Out of Practice (40 page)

She took pity on Holly’s obvious discomfort and leaned in. ‘Did I mention that Eric’s new obsession is underwear? He retrieves them from the laundry – dirty or clean,
he’s not fussy – and then leaves them on the stairs as an offering. Will came in from work last night and was convinced his luck was in . . . He just followed the knicker trail up to
our bedroom.’

‘And?’ interrupted Holly, realising with a thud just how much she’d missed Eric and wondering when she could reasonably organise a visit.

‘And was rather disappointed to find me on my knees scrubbing the loo!’ said Lizzie.

‘Not the ideal foreplay,’ Holly agreed, ‘unless it was a bloke.’ She considered for a moment, as if weighing up her options, ‘I could probably get turned on by a
bloke cleaning
my
bathroom.’

Lizzie shook her head at Holly’s logic. ‘And that, my darling, is why you
seriously
need a cleaner.’

Hattie came back through from the kitchen, wiping the flour off her hands and looking pale and drawn. ‘Right then, do you need a little longer or can I tempt you both
with the Carbonara?’

‘Oh my God, that sounds amazing,’ groaned Holly apologetically, ‘but really just a mixed salad for me please, Hats. I’m trying to give up carbs, but it’s so much
harder than I imagined.’

Hattie smiled tiredly. ‘No worries. Even though carbs are what makes life worth living, in my opinion. And I reckon that I can eat twice as many now I’m eating for two.’

Holly nodded. ‘I know I did when I was having the twins, but then they’re two now and I still can’t zip my favourite jeans up.’

‘Do you want my advice? Buy new jeans. You look amazing, your skin is glowing and half the town has a secret doctor fantasy going on . . .’ Hattie took her menu. ‘Trust me,
life’s far too short to be miserable.’

There was a moment’s silence hanging in the air between them, as all three women were only too aware of the truth in that statement.

‘How
is
Lance doing?’ Holly asked gently, as she gratefully took another sip of her espresso, wincing at the bitter flavour and dismissing the urge to swap it for a
cappuccino or add a handful of sugar cubes.

Hattie shrugged tiredly. ‘He’s doing pretty well all things considered. I’ll pop in to Bath and see him again later, but the surgeon sounded really positive yesterday. He
reckons it was all contained in the, well, you know,’ she whispered, rather than say the word testicles.

Despite years as a doctor, Holly could still identify with patients that struggled to name bits of their body out loud. Only yesterday she’d had a confident, blousy woman confiding that
she was having a bit of trouble with her ‘gazebo’. It had taken a few minutes of very confusing conversation before Holly had established that the poor woman was suffering from an awful
bout of thrush but too embarrassed to come out with it.

‘Are you coping okay with the extra work and all the running in and out to Bath? It won’t help anyone if you overdo it and end up on bed rest, you know. Tell me, Hats, what can I do
to help? I’d offer to make you a casserole, if I didn’t know how crappy it might taste compared to your wonderful cooking.’

Hattie grinned. ‘Food’s the one thing I’m not short of, thankfully. Although lovely Marion in the supermarket told me off about pre-natal nutrition when I kept going in to buy
pickled onions and liquorice allsorts.’

‘Go steady on the liquorice, it can give you high blood pressure, but otherwise I’d say, just follow your cravings. Your body knows what it’s doing,’ said Holly
reassuringly.

‘That’s the other thing I just can’t get my head around,’ Hattie confided. ‘How on earth does it know what to do? Is there like a tiny army of workmen poring over a
set of blueprints in there? And I know Lance is desperate to know whether it’s a boy or a girl, but my 20-week scan isn’t for another month.’

Holly drained her cup. ‘Do you think it would cheer him up? To know?’

Hattie nodded. ‘He just wants to be part of it all, you know, running out in the middle of the night because I’m craving ice cream and fighting in Ikea about which crib to buy. Like
normal couples do. And instead, we’re making decisions about chemo and radiation and wondering whether he’ll even get to meet the baby.’ Hattie’s face collapsed as she
staggered to the end of her sentence and pressed her hand against the neat little bump under her apron.

Holly stood up and guided Hattie into her chair, thankful that all the other patrons were engrossed in their own conversations. At least for the moment. She crouched down and wrapped her arms
around Hattie’s shaking shoulders and made a quick decision. ‘What time can you close up here? Could you be done by four?’

