Moonlight Bay

Once Jessica admitted she hoped to be an ER doctor, the room erupted into groans. Everyone agreed that the two women should complete their residencies locally and assume roles in their respective specialties as soon as possible.

"We've already been accepted for residencies," pointed out Willow. "Jessica will be at a well known Baltimore hospital while I'll be at a Philadelphia children's hospital. We worked damn hard to get those residencies. They're with prestigious hospitals that are well known for great residency programs. Does your local hospital even have residents working there?"

"We have in the past," insisted one of the paramedics. "We're too lightly staffed right now, so residents would be carrying a lot of the actual load. As far as I'm concerned, that simply means we need them more than big hospitals. Of course, Dr. Thorp would have to be Willow's attending for a few years. He's a great guy, but he's not getting any younger. You might wind up learning mostly by doing, but the experience would be great."

"This is all very flattering, but it isn't that easy. Plus, we've made commitments to those hospitals and they're planning on us being there. Getting these positions takes a lot of effort, so I can't see giving them up to work in a small hospital in a resort town, as much as I love it here," explained Jessica to the disappointed group.

On the trip back to the girls' hotel, Dave asked, "Jessica, would you like to take a ride to the lighthouse tomorrow afternoon. It's really beautiful up there. Everyone that comes to Moonlight Bay visits the lighthouse at least once."

"Tim and I are going golfing tomorrow and you don't golf, Jessica," revealed Willow. "I felt guilty about leaving you, but not anymore. You guys have a good time and we'll meet up for dinner."

The next afternoon, as Jessica was riding back down the coast toward Moonlight Bay with Dave, she couldn't stop herself from smiling. She had thoroughly enjoyed the trip. The lighthouse had been beautiful and she was sure she had managed to get some great photographs. She had even asked another tourist to take a few of her with Dave. She would have something to remember him by long after her vacation was over, and that thought caused her smile to fade.

She wondered if she was attracted to Dave because he was so different than James. He didn't brag or swagger. In fact, she had to pry to get any personal information from him. He was polite and thoughtful, yet confident and self-assured. Still, Jessica couldn't see a future with a 'surfer dude' type of guy. She knew herself well enough to realize her mate would have to treat her as an equal, but he would also have to be her equal. He didn't have to be a doctor, but he had to be hard working and committed to her and any children they might have. Surfers didn't really fit that image.

"Uh oh!" was all Dave uttered, but it quickly caught Jessica's full attention. "It looks like there's trouble up ahead."

They were driving along one of the many canals crossing Florida's landscape. In the distance Jessica could see a large cloud of dust and the brake lights of several cars. As they approached the parked cars in the road, Dave pointed to the canal where the driver's side of a white car was pointed upward.

Dave was remarkably calm as he turned on his four-way flashers and stepped from the truck. He pulled the back seat forward, grabbed what appeared to be a plastic tool box and headed for the submerged car. An older man was still behind the wheel, held in place by his seat belt and an air bag. Jessica watched as Dave, reached into his tool box and pulled out a large lock blade knife. He opened the blade as he slid down the canal bank to the car. Soon he was in dirty water up to his chest.

Dave managed to get the door unlocked and opened. By this time, several bystanders had gathered. Dave glanced around, his eyes stopping when he saw a rugged young man about twenty years old.

"Jim! Get your ass down here and hold the door open for me. I need to cut the seatbelt and pull the guy out! You, call 911!" instructed Dave to a woman watching the scene.

The young man quickly scampered down the bank, took a position near the door and nodded to Dave, who then proceeded to slash the seat belt and haul the unconscious man from the car. Although the man was not small, Dave carried him up the bank and gently placed him on the ground.

"Jess! Can you try to help this man? I have to see if there's anyone else in the car!" was all Dave said as he slid back down the bank, ripped open a back door and laid down over the seat with his head disappearing into the murky water as the young man assisting him moved to hold the back door open.

Jessica had immediately kneeled down next to the unconscious man. She quickly determined he wasn't breathing and had no pulse. Her training and experience kicked in immediately and she began chest compressions. That was when she saw what looked like a very large alligator moving along the bank toward her!

