Apocalypse Atlanta (2 page)

“Minority?” Jessica asked.

“On the clothes thing.” Joey said as he started opening the plastic bag inside the cereal box.  “Some of the stuff girls are wearing these days . . .” he grinned like only a teenage male contemplating an attractive female could.

Jessica allowed herself a slight frown.  “Well, you’re the big brother, so I’d appreciate it if you’d help keep your sisters on the straight and narrow.”

“Like I need his help.” Sandra said as she entered from the front room.  “With these clothes no boy’s ever going to look at me.  I might as well turn lesbian, that’s who’ll be interested in me dressed like this.”

“Language.” Jessica reprimanded sharply.  “And you look fine.” she added, taking in the more sensible skirt her daughter had put on.  This one came past her knees and didn’t reveal most of her legs.

“No complaints from me sis.” Joey said, crunching cereal audibly.  “If you get a girlfriend it’ll make my life easier.  The guys will stop bugging me about asking you out.”

“What’s a lesbian?” Candice asked as she came back in.

“Oh God!” Jessica said, resisting, with difficulty, the urge to throw her hands up.  “Enough!  Sit, eat!” Jessica said, pointing at Sandra.  “Honestly, for someone who claims to not like drama you create quite a bit.”

“I’m–” she started to say, but stopped when Jessica turned the pointing finger into a raised one.  She considered the look on her mother’s face, then sat down and reached for the other English muffin.

“You’re eating, then you’re walking your sister to the bus stop.” Jessica said as Sandra started putting the barest amount of jelly on her muffin, skipping the butter entirely.  She was firmly entrenched in the teenage girl phase, where how she looked and what she ate was critical.  Jessica was fine with all of it except for how it complicated school mornings.  She told herself, again, there was no way she’d given her mother this much trouble when she was Sandra’s age.

“Good o–” Joey started, only to stop when Jessica swiveled her finger to him, pointing once more.

“And you, I can just find something to do tonight other than staying home so you can use my car.”

“Could we go to the movies?” Candice asked hopefully.  “I’ve been good.”

Jessica let out a chuckle of laughter, mostly at the look of horror that was resolving across Joey’s face.  “If your brother and sister manage to get to and through school today without anymore drama, you and I can find something in the downloads we can watch together.  If not, then we’ll see.”

Joey and Sandra eyed her silently, one spooning cereal up while the other nibbled on the muffin.  Neither said anything as Candice clapped her hands twice innocently, though Jessica saw their eyes flicker a bit.  Draining the last of her coffee, she went into the kitchen and rinsed the mug out before sticking it in the dishwasher.  Her big travel mug was already full, lid on and waiting for her to grab.

Jessica dumped the last dregs in the coffee pot down the sink and rinsed that out before sticking it back in the coffee maker.  She heard a low undercurrent of conversation going on in the dining room, but it was too faint for her to make out, and didn’t sound all that heated regardless.  She knew better than to inquire after what they were talking about, or to try and demand they not take advantage of her absence.  She was a mother now, but she’d been a kid herself too.  She knew how it went.

“Okay, bye kids.” she called as she collected her purse and the travel mug off the counter.  “Have a good Friday.”

“Wait!” she heard Candice half-shriek, her voice cutting right across the somewhat unenthusiastic goodbyes Joey and Sandra were offering.  Jessica turned, smiling, as footsteps sounded, then Candice ran into the kitchen with her arms outstretched.  “Nosy kisses!”

“What was I thinking?” Jessica said, leaning down and wrapping her arms around her daughter as she arrived with a thump.  “Leaving without nosy kisses.”  She rubbed her nose across Candice’s, who giggled after a few seconds and squeezed her arms around her mother to end the hug.

“Bye Mom!”

“Be good.” Jessica said.  “Hear that?” she added, raising her voice.  “Be good!”

Acknowledgements drifted in from the dining room as Jessica opened the door to the garage.  As it closed behind her, she heard Sandra say something to Candice that provoked a somewhat outraged response.  “One more day.” she muttered, digging her keys out of her purse so she could unlock the car.

