Page 30 of When the Smoke Clears

The little boy with messy red hair and freckles nods.

She gently closes the door behind her, then grabs my wrist and pulls me down the hallway, opening the door with her name on it. “Is this an emergency?”

I step inside her office. It’s nothing but bare white walls, save for a slew of framed licenses and accolades. The only things on her sleek glass desk are a computer and a candy dispenser. Why can’t she be this clean at my house?

“Will, I have a patient. If this isn’t an emergency, then take a seat and wait for me. I will be finished in thirty minutes.”

I press the button on her M&M dispenser, and several drop onto her desk. “Okay,” I murmur as she exits her office, closing the door behind her. It’s weird being in here.

It’s weird observing her in a white lab coat.

It’s weird seeing her name on the door. Dr. Reichart. She’s a fucking medical doctor. How is that possible?

After surveying everything in her office, or lack thereof, I sit in her comfy leather chair and prop my boots atop her desk to doomscroll on my phone. Before I know it, thirty minutes fly by, and she’s back, standing in the doorway, eyeing my boots.

I drop them to the floor and sit up. It shouldn’t matter. She and her mom don’t think twice about making a mess of my place.

“I have twenty minutes. What’s going on?” she asks, sliding her hands into her coat pockets.

“Chief Killmer said he’s been seeing you for three years,” I say for whatever reason. Probably because witnessing her in her element has caught me off guard, and for a second I forget why I’m here, so I say the first thing that pops into my head. “I thought kids were your specialty.”

“Kids make up 80 percent of my practice. Not all of it. And I can’t discuss my patients with you. So I can neither confirm nor deny anything. If that’s why you’re here, I’m sorry you’ve wasted your time.”

I shake my head. “No. Uh, that’s not why I’m here. I’m here because, as we speak, your mom is shopping for art supplies to paint a picture of me.”

Everleigh is in Dr. Reichart mode. She doesn’t so much as flinch. Not a twitch of her lips or a slight raise of an eyebrow. “Oh, sorry about that. You can say no. Did you try that?”

“Not exactly. I told her I don’t have anything nice to wear.”

“It’s a nude painting.”

I give her a dead stare. “I’m aware now.”

“But you didn’t tell her no?”

“I didn’t know what to say. She gave me this look. It was as if she was daring me to say no. I felt like my manhood was being challenged.”

“Will, you don’t have to take off your clothes to prove you’re a man.” She scrapes her teeth along her bottom lip for a second. “I realize you’ve taken off your clothes for charity calendars.”

I frown while standing. “That’s not accurate because in those calendars I’m wearing my gear, minus my shirt. I’m far from naked. Besides”—I run a frustrated hand through my hair—“what is she going to do with it? Gift it to me like I really want to stare at a naked painting of myself?”

“She’ll probably give it to me for my birthday.”

My face sours.

She waves a dismissive hand. “Don’t worry. I don’t want it either. I mean, I’d be fine with it if your legs were crossed or folded off to one side. Maybe a hand tastefully placed in front of you like a fig leaf. I think penises and scrota are ugly. Don’t you?”

“Is that a trick question?”

She grins, lifting one leg to sit on the edge of her desk.

I study her for a few seconds, seeing everything I should have seen when we met. “When you weren’t wearing makeup, I thought you looked young, like a teenager, not a girl in her mid-twenties. I should have followed that instinct.”

She deflates. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“Because you feel guilty? Because you know it’s true?”

She rolls her eyes. “I told you I can’t be your doctor. Stop trying to get free therapy.”