Cry to Me

“Can I have some 3/O PDS, please?” Sam’s cruciate repair surgery was in the final stages. Dulci had opened to knee capsule and joint, successfully taken out the ruptured ACL and meniscus, artificially secured the ligaments with heavy-duty monofilament, and began to suture the muscles and skin closed before bandaging the leg. All at once, the blood pressure and pulse-ox machines started beeping, but not in their usual alarms. The pulse-ox would alert with three quick consecutive beeps whereas this beeping sounded more like an unrelenting fire drill.

“How is the patient doing?”

There was no response. When Dulci looked up to check on the patient, she noticed she was the only person in the room. Where was her monitoring technician? Looking at the monitoring devices, Dulci was confused as to why they were alerting her when Sam’s heart rate, SPO2, and blood pressure where within their normal limits?

“What the hell? Lindsay? Ashley? Can one of you monitor while the other checks on these machines and figure out why the alarms are going ballistic?” At this point she’d be finished with the surgery at any moment. She continued suturing and noticed through the corner of her eye that one of her technicians had finally arrived.

“Can you at least silence the machines while I finish?”

There was no response and no change in the machines. When Dulci looked up at her technician expectantly, she locked eyes with Sidney. Within that moment, all the air in the room had vanished and she dropped her needle drivers onto the drape. He was shirtless again, but instead of wearing gym shorts, he was wearing only underwear that sat extraordinarily low on his abdomen.

“What are you doing here? And why aren’t you dressed?”

He didn’t respond. He only looked at her with a very seductive stare and she couldn’t look away, well, not from his midriff, at least. What the hell was going on? He needed to leave or she wouldn’t be able to finish the surgery with him as a distraction.

“I could ask you the same thing.”

Dulci was bewildered. What the fuck was he talking about? Within seconds, she was cold, as if someone turned the air conditioner from seventy-two to sixty. This was odd considering she was wearing a cotton surgical gown and the surgery suite was always stuffy. She couldn’t help by feel goose bumps growing all over her body, and when she looked down, she noticed she was completely naked. She instantly went to cover herself with her arms as much as possible before and turning away from him. When she looked up, hoping he had walked out of the room, he was standing within inches of her. Everything else in the suite had also vanished, except for the relentless beeping of the surgical machines.

“Look at me.” He was barely audible over the noise.

“I am,” Dulci responded breathily as if entranced.

“Give me your hand.” Without breaking eye contact, she slowly raised her hand toward him and wasn’t paying attention to what he was doing until she felt something chilly and smooth wrapping around her wrist. When she looked down, she saw him putting leather cuffs on her, the same set that she wore for Henry when Sidney ambushed her. She noticed she was wearing them on the other wrist and ankles as well. The beeping was getting louder.

“Turn around and bend over,” he whispered in her ear. She closed her eyes. She had to stop herself and him before she fucked her best friend’s boyfriend. But the idea of it was too much to stop. Dulci slowly turned and bent forward. All of a sudden, her ankles and wrists were in the spreader bar and she was fully exposed from behind. She felt one hand gently rub her ass with a cooling cream, probably spanking cream, while the other grabbed her hair at the base of her hand and pulled back hard. Before she knew it, the hand on her ass disappeared and came back with a resounding smack.

Dulci flew up. She was sitting on her bed, excessively sweating, and gripping the comforter like it was her savior. She grabbed her phone, which was blaring the alarm clock, and disabled it. It was 6:30am.

“Jesus Christ…” she sighed and started giggling at how absurd, yet real, her dream seemed. The giggle became a full blow belly laugh. Her phone started buzzing.

I’ll be over around 8:30, usual time. Hopefully you wont have any visitors this time ;)

“Absofuckinglutely,” she mumbled as she responded. After that dream, she needed sexual release, and the sooner, the better.

-----

An hour later, Dulci was sitting at her kitchen table drinking coffee and reviewing her orthopedic surgery textbook once more before Sam’s procedure that day. She was wondering what time Sidney would be over with Sam as she took a bite of her bagel. It was as if she had some sort of ESP because she received a text message from him at that moment.

I’m on my way. Are you decent?

