you’re correct, old chap. Do we know yet when they’ll leave for London?”
“Tomorrow. As soon as Isabelle and Alexis get back from Aspen.”
* * *
Preparing for their tour at Aspen Valley Hospital, Isabelle and Alexis donned their normal-looking business suits and short wigs. They pinned on the phony SKIING ATHLETICA name tags Fergus had made for them. Yep. They certainly looked official.
When they arrived at the front desk, they were greeted by a bouncy, blond, pigtailed volunteer. “Hey! I’m Brandy! I will be your personal tour guide for today!” She giggled.
“Nice to meet you, Brandy! We are very excited to see your facility. As you know, we conduct research on orthopedic facilities for the Olympic teams,” Alexis said.
“Oh wow! You guys are in the Olympics?” Brandy bounced some more.
Isabelle gave Alexis the “This is going to be too easy” look. “No. We aren’t, but we kinda work for them, ya know?” Isabelle was dumbing down her speech pattern for Bouncing Brandy.
“So, like, what do you do for them?” Brandy was still confused. Obviously, she didn’t know that there was more to the Olympics than the athletes.
Taking Isabelle’s cue, Alexis explained. “We’re, like, kinda behind the scenes, ya know? We help them get stuff set up and all.”
“Wow. That is way cool. So, like, what are you setting up here?”
“We’re not setting anything up at the hospital. We’re gathering information about hospitals that do a lot of orthopedic procedures. You know, for when an athlete gets hurt and stuff.”
“Oh . . .” Brandy seemed to understand from her millennial point of view. “Okay. Where do you want to start?”
“How about admissions?” Isabelle urged.
“But they don’t operate in there.” Brandy was still confused.
Isabelle and Alexis tried to stifle a laugh. “That is correct. We would like to see the process. You know, like, when a patient is brought in. How that gets processed. Then what happens to the patient,” Alexis said.
“Well, okay. Sounds kinda boring. Follow me.” Brandy turned on her heel and bounced her way to the admissions-office area. “Hi, everyone. This is . . .” Her voice trailed off when she realized she had not gotten their names. Nor had she noticed their badges. Maybe they should have taken a selfie and shown it to her.
“Hi. I’m Georgina.” Isabelle extended her hand and pointed to her name tag. “This is Stephanie.” She pointed to Alexis and her name tag.
A tall, thin man stood. “Dennis. This is Mabel,” he said, introducing his coworker. Brandy was right. Dennis and Mabel could have blended into the beige walls, floors, and desks. They said that people and their pets started to look alike. In this case, everything looked alike.
“You’re here to take a tour and do what again?” Mabel asked in a tone that displayed slight annoyance.
“They’re on the Olympics,” Brandy burst out.
Isabelle held her breath for a second. “We do research for the teams. Orthopedics in particular.”
“What do you want to know?” Dennis asked, folding his arms across his chest.
“How you process patients who come here for emergency orthopedic care.” Alexis was starting to think it was going to take all day just to explain why they were there. The pretending part, that is.
“Oh.” Mabel did not sound the least bit interested.
“Where do you want to start?” Dennis asked.
Isabelle thought she was going to smack the three of them. “Let’s start with processing. We can skip the ambulance emergency arrival.”
“You mean ‘intake’?” Dennis offered.
“Exactly.” Alexis was trying to move this laborious process along.
“Someone sits at the desk and takes the information. The ER people figure out which doctor will see the patient. If they need emergency surgery, they go to the surgical unit. If not, they get assigned to a room.” Dennis seemed exasperated. “Not very complicated.”
Alexis casually put her hand into her jacket pocket and secretly buzzed Isabelle. Time to get that e-mail you can’t open.
“Excuse me.” Isabelle reached for her phone and then looked up at Dennis. “My apologies. I’ve been waiting for some information from our office, and I can’t download the e-mail. Do you have a terminal I could use to access the Internet? I’ll just be a minute. I am so sorry, but it’s very important.”
Dennis shrugged. “Yeah, sure. You can sit in that cubicle back there. Click on the Google Chrome icon.”
“Thank you so much.” Isabelle nodded at Alexis to keep the others occupied and made a beeline for the desk.
Isabelle pulled out a flash drive and inserted it into the computer. She typed in several numbers