‘No, really, I can’t. It’s book group again. They want to do it every week and … well … Kira’s coming to pick me up this time.’ She lowered her voice to a whisper as if expecting Kira to leap out from under the table at any moment. ‘I’m a little scared of her to be honest. I didn’t know how to say no.’
Pav almost groaned. He’d been the one to coerce the girls into forming a bloody book group for the express purpose of coaxing Millie out of her shell. It seemed that his tactic was backfiring on him. Did theyhaveto meet every goddamn week?
‘I’ll pick you up,’ he told her, and her eyes slid away from his to his shoulder.
‘Uh … I don’t even know where we’re going.’
‘I’ll find out, don’t worry,’ he told her.
‘Um … okay,’ she whispered, and then something beautiful happened. Her clear grey eyes met his and she smiled. It was the first spontaneous smile he’d managed to squeeze out of her. He felt like he’d won the Olympics. He started to lean in. She blinked as her smile dimmed and her eyes lost focus.
‘There you are, Dr Morrison.’ An impatient voice sounded from the doorway and Pav’s head jerked away from hers. Millie blinked again. They both turned towards the balding man who was pushing his way into the room. Pav recognised him as the head of the radiology department. The one who’d helped him bully Millie into presenting at the Grand Round. A wave of guilt swept through Pav, morphing rapidly into anger at the guy’s next words. ‘I thought you’d got lost on the way back from the meeting. There’s a whole stack of reporting to do, you know. We kind of need you down in the department.’ His eyes flicked from Millie to Pav’s hands on her shoulders, and then to Pav himself. ‘Oh … er … hello, Pavlos, old chap. What are … ?’ He trailed off and rubbed his beard.
Much to Pav’s annoyance Millie had lost that unfocused look in her eyes; it had been replaced with anxiety and her hands had coiled back up into tight balls. She pulled back from Pav and took two steps away.
‘Barney,’ Pav said through gritted teeth.
‘I was just getting back,’ Millie muttered, looking down at the carpet and pushing a rogue lock of hair, which had escaped the complicated hairstyle at the back of her head by sheer force of will, behind her ear. Pav caught her arm as she passed him.
‘Sorry, Millie,’ he said as she shot him an adorable, wide-eyed, annoyed look. He bit back a smile. Millie’s annoyance he could handle, in fact he was unreasonably heartened that she would show him that much emotion. He was getting somewhere. ‘But I need to talk to Barney for a sec. I’ll catch you later, okay?’ Millie nodded in vigorous agreement and pulled her arm away to leave.
‘Right,’ Pav started as soon as the door closed behind her. ‘Barney, were you aware that Millie came to the meeting alone today?’
‘Well …’ Barney paused and scratched his head. ‘She seems to cope okay with this stuff and we’re so stretched on the consultant rota at the moment that we may have just …’ He trailed off and shrugged. ‘I’m sure Dr Morrison conveyed the relevant facts.’
‘Her name is Camilla, Millie for short. ButI’msure you already know that,’ Pav told him in a low voice.
‘Uh … right, yes, of course, I –’
‘You know as well as I do that a registrar issuing orders to a room full of consultants is not going to go down well, however many facts she manages to convey. And passing her off as a consultant is not going to work from now on. Not after Lucas’s little outburst in the meeting.’
‘Look, we’ve all got to pull together at the moment,’ Barney told him. ‘If that means a perfectly capable junior like Dr Mor … I meanMilliehas to go to a couple of meetings without her hand being held, then …’
‘How many of your other registrars would you send unaccompanied to the MDT?’
‘Uh …’
‘How much of your reporting does Millie do?’
Barney’s face went red and he looked away for a moment. Pav had his answer.
‘I’m guessing it’swayover the average consultant, right?’
Barney took a step back and started to rub the back of his neck. ‘Look, she’s like a goddamnmachine, okay? The amount of work she gets through … it’s insane.’
‘You can’t just keep using her for service provision and for the shitty meetings you lot are too bloody lazy to go to.’
Barney let out a huff of breath. ‘She knows all the data, all right? She doesn’t need us. Hell, when somebody does go with her they have to ask her how to wipe their own arse anyway.’
‘She was uncomfortable in that meeting, Barney. You know what a prick Lucas can be and how he’s resisting this move towards the non-invasive stuff you lot deliver. It was like sending a lamb to the slaughter.’
‘A lamb?’ Barney spluttered, his eyebrows shooting up into his hairline. ‘Have you met Dr Mor … I mean Millie? She’s a bloody robot. My stapler has a bigger range of emotions.’
Rage swept through Pav for the second time that morning. His hands clenched at his sides and he had an overwhelming desire to punch this joker in his smug, pudgy face. He took a step towards him, and at his murderous expression Barney’s face paled. ‘She isnota robot. You know she isn’t. You were there at that Grand Round and you saw what happened.’
‘Well … I … I … that was …’
‘That was a sensitive, anxious-to-please, terrified woman being pushed beyond her limits.’
