Jocelyn
Grief isn’t linear. It’s a circle.
—My Therapist
Early mornings after a rough call make me want to murder things.
Well, early mornings period make me want to murder things, but as an anesthesiologist, I sort of brought this upon myself. Surgeries start early, and
therefore, so must I. At least it’s June, so it’s not pitch-black outside.
My day is always better when Asher is operating. I’ve bullied myself into covering his cases enough times that my colleagues
no longer try to assign me elsewhere. Best friends unite, yo. If Dr. Foley is operating, then Dr. Mattox is his anesthesiologist.
I sip my life-giving espresso on the OR physician lounge couch, then begin peeling my breakfast orange when Asher enters, deep circles beneath his eyes.
“Hey, sugar duckling,” he says with a yawn, falling onto the couch next to me.
“Your nicknames are getting perpetually weirder, Ash.”
He sets his yellow Mountain Dew Kickstart on the side table and shoots me a crooked grin, albeit a little more languid than
normal. “Not into ducks this early in the morning?”
“I’m not into anything this early in the morning.” I glare at the muted TV on the wall, the channel set to—as usual—Fox News.
“Who decided working the day after call was a good idea?”
He yawns again. “The people who don’t want to pay for more doctors to cover.”
“Cheap hospital bastards.” I dig the remote from between the couch cushions to change the station to HGTV.
One of my fellow anesthesiologists, Cassie Hersl, saunters through the door and heads straight to the kitchenette. She snags
a banana from the breakfast fruit pile, then pours a cup of coffee.
Asher glances at her and nudges my elbow. “You got my cases today, right?”
“Of course.” I lean closer. “No one else can tolerate you.”
Judging by the far livelier smile on his face, the caffeine must have hit his system. He has such an appealing smile—always
bright, never forced. The man is unendingly happy.
It’s gross. Sweet, but gross. How did I become best friends with a morning person? In my perfect world, I’d be a vampire.
“I’m sorry you got the short end of the stick,” he says.
“Don’t worry. You’re buying me dinner for my troubles.”
“I am?”
“Yeah,” I say. “With drinks.”
“Morning, Asher.” Cassie approaches us with a rare smile. Her black hair isn’t yet pulled into its customary bun, and it gleams
like a silk negligee. Her cat-eye makeup is sharp enough to cut.
Last I heard, she was on again with her radiologist boyfriend, but it seems like her crush on Asher hasn’t dimmed in the slightest.
If looks could fuck, Asher would be well and truly by now.
The woman hates me. She has since my first day. I don’t know why, and I no longer care. I’ve stopped any attempts to be friendly.
The two of us subsist on snark and professional rivalry.
“Hey, Cassie.” Asher’s smile for her is as genuine as always. Asher loves people, and they love him. He rests an ankle on
the opposite knee, showing off his crimson OU socks. “What’s up, girl? Still looking at buying that condo?”
“Oh, I passed on that.” She perches on the armrest next to him.
He pseudo-gasps and clutches invisible pearls. “But the view!”
“I know.” She giggles—ew—and starts to say something else when her phone beeps. She checks it and waves. “Shoot. Got to go.
Have a good day, Asher.”
Purposely excluding me, I see. Subtle.
“Every single woman in this hospital wants you,” I whisper.
He leans in and whispers back, “Then how come I’m not getting laid?”
I laugh in his face. “So full of shit.” He’d be getting laid if he tried, but he rarely bothers. If he ever opened his eyes
and looked, he’d find whatever mysterious woman he’s searching for.
In the past, I’ve asked why he doesn’t look, but I’m always treated to an off-kilter joke and a wink. He isn’t dating, he doesn’t want to talk about it and he doesn’t appear to care about it. He just isn’t ready, obviously.
Before I can reply, his partner, Dr. White, settles onto the couch opposite us. The wizened man holds a tumbler of coffee
and smiles benignly at Asher.
“What you got today, Foley?”
Asher shrugs, his body stiffening. “A couple hysts.”
The older man’s chuckle is a tad derisive. “Minor leagues, son. Call me when you’ve got three sacrocolpopexies and a colpocleisis
lined up.”
Asher smiles easily, though I sense the agitation behind it. “You a prolapse specialist now?”
White waves a dismissive hand. “You’ll get there. You get older, so do your patients. Lots of prolapse in your future.” He
laughs at his own joke. “By the way, had a few of your patients on my schedule lately. You too lazy to do Paps every year
now?”
“They aren’t indicated yearly—”
My pager goes off, alerting us that the patient is ready for me. I set a hand on Asher’s arm. “Time to work, Doctor Foley.”
He shoots off a quick goodbye to White, and we step into the hall.
