Fiction | December 18, 2023

The Fetch 

Joanna Pearson 

Sebastian Marks, whom I knew from medical school, called my office and left a voicemail saying he wanted to curbside me on one of his most difficult patients. A truly unusual case, he said. The fact of the phone call was itself notable—I hadn’t heard from him in years—but something else in his message also felt off. A quaver or a hesitation in his speech, nearly imperceptible. And yet so many things had felt off lately that maybe the feeling was meaningless.  

“Please, Tabby,” he said. “I trust your judgment.” 

No one called me Tabby anymore, but Sebastian said it as if we were still friends, maybe even confidants. His voice was a low purr he cultivated, almost infrasonic, like a high-end sports car, sending barely detectable vibrations through a person’s vital organs. An affectation. He spoke my name fondly—like a pet’s name, a cat’s—but I wasn’t “Tabby” anymore; I was Tabitha. Tabitha Grey, MD read the office plate on my door. “You’ve reached Dr. Grey’s confidential voicemail box” was what the greeting on my office line said. Sebastian called me Tabby the way he had when we’d first met at med school orientation all those years ago. I’ll admit, though, that it gave me a little tingle of pleasure to think I might be a person he still thought of, with respect or even affection—to hear any name of mine on his tongue at all.  

“Please,” Sebastian said again into my voicemail. It was unlike him, this tone. “Call me back as soon as you can.”