Chapter 6
SIX
JESSE
Someone had binge-watched too many talent shows—and by someone, I meant Garcia.
Because the way interns were herded out of the skills lab and made to form a corridor for us judges, so that we could march in to assess their performances like a panel of celebrities?
Yeah. All we were missing was confetti and an aggressive pop soundtrack.
I filed in with the other four, clipboard under one arm. Around me, the two dozen interns were vibrating out of their skins, chattering at each other and clutching coffee cups that had been handed out like participation awards.
“I’m just gonna call you Spider-Hands,” a bright voice drifted through to me.
I tracked it to a California-tanned, pink-haired resident I recognized from correcting her the day before.
She stood with Finn and a slim guy with mile-long lashes and golden-brown skin.
Finn laughed, head ducked a little in what seemed to be a reaction to the comment.
He looked… lit up. Eyes too bright, cheeks blotched high with color as if he’d yet to decide whether to spike or crash, bouncing a little on the balls of his feet.
I hadn’t really responded to his second text—hadn’t known how, didn’t think I even should. I’d wanted to, though. Which… Well.
Anyway. I dragged my attention away right as the other guy sighed. “Wish that was me, too. My lines were decent, but I didn’t finish with the mannequin, so… Yeah.”
“Hey,” Finn said right as I passed them, his tone gentle. I slowed down just slightly to catch the rest. “Precision beats speed. Maybe not in this kind of timed exercise, but in reality? It’s all about quality, man.”
“You’ll get faster,” the girl chimed in, and then I was past them, an odd kind of warmth in my chest as snippets of other conversations washed over me.
These three were meant to be competitors, but you wouldn’t know it from the way they propped each other up.
Good for Finn. Not something I wanted to dwell on, but… Yeah. Good for him.
Even if it was none of my business.
I stepped through the partition curtain. Stations were frozen mid-motion—needles abandoned, central-line mannequins beaded with fake blood, a stopwatch in the middle of the space still showing 00:00 like an apocalyptic aftermath.
“All right,” Garcia said, handing out anonymized score sheets. “Let’s fan out, rate each station on a scale of one to five. Only the top scores advance, but we’ll keep everyone’s scores and comments on file.”
I moved to station 3. Decent, tidy work—good but not perfect. I noted it down accordingly, four out of five. Station 7 showed half-finished knots and a snapped suture—someone had panicked. I marked it as such.
At station 12, I paused. The knot board was flawless, lap-peg tower cleared, the central-line mannequin dressed with textbook precision. Impressive.
Speed and finesse, five out of five.
Spider-Hands.
I shook it off and moved on, refusing to let myself wonder as I settled into a rhythm—check, score, note, next.
Station 14 was fit for a crime scene, the fake carotid perforated.
Station 17 pulled me up short: the knot quality was gorgeous, but only two-thirds of the board was completed.
Whoever it was had sacrificed the clock for doing a damn fine job on the parts that were complete.
Excellent technique, pace will come
I jotted down. Three out of five.
Neutral, deserved. Absolutely not a charity bump because I might have overheard the guy fretting outside, or because of the company he kept.
A few more stations—one solid four, one additional five, a few limp twos and threes—until my circuit led me to a desk where Garcia waited for our verdicts. “Numbers ready?” he asked.
Nods all around.
The chatter outside had died down, interns off to enjoy what was left of the day or, more likely, fretting about how they’d done.
Garcia pulled up a sheet on his tablet, and then the math began—pens tapping, scores adding up.
#12 and #19 were tied with perfect numbers, and my pulse ticked higher even as I strove for calm indifference.
Easier if it isn’t him. And yet…
God, I shouldn’t care.
Final tallies: #12 came in first by one point, #19 just behind. #5 and #3 were tied, with #22 rounding out the top five. The rest bled points in speed or sloppiness.
“Reveal time,” Garcia said, and I told myself I was completely unbiased, neutral, practically Switzerland.
The first two names, #3 and #22, pinged no more than a distant sense of recognition.
Then #5: Tessa Edwards. Pink hair, big smile.
Nice. #19 was a Cam Nguyen I didn’t remember at all. And then… #12.
Finn Hayes.
My heart thumped once, stupidly. Pride, maybe—irrational, at odds with the stab of inevitable complication.
Fuck. Tomorrow, I’d sit front and center while Finn presented, pretending I didn’t have his number saved in my phone under Walking Trouble.
I’d ask him a scripted question, same as everyone, while the other interns watched.
