2. Greer
Greer
It really is a beautiful kidney.
Dr. Davis and Dr. Ladak wouldn’t have known just how wonderful it is from labs alone—sometimes labs lie. You get in there and the organ just doesn’t look as healthy as it should.
But this one—this organ that belonged to a seventeen-year-old who turned out to be kind, thoughtful, and maybe a bit too wise beyond their years so that now it belongs to their fifteen-year-old cousin they so desperately wanted to give a new lease on life to—this one is perfect.
A small smile tugs at my lips behind my mask. I stare at the kidney for a few seconds longer, eyes tracking where I just sutured off the reconnected blood vessels. The stitches stay taut.
My shoulders relax, and I roll them out as I step out from under the glare of the overhead OR lighting and off the platform. “Dr. Ihnat, you can close up.”
She beams at me in thanks, stepping up to take my place, one hand extending for the forceps.
I usually like closing on my own work, but my neck was getting sore. I don’t sleep well the night before I operate on someone young. I have a harder time detaching from those donors, whether they’re living or dead.
Dr. Ihnat starts murmuring and making conversation, leaning forward as her hands start to move.
My fingers twitch in my gloves, the ghosts of all the movements I’ve spent the last seven years perfecting.
Movements I’m not so sure about anymore.
I notice Dr. Davis when I turn around to push back into the scrub room. He did end up scrubbing in to observe, and he’s standing at the back of the operating theatre with most of the surgical oncology and general surgery residents.
He raises his eyebrows at me, and I don’t realize he’s followed me until the door doesn’t swing shut—it catches on the toe of his pristine white Hoka.
A terrible shoe for the operating room. You’re just asking for blood splatter.
He clears his throat, and my eyes cut to him as I stand by the biohazard disposal and start to doff my gloves and gown.
“Thank you.” His voice is hesitant, almost like he’s nervous.
I don’t like that I make the residents nervous. I don’t mean to. It’s just that I take my job seriously. All surgery is serious. All medicine is.
But there’s this tagline one of the donor networks uses about giving the gift of life.
The whole thing just feels significantly more fragile to me. If you’re a living donor, you’re trusting me with a part of yourself that you’ve given up—you’ve given me or someone like me permission to excise from your body—so that someone else might live a little easier. Get to make mistakes and fix them and love and laugh and see sunsets and sunrises.
And if you’re a deceased donor, you’re going to live on with this beautiful, insurmountable legacy and someone is going to hear your heart in the chest of someone they love and they’re going to love you, too.
I can’t think of anything more serious or more beautiful than that.
Even if sometimes, it hurts me.
Dr. Davis clears his throat again; his voice low, tentative, and hopeful—I know he understands—that he thinks it was a serious, beautiful thing we just did in there, too. He repeats himself. “Thank you.”
I hit the tap with my elbow, and water splashes into the basin, droplets peppering my scrubs. “I was just doing my job.”
He nods, considering, when he starts doffing his gloves and gown.
It wasn’t the answer he was expecting—maybe he wanted the whole soliloquy about the gift of life. How I’m not really mean. I’m only hard on residents because this is just so important. And it is—but I’m just me.
The water hits my hands, and I can see my reflection in the window looking into the operating theatre when I start scrubbing.
I think of my sister, Stella. She tells me I need to be friendlier, so I clear my throat and try again. “And I’m happy to do it.”
He glances at me before lathering his hands and arms. “You really didn’t know who my brother was?”
“Your brother?” I ask, moving the soap up my forearms, but when I look at him, I remember. “Oh, the other day. Beckett. You two look alike.”
He drops the scrub brush, and it clatters loudly against the bottom of the basin.
I wince, but I squeeze my eyes shut, and the feeling passes.
“We look alike? I look like him? The man with the endorsements who once modelled for Saxx and regularly gets named one of the sexiest athletes of the year by every magazine in North America?”
They do look alike. Same eyes—bright and green. Dr. Davis has lighter hair. Golden to the messy mop of chocolate hair his brother hid under a hat. The same straight nose. Sharp cheekbones and defined jawbone covered in stubble. But as far as I can tell, the brother is the only one with a singular dimple.
I nod, looking back at my hands and flexing my fingers. “Very all-American.”
“We live in Canada.”
“Figure of speech.” I attack my nails with the bristles of the scrub brush.
“Well, thank you ... for that, too.”
