Itwasall over the chart. And anyone else would have shrugged off the interaction, but I can’t. Not with my background.
Spending ten years in prison for murder changes the way you look at things.
Donna most likely doesn’t know anything about it, and I’m not eager to tell her the story. The short version is that when I was a teenager, a boy tried to rape my best friend. I walked in on them and bashed him on the head with a paperweight. Unfortunately, that didn’t stop him. So I hit him again. And again. Eventually, he stopped… breathing.
The boy’s parents were very wealthy, and they weren’t about to let me off the hook for killing their pride and joy, even though their pride and joy was a rapist. A good lawyer might have been able to get me off, but I only had the public defender, and he wasn’t a very good one. I was found guilty of manslaughter and served ten years in a women’s prison.
It’s not something I go around telling people. Even though I don’t regret helping my friend, my time behind bars is not something I’m proud of. But when this hospital hired me a couple of months before I moved out to the island, I disclosed it to them because I had to. I wasn’t sure if they would still want me after that, but they did. Social workers are in short supply.
Still, it leaves me feeling paranoid. At my last job, some objects around the hospital went missing, and I was the only one who got called in by the police to be questioned about it. It’s notlike they brought me into the station or anything serious like that, but it was very clear that because of my background, they were looking at me more closely than anyone else.
Is Donna looking at me that way? Does she think I really stole something from that room? Does sheknow?
“Millie,” she says.
A cold sweat breaks out on my forehead. “Yes?”
“You lookreallypale. You should sit down.”
Donna manages to grab a chair for me just before my legs collapse under me. She instructs me to put my head between my legs, and then she goes all nurse on me, grabbing one of the automatic blood pressure cuffs.
“Did you eat lunch?” she asks me.
“Uh-huh,” I manage.
“You look queasy. Let me take your blood pressure.”
Donna insists on wrapping the blood pressure cuff around my arm, even though I’m sure my blood pressure is fine. It’s not a blood pressure issue. I’m just scared she knows that I’m a convicted killer. That’s all, sheesh.
I sit there while Donna watches over me. The blood pressure cuff tightens around my left biceps, then the pressure eases up, then it tightens again, then the cycle repeats another two times. Donna swears under her breath, but finally, we manage to get a blood pressure reading.
“Whoa,” she says.
That is not the response you want to hear from somebody after any kind of medical test. “What?”
“Your blood pressure is high,” she says. “Reallyhigh.”
“It is?”
“Yes. What was it at your last doctor’s appointment?”
Truthfully, I don’t go to the doctor very often. I used to go to my ob-gyn more frequently prior to getting my tubes tied, but given that my childbearing years are over, it doesn’t seemlike there’s much point to it. The last time I went to any kind of doctor was about three years ago, which is ironic since I work in a hospital and I’m around doctors all the time.
“Well, I’m feeling anxious,” I say, and it’s not any better now that I know my blood pressure is high. “That’s probably why.”
“It’s pretty high, Millie. You should call your doctor.”
Great. One more thing to put on my plate. “Is it that big a deal?”
“No,” she says. And before I have a chance to relax, she adds, “I mean, not if you don’t care if you have a heart attack or a stroke.”
That’s ridiculous. She is completely overreacting. I’m not old enough to have a heart attack or a stroke. And I’m in pretty good shape. I don’t need to deal with this blood pressure issue right now. Obviously, I’m just stressed out from the move. And last night, I got woken upagainby that scraping sound coming from somewhere within the house, although thankfully it stopped before I had a chance to consider investigating.
I’m sure once everything settles down, my blood pressure will get better too.
SIXTEEN
After dinner tonight, Enzo helps me clear the table. He’s pretty good about doing stuff like that, or at least he’s gotten good about it after several snarky comments over the years. But now, he’s great. He brings all the plates and glasses into the kitchen without even being told.
