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character of the iDoc algorithm.”
    Langley nodded slowly at the mention of his name but didn’t stand. He didn’t look anything like the typical software guy and was miles away from the other two men with whom he was sharing the dais, wearing shit-kicker boots with black jeans that were topped off with a huge, silver-plated Texas longhorn belt buckle. To round out the outfit, he wore a black sport jacket over an open-collared black shirt.
    For the next few minutes George found it hard to concentrate on Thorn’s words. His unexpected trip down memory lane of that awful Thanksgiving Day
and his mother’s death had him freaked out. On the flight back to L.A. after the funeral, he had found himself agonizing over the way the lack of primary-care physicians had contributed to the nightmare.
    As fate would have it, the airplane magazine had an article about a phone app that could anticipate heart attacks. That had been the stimulus that made him think about the phone as a primary-care doctor. There were already six billion cell phones in the world and the technology was there; it just needed to be channeled. Although he didn’t do anything about this revelation—what could he do as a first-year resident—he did mention the idea to Paula when he finally did get in touch with her.
    They had met for a drink, and after some small talk he told her his mom’s sad story and his idea of a cell phone functioning as a full-blown primary-care physician. He was convinced a device like that would have been a godsend to his mother and probably would have saved her life.
    Paula was immediately taken by the concept and told him the idea was perfect for Amalgamated, which alarmed George. It was his belief that if anybody did it, it should be the medical profession, not an insurance company, since the smartphone, in a very real way, would be practicing medicine. Paula’s response was to laugh, pointing out that the medical profession would never get around to it, having dragged their collective feet at the idea of competition of any sort as well as their disinclination to embrace the digital world.
    In the end, George’s effort in reconnecting with Paula didn’t pan out. As busy as he was with his first year of residency, he didn’t call her for months, and when he did, she declined the offer of getting together. The next time he had heard from her was just the previous week, when she texted him the invitation to the event out of the blue. The fact that the presentation was about the smartphone being a primary-care physician was a complete and total surprise.
    George again considered getting up and walking out. She obviously latched on to his idea and ran with it without any attempt to connect with him even just to acknowledge his contribution. George squirmed in his seat, his mind racing to think of what to do about it. He shifted his weight to stand and leave. The man next to him even moved to let him by, but George didn’t get up. Instead he relaxed back into his seat. What purpose would it serve to walk out? Just wanting to get away was a childish response.
    It ended up being a good thing that he stayed, too. Thorn still had a few surprises. “Amalgamated Healthcare is proud and will be announcing to the media that we are near the end of a very successful beta test of the iDoc algorithm and app. For almost four months, twenty thousand people here in the Los Angeles metropolitan area, who had signed strict NDAs, or nondisclosure agreements, have been using the iDoc app with truly phenomenal success. As a primary-care physician, iDoc has proven itself to be utterly reliable, far better than a flesh-and-blood general practitioner under our current health care system. And this sentiment comes directly from our participant surveys. Enrollees love it!”
    George swallowed with some difficulty. His mouth had gone dry. He’d seen the iDoc app on Kasey’s phone but had not known what