The drive down Highway-124 was uneventful, as it usually was this early.  The real crunch didn’t start hitting until closer to eight am, and she was usually well settled into her work day by the time that happened.  When she reached the office and unlocked the door to the suite, her eyes darted automatically to the clock on the wall above the receptionist’s window.

Ten after seven, which matched with what her phone had showed only moments before, and tracked with what the radio deejay had said just before she pulled into the lot.  It wasn’t that she didn’t remember the time so much as she harbored the tiniest notion the universe might be trying to play a trick on her.

Deciding to believe the office clock, she shoved the irrelevant thoughts aside as the office suite’s alarm beeped twice as a reminder that it was active.   She hustled over to the door that led into the office’s workspaces, turned left through it into the office fronted by the reception counter, and flipped down the cover on the security system.  Tapping briskly, she disabled the alarm, then backed out into the hallway and went to her office.

Dropping her purse on the floor between desk and wall, she half sat and half fell into her chair and paused to take another sip from her coffee.  Without looking, she tapped the button on her desk phone to put it on speaker and batted at the mouse to wake the computer up from sleep mode.  She sipped again as she punched into voicemail, savoring the warm, strong, sweet caffeine, then sat back and cradled the cup in her hands as she waited for the first message to play.

“Hello, this is David Jordan.” A male voice said, sounding hoarse and nasal.  “I’m scheduled for today, uh Friday, but the instructions you sent said I shouldn’t come in if I’m feeling sick.  I am sick, so we’ll need to reschedule the appointment, probably no earlier than Tuesday next week.  Uh, thanks.”

Jessica frowned and rolled her eyes, then leaned forward and set her coffee aside.  Her fingers tapped across the keyboard as she entered the screensaver password, then she clicked the scheduler application up.  Clicking again, she shifted the primary view to Friday, then paused as her eyes flicked down the listing.  There, ten thirty, David Jordan.  Jessica right clicked on that entry and selected reschedule, then clicked ok.  The appointment vanished off the schedule, and reappeared in the to-do section.

Lifting her coffee again, Jessica tapped on the phone to delete the message and sipped as she listened to the next.  Two more cancellations, which she marked, and one patient calling for clarification on the pre-procedure instructions.  Jessica made the appropriate notations in the day’s to-do list, then frowned as the receptionist’s voice came from the phone.

“Hi Jessica, it’s Mary.  I’m not feeling very good today, not at all.  I’m going to stay in bed and make my husband get some orange juice from the store before he goes into work.  Sorry.  Hopefully I’ll be feeling better Monday.”

Jessica closed her eyes briefly in frustration.  Mary was a nice person, but Jessica harbored an innate suspicion of any absence that timed itself at the beginning or ending of the week.  It came off as a desire for a three day weekend.  Or worse, in this case, a four day weekend.  Labor Day was Monday.  That was her lack of caffeine talking, she decided, since Mary was generally reliable.  She took a large gulp of coffee, then clicked to bring the big view of the to-do list up on her second screen.

In addition to the cancellations, there were nearly a dozen new schedule calls to make, all the lab results to get entered into the system, the weekly inventory so she could put reorders in, calls to all of Tuesday’s patients so they did their pre-procedure stuff, and at least two hours of entry and reconciliation for accounts.  Normally Mary would handle the labs and most of the calls, now Jessica would have to do all of that in addition to handling all the front desk duties.

Scowling, she got up and turned the room’s lights on, then headed deeper into the office for the break room, flipping more lights on as she went.  In the break room she started the coffee machines brewing, fixing one with a double strength batch.  While they started popping and ticking, she opened the dishwasher and pulled out the waiting room carafes, then went into the cabinets next to the dishwasher for one of the extra carafes.

Leaving the coffee to brew, she headed to the lab room, where she found the fax machine was full of the results that had come in overnight.  Collecting the papers up, she took them with her to the reception desk.  The stack of paper went down on the desk next to the keyboard, and she bent beneath the desk to hit the button to start Mary’s computer warming up before she headed back into her own office.