Was he flirting? She reread the text about seven more times. How the hell was she going to respond? A small devious part of her wanted to respond with “You’ll just have to find out.” No. She wasn’t going to respond. She needed to get her head together and stop being a creep about this.

Within fifteen minutes, she heard a knock at the door. When she opened it, Sidney stood before her with his eyes closed and a goofy smile on his face. He had Sam’s leash looped around his arm that was carrying a Starbucks coffee cup.

“Ha! Ha! Funny…” Dulci said sarcastically.

“Well. You never responded to my message so I didn’t know what to expect.”

“I’ll take Sam so you can leave if you’re in a hurry,” Dulci said reaching for the leash. “I know how much Carly loves her Starbucks in the morning,” she joked.

“Actually the Starbucks is for you. Carly told me your favorite drink is hot peppermint mocha with whipped cream,” he said handing it to her.

“Oh… Thank you.” They stood in her doorway for what seemed like forever before Dulci regained her senses. “Would you like to come in?” she asked with an awkward hand gesture into the house.

“I can’t. I have practice.”

“Oh ok. I’ll call or text after I take a look at her x-rays. Question. Are you planning to pick her up at the hospital?”

“I was hoping I could either pick her up here or if you’d be willing to drop her off at my place, that'd be great."

"I could probably swing by after work. Actually, instead of talking over the phone, the better option would be to show you the x-rays."

"That'll work. Thanks." He smiled and turned toward his idling Range Rover.

Dulci turned inside and shut the door. "Sam, what are we going to do for the next hour?" She asked herself out loud, and when she looked over, Sam was staring at her with perky ears and a head tilt.

After finishing her make up, she looked at her watch to see that she needed to leave soon. Sam had been attentively watching her in the bathroom but seemed to have disappeared at some point. Walking into the living room, Dulci saw that Sam was lying sprawled out on her couch with Dulci's cat wedged between her legs. She took out her phone and snapped a picture. Attaching the picture to a message.

She's made herself right at home. Even made a friend! :-)

-----

"Dr. Hammett! This dog has an obstruction. It needs an exploratory."

Dulci walked into the X-ray room to review the films. "Oh man," she groaned. The sixteen week old puppy needed an exploratory surgery to remove the obstruction days ago. At this point, she had too much fluid on her abdomen and was probably on the brink of sepsis. Survival with surgery was grave. Fuck…

“Beth, will you put the owners into a room, please?” She sighed. It was going to be bad. While she prayed they'd be willing to take the puppy for emergency surgery, it probably wasn't an option and suffering wasn't either.

Five minutes later, she was placing an IV catheter for humane euthanasia on a puppy that was licking her hand and still wagging it’s tale. Happy sick animals were the worst. She had another one to do later that evening; a six year old happy Old English Sheepdog with bone cancer that has metastasized to her lungs but still had a decent quality of life. Euthanizing was the hardest part of her job.

Afterward, she collapsed into her desk chair and noticed she had a pile of laboratory results waiting to be interpreted, and none of it was cut and dry. One spleen biopsy came back as hemangiosarcoma. Two senior cats came back in end stage renal failure. The last chart's results belonged to the lymphoma patient seen by Dr. Harrison two says prior. Chemo wasn't an option. The lymphoma was stage four. Dulci rubbed her face and picked up the phone to make the first bad news phone call. Hearing the disappointment and crying always made her shed a tear.

-----

“Have you ever been with a girl that was super kinky?”

James shot Sidney an incredulous look. “Have we met?Of course!”

“Have you fucked girls that liked to be tied up and restrained?” Sidney couldn’t even look at James.He’d been with Carly for quite some time and never mentioned any kind of deviant sexual activity.He could almost feel James reading his mind as he glanced at him through his peripheral vision.

“Is Carly into that shit? I would have never pegged her for a freak.Good for you man!” James slapped Sidney on his back.

“It’s not Carly. I ended up on a bondage website the other day and…”

“I would’ve never pegged you as one to watch BDSM porn either, Crosby!” James interrupted.

“Dude, keep your voice down!” Sidney hissed at James. After looking around and noticing nobody was listening to their conversation, he continued.“I don’t watch that shit and I ended up at a bondage fetish online store.I was just curious.It looked… interesting.”