"Get the hell out of here!" screamed Jessica as she continued the chest compressions. "I won't let you get him!"

One of the cars that had stopped at the scene held two local teenage girls. The girl driving had heard Dave tell the woman to call 911. It was obviously an emergency, so she called her mother, an ER nurse at the hospital. Not being busy at the time, her mother answered the call and was quickly apprised of the situation by her daughter.

"Mom, Trish is streaming it on FaceBook. You're her friend! Just go to her page and you can see it!" explained the girl before she began calling other family and friends. Within a couple of short minutes, hundreds of viewers had pulled up the streaming video on their phones, tablets, and lap tops.

Trish had briefly shown Jessica performing CPR on the driver before moving her camera to follow Dave as he slid headfirst into the muddy water in the back of the car. She gave an involuntary gasp when Dave squirmed back out with the help of the man holding the door. Gripped in his right hand was a crying girl about five years old!

Suddenly Jessica yelled and the teen swung her phone around to catch Jessica staring at a large gator as she continued to perform CPR on the unconscious man. Those watching clearly heard Jessica shout she wouldn't let the gator get the man. The alligator seemed to freeze in place briefly as he considered her words. Then he lunged at Jessica and her patient!

Trish was unable to look away as she kept her phone's camera pointed at the confrontation and streaming to the world. She didn't understand what she saw in her screen as the gator suddenly jerked and seemed to roll down the hill and into the canal.

Dave had determined the child strapped in the back seat was the only other person in the car. He quickly cut her seatbelt and pulled the squirming child out of the murky water. He had just regained his footing when he heard Jessica yell at the gator. Since the child was moving and crying, he quickly determined that he was most needed by Jessica, and the man she was working over.

He handed the child to the man that had helped him and moved up the bank with amazing speed. He topped the canal bank at the moment the gator decided to grab his dinner. Dave's right arm wrapped around the alligator's neck area as he planted both feet and pushed back toward the canal. Man and reptile rolled down the embankment and over each other several times before disappearing into the dark waters of the canal.

The water seemed to suddenly boil as it was turned frothy by the two combatants struggling for survival. The splashing water yielded glimpses of man and reptile as they thrashed and twisted around each other for what seemed a very long time. Suddenly everything went still. Everyone on the canal bank, as well as those watching the live feed, held their breath as they waited to see who, or what, would surface.

Even though they were watching and hoping, everyone gasped in surprise when Dave's head suddenly appeared. He made his way to the bank of the canal and leaned against it as he fought to regain his breath. His shirt had been torn from his body and there were several angry looking red lines crisscrossing his back. Slowly he stood, and those watching clearly saw more cuts running across Dave's chest and arms.

Through all of this, Jessica had maintained CPR on the driver. Tears were flowing down her cheeks as she watched Dave struggle up the bank and kneel next to her. Whatever he said was drowned out by the wail of sirens as ambulances and police cars arrived on scene.

Diane was the first to arrive at Dave's side. She quickly took in the scene on the bank and then turned to stare down at the canal. Jessica followed her eyes to the water. Floating belly up in the canal was a huge alligator, deader than last year's roses.

"Jesus!" gasped a cop Jessica had been introduced to in the diner the day before. "That thing's got to be seven feet long!"

Paramedics rushed up to Jessica and she calmly explained her belief that the man had crashed his vehicle because of a heart attack. An automated external defibrillator was quickly attached to the man's chest. It took three attempts, but the man's heart suddenly began to beat!

The man was quickly loaded on a gurney, placed into the ambulance and rushed to the hospital. The small girl was still crying as paramedics prepared to transport her in a second ambulance.

"It looks like she has a broken arm," stated Diane as she walked over to where Jessica was trying to cleanse the many cuts on Dave's torso with materials she had borrowed from the ambulance. "They're going to transport her with the second ambulance.

"Jessica, do you think it's okay to have Dave ride in my squad car to the hospital? He obviously needs some medical attention."

"He doesn't seem to have any neurological injuries, so I'd say it would be a good idea rather than wait for another ambulance to get here. That's if his doctor is allowed to ride in with him, of course," added Jessica.

