Part 4 – The Patient Without a Name
The girl didn’t speak.
Not when Alicia offered her water. Not when she asked if she was hurt. Not even when Reggie, gentle as a cloud, nudged her arm with his snout.
She just sat there, curled tight behind the plastic storage bin at the back of the van—knees to chest, shirt dirty and too small, eyes locked on the gravel like it held the whole truth of the world.
Reggie had found her first.
It was just after dusk, and Alicia had been stacking her folding table after a long clinic day near Wheatland Elementary. She’d let Reggie wander the fence line like he always did—sniffing for discarded wrappers and scraps of dropped lunch. But this time, he hadn’t returned.
Instead, he barked once. Then waited.
Alicia rounded the corner—and there she was.
The girl couldn’t have been more than eight or nine. Thin. Pale. Her hair hung in tangled ropes, and her sandals had duct tape around the straps. A red sweatshirt—likely from someone much bigger—draped over her knees.
Alicia crouched a few feet away. “Sweetheart, are you okay?”
Nothing.
“My name’s Alicia. I’m a nurse. This is Reggie. He’s a helper dog.”
Still nothing.
Reggie lay down beside the girl, head resting on his paws. A quiet offering.
The girl’s fingers twitched. Then slowly—cautiously—she reached over and touched his fur.
Just once.
Alicia didn’t press. She just waited.
It was Reggie who broke the silence.
He licked the girl’s wrist. Her face didn’t change. But she didn’t pull away either.
That was enough.
Later, under the soft hum of the van’s overhead light, Alicia cleaned the girl’s scraped knees and offered her a peanut butter sandwich from the food box. The girl didn’t say a word—but she ate like she hadn’t in days.
Alicia tried a different approach.
“Do you have a name?”
No answer.
“Do you know where your family is?”
A faint shake of the head.
“Did someone hurt you?”
The girl blinked. One tear slipped down, carving a clean line through the dust on her cheek.
Alicia pressed a gentle hand to her shoulder. “It’s okay. You don’t have to say anything. You’re safe here.”
Reggie, as if sensing the emotion shift, climbed onto the cushion beside her. The girl curled into him without hesitation.
That was when Alicia saw it.
Around the girl’s neck, on a frayed shoelace, hung a plastic pharmacy tag.
Faded. Worn.
But Alicia recognized it immediately.
WHEATLAND FAMILY RX — INSULIN GLARGINE — VIAL
She leaned closer. Her breath caught.
The child had been carrying it like a necklace.
Alicia stepped outside into the thickening dark and leaned against the van. Her heart was racing. Somewhere, someone had once picked up insulin for this girl—or for someone she loved.
She called the number printed on the tag.
Disconnected.
Of course.
The pharmacy had closed six months ago.
Back inside, Alicia found the girl curled up beside Reggie, already fast asleep.
She whispered into the quiet, as much to Reggie as to herself, “Who is she?”
Reggie blinked slowly. Then tucked his head under the girl’s arm.
Alicia turned off the overhead light and let them sleep.
The next morning, Alicia made calls.
Child services.
Local shelters.
Hospitals.
No missing persons report had been filed matching the girl’s description. No one was looking for a quiet child with a plastic insulin tag and torn sandals.
It didn’t sit right.
Reggie paced near the van door, ears sharp, body alert.
She pulled out a thermometer, gently waking the girl to take her vitals.
Low-grade fever. Pale gums. Elevated heart rate. And faint tremors in her hands when she reached for the sandwich.
“Have you… ever had insulin?” Alicia asked softly.
The girl stared at the sandwich. Then nodded.
Once.
Just once.
Alicia remembered something Carl Jensen had told her after his rescue.
“People assume it’s the price of insulin that kills you. But it’s not just that. It’s the fear. The math. The guessing. Skipping meals because you’re out of test strips. Sleeping in your car because a doctor’s visit costs a tank of gas. It’s the war you lose slowly.”
She looked at the girl—eyes dark with fatigue and unspoken history.
“You’re in that war too,” Alicia whispered.
And somehow, Reggie had known.
By noon, she’d set up another tent in the parking lot of the old lumberyard in Linda. She printed a fresh flyer and posted it on the local bulletin board:
“Pop-up Clinic: People & Pets Welcome — Nurse Mendoza’s Van”
Folks began trickling in again. A woman with a goat that had stepped on a nail. A man with a tooth abscess. A teenage boy with a sprained wrist and no insurance.
But Alicia’s thoughts kept circling back to the girl. To that insulin tag. To the way she slept like she hadn’t truly rested in weeks.
She didn’t even have a name.
But she had Reggie.
And that was something.
That was everything.
As the sun dipped, Alicia sat with her notebook, scribbling supplies she’d need. She was low on gauze. Syringes. Clean gloves. Half the van’s battery bank was starting to give out.
She should’ve felt exhausted.
Instead, she felt something stirring. A small, stubborn light.
Not hope.
Not yet.
But maybe the beginning of it.
That night, as she tucked the girl into the van’s makeshift cot, Alicia whispered, “We’ll find out who you are. I promise. We’ll figure this out.”
She placed a hand on the plastic insulin tag, resting on the girl’s chest.
Reggie stood watch at the door, tail wagging softly.
And in that moment, it no longer mattered that Alicia wasn’t supposed to be practicing medicine. That she was one nurse with a rusting van and a dog with a limp.
They were enough.
For now.