-ray of that arm, okay? The lab is in the next building.” She turned to her laptop and made a note, then said to Trace, “You can take him over there and have the X-rays taken. They’ll send them over, and I’ll look at them. It won’t take long. We’ll meet up here again, after I check them. If I think you should see an orthopedist, I’ll let you know and set up an appointment with Dr. Belding in Missoula. Or whomever you want.” She offered a reassuring smile, which wasn’t returned. “I’ve worked with Dr. Belding. She’s good.”
Trace nodded curtly. “Thanks.” To his son, he said, “Let’s go, bud.”
Heather appeared with the request forms for the lab just as Trace was helping Eli from the examination table. “Do you need anything else?” she asked Kacey.
“I think we’re okay. Thanks.”
As Heather returned to her desk, Kacey handed Trace the request forms, then, to make the boy feel more at ease, said to Eli, “Look, I know a shortcut, so I’ll walk you over. Is that okay?” She smiled at Eli. “Just in case your dad gets lost.”
“He won’t! He was an Army Ranger.”
Trace snorted and held the door open. “That was a few years back.”
“But you were!” Eli insisted.
“Back in the Dark Ages,” he admitted as they headed through a series of short hallways and out a back door, where the wind knifed through her lab coat and snow was collecting in the planters.
“Right here,” she said, holding her coat closed with one hand while hurrying down the short walkway. Before she could reach the door, Trace pulled it open and waited for her and his son to walk inside.
The heat was blasting, of course, Christmas music drifting down the hallways.
“Okay, from here on in, you’re on your own,” she said as she dropped them off with one of the lab technicians. “I’ll see you in about an hour, after we get the X-rays back.”
“Got it,” he said, and when his eyes met hers, she saw something dark and undefinable in his gaze.
Just your imagination.
Maybe Trace was just worried about his boy, but there was something more to the guy’s reaction, an undercurrent of distrust that seemed out of line with the situation, almost as if he didn’t trust her. Or maybe it was doctors or the medical profession in general. Not that she had time to worry about his hang-ups, whatever they were.
She and Randy, her nurse, spent nearly an hour with other patients: Cathy Singer was dealing with adult acne; two kids came in with flu symptoms; Kevin Thomas’s mother was certain he had head lice as there had been a case at school; and even Helen Ingles, having apparently found a replacement babysitter for her nephew, returned to have her own health and diabetes monitored.
An hour after being sent to the lab, the O’Hallerans were back in exam room three with the X-rays, which proved there was a small fracture in Eli’s left ulna. “Looks like we’re going to need a cast,” she told father and son as she showed them both the tiny hairline fracture in the bone. “So you can have your pick of colors. Pink or blue.”
“Pink?” Eli looked stricken. His nose wrinkled in disgust. “No way!”
“Blue it is,” she said with a grin as Randy found the appropriate colored kit from a supply closet and helped her apply the cast. For his part, Eli was a trooper, didn’t flinch too much, tried to be as stoic as his father.
Once the cast was in place, and Randy was cleaning up the extra packaging, Kacey gave them instructions. “The main thing is that you don’t reinjure it. So you”—she eyed the boy—“have to take it easy for a while. No more climbing on the jungle gym, or being pushed by Cory Whoever.” She leaned down so that she was eyeball-to-eyeball with him. “Can you do that?”
Eli nodded, then looked down at his cast. “Maybe you tell him that? He’s a butthead.”
Trace was long-suffering. “I thought that was our secret. Remember?”