The Human Blend - Alan Dean Foster [58]
Physician, heal thyself. Or at least call a colleague. There were plenty of readily available medications that would mitigate the effects of the hormonal changes her body was undergoing. She had put off taking them: a fine example for a medical practitioner. This evening, she told herself. Before lunch she would file a request to fill the pertinent prescription and it would be ready for pickup when she finished work. As if the discomfort and personal embarrassment the nightmares were causing her were not enough, there was the matter of continually having to change the bed.
At least she could look forward to the fact that it was Friday. Saturday lay uncommitted before her, open and inviting. Maybe she would call Suzanne and Leora and the three of them would go down to Dubaia Park for the weekend, letting themselves luxuriate and unwind among the welcoming spas and sensoria of the south coast’s strand of artificial islands.
The mere thought was enough to reenergize her. So much so that this morning she decided to spurn the usual severe white unisex medical garb in favor of a lightweight business suit of robin’s-egg blue, one short of sleeve and tremulous of hem. It would brighten her colleagues’ day as well as her own. She smiled mischievously to herself as she imagined Rajeev’s reaction to it. Though he didn’t see them often, he was of the considered opinion that she did indeed have legs.
Before she left her apartment and took the elevator down to work she thought to check on the lab report that had nagged at her ever since she had first listened to it. The notion of tiny vanishing devices fashioned of impossible substances was sufficiently thought-engaging to push the last remnant memories of her most recent nightmare clean out of her mind. While ongoing speculation as to the source and function of what she had extracted from the back of Cara Gibson’s head produced only greater confusion and bemusement, these were at least a welcome relief from continuing anxiety and frustration over the inescapable hormonal changes that were taking place within her own body.
Work itself was also a great help. Even for a general practitioner such as herself, far more concentration and effort was demanded than had been for her long-ago predecessors. Like her, they had prescribed aspirin and bed rest, had set broken bones and administered vaccines, had been required to observe symptoms and call for specific tests to isolate certain diseases.
None of them, however, had been asked to identify the cause of infection in a third eye. None had been expected to diagnose whether the progressively collapsing bone structure of a complete facial remeld should be attributed to failed surgery, inadequate maintenance on the part of the patient, or the insidious effects of a recently banned self-administered tanning additive.
Though she dealt with no one under the age of thirteen, there were still children present in the office antechamber. Accompanying adults seeking treatment and advice, the kids kept the atmosphere lighter than that generally found in specialists’ offices. Maybe it was the presence of the candy robot Ingrid had acquired several years back. The mechanoid entertained, and dispensed sweets, and joked around, and generally made life easier for her adult patients by diverting their progeny. Ingrid had never thought of the robot as a tool for bringing in business. In truth, she had more clients than she could comfortably handle and was regularly forced to turn prospective patients away. She hated to do it, but the alternative was to exhaust herself, to the detriment not only of her own health but of her work.
It wasn’t her unarguably