6. Joshua

Joshua

“ D r. Martin, you have an emergency drop-in patient.”

I looked up from a stack of paperwork, almost glad to hear someone needed my help. When I purchased this practice from my mentor Dr. James Phillips a few years back, I had no idea just how much paperwork was involved in running your own practice. It was endless and it kept me away from spending time on my true passion – caring for animals.

“What do we have, Erica?”

My vet tech took a quick look at the iPad in her hand to verify the details before speaking. She was new to her career but already an integral member of my team. I appreciated how thoughtful she was about her work.

“Mixed breed chihuahua, age approximately three, went after a squirrel at the dog park and somehow ended up trapped inside a box hedge. The dog was wearing a princess dress, part of which is now embedded in her skin, causing localized bleeding.”

“Did you say a princess dress?” I asked incredulously.

“Affirmative.”

Seeing my raised eyebrow, Erica added, “I didn’t ask. The owner is beside herself. In addition to the abrasions, the dog hurt her leg and won’t put weight on it.”

I nodded. “Okay, let me save this spreadsheet and I’ll be right there.”

“They’re waiting in room one.”

I grabbed my stethoscope, draping it around the back of my neck, and headed into the exam room.

“Hello, I’m Doctor Joshua Martin,” I said as I entered the room, my eyes going immediately to the dog. “I understand you had an accident at the dog park.”

If I had a dollar for every canine who got injured at the dog park, I could probably retire early. The combination of overexcited dogs and inattentive owners could be a recipe for disaster.

“Yes Doctor, this is Esmerelda, she got chased by a Doberman, but then they teamed up together to chase a squirrel, the fattest squirrel you’ve ever seen, with evil in its eyes too. Then the squirrel and the other dog jumped the hedge, and my poor sweet baby tried to follow but she was too short to make it over, so she got trapped inside the hedge. It took me a while to dig her out. Now she’s injured and she can’t walk, and she’s been whimpering in pain. I got her here as fast as I could. Please tell me she’s going to be all right.”

The words came out in a frantic rush. I turned my attention to the dog’s owner and reared back in shock. She was the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen, but it was more than that. It was like I knew her somehow, even though I’d never seen her before..

It was hard to gauge her height since she was sitting, but I could tell her figure was curvy. Long, dark brown hair cascaded down her shoulders in soft waves, and she had the most unusual green eyes that stood out in contrast to her pale, smooth skin. A cute little button nose and thick, heart shaped lips led to a slightly pointy chin.

Those green eyes locked onto mine and I felt my heart start pounding frantically in my chest. The air in the room seemed to be sucked away, leaving only the crackling of something electric, the way the air was before a big thunderstorm.

It’s her, a voice in my brain said in wonder. She’s the one. I couldn’t figure out why I had that thought, I wasn’t a man who was prone to bouts of whimsy.

The dog in her arms made a whining noise, breaking the strange spell between us. Oh yeah, I was a doctor. I was supposed to be helping her injured dog. Somehow all of that had flown right out of my head. It wasn’t like me to lose focus. Later I’d have to think about why this woman was so distracting.

“Uh. Let me have a look at her. Can you put her up on the exam table for me?”

She laid the dog on the table.

“Stay, Esmerelda,” the woman instructed.

The dog obediently stayed on the table, her eyes on her owner as I started a visual assessment of the animal’s condition.

“May I ask what this is?” I picked up the edge of torn fabric around the dog’s hindquarters.

“It’s a princess dress,” the woman said, as if that was the most normal thing to say.

“Why is your dog wearing a princess dress?” I asked, “Miss, uh…”

I glanced at the computer screen next to me for her name, then realized that I’d been so distracted by her that I hadn’t logged in. I turned away to wake up the screen and access my medical records system. Esmerelda’s record was at the top of the list.

“Mabel Jameson,” she said. “Today is National Dress Up Your Dog Day so I thought it would be fun to dig out Esmerelda’s princess costume from Halloween.”

Dear God, she was one of those nuts who dressed up her pets for holidays.

“I never expected her to run away and get stuck in a hedge. She’s usually so well behaved, but that Doberman was a bad influence.”

Focusing on the little dog instead of its owner’s chatter, I checked its vitals before determining the best way to get the princess costume off the dog. I needed to look at the wound on its midsection and then examine its leg, and I couldn’t do that with fabric in the way.

The dog was shaking violently, although I didn’t yet know if it was from pain or anxiety. Mabel stood on the other side of the table, leaning over to stroke the dog’s head, whispering words of comfort. The position gave me a clear view down the neckline of the dress she wore, and I cursed myself for being a pervert even as I noticed she had lovely breasts. Full and lush.

Then I got another surprise. Using a pair of surgical scissors, I carefully cut away the fabric of the princess costume, then stopped to stare at the dog. I’d seen a lot of strange looking mixed breeds during my career, but Esmerelda was one of the strangest.

From the head up, the dog looked like a classic brown chihuahua, but it had the body of one of the terrier breeds. There was a clear demarcation between the brown chihuahua head and the white fur on the rest of its body. It looked like someone had taken the body of Toto from the Wizard of Oz and attached it to the head of the dog from the Taco Bell commercials.

She was either the ugliest or the cutest dog I’d ever seen, I couldn’t quite decide.

I lowered my head, using a pen light to look at the abrasions around the dog’s midsection where the belt had cut her skin.

“The dress tore off the top layer of skin, kind of like a rug burn. This will need to be cleaned up and you’ll have to apply antibiotics so it doesn’t get infected, but it’s not bad enough to need stitches,” I told Mabel.

“Oh good,” she breathed.

I gently palpated the dog’s leg, noting that the kneecap seemed to not be tracking right. “I’d like to get an x-ray of this leg. It doesn’t appear to be broken, but she might have torn her cranial cruciate ligament.”

“Is that bad?” Mabel asked in alarm.

“It’s basically the same as a human tearing their ACL,” I explained. “If it’s torn, Mabel will likely need surgery, but hopefully it’s just a strain and it will resolve on its own.”

I pressed the button on the phone which let the techs know I needed assistance. Erica must have been close by because she entered the room in less than sixty seconds.

“We need to clean the wound up and get an x-ray of the injured leg,” I told Erica.

“Yes, Doctor.”

Turning my attention back to Mabel I said, “I’d like to put Esmerelda on an IV for a little bit. We can give her some pain meds and also something to calm her down while we treat her, is that okay with you? I can have someone come in and give you an estimate, but you’re probably looking at about six hundred dollars with the x-ray and IV, plus the exam.”

I hated this part of the visit. Medical care was expensive and even if people had pet insurance, it covered substantially less than human insurance did. It was heart-breaking when I saw situations where the owners couldn’t afford to get their pets the care they needed. It led to some difficult choices.

“Of course, anything for Esmerelda.” Mabel stretched her arms out towards the dog. “Whatever she needs.”

That’s when I realized that the dog wasn’t the only one who was injured.