Clicking through the programs she kept permanently open, she generated the report on the month’s accounts, including all the un-reconciled entries that needed to be checked and coded before the accountant closed the books for August.  These papers she also dropped off in reception, then she went back to the break room.

The coffee was done brewing.  She filled the two waiting room carafes, tightened down their lids, and walked them up to the table in the customer area where they lived.  The supply closet behind the receptionist desk provided two tall stacks of styrofoam cups, and she set out plenty of extra sugar and creamer packets.  She didn’t want to have to fool around with resupplying penny-ante crap like coffee creamer for the patients once the day got going in earnest.

The extra carafe she filled with the double strength coffee, added generous portions of sugar, and cream from the quart of special French vanilla cream in the refrigerator that was labeled “Jessica’s”, and carried it up to Mary’s desk, swirling it as she walked to mix properly.  She scribbled “Do Not Touch – Jessica’s” on a sticky note, and slapped it across the top, then positioned it on the end of the desk.

That settled, she retrieved her travel mug from her desk, drank half of what remained, then started looking over the faxed lab results, comparing them to the morning’s schedule of appointments.  Any belonging to patients who were coming in early needed to be entered in first.  After identifying two that were due in before ten am, Jessica pulled up the relevant patient records and started typing.

She was interrupted a few minutes later by the office door opening.  Leaning forward, she cracked the customer window open and saw Doctor Morris entering.  He saw her looking out at him, and smiled ruefully with a sad shake of his head.  “Mary called in sick?” he asked her.

“Sadly.” Jessica replied, managing a smile that combined resignation with determined cheerfulness.  “We’ll manage though.”

“You always do, Jessica.” Dennis Morris said.

“Coffee’s on in the back.” Jessica said, waving a hand vaguely in the direction of the back of the office.  “And Mrs. Nittney canceled this afternoon’s appointment, so you’ll probably be able to get out of here early.”

Dennis’ eyes brightened, he liked to get out ahead of the traffic when possible, especially on the weekends.  By six pm on Fridays, his preferred place was the back deck of his Johns Creek home, sipping a cocktail and flipping steaks on his grill.  “Weekend’s looking up.” He said with a chuckle.  Then his eyes lit up and he gave her a hopeful glance.  “Hey, if Mary’s out, that means you made your special coffee, doesn’t it?”

Jessica gave him a wounded look, and lifted a porcelain mug onto the counter.  “I know you crave what I’ve got, so I poured you a cup.”

“Bless you Jessica.” Dennis said as he stepped over, reaching for it.

Jessica moved the mug behind the glass window and gave him a look of mock fierceness.  “But you have to promise not to get grumpy if I have to call Darshan and tell him the books might not be ready for him until Tuesday.”

“Promise.” Dennis said, his eyes tracking the mug as it disappeared behind the frosted glass.

“Doctor.” Jessica said sternly.

“Honest Jessica, I promise.” He said, moving his eyes to her face.

“Okay then, here you go.” Jessica said, handing him the mug.

He sipped greedily, then closed his eyes happily.  “Heaven in a cup.”

“If you’d learn how to make coffee, you could have it whenever you want.” Jessica noted with a grin as she printed out a copy of the day’s schedule.

“What would I have to look forward to then?” Dennis said in a dreamy voice.  “Besides.” he opened his eyes and gave her a wink.  “The other doctors would make fun of me if they knew I was making my own coffee.”

“Go.” Jessica said firmly, making a shooing motion.  “I’ve got more than enough to do, and I know you’ve got patient notes to finish dictating.”

“Spoilsport.” Dennis said, but he went.

Jessica shook her head fondly as he vanished through the waiting room door.  Dennis Morris was a pretty good boss, especially for a doctor.  She could do far worse, especially considering some of the horror stories a few of her friends in the building had about their doctor bosses.  She found her place on the screen, matched it up to where she’d left off from the lab result, and resumed typing.