“For not knowing who your brother was?” I ask, inspecting my nail beds.
Dr. Davis snorts, and I see him take the brush from the basin, throw it out, grab a new one, and start the process over. “He’s had a rough few months. He probably appreciated the anonymity. He uh ... missed a record-breaking kick that would have won us the championship last season. First one in franchise history.”
“Us,” I repeat, moving the bristles over to my left hand. “That’s the thing about sports. Fans think they have all this entitlement to people who’re just out there trying to do their jobs. I’m sure your brother feels worse than anyone else.”
Dr. Davis nods, a smile tugging at the corners of his lips. “You’re probably right about that.”
We finish scrubbing in silence, and I peer up when I hear muffled clapping. Dr. Ihnat just stepped back from the table—it’s the first time she’s closed solo.
I smile—and it’s big and bright and wonderful. My cheeks hurt. I remember what that felt like for the first time.
“Do you always let residents close?”
I glance at Dr. Davis. “I let anyone who deserves it practice.”
“And you let people who’ve been suffering from public humiliation for months, like my brother, off the mat.” He grins at me, backing up to hold the door open for me. “I’m not sure why I was so scared of you.”
“It’s hardly letting your brother off the mat if I had no idea.” I give him a pointed look as I walk past. “Now, if your brother starts showing up and improperly rounding on my patients or giving unsound medical advice, I’m sure I’ll hop on the bandwagon. I’ll be by to check on your patient before I leave tonight.”
He offers me a smile, softer this time. “Thank you, again. I’ve been with her since I started my residency and she’s a good kid. She deserved it.”
I wrinkle my nose. He doesn’t realize what he’s said, that in this world, there’s a hierarchy and all sorts of rules and judgements that sometimes take the place of compassion. “They all do.”
“And thank you for giving my brother a break, even though you didn’t know it.”
“Like I said”—I turn and walk backwards for a moment, shrugging—“it doesn’t seem like the type of thing to get upset over. You can tell your brother there’s one person in this city who doesn’t care, if you think it’ll help him sleep at night.” Raising one hand, I offer him a small smile.
I do hope he tells him, and even though I don’t know him, I hope Beckett Davis sleeps better tonight.
The house I grew up in isn’t far from where my dad lives now. It’s only a few blocks away.
It was a house, not exactly what I’d call a home—an innocuous bungalow nestled on a side street in the Danforth, long before it fell victim to gentrification.
It looked nice from the outside, and sometimes, it was nice on the inside.
But not all the time.
August in Toronto can be sweltering. At some point, it’ll convince you it’s fall, and you’ll start getting excited to say goodbye to the way the heat quite literally radiates off the pavement and all the concrete.
But that’s not today. My scrubs stick to my skin the second I shut my car door behind me, even though we’re moving firmly into the twilight hours. I clamp down on the paper bag from the pharmacy between my teeth, trying to shove my keys, my phone, and my pager into my purse.
Overgrown hosta and flowers spill onto the cracked cement of the walkway leading up to my dad’s front door, their leaves turning inwards, tired from the humidity.
Someone needs to trim them and it’s not going to be me. Lawn maintenance is firmly in my sister’s department.
She’s better at that sort of thing. I stick to medication delivery and obsessively checking our father’s blood pressure.
In a bizarre twist of fate, or just a sign of the architectural times, my dad moved into a house that was practically a mirror image of the one I grew up in. I’ve never lived in this house—but it’s done a significantly better job at feeling like a home.
The porch creaks under my feet when I kick my shoes off beside the mat. They were the ones I wore at the hospital all day and god knows what they’re covered in.
Another wilted plant sits to my right, and my lip curls back at the sight. Maybe I should try to water it before I leave.
I knock, but I don’t wait for an answer before unlocking the door.
“Dad?” My voice comes out muffled. I drop my bag at the side of an end table adorned with another plant, which looks to be doing better than the ones outside, and a neatly stacked pile of mail.
“Greer? You’re early.”
I hear him as he rounds the corner from the living room.
He looks older than he should—shoulders curved inwards and skinnier than they used to be under a worn flannel. It’s too hot for that, but he’s cold more often than not. His brown hair was always thin, but now, it’s become nothing more than feathers dusting his scalp. Eyes just like mine protrude a bit too much from a too-prominent brow bone, but he still smiles at me.
