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Post by rorygilmore on Sept 24, 2006 15:12:34 GMT 10
“This shirt is mine because I paid for it?” Richard pulled a way from her. “My mother gave me this shirt for my birthday,” he said. He shook his head at her. Richard is so immature!!! GRRR... Your fic is simply GREAT, larue. The way you tell us the facts is so good, so well narrated. You really know how to hook your readers up to the story. When I read the part of the abortion, I was feeling everything Abby felt...by the end I was: wow. Great Job, larue.
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Post by larue on Sept 24, 2006 22:50:52 GMT 10
“Comes the Dawn”
Abby lifted her head from where it rested on her elbow folded over a text book and stack of medical journals. She looked up at the clock on the wall and groaned. She’d slept all night at the table again. She sat up and glanced over her notes. She shook her head. At least she had managed to finish her notes before falling asleep. She’d be able to actually write the paper tonight. She gathered everything into a file folder and stood up from the table and stretched wearily. She could hear Richard in the shower.
She went to the coffee maker on the counter and poured the remnants of the old pot down the drain. She hesitated a moment as she held the empty pot under the spigot in the sink. A wicked smile crossed her lips and she turned the hot water on full force to fill the pot. She counted to five and then grinned as a stream of violently angry curse words filtered through the bathroom door. That would teach him. He refused to help her study. Anything. It was infuriating. He’d said that the ‘Great Gods of Medical Schools created study groups for a reason.’ But she was second in her class overall...no thanks to him.
She filled the coffee maker with water and added a coffee ground filled filter to the basket, set it in the pot . She put the pot in it’s place and flipped the switch. It would be a few minutes yet but her nose could already smell the aroma of a much needed fresh cup of coffee.
She was standing against the counter sipping a steaming cup when he finally came out of their room. He was dressed in a suit for work and had his brief case in hand. Neither of them said a word but his eyes met her’s and he shook his head. He set the brief case on the table and snapped it open. He went through some of the papers and rearranged a couple of files. He sighed and snapped the brief case shut again.
“Sabotaging my shower was a pretty shitty thing to do, Abby,” he said. Her eyes widened innocently.
“Did I do that?” Richard’s eyes narrowed and he shook his head.
“Rather childish actually.” She was silent as she took another sip of her coffee.
“Don’t wait up for me...” he slipped his arms into an expensive coat and then picked up his briefcase.
“I’m not going to be home tonight anyway,” she said. Richard stopped short and looked at her questionably. Abby shrugged. “I’m going to a meeting and then I’m scheduled for a night shift.”
“Another meeting?” .
“Keeps me from drinking,” she shrugged.
“And you want to do that...why?” Abby chuckled sarcastically.
“Being a drunk and going to med school do not walk hand in hand, Richard,” she said. “You never thought I would make it through one semester and in two months I will be a third year. Why can’t you be proud of that? Proud of...me?”
“Maybe because paying for med school...again...is keeping us in this dump,” he said as he cast his eyes around the apartment. He picked up his brief case and then left. She waited until she knew he would be safely on his way to his office before she stepped into the shower. She stood still for a long moment and just let the hot water splash all over her before reaching for her shampoo bottle. It was empty. And so was his. Shit. Talk about childish.
The meeting was...another meeting. She had been attending regularly and listening for three years...since the weekend she’d poured the bottle down the drain. She didn’t like to refer to that weekend as being the time of anything else. It was too painful. She tried sharing it once. She never went back to that meeting group again.
OB was slow for a change. She really wasn’t needed. She decided to head home to work on her paper there rather than in the call room. They would page her if something came up.
The lights were on in the apartment when she opened the door. Richard’s coat and brief case were thrown over the couch. She sighed and picked it up to hang in the closet. Then she noticed the red stilettos next to the couch. They weren’t her’s.
She looked up as Richard came out of their bedroom clad in his bathrobe. He was startled to see her there.
“Abby...” he breathed as their eyes met. Abby’s eyes shifted to the laughing woman who was following him, wearing her bathrobe. For a long moment the three of them just looked at one another in silence. Finally Abby spoke.
