Chapter Twenty-Four #2
I exhaled, rubbing my forehead before saying, “Do you have any actual questions, or can I go give myself a lobotomy to erase this interaction from my memory?”
Sarah beamed like she’d just delivered the closing argument of a lifetime. “Nope, I’m good,” she said cheerfully. “Just needed to set the tone.”
“Fantastic,” I muttered. “Next time, let’s try for less tone and more tact.”
“Yes, okay, only questions. No more threats,” she promised, voice all business now. “Khalifa—what’s Lilly’s favorite coffee order?”
He startled, like she’d yanked him from somewhere far away. He’d been quiet—too quiet—since Sarah’s story about my mom. His gaze had stayed fixed on me, heavy and unreadable, like he was trying to piece together all the hidden parts of me.
And of course, my brain immediately went rogue, wondering what he saw.
If that one small slice of my past had shifted something in the way he looked at me, or made me seem different.
Weaker, maybe. Not nearly as tough and confident as I pretended to be.
What version of me was he seeing now that he knew the cracks weren’t metaphorical—they were structural?
The thought made something defensive rise in my chest. Instinct or muscle memory, I wasn’t sure.
So I tilted my chin up a fraction and rolled my shoulders back until they were squared, as if altering my posture could alter the narrative.
As if standing straighter might hide the fact that the ground inside me was still uneven.
“Um, oat milk latte, extra shot, two pumps vanilla in the morning,” he said finally. “And then an iced caramel macchiato in the afternoon. Half sweet, extra ice.”
Sarah nodded approvingly. “Good. I was worried you’d say black coffee or something equally tragic.”
He almost smiled, but his eyes didn’t leave mine until a full beat later. Under the table, his foot found mine. A small, deliberate press.
I didn’t move.
Neither did he.
“What’s her biggest pet peeve?”
“People who chew loudly. Or when someone messes up her pen organization system.”
Sarah narrowed her eyes. “She told you about the pens?”
“She didn’t have to,” he said. “I learned that lesson the hard way.”
My mouth fell open. “You put the blue pens in the black section once—”
“And she didn’t speak to me for three hours,” he finished.
Sarah snorted. “That sounds about right.”
“Next question,” he said dryly.
“Okay, big shot.” She leaned back. “What’s her favorite movie?”
“My girl.”
Sarah made a face. “Ugh. I was hoping that was a trick question.”
He shrugged. “She’s sentimental.”
I tried not to smile, but the corners of my mouth betrayed me.
“What’s her biggest fear?”
He hesitated for the first time—not long, just enough for my stomach to twist—but then he said softly, “She says it’s pigeons, but I think it’s actually losing a patient.”
My breath caught.
Sarah blinked, her teasing smirk wavering for a second before she recovered. “Wow. Okay. That was...accurate.”
I stared down at my coffee, suddenly too aware of how close he was sitting beside me.
Sarah cleared her throat. “Final round. What’s her guilty pleasure?”
Khalifa made a show of pondering, but the hint of mischief tugging at his lips gave him away. “Standing by the nursery window and coming up with futures for the babies.”
Her eyes lit up. “Oh my God, you know about that?”
“Sarah, don’t—”
But she was already grinning at him. “She’s been doing that since residency, and then I joined when I started working here. The baby in the yellow hat? Future marine biologist. The one with the tiny dimple? Definitely a heartbreaker-slash-concert pianist.”
He nodded. “She told me about the dimple one.”
“You told him?” Sarah huffed, clutching her chest. “That was our bit!”
Khalifa smirked. “He’s called Ethan now. He owns a bookstore by the coast.”
Sarah pointed at him, delighted. “He does get you.”
I sighed theatrically. “Wonderful. My best friend and my husband are forming an alliance over imaginary infants.”
“Only the best kind of alliance.” Sarah leaned back in her chair, eyeing Khalifa. “Alright, last question. Possibly the most important one.”
I groaned. “Sarah, please—”
She held up a hand. “Do you,” she said, pausing for dramatic effect, “have any cute friends to set me up with?”
Khalifa arched a brow. Then—slowly, like he was deciding whether or not to play along—he said, “Define cute.”
Sarah gasped. “He deflects.”
“He does that a lot,” I muttered into my coffee.
“I mean,” Sarah continued, ignoring me completely, “someone tall, nice, emotionally stable but not boring, and preferably not allergic to commitment.”
Khalifa’s mouth curved. “So...fictional?”
Sarah laughed. “You’re funny. Why did you never tell me he was funny?”
“Because he’s not funny,” I said. “He’s—”
“What?” Khalifa cut in. “Short, rude, and emotionally unavailable?”