Hattie nodded against her shoulder, the tears making Holly’s t-shirt cling to her skin.

‘Then let me make a few calls, okay? And then you can drink a tonne of water and drive to Bath this afternoon. If I can possibly swing it, then you and Lance can see your baby today. How
does that sound?’

Hattie’s sobs got louder, even as she pushed away and looked up at Holly. ‘Can you do that?’

‘Let me try. The Head of Obstetrics is a mate from way back and I can’t think of a better time to call in a favour, can you? I just need to check that Lance can get down to the ward,
or that they can move the machine up to his room.’

Hattie wiped away her tears with the back of her hand and smiled weakly. ‘That would be amazing, Holly. Thank you.’

Any hope that the rest of the customers in the deli hadn’t been eavesdropping on every word disappeared in a moment, as they all hustled around to share in Hattie’s small moment. But
with the unimaginable challenges looming in her future, it was probably these small moments that would keep Hattie going.

Holly couldn’t help but notice that Lizzie was distinctly off with her after that. She couldn’t put her finger on exactly why – why on earth would Lizzie have
a problem with Hattie having an ultrasound? It wasn’t as though there was any chance that Lizzie was getting broody – not with her ‘contraceptive children’ as she called
them.

On the surface, they were chatting like always. The odd story about the kids or what they were planning for the summer, but there was an exhausting undercurrent. Holly was picking her words
carefully but Lizzie just seemed distant. If she’d been building up to an apology, it might have been okay, but Holly wasn’t so naïve as to expect one. Lizzie didn’t do
‘sorry’. It would have implied a certain culpability on her part that she was never prepared to acknowledge. This character flaw was so well known amongst her nearest and dearest that
Will had even referenced it in their wedding vows. No, with Lizzie, the best you could hope was that she would behave as if she were sorry.

It had been looking promising, but now, if anything the chasm between them seemed to be widening.

‘So, best joke of the week so far – why did the dog refuse to go to the zoo?’ Holly tried.

‘Erm, I don’t know, why did the dog refuse to go to the zoo?’ Lizzie replied, rolling her eyes.

‘Because it was a shih tzu!’ said Holly, unable to keep a straight face. ‘Oh come on, that’s one of Taffy’s best. He’s on a mission to keep us all smiling
while . . .’

Lizzie cut her off mid-sentence. ‘Are you still crushing on Taffy Jones then?’ she asked, the friendly tone of intimate confidences in place, but with a hint of scorn layered in for
good measure.

Holly was lost for words for a moment; this didn’t feel like a friendly compassionate arena, in which to disclose her innermost feelings. She shrugged. ‘He’s a lovely guy. You
said so yourself. No harm in having a mate to chat to at work, is there?’ She found herself getting defensive and cursed herself for being so easily wound up.

Lizzie raised an eyebrow sardonically. Before . . . well, before Lizzie had strangled their friendship, Holly would have thought that her friend was clever and witty with such a look on her
face. Now, there was a curl to her lip that hinted at cruel enjoyment.

Lizzie cast a hand around the deli. ‘You’ll have to get in line, Holls. He’s probably bedded half the girls in this town. Look, there’s Debbie his Ex, and there’s
Lara, his previous Ex, and . . . Well, you get the picture.’ Lizzie drained a glass of wine, that Holly hadn’t even noticed her ordering.

‘I’m beginning to,’ said Holly slowly, not just referring to Taffy, and trying to evaluate how she was feeling right now. She’d made a promise to Will and she’d
keep it, but nobody said it had to feel good.

Holly took a calming breath. ‘Well, for all Taffy’s womanising ways, he’s been amazing about this whole closure thing. There’s so much to do, so much support to rally.
Hey,’ she said, speaking without thinking, ‘do you want to do something in your magazine about supporting The Practice? It’s a local magazine after all – this has to be
relevant . . .’

Holly stopped talking at the expression on Lizzie’s face. ‘Holly, I’m sure you’re a brilliant doctor, but please don’t pretend that you know how to run a magazine
as well. Besides, I would have thought that the last thing you would want, was for me to get involved in your “professional life”.’ Lizzie made air quotes with her fingers.
‘I’ve already had a gut full from Dan and your wonderful Taffy about how appallingly I’ve treated you. I’m not sure I can cope with any more.’