“Well, she’s a little prettier than the last one, Richard. How much is this one charging you?” Richard rolled his eyes and fell back against the door jamb. He glared at Abby with a forced grin and shook his head.
“What...did you say?” the leggy blonde behind him said. He scowled and then turned to push his...friend...back in the bedroom and closed the door behind them. Abby stood still for a longer minute and then slowly made her way to the kitchen. Methodically she filled the tea kettle and set it on the stove. She turned on the burner and took a mug from the cupboard and reached for her box of tea bags. They were on a shelf next to a bottle of Scotch. How interesting that he would think to put the liquor next to her tea bags. She hesitated for a long moment and then grabbed the box and slammed the cupboard door. She stayed there waiting for the water in the kettle to boil and for the sounds of Richard ushering the woman out of the door. She heard the apartment door open and shut and then open again. She knew he would be standing there when she turned around. She leaned back against the counter and folded her arms across her chest.
“So how many other whores have you screwed in our bed?” she asked.
“Abby...” he said slowly.
“All those times I would come home to clean sheets and pillow cases,” she scoffed. “I thought you were just being a helpful husband.”
“Well, maybe if you’d been a wife I wouldn’t have needed anyone else.” Her eyes widened. The look on his face said that he was immediately regretting that remark but he went on.
“You were the one that decided you had to go back to school, Abby. You’re in class. You’re taking shifts when you’re not meeting with a study group. You go to your AA meetings all the time. You are chasing down your mother.” His gray eyes narrowed accusingly. “You haven’t exactly been around that much.” He ducked as she threw the ceramic mug in her hand at his head. The mug crashed against the wall and hot tea splashed to the floor and dribbled down the wall paper. Richard backed away as Abby headed toward the door of the kitchen and him. She turned and disappeared down a hall and into the bathroom. She came out with clean sheets and her bathrobe. She dropped the sheets on to the couch and threw the bathrobe at him.
“You can get rid of that,” she spit angrily. “Oh...unless you want to keep it for anyone else you have sleep over.” She started shaking the sheets out and making a bed on the couch.
“What are you doing?” Richard sighed. Abby’s brown eyes were flashing.
“I have no intention of sleeping in that bed with you ever again,” she said. She stopped and looked at him. “I guess what I want is...out. I want a divorce.”
“Abby...” he said quietly and tried to take her hand. “Don’t make that kind of a decision right now. It’s not that big of a deal.” Abby stepped back and held her hands up in front of her to stop him.
“Eight years,” he said quietly. “How can you say you want to quit something that has lasted eight years? We need to talk about this.”
“Eight and a half, Richard,” she said as her voice trailed off. “And as you pointed out, we stopped talking a long time ago.” She went back to tucking the sheets in and spreading an afghan from the couch over them. He gazed at her sadly for a long moment and then went into the bedroom and closed the door. Abby watched him go out of the corner of her eye and then sat carefully on the couch. She didn’t regret what she had said. She knew this wasn’t the first woman he’d cheated with. Her mother in law as much as told her that three years ago. It was her choice to ignore it then. She had hoped it would get better. But he was right about her not being around. It was easier not to be. She didn’t have to look at him and think about what she had done. The secret she carried. It was just...easier.
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Post by Little Amy on Sept 25, 2006 3:05:07 GMT 10
OMG I can't believe i missed two updates!!!!Well anyway..... AWESOME UPDATES
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Post by zelda on Sept 25, 2006 10:11:28 GMT 10
Larue, I read the 2 last chapters together. Richard is an insufferable jerk. What I wanted to express, is that the conversation between Abby and her mother-in-law was a TURNING POINT ,for me. QUOTE: "make sure you are the person you want to be, Abby." And Abby knows that male chauvinist Richard will never be a good father. I believe that it wasn't so much the fear of having a bipolar child which induced Abby to have an abortion, as the absolute certitude, that this man could only destroy her life and her baby's life. This terrible decision will make her stronger to get on with her OWN life. Great, great story.
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Post by Cornflake Girl on Sept 25, 2006 19:49:23 GMT 10
WOW thse last few chapters were simply incredible! I liked the turning point for Abby to quit drinking, it was very approprite.
