Doctor Perry by Kirsten McKenzie

Author:Kirsten McKenzie [McKenzie, Kirsten]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780473419912
Publisher: Squabbling Sparrows Press
Published: 2018-04-26T05:00:00+00:00

32

Doctor Perry drove Sarah Miller home. It turned out she’d taken a taxi to the surgery that afternoon, so as a gesture of goodwill, and with more than a small measure of curiosity, the good doctor drove his newest patient home.

Home wasn’t a romantic bohemian garret room, instead an old apartment block suffering from neglect and a transient population. Doctor Perry shrugged off a flash of concern about the safety of his car. There were no obvious undesirables hanging around, but he locked the saloon as he helped Sarah into the building.

“The elevator works,” Sarah said, the corners of her mouth turning up as she pointed to the elevator doors. Someone had graffitied the doors and although the offending words had been scrubbed off; like the damage to Sarah’s lungs, the shadowy swear words remained.

The numbers above the doors counted down from seven. Seven, six, five, four, three, two, and without hitting one, the doors opened. An oily stench fell out of the elevator. Doctor Perry had expected worse, much worse.

“Which floor, Miss Miller?”

“Six,” Sarah rasped.

Doctor Perry pulled his sleeve over his finger before pressing the button for the sixth floor. You never knew what germs abounded on elevator buttons.

The elevator doors opened reluctantly as if sand oiled their runners. Doctor Perry escorted Sarah along the corridor, the linoleum squeaking under their shoes — the doctor’s leather brogues and Sarah’s vegan leather sandals ordered direct from the Netherlands, until they came to door 613, which differentiated itself from the other apartments with a large PETA sticker on the cream-coloured door.

Sarah’s hands shook so badly that Doctor Perry eased the keyring from her fingers and slid the key in himself. Sarah faltered at the threshold so Doctor Perry half carried, half dragged her to the couch dominating the room. A mountain of pillows covered with sequins threatened to engulf her and the doctor flung them to the floor, keeping the least decorative one to place under Sarah’s head.

Doctor Perry watched Sarah shrink into the couch, her eyes closing. Her coughing had subsided although the rasping from her chest was audible in the quiet apartment.

Satisfied Sarah Miller was comfortable, he checked out the room. Exotic trinkets adorned every shelf — a Cuban baseball, a Tibetan ceremonial bell, a jewelled box from the Middle East, an assortment of polished wooden statues; dust collectors all.

Tiny snores emanated from the couch, allowing Doctor Perry the freedom to explore. Apart from the trinkets and the art on the walls, the apartment was impersonal and devoid of photographs. Doctor Perry ran his fingers along the spines of the books in the bookcase - travel guides, autobiographies, dog-eared Agatha Christie paperbacks, and a full set of the Harry Potter books. Ah, on the bottom shelf. Sarah’s photo albums.

Doctor Perry lifted the albums from the shelf, and settled himself at the small dining table noting that there were only two chairs, not big on entertaining then. Home visits were so important in his line of work. Vitally important…

The first

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.