Drifting Apart
Part 1
By Kellie
Michelle groaned as she awoke to the annoying sound of her pager. "I just got to sleep," she grumbled as she rose and walked to the telephone on the other side of the on-call room. She looked at the number on the pager display and realized it wasn't an emergency page. She tapped her foot lightly as she dialed the number. She didn't even let him get out a hello before saying, "Danny, this had better be good. I had just gone to sleep for the first time this shift. This snow storm has flooded the ER with wreck victims."
"My aren't you the grumpy one this evening. I guess I'll have to forget about the little surprise I have for you," Danny answered in a teasing tone.
"I'm sorry sweetie. Thirty-six hour shifts like this one tend to make a person grumpy."
"I understand completely. I'm sorry that I woke you up. You go on and grab your nap and call me when you have a free minute."
Michelle quickly replied, "Hold it, you're not getting off that easy! You mentioned a surprise. I'll never get back to sleep until you tell me what it is."
"If I told you now, I'd miss seeing that beautiful face of yours light up when I give it to you." Danny smiled as he thought about how Michelle was going crazy with curiosity.
"Danny."
"Don't even try to pry it from me. You'll find out in due time. I just called to see if you were going to get off on time for once."
Michelle softened her tone, "I think so. Danny, you have to at least give me a hint about that surprise."
"Well, I guess I could be persuaded to drop a hint."
"Hmm. What will it take to get you to talk? Too bad you're not here, I know I could get more than that hint from you."
"Who says I'm not there," Danny replied as he opened the door to the on call room, cell phone in hand. "What type of persuasion do you have in mind?"
Before Michelle could walk to the doorway, her pager went off again. "Damn! This thing always goes off at the worst moments."
Danny nodded and watched as his wife went back to the phone and answered what he knew was an emergency page. Michelle rushed across the room and grabbed her lab coat after hanging up the phone. "I'm sorry sweetie, they're bringing victims from a ten car pile up into ER. I have to get down there," she said before giving Danny a quick kiss and darting out the door.
A half hour later, Danny left the hospital dejectedly and headed to Company. He went over to the bar and had a seat. "Buzz, I'll take a beer please."
Buzz walked over to him and placed the beer on the bar. "Danny, you look like you just lost your best friend."
"Seems that way, lately."
"Why don't you tell me about it?"
"Buzz, I'm not sure talking is going to solve this problem."
"You can't know that until you try. Besides, everyone needs to enjoy my pearls of wisdom from time to time."
Danny smiled at Buzz's attempt to lighten his somber mood. "It's Michelle."
Buzz replied, "Trouble in paradise, huh?"
"You could say that," Danny answered as he grabbed a handful of nuts from the bowl on the bar.
"Well, enlighten me."
"I'm just tired of not seeing my wife. Ever since she started her residency at the Cedars, she works non-stop. Her shifts usually begin when I'm getting home from work and end two days later when I'm on my way out the door to the office. When she's not at the hospital or sleeping, she's writing up case studies and reports for her med school supervisor. We both knew that this was going to be tough, I just didn't realize how tough."
"What happened before you came here?"
"How did you know something happened, Buzz?"
"I'm psychic." Buzz paused while Danny smiled. "Actually, it was the look on your face when you walked in."
"Buzz, you are an expert at reading people. I just came from the hospital. I went over there to surprise Michelle and have dinner with her. Rick loaned me the key to his office."
"That explains why Selena dropped what she was doing and took that basket of food over to the hospital earlier. You were the one who called her."
"Yeah."
"What went wrong?"
"Michelle got paged to ER. There was a ten-car pile up. It will be hours before she gets another free moment. When that happens, she'll need to grab a nap. She's worked most of this shift without sleep."
"I see. When does this shift end?" Buzz asked.
"Eight o'clock tomorrow morning."
"Since tomorrow is Saturday, why don't the two of you go up to the Bauer cabin when she gets off? A weekend away might help."
"I thought about that, but Michelle will be dead on her feet when she finally gets home. Sleep will be the only thing on her mind when she walks in the door."
"Well, I don't know what else to tell you. You'll just have to trust that everything will work out."
"That's getting hard to do. I've always tried to support Michelle and her dream of being a doctor. I guess I didn't realize our marriage would take second place to medicine."
Part 2