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Andie
Duchess of Luby
Posts: 325
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Post by Andie on Sept 25, 2006 22:16:12 GMT 10
That was awsome... totally awsome!!!! I simply loved it...please keep going!!!!
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Julianna (juscully)
Duchess of Luby
"I don't want to be alone, I want to be left alone.? Audrey Hepburn
Posts: 352
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Post by Julianna (juscully) on Sept 26, 2006 2:21:10 GMT 10
simply awesome! talk about selfish! cant wait for more!
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Post by ninabrasil (Marina) on Sept 26, 2006 10:00:35 GMT 10
Larue, this story is amazing. From the tottally creative initial theme to the way you describe Abby's feelings and actions. You certainly have me glued to the screen like any episode of ER. Please update soon. Nina xx
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Post by larue on Sept 27, 2006 13:05:01 GMT 10
Okay...so I took a little liberty with the timing of things. I think Abby was still married when she began her ER rotation...and the divorce took place in the summer, not in the winter when this chapter takes place.. Also, I borrowed some dialog from the season 6 episode ‘Abby Road’. Hellloooo Luka!
Court and County
It took months, sometimes years, to plan a wedding. You had to find the right minister and church, the perfect reception location, photographers, caterers...the perfect dress. Even the wedding ceremony could possibly last an hour...to begin a marriage. It took 20 minutes in front of a judge and the bang of a gavel to end one.
Just like that. Eight and a half years of her life were over. Good years? Some of them. Others...well... Abby did not hesitate for a second when her lawyer showed her where to sign the paperwork. She never once looked at Richard. He looked at her however. Just before he signed his name to the divorce decree, he scowled at her. She could feel it.
Abby knew that her lawyer wasn’t really happy with the settlement she had agreed to. She didn’t really want anything. She didn’t contest his desire to keep the condo, his car, the furniture...even though her salary had paid for most of it. Whatever he wanted, she gave to him. All she wanted was her med school tuition. Which he fought tooth and nail. Said she could earn a reasonable living on her own while attending school but in the end, even his lawyer said it was not an unreasonable request. She had supported him through medical school, his internship and residency. And she was third year after all. It wasn’t like it was going to last forever. Tomorrow she would start her first hospital rotation cycle as a medical student. She had waited a long time for this. And it was perfect timing. The end of one thing and the beginning of another.
Abby stood up from the courtroom table and turned around. Richard was huddled in the back with his dad and his lawyer. His mother stood off to the side a bit and was watching her. She smiled wistfully when their eyes met. Jacqueline raised her fingers to her lips, kissed them and then tipped them in Abby’s direction. Abby smiled a little and nodded. She knew. She understood.
Outside the courthouse she took a deep breath and decided to walk the blocks to the el station. It wasn’t that cold and her new place was just a short ride to the hospital from there. She has a whole day and night before she needed to report for her ER rotation. She hadn’t really spent much time in that department but she had heard all of the hospital gossip about how crazy it could be. She was actually looking forward to it.
They were terribly shorthanded and the middle of an onslaught of flu victims when she arrived to report to the admit desk. The desk clerk brushed her off as she spoke on the phone with someone about a flu shot. Abby looked up as a nurse in familiar pink scrubs rounded the entry of the admit desk.
‘Abby!” she said. “Did they send you down here?”
“Uh, yeah...”
“Ah...I was wondering when they were going to send us some help,” she said. Abby was confused.
“Carol...” she said.
“Hathaway!” It suddenly came to her. Thanksgiving.
“Yeah, you were my OB nurse.”
“Right! Twin girls...how are they doing?”
“Oh, just great,” she said. “Sleeping through the night...just not at the same time.” Abby shook her head and chuckled.
“I don’t know how you do it.”
“Well, it’s not easy,” she sighed. “And neither is managing 36 patients when you’re short two nurses.” They started down the hall dodging patients, med students, residents and doctors. All the while Carol kept a running diatribe of the treatment nurses got from med students and residents. Abby was beginning to get a little uncomfortable with the misunderstanding. She stepped aside as a gurney was pushed in from the door with a little boy in a snow suit.
