Chapter Text
Claire Randall pressed with all her might on the bleeding wound, blocking out of her mind the screams of the young boy that was lying on the hospital bed. He struggled underneath her palms as nurses attempted to calm him down so he could be treated. She didn't expect her first shift as the newest Chief ER Doctor at Raigmore Hospital to start with such a young patient, but here we are! She wiped a stray lock of hair off her forehead with the back of her right arm before quickly repositioning it on the boy's thigh.
"You need to lie still..." Claire tried telling him as calmly as she could then turned her head away to ask one of the nurses, "What's his name?"
"Jamie," came the reply. "Jamie Murray. His mum is on her way..."
"Jamie, your mother is on her way, you don't want her to see you acting like this, do you? You want her to see how brave you are, right?" Claire asks him. The wailing stopped for a moment as he listened Claire's question, and started again when he had comprehended what she asked, but at a lesser decibel.
"Mummy!!" Jamie cried. "Mummmm-yyyyy!!" He tossed his head sideways and back, struggling under Claire's grip, his brown locks whipping into his face and sticking to his tears.
"Jamie, you're going to be fine, but you need to calm down..."
Claire feels the breeze from the hospital curtain and hears the *zing* of the hangers along the track as it whips away from the entrance of the cubicle. A short, dark haired woman, her eyes wild with fear when she sees the blood stained sheets, stands at the foot of the bed staring at the boy while still holding the curtain in her hand. "Jamie??"
"MUMMY!!"
"I'm here, son! I'm here!" She lunges forward and reaches out to touch the boy but Claire catches her with a free hand.
"She needs to wait outside," Claire tells a nurse firmly, still holding the mother by the arm, while the nurse takes her by the shoulders to pull her away.
"Mrs. Murray, we need you to wait outside while we work on Jamie," she tells her calmly.
"No! I want to be with my son!" Mrs. Murray struggles in the nurse's grasp, but the nurse was prepared and held her tightly.
"Mrs. Murray, if you'll just wait outside, Dr. Randall will update you as soon as she's gotten Jamie stabilized..." The nurse removes Mrs. Murray forcibly as she continues to protest loudly.
"But my son...my brother is....!!"
Claire refocuses on Jamie Murray lying before her but can't help but think, "Did she say 'brother'....?"
"Mum-MMMYYY!!"
"Get him a sedative. I can't work on him when he's in hysterics," Claire tells the closest nurse who hurries outside the cubicle and pulls the curtain closed behind her. "Jamie, can you tell me what you were doing when this happened?" She already had an idea from the EMTs who brought Jamie into the ER but felt she needed to distract her patient long enough to get him calm. Best way to do that: get him talking. "Were you being a boy?" she jokes.
Jamie's screaming and sobs reduce when he hears the question and he looks at Claire with a curious look. "But...I *am* a boy," he tells her earnestly, wiping tears from his eyes and face while gasping for air from all his crying.
"Yes, you are," Claire smiles. "I'm just wondering if you were being a boy and possibly doing something you...shouldn't have been doing?" She manages to get more of the wound clean since Jamie has calmed down, but she works quickly anyway - not only out of habit but for the fact that she's not sure when he'll lose his composure again.
Jamie blinks at her with big blue eyes. "I...I was..." He starts, but can't find the words to explain, or at least can't find the words to use that won't get him into trouble. "Are ye gonna tell my mam I was bad?" The blue eyes turn to puppy eyes and Claire can't resist that. She's never been able to resist puppy dog eyes.
"Well," she starts, "your mum will need to know how this happened, and if that means you have to tell her you were doing something wrong - then yes, we will tell her." Jamie's eyes start to well up and Claire can feel him inhale as if he's about to set off with the screaming again. "BUT...I just met your mum, and I will bet that she'll be so happy to hear about how brave you were so we could fix your leg, she won't be mad about how you got yourself into this mess." Claire finishes with a smile and meets Jamie's eyes. The nurse pops back into the cubicle with the sedative and holds it out to Claire. She holds her hand up in rejection and nods towards the instrument tray where the nurse sets the syringe. "I don't think we'll need that after all, Nurse Mary - Master Murray has calmed down quite a bit. I think we'll be able to get him fixed up quickly and out to his mum in just a few more minutes.