“Trust me. It is.”And with that, Sidney walked away to shower before leaving.Speaking of bondage, he was wondering why Dulci hadn’t tried to get in contact with him regarding Sam’s sedation.He’d try and call her back when he was done showering.

----

"Who's Dulci?"

The question took Sidney right out of his focus. How did James know about Dulci and more importantly, why was he asking? Did he actually read Sidney’s mind a few minutes ago?

"Excuse me?" He hoped he didn’t look as taken aback as he felt.

"You got a text earlier from someone named Dulci with a picture of Sam on a couch with a flirty message. You got something going on on the side?" James joked wiggling his eyebrows.

Sidney rolled his eyes at his teammate. "No man. She's Carly's best friend from college. She a veterinarian and Sam's ruptured her ACL. She taking a look for me," he explained taking his gear off.

"Is she hot?"

"She's cute,” he shrugged. Dulci was pretty.Not supermodel beautiful, but she had beautiful blue eyes framed with long lashes that always seemed to be accentuated by her shirt or eye makeup.She had thick, luscious brown hair that ran midway down her back.She had a lot of freckles, more so on her body than her face.She wasn’t too tall or too short.Of course, since he saw her unclothed, he knew she was in decent physical shape.Totally down for a hog tie and rough sex, he thought but immediately shook the thought off.“You’d probably be into her.”

“Well bring her to a game or out afterward. I’d be down to meet her,” James smiled walking out of the locker room.

----

“Dulci! Thank God you called!I need your help!” Carly shouted with a panicky voice.

“I’m on my way over with Sam. What’s wrong?Is everything ok?”Dulci cringed waiting for Carly’s response.She was already emotionally drained from her day of death and terminal illness at the animal hospital, and dealing with Carly’s neuroses would most likely put her over the edge.

“I’m physically ok. Just get here soon, please!”

Twenty minutes later, Dulci pulled into Sidney’s driveway. She grabbed Sam’s leash and walked her into the front door that was opened for her.

“Carly? Where are you?”

“I’m in the bathroom,” Carly responded between sniffles and sobs. Dulci only dropped Sam’s leash and rushed to where her friend was in emotional distress.

“Hey. What’s going on in… Holy shit.”Dulci looked onto the vanity to find four different brands of pregnancy tests all displaying positive results.Between Carly’s reaction, balled up and crying on the floor against the wall, and the amount of tests, Dulci knew the pregnancy was not planned or wanted.She instantly dropped to the ground and wrapped her arms around her friend, holding her as tight to her body as she could get her.Dulci must have held on for at least ten minutes listening to Carly cry before they parted.

“I have to get it taken care of,” Carly spurted as she wiped her nose on the side of her sweatshirt. It made Dulci nauseous.

“Don’t you want to talk to Sidney first before you make a decision?” Dulci was hoping that Carly would come to her senses once she brought up her boyfriend and his feelings.

“Absolutely not! The sooner I get it out, the better.I’ve never wanted to have kids or get married, especially with someone who’s gone half the time on road trips.I’d be raising this kid by myself.”

“You wouldn’t be raising a baby by yourself. I could help you while he’s away.Besides, you and the baby would always be taken care of.Sidney seems like the type of guy that would make an honest woman out of you.”Dulci was hoping that she would at least sleep on it.Abortion wasn’t a decision to take lightly, not matter what the circumstances.

“Will you take me to a clinic? Please.You’re the only one who would understand,” Carly pleaded to Dulci.It was as if Carly wasn’t hearing anything Dulci was advocating.Remembering all of the times Carly had been there for Dulci, she nodded her head and held Carly close again.She felt numb.

They were both lost in thought when the front door opened. Both girls scurried to look and seem normal.Dulci grabbed the pregnancy tests and threw them in her satchel before walking out of the bathroom and neglecting the four empty wrappers in the trashcan.

She quickly said he goodbyes to both and headed toward her car. She felt horrible not staying to talk about Sam’s x-rays, but the new information that she would be harboring made her feel cramped in his giant house.

Dulci got home a little before 8:30 and was relieved when she heard Henry knock at the door. She needed her proverbial brains to be fucked out of her body after the shitty day she experienced.

Notes

I typed most of this on the Notes icon on my iphone. Hopefully there aren't too many errors. :)