“Can someone take this? We’ve been waiting for ten minutes. Todd Sullivan, five,” the EMT said. “Took a nasty header while sledding. Mom’s on her way.”
“I lost my teeth,” the little boy said as he held up a plastic jar.
“Aw sweetie, don’t worry,” Carol said as Abby glanced into his mouth. “I bet they were your baby teeth.”
“He’s avulsed his front incisors,” Abby said quickly as she followed alongside the gurney. “He’ll need a C-spine and a head CT.”
“Yeah, if we can find a doc to order it,” Carol sighed as she looked around.
“I can do it.”
“What?” Carol stopped.
“Med students work up patients, right?” Abby said .
“Yeah.”
“I’m a third year. I start my ER rotation today.” Carol stopped and stared at her as Todd’s gurney was pushed into an exam room.
“You’re a med student?” Abby shifted and shrugged her shoulders.
“What can I say? I crossed over to the dark side.” She ducked in to the exam room after her first patient and left Carol standing in the hall.
She put her winter coat in the call room and changed into her lab jacket. She was examining Todd’s CT films when an attending entered the trauma room.
“And what do we have here?’ he asked in a jovial, heavily accented voice.
“Sledding accident,” Abby said as she turned away from the light board. “His facial films are clear and I paged an oral surgeon to come down and take a look.”
“Should we update his tetanus?” Carol asked.
“He had one a year ago,” Abby offered.
“I guess not,” the attending said as he smiled a little at her. “By the way, I am Luka Kovac.” Abby was dumbstruck for a second. Those eyes...
“Abby Lockhart. I’m a third year.” She shook her head a bit and tugged nervously on the stethescope around her neck.
“Another new resident in the middle of the year?” he asked.
“Well, I’m a med student,” she replied with a sigh.
“Oh...” He was smiling at her. Their eyes met and he grinned wider.
“Another half gram of ancef?” Carol interrupted.
“Oh...uh...Abby?” Dr. Kovac tipped his head and looked at her again.
“Yeah...sure. Sounds good,” she said.
“Okay,” he smiled. “Nice job.” Abby watched him go and then turned back to the nurses across from her.
“Wow, “ she said. “We never had doctors like that up in OB.”
“Yeah, easy on the eyes, isn’t he?” Haleh chuckled.
“I’ll say,” Abby laughed. “Is he single?”
“He doesn’t talk about his personal life,” Carol said flatly as she drew up the meds for Todd.
“Oooh...tall, dark, handsome and mysterious,” Abby sighed as she started gathering up the sponges and papers covering the blanket on the gurney.
“What are you doing?”
“Cleaning up,” she said.
“I got it,” Carol said flatly.
“Don’t be silly.”
“No, really, I’ve got it,” Carol insisted.
“Okay.” Abby dropped the papers into the bowl on the bed and headed toward the door. She turned around
“Uh, Carol,” she said. “I’d love to see some pictures of your girls later. “
”Sure...” Carol replied. Abby sighed as she left the room. The friendliness seemed to be gone. She headed back to the admit desk which seemed to have calmed a bit.
“Check out my fever,” an intern in dark scrubs said as he snagged her arm. She pressed a hand to his forehead and then was pulled away by the ER department head.
“Eh, Malucci, leave her alone,” Dr. Weaver said and pulled Abby away. “Abby?” Abby nodded.
“Aw, give me a break, Chief,” he said.
“Yeah, yeah...suck it up,” she said and led Abby toward another doctor.
“Abby Lockhart, third year...Mark Greene, attending,” she said.
“We’ve met,” Abby said as they shook hands.
“Okay, good...I’ll see you tomorrow,” Dr. Weaver sighed as she turned to leave. “That is if I live through the night...”
“So she wasn’t hallucinating?” Dr. Greene asked.
“No, I’m a med student.”
“And an OB nurse...”
“I take a shift occasionally,” Abby said. “To pay the bills.” He erased a patient’s name from the white board.