Jamie bites his lip at the same time he tries to smile at Claire. His rapid inhaling let her know he's decided to stop crying and cooperate so Claire and Nurse Mary set back to work on stitching and bandaging his wound.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Claire pulls off her nitrile gloves and walks out of the ER to find Mrs. Murray. She spots her in the corner of the waiting room, pacing, a cell phone pressed to her ear. Claire approaches, but stops at a short distance so as not to interrupt the conversation. She doesn't have to wait long when Mrs. Murray spots her and Claire is surprised to see her face cloud over. "This is Jamie's doctor - he wants to speak to you!" Mrs. Murray snaps, holding the cell phone out to Claire.
"What....why....?" Claire searches her brain and retraces her steps: What did she miss? Why would the child's "doctor" need to speak to her? She didn't remember any special accommodations or conditions noted on young Jamie's record, so....why is his doctor insisting on speaking with her? All she did was stitch him up...
Mrs. Murray shakes the phone at her, encouraging Claire to take it from her. With no choice, Claire takes the phone. "Hello, this is Dr. Randall...."
"This is Dr. James Fraser. What happened with young Jamie?!" The loud Scottish voice on the other end of the line jumped right to the point.
Claire glanced at Mrs. Murray who was standing in front of her with her arms crossed over her chest, and gathered herself to respond with professionalism and clarity even though Dr. Fraser had chosen slight unprofessionalism with his tone. She had also decided to explain Jamie's condition in layman's terms so Mrs. Murray would understand since she was listening in as well. "According to the EMTs that brought Jamie in, he and some other boys had gone off the schoolyard boundary and climbed a fence. Jamie's leg was caught as he dragged it over the top and he has a cut - about 13cm long - on his right thigh," Claire explained, speaking in the phone but looking at Jamie's mum while she did.
"What did you do?" Dr. Fraser snapped.
Claire gasped in confusion. "What do you mean 'what did I do?’ I did my job: I stitched him up..."
"Jenny said he was in hysterics when she arrived! What did you do?!" Dr. Fraser shouts.
So mum is Jenny. Got it. "He was, but he calmed down and we took care of him, because that's what we do here," Claire tells him with a touch of sarcasm. "And if you, doctor, are so very concerned about your patient, why don't you just come down and see him for yourself?" Claire didn't wait for a response and pushed the phone back to Jenny who stares at her with her mouth agape in shock. "Jamie should be ready to check out when you're finished here."
Claire turns on her heel and storms out of the waiting room back to the ER. She'd had enough of Dr. Fraser with his "high and mighty" attitude and needed to collect herself before she spoke to Jenny Murray about Jamie's discharge instructions.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Jenny Murray hears laughter as she approaches the ER cubicle where she'd last seen her son and stops at the curtain to listen quietly. She's sure she hears Jamie laughing, but there's another laugh she doesn't recognize - it must be one of the nurses. Thier voices continue in a lowered tone and then the laughing starts up again. Jenny relaxes with an exhale after hearing her son's voice so cheerful after all his previous wailing then grasps the curtain and says "Knock, knock," before she pulls it away. She finds Jamie sitting up in his bed and Dr. Randall sitting in a chair next to it.
"Mummy!" Jamie lifts his arms in excitement and starts to kick his legs before Dr. Randall stops him.
"Careful there, Jamie! You don't want your stitches to come undone," Dr. Randall tells him. "I've done all the stitching on you that I want to, young man!"
"Yes, Dr. Randall," Jamie says sheepishly. "Mam! Dr. Randall has ridden an elephant! Can you believe it?"
Jenny looks at Claire shyly. "That IS hard to believe, Jamie," she says, leaning down to give him a hug. "But if Dr. Randall said it, it must be true." Claire gives her a smile and Jenny returns it.
"Jamie, would you mind if I spoke to your mother for a minute alone? We need to talk about what you will need to do when you get home..." Claire asks him, rising from her seat and stepping past Jenny. Jamie smiles at Claire and nods his head. Claire holds the curtain back for Jenny and they walk into the hallway together. "As I told you...and Jamie's doctor," Claire starts, looking at Jenny pointedly, still not happy with the way she was spoken to, "Jamie has a 13cm cut on his right thigh. 20 stitches to close it up, but it was a clean cut, so there shouldn't be any problems with healing. We did give him a tetanus shot as a precaution. He will need to take it easy for the next few days - limit his walking around, NO running. I can provide him a note for school...unless you'd like Dr. Fraser to take care of that for you instead."