The silence sat pugnaciously between them. Words just wouldn’t come for Holly, at least none that were polite enough for use in public.

‘Do you know,’ said Holly in the end, tucking a twenty-pound note under the edge of her plate. ‘I think I need to leave.’

She picked up her bag and left the table.

‘Bye, Holly! Lovely to see you,’ called Hattie from behind the counter. ‘Oh, and you too, Lizzie, of course.’

Holly caught the furious look on Lizzie’s face as she pulled the door closed behind her.

Holly kept on walking. Pick your battles. Pick your moments.

But what was really quite strange, if she hadn’t known better, was that Lizzie looked positively jealous. Jealous of what though? wondered Holly, racking her brains for an answer, before
deciding that she must have the wrong end of the stick yet again. There were probably several thousand more realistic explanations. Right now though, Holly had a patient with blue legs to see and a
meeting to chair.

What were the odds that Rachel Haldon had been buying cheap denim jeans off the market again, Holly thought, as she mentally changed gear and walked into The Practice for her afternoon
clinic.

Julia sighed as she rifled through the leaflets in her desk drawer. Unusually for her, she wasn’t rushing this morning, checking her watch or her reflection. Since the
crushing news from the Primary Care Trust, she couldn’t seem to find any enthusiasm for anything. She’d tried calling the TV production company that produced
Doctors In The
House
but had been routinely stonewalled. Eventually, she’d tracked down one of the interview panel on their mobile and they’d been characteristically blunt. They wanted to forge
an ongoing relationship. In simple terms, no Practice, no starring role for Julia Channing.

In even simpler terms, no money either.

Her motivation had completely deserted her.

Last night, she’d even gone to bed without taking off her make-up. In Julia’s ordered world, this was nothing short of Defcon 2 – the highest level of drama being saved for the
days when she was so distressed by life, that she resorted to eating carbohydrates. Julia thrived on a controlled environment. It made her feel safe and secure.

Today, however, that security had blossomed into an unwelcome malaise and the cloying pull of defeat. Even perky Holly Graham seemed to be more driven to find a solution to the problem than she
was. Julia was so exhausted, she couldn’t see the wood for the trees. She wanted to be annoyed at Holly, for being so god-damned energetic in the face of such overwhelming opposition, but
their recent conversations had actually given Julia a little taste of what it might be like to have a female friend. To be honest, she’d actually quite enjoyed it.

She knew, because her mother’s shrink had told her so when she was twelve, that she was socially retarded. She didn’t
do
friendship. All the confessionals and in-jokes and
the unbearable neediness of it all . . . She shuddered. On the other hand, when she saw girls together, in cafés, jogging, just chatting comfortably, she always felt excluded. This
friendship thing was obviously a big deal to some people, but for Julia there was one underlying stumbling block: she just didn’t like people very much.

Well, she now amended that thought: she didn’t like
most
people. Holly Graham and possibly bonkers old Elsie, might yet be the few exceptions to that rule. Julia assiduously
ignored the image of Dan Carter that flashed into her mind.

She ignored the mobile phone vibrating yet again on her desk, knowing without looking that it could only mean yet another drama at home. Didn’t she have enough to deal with here, for
goodness’ sake? All her carefully laid plans were slowly falling to pieces and, as much as it was easier to blame Dan, or George, or her parents, sometimes it just felt as though the universe
was simply conspiring against her.

Thankfully, there was nothing like General Practice to focus the mind. She looked up as Mrs Brent and her little boy, who appeared to be picking his nose and munching the bogies, walked in.
Taffy’s definitions tickled the edge of her mind and she very nearly typed FLK and NFS into his notes, just stopping herself in time. Little Jimmy Brent may be a Funny Looking Kid and he
probably was Normal For Swindon, but that didn’t mean she should be anything less than professional.

‘Right,’ she said, trying to pull herself together, ‘let’s have another talk about sorting this constipation, shall we, Jimmy? The three most important things that you
and your mum need to remember are to drink lots of water, eat lots of fruit and vegetables and make the time to sit on the loo regularly – even if you don’t think you need to go.
We’ll train that body of yours to remember what it’s supposed to do naturally.’