“Well, welcome to the glory that is the ER,” he said. “Anyone given you the three dollar tour?” Abby looked around in dismay and double stepped to keep up with him as he took her on a quick tour of the admit desk and procedures and then through the various treatment and trauma rooms. He was throwing out names as quickly as they walked. Malik, Yosh, Carter, Cleo... She was a bit dismayed and yet found it a bit comforting. Dr. Greene was obviously in control and a calm center in the midst of the ER havoc. They stopped in the treatment room where Todd was still waiting for the oral surgeon and she looked at his chart.
“Still hurting, Todd?” she asked.
“A little,” he said.
“We gave him four of morphine,” she said. “Can we give him two more?”
“Sure,” Dr. Green said. “Are you sure you need this tour?”
“Can’t hurt,” Abby said with a smile. And they were off again.
It seemed like days before the shift was finished. Abby was exhausted. And frustrated. And feeling a bit overwhelmed. She may have gotten a wee bit over her head already. She headed up to the hospital roof and stood looking over the lights of night time Chicago for a long moment. She lit up a cigarette and leaned against the side of the wall and shook her head.
“Hi.” Abby turned around. It was an intern from the ER.
“Hi.”
“You’re the new med student, right?”
“Yeah,” she said. “Abby Lockhart.”
“I’m Lucy,” the intern said as she approached the wall. “Nice to meet you. So how was your first day?”
“Uh...” Abby grimaced. “Well, let me put it this way. I haven’t had one of these in two years.” She held up her cigarette. Lucy laughed.
“What happened?” she asked.
“It was more like what didn’t happen,” Abby sighed as she stamped her feet in the cold. “Up in OB, I would deliver a baby and deliver a baby and then deliver a baby. Today I was puked on, spit at, bit...and then I tricked a psychotic woman and...almost killed a guy.” Lucy laughed again.
“That sounds about right,” she said. “And fortunately in the ER, ‘almost’ doesn’t count.” She opened a battered metal lunch pail and picked out a few dollar bills and dropped them over the edge and into the street below.
“What are you doing?” Abby asked.
“Patient’s last request,” Lucy said. “Come on, toss some. Might make you feel better.” Abby looked into the lunch box and tipped her head. She dropped some of the money into the wind.
“Shouldn’t we say a prayer or something?”
“I don’t think so,” Lucy said. When the lunch box was empty they stood for a few minutes and just looked out over the city. They hurried back inside, out of the cold and headed toward the ER again. They walked out through the ambulance bay together and separated at the street. Lucy hailed a cab to head back to her student housing and Abby turned to the el tracks. There was a little bounce to her step again. It had been a long day. Tiring. And yet invigorating. Her medical career as a doctor was really beginning to happen.
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Post by Real Dream on Sept 27, 2006 13:20:19 GMT 10
great update again! Are you going 'til season 13? Hope so!
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Post by Little Amy on Sept 27, 2006 13:45:46 GMT 10
wow I really liked it!!!!! Since I haven't seen 'Abby road' YET!!!!!!!!!!
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Post by maggie on Sept 27, 2006 16:32:19 GMT 10
i loved the exchange between abby and her mother-in-law (or ex-mother-in-law...) i wish there was some way you could work her into the rest of the story, something about those little interactions is just really...something. je ne sais quoi.
as always, pure brillance. if you decide you'd like it back on the luby board, let me know.
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Post by Cornflake Girl on Sept 27, 2006 19:06:06 GMT 10
Once again Larue nice work! I hope you keep this one going through a few episodes, I love reading peoples thoughts and insights into what may have happened off screen
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Post by lubyfan on Sept 27, 2006 20:30:12 GMT 10
Amazing story! Update soon
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Julianna (juscully)
Duchess of Luby
"I don't want to be alone, I want to be left alone.? Audrey Hepburn
Posts: 352
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Post by Julianna (juscully) on Sept 28, 2006 5:26:58 GMT 10
i totally agree with maggie, i thought it was really touching the exchange between abby and her mother in law, even though they didnt even exchange words, such a simple yet meaningful gesture they exchanged!!! (ive never used 'exchange' 3 times in a sentence before) loving this!!! update as soon as you manage, please!
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