In some people, all those things might be a sign of a life well lived—of too many nights staying up too late and singing too loudly and living too much.
But on him, they’re signs of how he lived and what that cost him.
“No, I’m late.” I shake my head, finally taking the paper bag from between my teeth. “You can’t leave your prescription refills to the last minute like that. What if I got stuck in surgery? Or Stella was away? Try to fill them at least a week in advance next time.”
He takes the bag, frustration, and maybe kindness and caring, etched in the lines of his face. “I could say the same thing to you.”
“I’m not the one on immunosuppressants for the rest of my life.” I pinch the bridge of my nose. I’ve tried several times to get my father and sister to understand the difference between a lifesaving, required, daily medication that keeps the part of his liver that didn’t belong to him from being eaten alive by his body and my occasional need for a sedative because my nervous system forged some connections a long time ago I can’t seem to shake.
He looks troubled, nostrils flaring, and he wrings his hands. His fingers are too thin. “I mean it. You’ve been feeling okay, right?”
“Dad, I just got here.” I press my fingers to my temples and squeeze my eyes shut. My eyes burn, and I can’t tell if it’s tears or they’re too dry because I’ve been awake for too long. “I’m exhausted. I was on call last night and I did three kidney transplants today. I’m waiting on a call for a patient that desperately, desperately needs a liver I can’t guarantee is ever going to come. Can we just—not?”
It probably seems rude, and if Stella was here—she’d elbow me in the rib cage and tell me it was before taking our father by the arm, leaning in conspiratorially, whispering to him about the latest drama on the set of any TV series they watch together.
But I’m trying to be better about setting boundaries and drawing lines in the sand instead of giving pieces of myself I can’t afford to give, and sometimes it comes out wrong.
He cocks his head to the side, and I think he’s chewing on the inside of his cheeks, like he’s mulling over something, before he gestures for me to follow him into the kitchen.
“How was your meeting?” I ask, trying to throw out a peace offering, even though I don’t have to.
At least my psychiatrist says I don’t have to. He tells me it’s okay to create a boundary people are uncomfortable with. It doesn’t mean we have to appease them afterwards.
I follow my father into the kitchen, light from the setting sun spilling across the hardwood floor through ancient wartime windows he won’t replace.
It’s a normal kitchen. More modern than the rest of the house because someone saw fit to update it before my father landed himself here. But with more pill bottles dotting the counter and more reminders for upcoming appointments than your average household.
“Good. I presented someone with their one-year medallion.”
I hear the pride in his words when he drops the bag from the pharmacy alongside the empty bottles and makes his way to the fridge. He pulls it open and grabs me one of those boxed waters I’m particularly fond of that he keeps here even though he can’t afford them.
“Cool.” I smile at him because I can’t really think of anything else to say.
I’m happy for him, and I’m happy for this stranger.
We say we’ve come so far in understanding mental health, and I do think we’re leaps and bounds ahead of where we used to be. But addiction remains this elusive thing people can’t really seem to understand.
Sobriety is rare and difficult and wonderful and challenging and beautiful.
And I’m always proud and overjoyed and thrilled for anyone who finds it.
But my father’s sobriety came at a cost I’m not sure either of us should have had to pay.
“Is your sister coming over tonight?” he asks, handing me the box.
We stand there in the kitchen, staring at one another awkwardly for a moment before I clear my throat. “No, she’s got a group.”
Stella and I somehow became the most stereotypical children of addicts you’d ever find—she spends her days trying to help people get sober and I put organs back in people whose disease ruined theirs.
It was all we knew, and I don’t think we ever left.
“Oh.” He looks troubled for a moment before he tips his too-pointed chin towards the living room. “Did you want to watch a movie then?”
They say addiction is a cycle you can’t escape. I think of all those cirrhotic livers I’ve removed and replaced with new ones. I think of all the people my sister listens to so intently, night after night, day after day, trying to help them find their own version of peace. I think of my father, soon to be practically housebound because flu season is coming up and he’s forever immunocompromised because he has an organ that didn’t always belong to him.
I think of my mother—gone before Stella and I were even old enough to really know her.
I think of all the things that landed us here, in these worn chairs in this bungalow on another random side street in the east end of the city. I think of my father’s too-frail fingers on the remote control. And mine, too-tightly gripping the twist top of my box of water because I wince when the opening credits started too loudly.
And I think they might be right.