The door swung inward at Dr. Cushing’s touch and revealed a standard medical examination room. Katie sat on the paper-topped exam table idly kicking her long legs.
At the sound of the door opening she looked up, squinting in your direction, and then leapt to her feet. “Dad!” she exclaimed. “Please tell me we can leave now!”
“Well, it’s fine with me,” you said, pointedly glancing at Dr. Cushing.
The scientist nodded. “We’ve covered pretty much everything; you’re free to go, Katie.”
Katie made a bee-line for the door. “Hey, hold on,” you said. “What about your clothes?” Your daughter was only wearing a set of ill-fitting scrubs, the same dark green as the university colors. Katie was a fairly tall girl at about 5’7’’, and the scrubs showed several inches of skin above her wrists and ankles.
Katie gave an exasperated snort. “They had to throw out all my clothes after the accident. It was all completely soaked.”
Dr. Cushing nodded. “We had to follow regulations. Her clothes were classified as ‘lab waste’ and had to be disposed of.”
“OK,” you said, “that makes sense, but what about your glasses?”
“Oh! Yes!” Dr. Cushing fished a pair of thick glasses out of her lab coat pocket. “Here you go Katie. We were able to put these in the autoclave.”
“Oh, thank god,” Katie said, slipping the glasses on. “I can see again!”
“OK, one last thing,” you said, and pointed down to Katie’s bare feet. “Shoes?”
“Same as the rest of her clothes, I’m afraid,” Cushing said. “We offered her some slippers, but she declined.”
Katie rolled her eyes. “My choices were some crocs that didn’t fit, or some slippers made of paper. You’re parked right outside, right, Dad?” You nodded. “Then I’ll manage.”
“OK, then I’ll show you out, “Dr. Cushing said. “If you’ll just follow me.” She turned and left the room.
You and Katie fell in behind Dr. Cushing and followed her until you reached the front lobby and the exit. Dr. Cushing held out a hand to both you and Katie and you each shook it in turn. “Mr. Hightower, Katie,” she said. “A pleasure to meet you both. I’m just sorry about the circumstances. If you have any questions or concerns later, you can call me. I don’t have a card with me, but just call the university switchboard and ask for me.” She turned to you daughter. “Katie, I hope this incident won’t keep you from considering our fine university.” She nodded. “I hope to see you again.”
***
Later, you and Katie were in the car, navigating off the university campus. Between your previous experience and Katie’s directions, you took fewer wrong turns. Eventually, you made it to the highway.
“So, aside from getting doused with hazardous chemicals, how was the visit?” you asked Katie.
She shrugged. “It was pretty interesting, at least the stuff I saw. I really wanted to see some of the labs that were scheduled for after Dr. Cushing’s tour, but…” she trailed off. She brightened. “But Dr. Cushing said I can email her later if I want to set up a private tour of the stuff I missed, so that’s cool.”
Your eyebrows went up. “Yeah, it is. She seems to have been pretty helpful through the whole situation. She, uh, also said that there was a fight? You want to talk about that?”
Katie turned away and looked out the passenger-side window. “Not really.”
You were about to say more when a loud grumble echoed through the car interior. “Was that your stomach?”
Katie grimaced and placed a hand on her flat stomach. “Yeah, I’ve barely eaten anything all day. Can we stop somewhere?”
You glanced at the clock in the dash. “Hmm, your mom’s gonna have dinner ready not too long after we get home…”
Katie’s stomach growled again. “Please, Dad? Just a drive-thru to get some fries or something.”
You sighed. “Fine. Is Burger Titan OK?”
“Perfect.”
***
You glared at your daughter incredulously after she finished shouting her order into the drive-thru speaker. “I thought you just wanted some fries?”
Katie looked down sheepishly. “Sorry, but I was starving.”
“Two combo meals, each Titan-sized! Katie, that’s like 10,000 calories right there!” You thought about what Dr. Cushing had said about a heightened appetite. Maybe you should call her? Or maybe Katie really was just hungry from not eating much all day. You blew out a breath, resigned. “Your mother’s going to kill me.”
“Hey she doesn’t have to know,” Katie said. “I’ll finish it before we get home.”
Your eyebrows shot up. “We’re 10 minutes from the house, I very much doubt you can finish all that food before we pull into the driveway.”
But Katie proved you wrong. She hadn't been kidding about being starving. The empty wrappers were crammed under the passenger seat and she was sucking down the last few pulls of her coke when you pulled into the driveway.
“First thing I’m gonna do is change out of these stupid things,” Katie said as she stepped out of the car. She pulled at the tight material of the scrubs stretched across her torso. “And then maybe burn them. I mean, that’s only fair, right? That’s what they probably did to my clothes.”
“I don’t know,” you said. “You can hold onto them and you’ll have a cheap and easy Halloween costume.”
Katie rolled her eyes. “Yeah, right. I can wear the too-small scrubs and be ‘slob nurse.’” She suddenly looked thoughtful. “Although… maybe with the right makeup and accessories I can be ‘horrific lab accident doctor.’”
“Well, you do have experience with lab accidents now.”
Katie rolled her eyes again and ran into the house.
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