She came to the hospital in the evening the next day. She was on night duty.

“Good you joined me yesterday, Dr. Banerjee,” Paritosh told her when she went to his office to inquire about the child from the orphanage, “Otherwise his jaundice would have gone undiagnosed for another week. It wasn’t his group’s turn yesterday.”

“I am glad it helped, Sir. I will check up on him once.”

“Sure. And…” His mobile rang interrupting the conversation. He became tense as he heard the person on the other side of the phone. “Yes… Just now?? Oh… I will be there… I have Dr. Banerjee with me… right Rupali Banerjee… Please call Dr. Rao to see who else is on duty and who can be called from home… Sure…”

“Dr. Banerjee… To the emergency… Right away…”

“What happened, Sir?” she asked as she scurried to keep pace with him.

“There has been a an accident involving kids… A school bus was hit by a tractor…”

“School bus? At this hour?”

“They were coming back from some school trip.”

“Oh my God!” Rupali could not help exclaim as they reached emergency and saw the hospital staff carry one injured kid after another to the ward. They bodies were bloody. Most had passed out from pain and shock. Others were wailing in pain.

“Quick Dr. Banerjee. We don’t have time. Start from that bed. Ask nurses to attend to minor injuries. Focus on stopping blood loss for major ones.”

“Yes Sir,” she collected herself together and went on to do as he had advised.

The doctors on the emergency duty were already working. Doctors from other departments also came in soon to help, some who lived nearby came from their homes. Still there were too many patients and it took them about four hours to attend to everyone. Five of the kids were in critical condition and had been shifted to ICU.

Finally Rupali got a short break and walked to the common room. Paritosh was standing there watching TV tuned to a news channel. They were covering the school bus accident. The truck-driver had been drunk while driving. The situation had become even more scandalous, because the truck was found to be carrying large quantities of illegal firearms hidden beneath packets of clothes.

“Are you fine?” Paritosh asked when he noticed her.

“Define fine,” she replied with a sad smile, “As a doctor I can’t afford to get nauseated by blood, pain and injury. But as a person this news does nauseate me. As if those firearms wouldn’t have killed enough people, the truck driver also had to kill these kids.” She sat down on one of the chairs there.

Paritosh also sat down and said, “I have to apologize to you.”

“Excuse me?”

“Do you remember your first assignment? For an operation…”

“I do, of course. What about it?”

“I had probably offended you by asking if you were ready for that. Under some irrational influence, I had thought that you might not be… strong enough. I have seen you working since then. And especially today. Obviously I was completely wrong.”

She didn’t react for a while and Paritosh started worrying if he should have let bygones be bygones. Why did he feel this sudden need to apologize anyway? It wasn’t like he had been thinking about it? But when he saw her working that evening. With so many injured and bloody kids, what Rohan had said about her and what he had let affect himself for a while too, came back to him. He felt like he needed to make up for that. He needed to apologize. But after doing that he felt like an idiot. She had probably never noticed. Why did he have to tell her?

Then she gave what looked like a helpless smile, “Not your fault.”

“Excuse me?”

“You were under irrational influence.”

“I shouldn’t have been. But thanks for the generosity.”

“Aren’t you planning to leave? You have been here all day, right?” Rupali changed the topic. Although with his image of a workaholic in the hospital, she didn’t expect he would leave amidst that tragedy.

His reply was not unexpected, “Not under these circumstances. Non-ICU patients will need to be shifted to pediatric ward in the morning. I will be in my office though. If there are any updates, or any relapses, you can tell me. And inform others on duty as well.”

“Sure Sir.”

—

“Your duty is over. You have no business being here,” Rohan was insistent on sending Rupali home after her night duty.

“So many kids are in still in such bad shape Rohan. I can’t just leave and go. Many doctors are staying beyond duty hours.”

“I can’t see you falling sick.”

“Rohan please. I am fine.”

“I know better.”

“For God’s sake Rohan. Let me decide for myself. I am not a child. Dr. Khanna is here since yesterday morning. Dr….”

“Has he asked you to stay?” Rohan asked sharply.

“No. Nobody has asked me to…”

“Let me talk to him.”

“Are you even listening to me?”

But Rohan had turned away from her and she realized that he was going to Paritosh’ office.

“Wait Rohan,” she panicked and ran after him, “I am going home. Okay?”

Unfortunately for her Paritosh was coming their way and Rohan ran into him.

“Dr. Khanna. I had told you on the very first day that Rupali is not a very tough person.”

“Excuse me?” Paritosh could find no rhyme or reason to Rohan’s sudden verbal attack.

“Why is she being held back at the hospital after her duty is over?”

“That’s enough Rohan,” Rupali hissed and grabbed his hands. “I’m sorry Dr. Khanna. He has lost his mind,” she quickly apologized and then dragged Rohan away from there with a strength that surprised him.

“What are you doing Rupa?” Rohan was annoyed.

Rupali thought for a moment whether to give him a fitting reply. But she resorted to one of her tricks.

“You have already had a brush with Dr. Khanna once earlier. Because of me. I don’t want that to happen again. He is a senior doctor.”

“We don’t have to be afraid of Dr. Khanna. If he is a senior doctor reporting to the board, then Baba is a member of the board.”

“I know, I know Rohan. But think of professionalism. And if I need your help, I will tell you. You know that, right?”

“Yes. Of course.”

“Then go. I will leave when I want to.”

“Sure?”

“Yes Rohan. Now go to your department. You are getting late.”

“Fine. But be at home in the evening.”

“I will be.”

She turned back to go to the ward to find Paritosh within hearing distance. Her face flushed. Did he see the little drama that had played out here? She stood rooted at her place awkwardly as he came towards her.

“Dr. Banerjee. You can go back home, if you want to. Others are on duty…”

“But I don’t want to… I am really, really sorry about Rohan. I hadn’t told him anything…”

“It’s okay. You don’t need to apologize for other people. If you want to stay, then you will stay.”

“Thank you, Sir.”

“Keep up the good work.”

—

To be continued