Right now, he was ahead by only one point. A shaky lead. But if he won… Jesus Christ. Not only would he be part of discussions to prepare the twins’ surgery—no, he’d also step right into a three-month pediatric surgery rotation to complete the experience. So much for professional distance.
Neutral, Jesse. Cool, calm, collected.
Yeah—as if.
The carved wooden door of O’Rourke’s Irish Pub opened just as I was about to reach for it, spilling a pair of tipsy friends and classic rock onto the sidewalk.
I let them pass, then walked into a comforting cloud of stale Bud Light and fryer grease, the tiles underneath my sneakers just the slightest hint sticky.
A perfect antidote to the hospital’s sterile hallways. In more ways than one.
TVs above the bar replayed a muted Mets game, the playlist bouncing from Bruce Springsteen to Taylor Swift.
Over the past three years, this had become an off-duty sanctuary—no pagers, no scrubs, just sixteen beers on tap, bartenders who poured heavy, and a solid number of regulars with opinions about which one’s the real Guinness.
I claimed the end stool and signaled Maeve for a Jameson, neat—not my standard fare on a Thursday night, but I’d earned it. The first sip burned clean on the way down, my shoulders loosening just enough to notice the tension they’d held. What a fucking day.
The door opened again. I glanced over to spot Shane in a floral shirt bright enough to guide planes, backpack slung over one shoulder, scanning the room. When our eyes met, he grinned and beelined for me.
“Hey, man.” He dropped his backpack with a thud that suggested it held half a library, then straddled the neighboring stool. “You look like a particularly pensive storm cloud.”
I flagged Maeve for Shane’s usual pint, propped both elbows on the bar, and sighed. “Yeah, well. Turns out the universe likes irony even more than I do.”
“Sounds promising.” He bumped me with an elbow—gently, something inherently solid about him that had anchored me since our days of sharing a run-down apartment.
I didn’t regret getting my own place, but sometimes I did miss coming home to someone who’d distract me with stories of elementary school chaos.
I waited until he was set with his pint, then toasted him with my whiskey. “So, remember that maybe-hooker I met last weekend?”
“Met?” Shane grinned. “Yeah, that’s one way of putting it. What was it—best mouth in the city, possibly the whole damn country?”
Yeah, I might have said that. I swirled my whiskey and exhaled. “Plot twist: I just graded his knot-tying technique.”
His eyes widened. “Whoa, wait. You’re shitting me.”
“Wish I were.”
To Shane’s credit, he tried. He really did—silent, lips twitching at the corners as he clenched his jaw against a guffaw, eyes twinkling like some fucking cartoon character.
I took a despondent sip of my Jameson. “It’s okay. Go ahead—laugh.”
He did, loud enough to make a few other patrons glance over. “I just,” he started, stopped, and let another laugh spill. “Jesus, Jesse. He’s one of your interns? Mezcal boy with the eyeliner and the incredible ass—direct quote—”
“Indoor voice,” I interrupted, and Shane halted, then continued at a slightly lower volume.
“Well, him. He’s one of your boot-camp charges? How does that even happen?”
“Beats me.” I tipped my glass. “Professional backgrounds didn’t exactly come up the first time.”
“Let’s be honest—you thought you knew his.”
I ignored Shane. “So, well, I had no idea. Not until I saw him with the rest of the first-year residents a couple of days ago.”
“Did you open with ‘so that’s what you look like in clothes’?” Shane was clearly still biting down on a grin. Screw him. Except, you know. Best buddy and all that.
“Saturday Night Live called,” I said. “They want you on the show.”
“They’d be so fucking lucky.”
I snorted. “No, but anyway. I managed something like ‘Good job, anonymous resident who I never met before.’ While trying to forget, you know—you know.” I stopped for a meaningful look.
Shane had the good grace to try for a noise that vaguely resembled commiseration before I filled him in on the rooftop conversation, the competition, tomorrow’s presentation.
He listened the way he always did: chin propped on a fist, all attention.
His floral shirt was like a flag in the dim light of the bar.
“Let me get this straight,” he said once I’d talked myself out of words.
“Your options are flunk him and look petty, rank him first and look thirsty, or try and fail to be neutral?”
“Pretty much.” I shook my head. “He’s good, Shane. His friend called him Spider-Hands, which, yeah—joke. But there’s a reason he came in first. If he’s a decent presenter… Just, fuck. Whoever wins this, it’s massive for them. And if he deserves it…”
“You’d be a dick to take that from him,” Shane finished, quiet.
“Yeah. So, in summary: I’m doomed.”