“Can’t say as I have.” I kissed him and silently vowed not to make him choke on my dick until he got the all-clear. I wasn’t sure I could trust Griffin to take care of his health the way he should, but nothing was happening to him on my watch.
Next day at work, I maybe spent longer than I should’ve searching databases and articles for laryngeal nodules and polyps and tumors and confirming that yes, there was a full range of possibilities including the scary. I’d have felt guilty doing the research on work time, except for the hundreds of unpaid hours I put in through the year. Griffin didn’t have a lot of current risk factors, but I knew he’d drunk and smoked in his younger days, and sung in a lot of smoky venues. That had to have exposed his larynx to carcinogens.
Still, probably just benign nodules. He’d pushed himself hard at Rock on the Rock. Even one rough episode could cause nodules. Kashira had Griffin working with Mr. Harrington’s crossword and Tom’s checkers and doing art with Nancy. There were plenty of low-voice ways he could help with resident entertainment. He’d be just fine.
I might’ve repeated that a dozen times to myself with my eyes shut after I closed the article on laryngeal squamous cell carcinoma. The cancer usually spread to lymph nodes, lungs, and bone—
“Um. Mr. Robertson?”
When I looked up, a new aide hovered in my doorway.
“Sorry, just thinking. Yes? And call me Lee.”
“Mr. Zhukov is here to see you.”
“Oh.” I shoved everything I might feel guilty about into a deep mental box so Zhukov wouldn’t suspect and slapped a smile on my face, pushing to my feet. “Show him in.”
Zhukov strode through the doorway and planted himself in the guest chair, waving to me. “Sit, sit. I don’t have much time.”
“What can I help you with?” I eased back down.
“This vacation request of yours. It’s not a convenient time for you to be gone for six days.”
I blinked, because personnel management wasn’t Zhukov’s job. Ms. Kingston in HR handled any staff things that weren’t on my plate. She’d frowned over my short notice, but admitted I had so much vacation accrued it was ridiculous, and agreed it was about time I took some of my days. I hadn’t told Griffin I was going to Rocktoberfest, just in case something fell through. But I was totally going. The cost of the scalped ticket and hotel and flights was ridiculous, but I was going to show him I supported his career, given the way he was curtailing it to make me happy.
I told Zhukov, “I’ve arranged to cover my shifts.”
“We’re having nursing staff disruptions. It’s your job to smooth those over and assure continuity of care.”
I wanted to ask him if that was corporate-speak for dealing with the low wages he paid aides and the immigrant nurses waiting for their certification. They could make more at almost any other healthcare job. Some of the aides could make more at a lot of regular jobs. They often left to do so. But I didn’t want himmad at me, maybe looking too deeply into Harvey and Owen for retaliation. “There are always disruptions, sir. We handle them.”
“You can’t handle them if you’re not here.”
“I think Wellhaven will survive for six days without me.” I tilted my head. “Surely you’re not saying I’mthatessential to Wellhaven.”
That put him in a neat bind, because saying yes would be a hell of a lot of leverage for me the next time we were negotiatingmysalary.
“No, no, not essential. Just…”
“Great. So I’ll take a vacation for once, and come back refreshed and ready to tackle our staffing issues on an ongoing basis.” I could do the corporate-speak too.
“Well, I suppose that’s all right.” Zhukov leaned forward. “Now, I want to talk about that, um, gay wedding we had in our main lobby. Was that necessary? And who paid for all the staff time and the food and everything? We don’t have a budget for special events.”
It was necessary because you were being a cold bastard.“Don’t worry. Off duty staff donated their time, and the food and other costs were covered by the grooms.” Harvey was on Medicaid and owned very little, but Owen had cut us a check for the meal and cake ingredients and decorations. He’d said he might as well splurge, since their combined care would spend down all his assets fast. I’d told him it wasn’t necessary, but now I was pleased he’d covered that base.
“Ah.” Zhukov shifted in his seat. “Well, in the future I expect you and Kashira to run any such event by my office long beforeplanning begins. We’re not an entertainment venue. There are serious medical concerns.”
I went with, “Yes, sir, we’ll do that,” because it took the wind out of his sails.
He harumphed. “See that you do.”
We sat for a moment eyeing each other. I kept my expression bland as possible before saying, “Good talk, sir. Is there anything else? Perhaps we could go through my proposal for adding another overnight staffing position—”
“Send me an email.” Zhukov pushed his chair back and stood. “I’m a busy man. I’m just going to make sure Mrs. Svenson is doing well and then I have another site to visit.”
I was sure Patricia would have things to complain about, but she’d kept her unjustified ground-floor garden-view room in the reshuffle, so with luck she couldn’t cause any real problems. “Thanks for stopping by.”
“Yes. Right. Continue on.” He waved in the direction of my computer and strode out.