“Guy’s a tool sometimes, isn’t he?” I say on the jaunt to the OR.
“He’s just from a different generation.” Asher’s tone is light, but his body has remodeled itself—smile gone, shoulders a
tad droopier. Hmm. What’s up with that?
In the OR, he shakes it off and holds his patient’s hand while I put her to sleep.
He’s the only surgeon in all the departments who does this.
The patient has bled for two months straight, and this morning when I spoke with her, she wore a shirt with a picture of a uterus that read, Tearing down my baby factory to build a playground.
Despite her excitement for the hysterectomy, she was shaking in her sassy shirt. But she’s all smiles for him, his jokes
and his compassionate hand-holding.
His patients love him. It’s remarkable, really. He draws affection from all directions, like his personality is tinged with bunny rabbits and
sugar cookies.
When the propofol kicks in, he releases her hand and lets the nurses take over, then scrubs in and claps his gloved hands.
“It’s a beautiful day to kill uteruses, yeah?”
As usual, the team—all female—bursts into laughter. He grabs the sterile drapes and gets to work. All’s good with the patient,
so I snatch my phone to rid it of the million notifications. I sigh at the repeat email from the hospital regarding optional
Dragon training—a device that boasts voice-to-text for medical charts. I’ve suffered enough similar training sessions to last
me a lifetime. Dragon is utterly useless for anesthesiologists anyway, so I don’t know why they keep pushing it on us.
I delete it, watch a few TikToks, then open EverX, an exclusive hookup app for doctors and other professionals. I’m picky
with my matches, but it’s been several weeks since my last date, and the itch has returned.
Thanks to Asher, I’ve got more and better friends now than I ever have.
He lures people like bees to nectar, and due to my near-constant presence at his side, I’ve gathered a thriving friend group to negate the threat of loneliness.
Totally separate from that is my sex life, fulfilled by strangers because my therapist implies I’m emotionally crippled, though she uses fancier words.
But it isn’t my fault the concept of lasting love from anyone except my sister feels very much like a horrific lie. Trauma does that to a person.
I’m self-aware enough to know I’m broken, but not enough to fix myself. My therapist has tried innumerable times to banish
these beliefs from my psyche—to no avail. Some lessons simply can’t be unlearned.
Horniness, however, is a staple of the human condition, and I’m just as subject to my libido as the rest of the population.
It isn’t something I advertise, though. We’ve come so far in society, but women are still vulnerable to censorious looks and
gossip when they engage in casual sex.
Playas? Cool. Sluts? Not so much.
I don’t need that in my life.
But I do need sex sans emotions.
On my phone, a guy named Sebastian—Sebastian? Definitely not his real name—messages me. Based on his side view profile pic, I think he’s attractive. Brown hair. Dark eyes. Lean.
Hey girl
sup
so from 1 to america, how free are you tonight?
Syria
damn girl. That’s cold.
I glance up at the monitors. All’s fine.
I might have a minute. What you thinking?
I like it simple
dtf?
“Where you want to eat tonight, baby doll?” Asher pulls my attention to him.
His gaze is trained on the monitor, his skilled hands manipulating the instruments like the pro he is.
“Ask Geoff,” I say. “He’s the picky one.”
Our friend Geoff, the urologist, is a very meat-and-potatoes sort of person, but we tolerate him anyway. Sometimes we indulge
his ridiculousness. Other times, we make him eat shawarma.
Asher sighs. “Fine. But when we wind up at barbecue again, don’t blame me.”
“I’ll eat my sausage without complaint,” I say.
He pauses his operating to shoot a sarcastic eye roll at me. “Really?”
I give him a mock-serious stare. “Yes, Doctor Foley. I take sausage very seriously.”
“That’s what she said,” Asher quips, and the scrub tech chuckles.
I return to my phone.
Yeah. It’ll be late though.
I’m down
EverX is the best boyfriend. Sexual satisfaction—usually—with no obligation for more. More is off the table. It’s not worth the risk. A lesson I’ve learned over my thirty-four years: loving people is dangerous. It
hurts like hell when they die. Sounds morbid, but it’s true.
Age fifteen. Parents drown in the floods from Katrina.
Age seventeen. First love crashes his car into a dump truck.
Age eighteen. Brother overdoses on Oxy.
I could go on, but the deaths lose meaning after a while. My sister is the sole survivor, and only she understands the pathological way in which I interact with the world.
Yes, it’s wildly unhealthy. Yes, I’ll die alone if I keep on this way.
But we’re all alone. Most of us just don’t realize it. The deaths closed me off. Locked me in a cold glass room. Protected me. Safe in my bubble, I may be alone, but I can’t get hurt.