Emergency Room
Part Three
By Gary Schneeberger
TheSchnays@cs.com

One question raced more quickly through Luka's mind than all the others as he sat down across from Goran Visnjic, the first person he'd had the chance to talk to since arriving at County who just might understand the horrible scars his homeland's war with Yugoslavia had inflicted on his psyche:

Is *my* hair as greasy as *his*?

"So, where are you from?" he asked, making what he figured was a wise choice in selecting one of the questions that wasn't racing around quite so quickly, but fanning his fingers through his hair as he asked it just to see if he could settle the matter himself.

"Sibenik."

"Really? Me, too."

"Beautiful, isn't it? I still get back there every year, when I go to the Dubrovnik Summer Festival. Have you ever been, to the
festival I mean?"

"Yes, one time. Six or seven years ago."

Luka glanced down as he rubbed his hand on his lab coat, mortified at the five thin runways of slickness the swipe had
left behind.

"What did you think?"

His hair *was* that greasy! Why hadn't somebody told him? No wonder Carol went back to that guy in Seattle.

"Uh ... I thought it was ... um ... OK. I wasn't really impressed with their Hamlet, but ..."

The forlorn look in Visnjic's eyes - at least what he could see of the actor's eyes beneath those strands of seemingly unwashed
hair that obscured them - told Luka he didn't need to ask if he knew who played Hamlet at the Dubrovnik Summer Festival.

"So ... uh ... what is it that I can do for you?"

Except get us both some shampoo, that is.

"Well, I was hoping you could explain to me a little bit about this."

Visnjic pulled a month-or-so-old copy of "USA Today" out of the folder on the table in front of him, pointing to the story
headlined, "Hero doctors shield school-shooting victims."

He'd had enough practice answering the question by now that Visnjic didn't even need to ask it.

"It was instinct."

Visnjic slipped his finger an inch or two down the page, to the slightly smaller type below: "Questions raised about County
General's delayed treatment of injured gunman."

"No, I meant this part. I understand, because there's a lawsuit, if you can't talk about it."

Luka could feel his nostrils burn.

"I can talk about it fine. We had a boy who was badly injured, and the scum who shot him who was badly injured. It was an easy decision to make."

"But there was another doctor - Dr. Benton - who according to the police was saying the gunman was in more danger. Witnesses said he argued with you at the helicopter to take the gunman to the hospital first, but you refused."

"Yes, I did. Benton was wrong. And I don't care what the lawyers, or Romano, or Kerry say, I'd make the same choice today."

Visnjic scribbled something into the open-faced notebook in front of him.

"What are you writing?"

"Just some notes on our conversation. You don't mind, do you?"

"No,  I guess ... What did you just write, though?"

Luka reached across the table where they sat, the only people still left in the lounge, and pulled the notebook to him so he
could read the word printed on it:

Moralistic.

"What is that supposed to mean?"

"Moralistic. It means to interpret or explain--"

Who does this guy think he is, giving me English lessons? Like he's a native or something.

"No ... no. I meant what does it mean in a relationship with me?"

OK, maybe some of the American idiom did still escape him from time to time.

"Oh, I see. It just means that you base some of your medical decisions on how you feel, on your personal values, instead of
always on medical science. That will be very helpful to me."

Luka wasn't sure if he should be mad at Visnjic's presumption, or impressed by his insight.

He settled on mad.

"Who the hell do you think you are?"

"Look, Dr. Kovac, I'm just trying to find out some things about you to make the character more believable. I'm not judging you or anything. I've played murderers before-- "

He could feel his nostrils flare.

"You think I'm a murderer?

"No, no, that's not what I meant. I only meant that my job isn't to decide if you're a good man or a bad man, or if what you do is right or wrong. I just try to find out a character's motivation so I can say the words they pay me to say like the character
would say them."

The words he was saying right now sounded pretty good.

"Like a couple of years ago. I did a movie called "Practical Magic," with Sandra Bullock and  ... uh ... Tom Cruise's wife.
And my character, Jimmy, was involved with a witch, so-- "

Luka could feel his nostrils do whatever nostrils did when they progressed beyond the "flaring" stage.

"Who told you?"

"Who told me what?"

"About Carol?"

"Carol? I don't know anyone named Carol. I was talking about Jimmy and this witch he was dating--"

"It was Romano, wasn't it?

"Dr. Romano? No, he never said anything about ..."

Luka tuned out the rest of Visnjic's explanation, his mind incapable of contemplating anything but his own seething.  Hadn't
this guy, this actor, lived through that war, too? Didn't he know what it felt like to lose someone he loved more than life itself
to those damn bombs? How could he not understand his trying to save an innocent boy over a killer after seeing so many innocent lives sacrificed? Why would he bring up the whole Carol incident to someone whose heart was already broken even before he met her? Yeah, she *was* a witch, but nobody else could call her that but him.

"Why don't you go wash your hair?"

How could *that* have been the question, among all of them, that actually came out of his mouth?

Visnjic's eyes widened - near as Luka could tell through their oily canopy - but he recovered quickly enough to muster an
Emmy-worthy performance in concealing his offense.

"Maybe we could do this later," he said with a Hollywood smile.

"Good idea," Luka replied, with a Croatian frown.

Visnjic kept the smile firmly fixed to his face until his model for Dr. Vlade Kucoc was gone, dropping it the instant the door
swung shut. He slid his notebook back over in front of him and pointedly printed each letter, hoping the flow of the ink would
stem the flow of his anger.

S

E

L

F

R

I

G

H

T

E

O

U

S

H

O

T

H

E

A

D.

He flipped the notebook closed and stood to leave, stopping just as his butt left the chair, almost like he was rehearsing a scene
for "Emergency Room" set in a staff meeting chaired by Dr. Richard Rosetti.

He flipped the notebook back open and hastily scrawled a note to himself:

"Talk to stylist about switching to a drier mousse."

To be continued.....

NEXT TIME ON "EMERGENCY ROOM": Drs. Benton and Corday talk surgery - and try really, really hard to not talk about their failed romance - when they sit down with Eriq La Salle and Alex Kingston.