“Exactly.” My phone went off. “Oh, my patient is going into pre-term labour. Interrogation’s over.
” I pushed back from the table, gathering my things.
“Sorry to bail early,” I said, glancing at Sarah.
“I’ll see you soon, okay?” Then I turned to Khalifa, who was also standing, already pulling his jacket on.
“I’ll, um...” My voice faltered under her amused stare. “I’ll see you at home.”
Sarah’s gaze ping-ponged between us, her expression unreadable other than the faintest twitch of curiosity that spelled this is not how married people say goodbye.
I shot Khalifa a warning look. He, in turn, gave me one of those small, diplomatic smiles and patted my shoulder like we were coworkers finishing a very productive meeting, which only made it worse.
So I did what any self-respecting woman trying to look convincingly in love would do—I leaned in for a hug.
Except he moved the same way at the same time, and we collided halfway there. Our foreheads bonked together with an embarrassingly solid thunk, my bag slipped off my shoulder, the button on his wrist caught my hijab, and somehow—God only knows how—I ended up brushing my lips against his cheek.
It wasn’t planned. Or graceful. Or remotely believable as not an accident.
We both froze.
His eyes widened, mine darted anywhere but at him, and for one long, echoing second, the whole world seemed to hold its breath.
Then I did the only thing I could do—pretend I wasn’t on the verge of spontaneous combustion. I straightened, gave an awkward little nod, and walked out before either of us could say something that would make it worse.
As I hurried down the hallway toward the delivery floor, my brain finally decided to catch up with what had just happened.
Great, I thought bitterly, just wasted my second first cheek kiss on him.
Was there a limit to how many first cheek kisses a girl got? Like some cosmic punch card where, after three, the universe started charging interest?
I pressed the button and exhaled, the memory replaying in excruciating slow motion—the graceless lean, the half hug, the ridiculous collision.
And then there was the part that really bothered me.
Why were his cheeks so soft?
I stepped into the elevator and skimmed my fingertips over my tingling lips, glaring at my reflection in the metal doors as if it could explain things.
Of course, Mr. Rude-and-Stubborn-and-Emotionally-Unavailable wore moisturizer.
Probably the expensive kind that came in a jar with a French name and promises of eternal youth.
The scream reached me before the door did, shattering my frivolous thoughts.
Jennie Thompson’s panicked voice carried down the hall like a warning siren.
By the time I burst into her room, the place was chaos.
Machines blared in overlapping rhythms, nurses hurried between drawers and IV poles, the air heavy with adrenaline.
“Her contractions are one minute apart,” a nurse called over the noise, sweat shining along her temple.
Jennie was gripping the rails of the bed, knuckles bone-white, her hair plastered to her forehead. “It’s too early,” she sobbed, chest heaving. “They can’t come out now—they’re not ready.”
Before I could reach her, her husband rounded on me. “What took you so long?” he snapped, his face flushed, his voice thick with accusation.
I didn’t bother looking at him. “I got paged two minutes ago,” I said evenly, pulling on gloves.
“Let’s focus on your wife.” I moved to Jennie’s side and took her hand.
“Jennie, I’m here, okay? We’re going to take care of you.
” I glanced at the fetal monitor—two heart rates flickering across the screen, one slightly more erratic than the other.
“Alright,” I murmured, more to myself than to her. “Let’s see what’s going on.”
I performed a careful cervical exam. Her cervix was fully effaced and dilated to almost eight centimeters—too fast. And then I felt the unmistakable sign of trouble: the first twin was breech, feet presenting instead of the head, and the second twin was transverse, lying sideways.
My stomach dropped.
“Okay,” I said softly, but with a steadiness I didn’t quite feel. “Jennie, you’re doing amazing, but I need you to take some slow breaths for me. We’re going to have to move you to the OR for an emergency C-section. The babies’ positions aren’t safe for a vaginal delivery.”
Her eyes went wide, wet with tears. “No, no, I can’t—I can’t have surgery—”
“You can,” I said firmly, meeting her gaze. “And you will, because that’s how we’re going to keep you and your babies safe.”
Her husband muttered something under his breath—something about how this wouldn’t be happening if they had a real doctor—but I ignored it. He was just noise, background static.
“Betsy,” I said. “Let’s prep for a Category 1 C-section. Notify anesthesia and the NICU—these twins are thirty weeks; we’ll need the incubators ready.”
Within seconds, the team was disconnecting monitors, switching IV lines, rolling the bed toward the door.
Jennie’s hand clutched mine again, trembling. “Promise me they’ll be okay,” she whispered.
I squeezed back. “I promise I’ll do everything in my power to make sure they are.”
And then we were running down the corridor, past the waiting families and vending machines, toward the bright, sterile walls of the operating room.