Runaway Nurse

By Doris Knight, ©1968 

An unexpected shock too great to bear sent Nurse Diane West on a frenzied escape. She stopped at a hospital in a small Arizona town and became a member of the staff at what could only be termed the most unusual hospital in the Southwest. She sought to bury herself in her work in order to forget what had happened. But there were too many things to remind her … And there was Jeff Brooks …

GRADE: C- 

BEST QUOTES:
“Well, if you’re going to be run over, I guess it’s better to be run over by a nurse.” 

“Hey, nurse. You’re not supposed to emote.”

“You’re a beautiful girl. I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have run me over.”

REVIEW:
As we open Runaway Nurse, Diane West RN has been saved from being a child bride (she’s 22) as her fiancé and her sister had eloped to Las Vegas the night before her wedding. She’s also saved from having wasted all that money going to nursing school, as though she had insisted on finishing her training, her fiancé had demanded that “she was not to practice once they were married.” Instead of being grateful for her near miss, however, she’s leaving town, “driving too fast” to “escape the tears she had yet to shed.” She’s lucky she did insist on graduating, as now she has a profession that can support her, but doesn’t seem to see it that way: “Was she wrong to consider her nursing education over Tony’s”—ahem—“interests?” 

The wild driving leads to tragedy—she hits Jeff Brooks, who is standing in the middle of the road in the Arizona desert in the middle of the night. His fibula is broken and he’s been rendered unconscious for an unusually long period of time, but the next morning he wakes up and drags himself into the back seat of Diane’s car. It turns out they are both headed for El Sol Hospital in Cactus City—she to try to claim a job offer she had turned down, and he because he is “hoping to be a patient.” “Knowing El Sol Hospital had its major section devoted to the treatment of mental and emotional disorders,” Diane is a little wary.

El Sol is an architectural masterpiece rising five stories above the surrounding shanties, with a liveried doorman to boot. She has absolutely no idea what the job entails, and is shocked to discover that the patients are “neurotics mostly, with a large variety of hangups.” It doesn’t take her long to get on the wrong foot, as she tells the charge nurse that she doesn’t think her alcoholic patient is “getting the proper therapy,” which in this case is enough barbiturates to make her lethargic. The mean old head nurse, Miss Marcy—whom Diane maturely refers to as Stoneface—reports Diane to hospital chief Dr. Wallace, because “the doctors know best about the medication,” she says—clearly never having worked a day in a hospital in her life. Diane is called to an informal hearing for “a breach of professional ethics,” but manages to hold onto her job despite Miss Marcy’s recommendation that she be fired.

Miss Marcy doesn’t take this well and accuses Diane of having an affair with Jeff. Well, she is visiting Jeff Brooks on a daily basis, and he “continued to make overtures to her,” calls her “doll face” and tries to kiss her “clumsily because of his immobilizing cast.” Jeff laughs it off when she tells him about the accusation. “Diane, baby,” he says, “you’re such an iceberg that certainly no one will give it a second thought.” He follows this flattering remark by telling her, “You have really knocked me cold.” Diane, though she calls this treatment “kind,” is permanently scarred by being dumped and can’t respond warmly to him. Instead she points out that he has refused to be discharged from the hospital, which was recommended a week ago, and tells him she will not visit him any longer (though she keeps dropping by anyway). He responds by declaring she should quit the hospital, but won’t explain why. He is eventually thrown out, kicking and screaming, and she is shocked and outraged when he grabs her, tells her he loves her, and kisses her goodbye—“right in front of everyone!”

Diane receives a letter from Jeff again imploring her to leave the hospital, which she ignores, but the next day she is called to Dr. Wallace’s office and accused of having a relationship with Jeff and summarily fired. So now she decides to head home, and once there she discovers a big scandal has erupted at the hospital, with the local paper accusing it of fraud—and guess who the reporter is! Diane is outraged: “Jeff had lied to her and pretended to be something he wasn’t,” she decides. “He used me. And he allowed all this trouble to come to me. It’s his fault!” This attitude is a bit surprising, since he didn’t exactly jump in front of her car, he didn’t encourage her to challenge the doctors about their treatment plans, and one might understand that spilling his secrets to a woman he’d just met is a bit risky if a major project that could make the world a better place hangs in the balance.

Fortunately her mother has more sense. “You must grow up,” says Mom. “You are showing a lack of maturity that disappoints me.” Ouch! But needless to say, Mom’s tough love does not work, and her parents are left just hoping “she would not make another rash decision.” Well, she and Jeff both do—he proposes on their first date and she accepts, so I assume their marriage will be equally stupid.

Diane is colossally immature, from her first decision to blow town to the very end of the book, and she shows no evidence whatsoever of growth. It’s interesting to me that the author can see this, as she has Diane’s mother try to talk some sense into her, but does not give Diane any sort of awakening. Diane’s hypocrisy is also bewildering, as it’s hard to understand how she can have the gumption to stand up to the doctors about the patients’ medication, but at the same time thinks, “I must learn not to be such a rebel. Perhaps my independent spirit and rebelliousness are what caused Tony to leave me for my sister.” Jeff is kind of an ass too, so it’s not at all clear why anyone would go for him, even a moron like Diane. She can’t even pull off running away, as she’s back living with her parents at book’s end. You can do better, I’m sure—run away from this book.