After seeing Dr. Strohmile with his girlfriend I jumped into my work to keep my mind off of him. The following Friday I sped through the day as usual, but right before I left for the weekend, the receptionist buzzed and said I had a new patient. Knowing that we usually scheduled new patients for the mornings, I was just about to buzz her back and tell her he had to see someone else when there was a tap on my office door. When I opened it, standing before me was Dr. Strohmile. My breath, and my ethics, left me when he stepped into my office and kissed me passionately on the mouth.
“Wait, wait,” I tried to say while struggling for air.
But he wouldn’t let me go. He just kept pressing that wicked tongue of his deeper into my mouth, searching for the satisfaction it had given him on New Year’s Eve.
I pulled away. “Dr. Stroh . . . mile, this isn’t . . .”
To shut me up he circled my lips with his tongue, then whispered against them, “Whatever you were trying to say couldn’t have been more important than that.”
“No, it wasn’t. But I’m engaged and you have . . . you have that redheaded white woman.”
He laughed at my description of her.
“I mean . . . I don’t mean . . .” I tried to speak but I was tongue-tied.
“I don’t know what you mean and right now I don’t care. All I know is that since that night, since that time we spent at the hospital I can’t stop thinking about you. You’re for me, Dr. Lampley. I know it, I feel it in my soul.”
“But how can that be? We’re both in relationships. I’m engaged. What are we gonna do, walk out on these people?”
“What do”—he kissed me—”you want me to do, nameless lady?” he asked while his hands made their way up my skirt.
“What are you doing? We can’t have sex here in my office.”
“Sure we can. And really, Dr. Lampley, I think you want to make love to me right now. Or maybe you’d like it better in the exam room. You do have some stirrups in there, don’t you?”
“Yes but . . .” He didn’t let me answer and I didn’t want to, so instead I pulled him into my arms and stepped back through the door toward my exam room.
Before I knew it, he’d opened my lab coat and was pulling up my blouse while I fought to unbuckle his belt and unzip his pants. His fat penis popped out, curved, hard, and ready for me.
He pulled at my stockings, popping them from my garter belt, and then slipped off my panties. They fell in a puddle around my left leg.
Just as I was about to move toward the table, he gripped the cheeks of my ass and hoisted me up in the air. I wrapped my legs around his waist and he easily slid up into me.
“Oh, oh, my good doctor, please,” I cried out to him as he thrust himself inside me. From somewhere I heard a buzzing. Not right now. Please, no more patients. But we both knew I had to answer, so he slid from inside me and leaned against the table, stroking himself with one hand and my lips with the other.
I pushed the button on the wall to respond to the receptionist but nobody was there. Before I could return to my soul mate, I heard knocking on the outside door of my office.
I panicked. I hadn’t remembered to lock it so I buttoned my lab coat to hide my slightly torn blouse, smoothed down my hair, stepped into my panties and slid my feet quickly back into my shoes.
Kissing Dr. Strohmile one more time, I said, “Wait, wait right here. Don’t go away, please.”
Just as I closed the door to my exam room, my office door opened and in stepped Terrell.
“Cyn, you still working in here? I didn’t interrupt you with a patient, did I?”
“Uh, no, I mean, yes, but we’re not finished. I mean, we are but . . .”
With a puzzled look on his face as to what I was trying to say, Terrell kissed me on the lips, lips that were still tender from Dr. Strohmile’s mouth.
“Give me a minute,” I said, feeling trapped with Terrell on one side and Dr. Strohmile behind the other door. Before I could step back into my exam room and make a choice, Dr. Strohmile walked back into my office looking as calm as if nothing had happened.
“Doctor Strohmile, you’re leaving?” I asked.
Terrell looked at me, clearly hearing the desperation in my voice.
“It seems so, but I’m hoping to see you again next New Year’s.”
“Cynthia, what’s going on here?” Terrell asked.
Dr. Strohmile half turned toward me but kept his eyes more on Terrell.
“Dr. Strohmile, I don’t want to wait until next year.”
“Next year for what, Cynthia?” Terrell interrupted.
“But what about him?” Dr. Strohmile asked, nodding his head toward Terrell who was standing there in his uniform looking more threatening than I’d ever seen him.
“Yeah, Cyn. What about me? And like I said, what the fuck is going on?”
I saw Dr. Strohmile trying to hide a hopeful smile as we both looked at the quizzical expression on Terrell’s face.
I had to make a decision that would change the course of the rest of my life. Would I marry Terrell, eventually having to give up my practice to become the wife and mother that he would demand that I be or could I muster up the courage it would take to fall into a life that Dr. Strohmile and I hadn’t even discussed?
So far I hadn’t left much to chance in my life. I’d set my mind on being a urologist and by tenth grade I’d already selected the university I’d attend. By my junior year of college I’d already applied and been accepted at the medical school of my choice. Even winding up with a practice at Bryn Mawr hospital had been planned.
Yes, I knew how to make plans and even Terrell had been part of the plan when he came along. He was settled, had a secure future and was protective of me, maybe even a little obsessive. But I knew he loved me. The question was, did I love him? I didn’t want to marry Terrell just because he fit into my plan. I wanted to feel a fire in my belly like I had with Dr. Strohmile.
At that moment I had no time for plans. It was time that I finally took an uncalculated risk, something I’d never done in my life.
I turned my full attention to Terrell.
“Terrell, I’m sorry but I’m not ready to get married. There are some things I need to explore, and I’m not sure that once I’ve done that, I’ll still want to be with you.”
“What the hell are you talking about, Cynthia? I know you’re not . . . ,” he began to say, then trailed off midsentence. By now I wasn’t even looking at him. I was looking over his shoulder at Dr. Strohmile.
“This is the man you want to be with?” Terrell asked.
I nodded in response, then smiled as Dr. Strohmile moved from behind Terrell and came to stand by my side.
Looking at Terrell, he said, “Alexander Strohmile is my name, officer. If you need anything else, you can reach me at Cobbs Creek County Hospital.”
Terrell looked at both of us like were crazy before he stormed out of the room. But I wasn’t concerned. I felt that fire in my belly begin to burn again. I wanted to hurry and get my good doctor back into the exam room to finish what we’d started.