Magnolia Wednesdays Read Online Free PDF Page B

Sara was also a world-class hypochondriac and would never take a call lightly from a person entitled to wear a white coat.
    “It’s probably just an appointment reminder or some bookkeeping thing. I’ll call them back later.” Vivien hefted her box onto one hip.
    “Are you sure you want to do that?” Sara asked anxiously. “My aunt Matilda didn’t return a call from her internist one time and three years later she was dead.”
    “Your Aunt Matilda was ninety-one when she died.”
    “Right. But her sister, Gertie, made it to ninety-five.”
    Knowing better than to follow the thread of this conversation further, Vivien hugged Sara with her free arm. “Thanks for everything. You’ve been great.”
    “Are you sure you have to quit?” Sara asked. “Couldn’t you change your mind?”
    Good question. Now that all the emotions that had engulfed her seemed to have retreated, she couldn’t quite believe she was on her way out the door. Could she apologize and blame it on the pain pills? Post-traumatic stress syndrome? Where had all that rage come from? And where had it gone?
    As frightening as the glut of emotions were, she would have preferred them to the knee-wobbling, gut-wrenching emptiness and sense of impending doom that filled her now.
    As if everything had been yanked out from beneath her. As if she didn’t have a friend left in the world. She drew in a sharp breath of shock as her vision blurred with tears. Tears? Good God, she hadn’t cried in ten years, if you didn’t count her brother-in-law J.J.’s funeral. Now the waterworks kicked in at the smallest provocation.
    At the nearest Starbucks Vivien ordered a chamomile tea instead of her usual macchiato and a biscotti in place of the beckoning carrot cake, in hopes of settling her stomach. At a vacant table near the window, she sipped the warm tea and nibbled the biscotti tentatively, praying it would stay down. Between bites she tried to focus on her situation, but she couldn’t seem to marshal the resources required. Each time she tried to analyze what had just happened, her brain skittered away from the subject like a mouse playing hide and seek with a cat. Checking voice mail, she saw that the doctor’s office had tried her cell phone, too. Not really wanting to deal with it, she pressed play and listened to the nurse/receptionist’s message. “Hi, this is Dr. Sorenson’s office. The doctor has reviewed the lab work they did on you in the hospital and there’s something there that he would like to discuss. Please call to schedule an appointment for this afternoon; he promised to fit you in.”
    The biscotti turned to lead in her stomach. Dr. Sorenson, her internist, actually her only regular doctor, was not a spur-of-the-moment kind of guy. She went to his office once a year for her annual well-woman checkup, which included her annual Pap and general physical, and on the rare occasions when an infection or some other small malady presented itself.
    What could the hospital have found that would compel him to see her so quickly? Was it some kind of tumor? A cancer?
    Just as rage had taken her in its grip earlier, now panic consumed her. She chastised herself for being so ridiculous. And silently apologized to Sara for all the times she’d poked fun at her secretary for doing this very thing. Other than the recent bullet in her butt, she had always been healthy. The fact that she’d been riding such an emotional rollercoaster lately did not mean there was something seriously wrong with her; there was just no reason to travel down that mental road.
    Vivien pressed redial and waited anxiously for someone to answer. After she gave her name she said, “I had a message to call to schedule an appointment for today with Dr. Sorenson.” She expected the woman to laugh at her, but the woman said, “Yes, I have a note to fit you in. Can you be here at two thirty?”
    Since Vivien no longer had a job, getting there at two thirty was not a problem. But