“Does he hear you when you ask if he wants an hour of screen time?”
“I think he guesses what I’ve said because I have his device in my hand.”
“Does he hear you when you ask if he wants to go out for ice cream?”
“He does but—”
“Bristol’s three, Mrs. Wonks. Unfortunately, it’s perfectly normal for him to refuse to do things he’s disinclined to do.”
“He’s not refusing.”
“He really might be.”
“Pretending not to hear me would be lying.” Mrs. Wonks removed her hands from her son’s ears. “And Bristol does not lie to his mommy and daddy.”
“What?” said Bristol. “Huh?”
Rosie gave him a hearing test. To the shock of only Mrs. Wonks, Bristol’s ears were in perfect working condition.
They’d been in Seattle nine months, and Rosie still wasn’t convinced this counted as practicing medicine. Her mistake had been seeded during panicked Wisconsin midnights, which had demanded any job rather than the right job. She’d been surprised to have gotten it, in fact. Her ER skill set—triage, diagnosis, mild grace under extreme pressure—seemed like it wouldn’t be much use to the group of three very nice family physicians—Howie, James, and Elizabeth—who welcomed her in and demanded, mostly, extreme grace under mild pressure. The practice was run by Yvonne, receptionist/organizer/miracle-worker, a woman who had more children than Rosie (six) and more grandchildren than seemed possible (fifteen) though, as she said to Rosie, “Do the math. It’ll terrify you.”
The four doctors were equal partners, kept equal hours, did equal amounts of voluminous paperwork, attended conferences and taught workshops together, and shared companionably in all the other tasks that went into maintaining a small practice. Elizabeth was quiet and pleasant, kind without being sugary, politely inquiring after one’s weekend without diving into anyone’s business. She came in, saw patients, exchanged small talk in the break room, and went home to a life her partners knew nothing about. Rosie adored her. She adored James even more. He was not quiet. He scuba dived in her life. But in exchange, he let her live vicariously through his: James and his husband happy-houred or fine-dined most nights after work. They went to the opera and the theatre and over to friends’ houses. They slept in on weekends and ate leisurely brunches while reading newspapers and books and exchanging philosophical ideas. They generally lived the life of childless newlyweds that seemed to Rosie a fantasy on par with anything you’d see at the movies. If you ever got to go to the movies. Which she did not.
It was Howie who was the problem. Howie insisted on holding a meeting every Monday morning just in case any problems had arisen over the weekend. Howie outlawed paper down to the Post-it note so they could say their practice was green. He made everyone take home two thousand Band-Aids one weekend to marker on their URL so he could hand them out on Halloween. He guilted them into posting short, deep thoughts to a Twitter feed to show rival practices they were a force of cleverness. It was Howie who wanted them to call patients’ parents “Mom.” He wanted Rosie to be in charge of staff-appreciation breakfast and finding someone to update their website. He wanted Rosie to get Yvonne a gift from the practice to go with her holiday bonus. He wanted Rosie to go to Thailand for three months to staff a refugee clinic so he could list on their website that their doctors were sought after for volunteer work and international aid.