"I wouldn't have it any other way. I'll bring the car closer," promised Diane as she headed for her squad car.

Meanwhile Jessica was shaking her head as she looked at Dave's face. She wiped a couple of stray tears off her cheeks and then moved closer and gave Dave a lingering kiss on the lips.

"Let's get you to the car," was all she said as she walked with Dave to where Diane had parked.

Jessica held Dave's hand as she entered the emergency room with him. She had spent a great deal of time in ERs while doing her rotations, and was accustomed to the smells and sounds that greeted her. Then the typical sounds simply died. That was when Jessica first noticed that all activity had stopped and a large number of people were watching her and Dave. It was apparent that a large section of the hospital's staff was on hand, including administrators.

As Jessica looked around at all of the people, someone began to clap. They were soon joined by every person in the ER. A middle-aged nurse came up and gave her a quick hug before returning to her professional persona.

"Dr. Williams, would you like to assist in treating this gentleman with the alligator cuts scattered all over his impressive torso. We've voted you an honorary position on the staff. You saved that man's life this afternoon, risking grave bodily harm. You looked a seven foot alligator in the eye and never flinched!"

"I may not have actually flinched, but I'm in desperate need of clean underwear," replied Jessica with a straight face.

Everyone broke into gales of laughter at Jessica's comment. A beautiful, self-effacing lady doctor with a good sense of humor was not something often seen in their facility. Everyone who was able had watched the drama unfold in real time simply because a teenage girl had a good phone and the knowledge to use it. Staying with the ill man and doing CPR even as an alligator eyed Jessica up for dinner was heroic in anyone's book.

Jessica was shown where she could clean up and given a lab coat to wear before joining Dave as he was being treated. The attending doctor was an older man but worked with obvious confidence and skill. Stitches were needed for some of the deeper cuts, but large majority of the cuts only needed to be cleaned and treated with antibacterial creams. Dave complained mildly when the doctor insisted he receive a tetanus shot.

"For God's sake!" chided Jessica. "You're tough enough to wrestle a huge alligator with your bare hands and kill it, so why whine about a simple little shot?"

"I had my big lock blade," corrected Dave. "It was a good thing, too. It took me a while to locate a vital spot on that gator. I hate to think what would have happened if I hadn't been armed with my knife."

"You had a knife?" asked the nurse. "There goes that legend. Everyone thought you killed that beast with your bare hands. You practically cheated."

"Yeah, I feel real bad about that," quipped Dave just as his mother and father, a tall distinguished looking man, stepped into the examining room.

"We watched the whole thing on FaceBook! Jessica, you were incredibly brave the way you faced that animal while doing chest compressions. I'm just glad Dave was able to stop it before it got you," stated Mrs. Sanders as she hugged Jessica tightly.

"Wait! How did you see it on FaceBook?" asked an obviously puzzled Dave. "Did someone video it?"

"Better than that son," replied his father. "It was streamed live by a local high school girl. She did an amazing job of following the action. How about introducing me to your co-hero?"

"Oops! Jessica, this is my father, Mike Sanders. Dad, this lady is Dr. Jessica Williams."

As Dave finished his introductions, a nurse stuck her head into the room and announced, "There's a Mr. and Mrs. Williams coming this way and we aren't about to stop them. They want very much to be certain their daughter is healthy after her hair-raising heroics earlier in the day."

With that, Nancy Williams swept into the room and pulled Jessica into a tight embrace. Tears began flooding down her cheeks as she turned to Dave and hugged him much more gently. Ben Williams also hugged his daughter and then kissed her forehead before taking Dave's hand and shaking it firmly.

"Son, you came through for Jess today. I expected no less, but I was sure as hell relieved when you killed that big bastard. I'm just glad Jess didn't have to look to James for that kind of help. We both know she wouldn't be here if that were the case."

"One of the reasons I'm here is to ask Dr. Williams if she'd consider doing her residency here at General," stated Mike Sanders as he steered the conversation while looking directly at Jessica. "I know there are lots of reasons why you don't believe it would be possible, but we'll work with you any way possible. I'm on the board of directors at the hospital and we all agree about this. We're building for the future and you represent the type of physician we want on our staff.