Jenny had dropped her eyes from Claire's view and her hands fidgeted at her waist. "Thank you, Dr. Randall," she says quietly. "And....I'd like to apologize to you for Dr. Fraser being so short with you on the phone." Claire nods, accepting the apology. "It's just that my brother is very close to wee Jamie and loves him like his own." Claire can feel the confusion cross her face and Jenny smiles as she explains. "Dr. Fraser is my brother; Jamie's uncle."
"Ohhhhh...."
"I'm sorry I didn't explain that before you spoke to him. Things were happening so fast, and wee Jamie was so upset....I was upset...I didn't know who you were..."
Claire puts her hand on Jenny's arm to assure her. "It's fine, Mrs. Murray. I completely understand."
"Please, call me Jenny," Jenny tells her, placing her hand over Claire's. "I mean, you might as well, right? We're practically family!"
Confusion crossed her face again but Jenny missed it this time because she was rooting through her purse. "I'm sorry....'family' you said?" Claire asks.
"Well, yes - you're here at the hospital where my family is treated, my brother works here and we're very close with the rest of the staff because of him," Jenny explains. "So, you're like family now!"
Claire doesn't hear much of what Jenny says next because she's too busy searching her brain for traces of Dr. James Fraser from her interviews. The hiring process had moved quickly as the hospital was eager to replace their last ER chief and she'd met several doctors in each of her interviews, but couldn't remember meeting a Dr. Fraser. That's not to say she didn't - it's been a very hectic few weeks from interview to offer to start date.
"...and I will call you if we have any problems," Jenny says, holding her phone out to Claire.
Claire looks at the phone, and takes it from Jenny's hand when she finally realizes Jenny wants her contact number. "Oh....of course...." Claire punches in her number and hands the phone back to Jenny. "If you don't mind, I'd like to give you a call in a few days just to check on the patient. It's...what I do," Claire shrugs.
"Absolutely!" Jenny says happily. "And if you'd like to stop by the house, ye can...or even come for dinner one night, you're more than welcome to!"
"Ohh, that won't be necessary," Claire chuckles and shakes her head. The Scots she's encountered during her short time here in Inverness have already floored her with their friendliness and hospitality. All except for that Dr. James Fraser. "But thank you for the invitation."
"It's always there!" Jenny smiles.
"Mummy!" Jamie calls to Jenny as Nurse Mary pushes him down the hall in a wheelchair.
"My boy! Are you ready to go home?"
"Yes! Can I show Maggie my leg when we get there?" he asks her excitedly.
"Ummm...she may not be as excited to see it as much as your father will be," Jenny winks at him. "Do you have anything to say to Dr. Randall before we go?"
"Thank you, Dr. Randall, for stitching up my cut," he says to Claire. "I'm sorry I was such a boy."
Claire smiles at him. "You're very welcome, Master Murray. You take care of yourself!"
"I will!" he tells her proudly. Jenny pushes him out into the waiting room heading for the main exit and Claire hears him pummeling his mother with questions as they retreat. "Mam, is Dr. Randall going to come to our house? When is Uncle Jamie coming over? Does she know Uncle Jamie? Are they going to...?" His voice fades as they walk outside and the sliding doors close quietly behind them.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
After the Murrays left, Claire signed off on a few patient files, including Jamie's, then headed up to her office on the 2nd floor. She opens her laptop and brings up the hospital intranet portal to do a little "research" and clicks the "About Us" tab looking for a list of hospital staff.
Accreditation .... Board of Directors.... Taking a chance, she clicks on BOD. Scrolling through the list, there's no James Fraser. Next tab: Find a Provider.
Provider Directory
"Search by name...." A full list of doctors working at the hospital pops up on her screen and she feels a tingle of excitement zip through her as she scrolls down to the F's....and finds the professional headshot of Dr. James "Jamie" Fraser, DPM.
Pediatrics. Of course.
The striking blue eyes look back at her from the screen. She didn't know eyes could be that blue. Or that the mischief within them could sparkle so brightly in a photo.
Auburn hair with just the right number of curls. Not that there should be a limit...
And beard scruff. Claire exhales heavily.
"Nope, you haven't met this one," Claire says aloud. "You'd have remembered this one."