Raise money for charity
“Would you like a cupcake?” asked the French maid. He was six foot four with hairy knees.
Annie squinted. “Is that you, Yusuf?” Yusuf, or Dr. Khan as he was better known, was the head of cardio at the hospital.
“Yes, it’s me. It’s fancy-dress day. Everyone’s raising money—bake sales, dressing up…”
“I see.” She dropped a fiver in his basket and took two cakes, which were iced in pink ripples. Much like the one Polly had given her that first day. “Is this by chance anything to do with Polly?” The money from the fundraising event was still rolling in, and she’d become determined to raise enough for a new MRI machine.
“Do you even have to ask?”
“Good point. So what else is going on?” she mumbled through icing. It tasted like strawberries, the sugar hitting her bloodstream.
“We’re auctioning off some of the radiologists, and the nurses from the NICU are doing a conga. Oh, and some of the hairier staff are getting waxed in the cafeteria.”
“They are? Um, which staff?”
“The hairiest ones, I guess. I’m supposed to be doing it, too, but I felt the hair just added to this costume.”
Annie arrived just in time to see Dr. Max with his shirt off, lying across one of the tables, which had been covered in blue hospital paper. His back, like the rest of him, was indeed rather hairy.
He saw her. “Oh, for God’s sake. What are you doing here? Don’t you have a home to go to?”
“You can talk. I thought you hated stupid fundraising things?”
“I do. I hate them with every fiber of my being. Almost as much as I’m going to hate this waxing.”
“Oh, it hardly hurts at all.”
“Really?” He cocked his head, hopeful.
“No, it hurts like hell.” She stepped aside as one of the surgical nurses—used to de-fuzzing patients for operations—applied a long strip of gauze to his waxed back, then pulled. His howls could probably be heard all the way on the third floor, where Polly was no doubt masterminding the whole thing.
Annie checked her watch. “Much as I’d love to stay and watch this, I need to get my visits in, then go to work.”
“There’ll be pictures,” he said gloomily. “Bloody Polly.”
Outside the geriatrics ward, Dr. Quarani was running sprints up and down it, resetting his Fitbit each time.
“Not joining in with the fundraising?” Annie asked.
“I do not have time for that. Only five minutes between rounds.” His white coat flapped out behind him as he ran the length of it, counting under his breath, every muscle rigid and controlled.
* * * * * *
After she’d finished her visits, Annie went to the bus stop again. Jonny was in the same clothes. He must only have one set, she thought, then realized how stupid that was. Where would he keep the rest of them? He literally had nowhere else to go. “Hiya,” he said. He was turning the pages of a Terry Pratchett book.
She pointed to it shyly. “I’ve read that one, too. It’s good.”
“Oh, yeah. Gives me a laugh, anyway. How are you today?”
“I’m okay.” Compared to him, she had to say that she was. At least she had a home to go to, and friends, and a job. She wished there was something she could do for him. “Um, do you like cake?” she said awkwardly, holding out the brown paper bag. Cake was a small thing, in the scheme of things, but she knew from her first meeting with Polly that it was still something.