"Please don't give me an answer right now. Think about it and meet with our board to discuss the offer. We're flexible and very determined," concluded Dave's father.

"Sir, I'm extremely flattered. I have to admit that, but there are a great many assurances I'd have to have before I'd even consider changing my plans," responded Jessica carefully. "You have a wonderful community, but it would be quite impulsive for me to suddenly toss all of my plans out and embark in a different direction."

"We completely understand," replied Mike Sanders. "We just want you to understand that this hospital is very anxious to have you in our ER."

Soon everyone was engaged in conversation on the merits of Jessica remaining at General. It made Jessica uncomfortable to have other people trying to map out her life and career goals. She excused herself and went to use the staff bathroom, mostly to get away from the conversation.

All the stalls in the bathroom were unoccupied, so Jessica chose the farthest stall, hoping she'd have a few moments of quiet so that she could think. It had been an incredible day and she was beginning to feel the adrenaline rush wearing off.

A minute into her contemplation, Jessica heard voices as two nurses entered the restroom. "Did you hear Mike Sanders is doing everything he can to get that woman doctor to do her residency here," asked one of them as she opened a stall door.

"Yeah, he pulled out the big guns, one big gun anyway," chuckled the second nurse.

"Can I assume you're referring to Dave?" asked the first woman with a laugh.

"She's a goner if Dave gets her into his bed," predicted the second nurse. "He must have Dave putting the full court press on her. Once he has her on the end of that amazing cock, she'll wash windows and change bedpans just to be close to him."

"The voice of experience has spoken. He's that good?"

"He's very good, but it's the whole package. He's so polite and gentle, unless you want it rough. Then he'll do rough. He always made sure I was satisfied. Somehow he made me feel like a lady, even when I was giving him head. If my last boyfriend had been half as good, we'd probably be married by now," admitted the nurse with a sigh.

"Do you think he's going to settle down with this doctor, or is he just leading her on?" asked the other woman.

"Good question. I don't think he'd ever try to lead a girl on, but he's a confirmed bachelor. Every single female in the county, from eighteen to eighty has tried to take him off the market, but he's never come close to having a lasting relationship of any kind. I know for a fact he isn't gay, so I'd say he's enjoying playing the field too much to settle down.

"Mike must know how Dave is by now and probably doesn't care as long as she commits to doing her residency here. Once she does, Dave will put her in his rearview mirror a few months later. He'll try to let her down as gently as possible, but he'll start looking for someone new to warm his bed. It's what he does."

Jessica held back her tears until the two women left the bathroom. As soon as the door closed behind them, huge sobs shook her frame as she considered what she had just heard. She admitted to herself the main reason she would even consider General Hospital's offer was because she would be near Dave. Since she now understood the folly of that line of thought, there really was nothing they could offer that would keep her around once her vacation ended. It was very unlikely she'd even visit the area again!

Jessica was unsure which man was more worthy of her contempt. Mike Sanders was urging his son to pursue her in order to cloud her decision making abilities. He was using both Dave and her!

Dave was just being Dave, the local Lothario, using woman and then casting them aside like old shoes once his conquest was complete. Jessica felt ill when she realized she had almost succumbed to his charm! Jessica fixed her makeup and rejoined her family and Dave's.

Jessica strode up to Mike Sanders as he gave her his best smile. He had no knowledge of the conversation she had so recently overheard. Nancy Williams lost her smile when she saw her daughter's face. Jessica was obviously angry and upset. That observation was soon confirmed!

"I've reached a decision, Mr. Sanders," announced Jessica as everyone turned their attention to her. "It'll be a very cold day in hell when I have anything to do with you or your pathetic son!"

With that, Jessica pulled her hand back and slapped the older man across the face, leaving a red handprint on his left cheek. Still seething, Jessica moved slightly to her left to stand directly in front of Dave. He made no attempt to deflect her arm, or the palm that stung his face and plunged his soul into darkness.

"You think you can play with people's emotions and careers and not suffer any consequences? Maybe that works with the local talent, but I didn't get through med school by being stupid, or naïve. You can go straight to hell!" spat Jessica as she turned and headed for the door.