Chapter 11
That afternoon, Olivia had a splitting headache. She lay on the couch, gritting her teeth to
fight off the pain in her head.
Suddenly, the phone rang, startling her. Moaning, she struggled to sit up and grabbed
the cordless from the coffee table.
“Hello?” she answered weakly.
“Hey, Olivia? It’s Nick,”
came Nick’s voice.
Despite her pain, Olivia smiled.
“Oh, hey, Nick,” she said.
“Are you okay? You sound
weird.”
“I’ve just got a headache,” Olivia replied.
“Oh, I’m sorry,” Nick said sympathetically. “I didn’t mean to bother you.”
“No, it’s okay. I’m glad
you called.”
“Oh, good,” he said. She
could hear the smile in his voice.
“Well, I was wanting to ask you something…”
“Sure, what?”
“You ever been water skiing?”
“Water skiing? No, I
haven’t,” she replied.
“Really? Well, do you wanna
learn? Cause I got a new speedboat that
I haven’t really used much yet, and I was gonna take her out tomorrow. I thought maybe you would come with me.”
“Oh, Nick, that sounds great!” Olivia replied, a wide smile crossing
her face. Even though she had lived by
the ocean for over a month now, she didn’t have a boat of her own and hadn’t
been out on the ocean. Going out with
Nick sounded wonderful.
“Awesome,” Nick said. “If
we go out early in the day, it won’t be as hot. So what do you say we meet at… oh… eight
tomorrow morning?”
“Sounds good,” she said.
“You want me to come over to your place?”
“Sure,” he replied.
“Okay. Well, I’ll see you
at eight then.”
“Okay, cool. Well, I
better let you go now. See you
tomorrow,” Nick said.
“Yup. Bye, Nick,” Olivia
replied and hung up, feeling much better than she had before.
Wanting a glass of water, Olivia started to get up from the couch
to head into the kitchen. But as soon
as she was on her feet, a dizzy sensation came over her, and she wobbled,
sinking back down onto the couch and closing her eyes.
A couple minutes later, when she was sure the vertigo had passed,
she slowly got back up and walked into the kitchen. She got herself some ice water and sipped it
slowly. As she glanced around the room,
she caught sight of her calendar, hanging next to refrigerator. As she studied it, her heart sank.
“Oh, no… I forgot about my doctor’s appointment tomorrow,” she
murmured, focusing on the red words scrawled under the following day’s
date. “Now what am I supposed to
do? I already promised Nick I would go
out on his boat. I can’t just
cancel. He’ll think I was just stringing
him along.”
She sighed. “Well, I’ll
just reschedule the stupid doctor’s appointment then,” she said,
shrugging. “That’s no big deal. I’ll call the office right now.”
As she dialed the number to the doctor’s office, she felt bad,
knowing how mad her parents would be if they found out she was canceling a
doctor’s appointment to go boating with some guy she didn’t even know that
well. Luckily, my parents aren’t
here, Olivia thought. I’m
nineteen now, and I can do whatever I want.
“Dr. Brandt’s office,” came a tired sounding woman’s voice.
“Hi, my name is Olivia Caisson, and I have an appointment
scheduled for tomorrow morning that I need to cancel,” Olivia explained.
“What time was the appointment?” the woman asked.
“Nine thirty.”
“Let’s see… here it is.
Would you like to reschedule that?”
“Yeah. When’s the next
available day?” Olivia asked.
“Hold on, let me look,” the woman said, and Olivia patiently
waited. “There’s nothing open until
September sixth.”
Olivia’s mouth dropped open.
That was close to two months away.
But she knew how busy doctors were.
“Okay, that’s fine,” she said grudgingly. “What time?”
“There’s a spot open at nine.
Will that work out for you?”
“Yup, that sounds good,” Olivia replied.
“Okay, I’ll add you in then,” the woman said.
“Thanks. Goodbye,” Olivia
said and hung up.
***
