Chapter 1
RUN THE LIST!
In medicine, there are innumerable daily choices that will permanently alter your future: do you want a job, or no job? Study tonight, or go out? Do extra research, or the bare minimum?
Miss Spring, who, in the presence of a multitude of choices, an abundance of romantic options, and an above-average intellect, decided to make the worst choice of all.
THANATOS
15 HOURS PRE-BARGAIN
Ican’t tell which of my abusive relationships is more embarrassing: my pitiful attempts to escape my toxic situationship, or my vain attempts to outwit the medical education system I screamed, cried, and begged to be included in.
“I’m so sorry,” I apologize again to my intern for the week. “I was just—”
Just what? Stuck in 4 A.M. traffic? Oversleeping? Because the roads are empty this early, and my anxiety ricochets me awake before the sun does.
The intern glares, the incessant beeping of the hospital drones on, and my brain jumbles through excuses, fumbling for a worthy explanation.
“Well?” she prompts.
The cramped hallway crushes us all in—the apathetic chief resident, the drained middle residents, my disappointed intern, the third year medical student who’s passing me sympathetic looks, the husbands ambling through the dilapidated hospital, and worst of all, the unprepared sub-I who’s late.
Late again.
That obnoxious, two-faced valedictorian with an inability to keep his lust restrained showed up at my apartment this morning, begging on his knees in the shoddy asphalt for me to take him back.
In front of my car.
Blocking my exit.
Yet again.
But I can’t shake my attachment to him, the mirror to how I cling onto my best memories from college, to the pitiful, persistent idea of a what if—what if I’m making a mistake?
What if my quiet desperation, my persistent grappling with the past, is the only way I can get through my future?
What if I stop doubting myself and make a real decision instead of this constant wavering?
Above the intern, the digital red clock blinks 5:15 A.M.
15 minutes late. On my sub-I! I couldn’t even get in early to pre-round! My entire future delayed by a sanctimonious traitor who used to do practice questions while I was in front of him, and slept with whoever he wanted when I was away from him.
I can’t believe I’m trapped here, palms sweating, career imploding, over some man who couldn’t even look me in the eye when he still had me.
My thundering heart is saved by the attending striding down the hallway, my hesitation forgotten as the thin-lipped intern tosses me the list, already herding the group away.
I quickly scan the highlighted patients she chose for me, noting who’s still here and who isn’t as our team tears down the hallway. I usually like gynecologic oncology, but I loathe being late.
This is not my character. This is not me. I care about my patients. I want to see them before anyone else. I shouldn’t be rushing to catch up on overnight events, frantically scribbling down notes as the other residents check up on their patients.
I will match OB/GYN, or die trying. And I need to get David to leave me alone before he sabotages what’s left of my career.
And without making Hyacinth, my sleep-deprived, endlessly loyal, dearest future pathologist, wake up three hours earlier than she needed to chase him off with “a baseball bat and the finest witchcraft ClockTok Shop can buy.”
But first, rounds, then checking the schedule, then case, case, and case until it’s time for sign-out.
Thankfully, the attending today likes to pimp residents more than students, so I’m all but invisible for the day. And I didn’t break the sterile field once!
Lateness aside, I hope I’m doing a good job.
Just holding retractors, studying each cancer between operations, and praying the day drags on slower so I can procrastinate dealing with new ways to scare off David so that I can finally have peace.
10 HOURS PRE-BARGAIN
The second-year resident tips back her coffee cup, drinking idly, while I practice my suturing in the O.R. classroom.
The grimy pig foot I’m working on is as tough as my skin used to be, resisting my futile attempts at poking through it.
I swallow my growing embarrassment. “Sorry again for being late. I—”
“You don’t have to apologize,” she says. “He makes everyone cry and doubt themselves. It’s a rite of passage.”
My hand tugs hard, tying another knot. She doesn’t mean—
“I heard he made one of the attendings cry.”
She does.
“No!” I gasp, momentarily shocked out of self-pity. I suppose being heartbroken is a better excuse for being late than being a coward.
Although I stifle my surprise that she already knows about our conversation. I doubt he told her, which means others probably overheard, too…
“And don’t worry about being late,” she continues. “Ginny is just frazzled because her boards are approaching. She definitely forgot about it already.”
I tie the last knot, and we both grin. Still got it!
“Leave after the last case today,” she offers. “Application season is way more important than tying up loose ends here.”
God bless residents who remember what it’s like to be students.
That’s who I’m going to be when I grow up.
Nothing like the unmentionable man I tried to fake date.
7 HOURS PRE-BARGAIN
“Use Resilience!” Hyacinth says cheerily into the phone. “Grit!”
“Don’t attack me with buzzwords,” I groan, using my precious few minutes between cases to buy lunch and call my friend during her lunch break.
“Wellness module?” she teases.
“I’ll hang up,” I threaten.
“Okay, okay,” she says. “But…” she hesitates, and I know my best friend is up to something.
“Hyacinth, the last time we tried something…”
“Just let me convince you,” she begs. “Last conversation about it. I promise.”
“Fine,” I agree, wishing I could steal her relentless optimism. Usually, it’s me in that role, but lately, I’ve been so burned out I can barely summon the energy to walk.
She hesitates.
“Go on.”
“Before my plan.” She pauses for a second. “Have you thought about telling someone about him?”
I stop in my tracks, breath catching.
Have I?
“I’ll go with you,” she offers.
My blood chills, a bolt of adrenaline spiking. Doubt slams into me with jarring speed, seizing me in place.
What if it doesn’t work out?
What if no one believes me?
What if it makes me look worse?
It’s not worth being seen as a whiner who drags her personal life into work. I’m flawless, independent, dependable.
I cannot be perceived as a bad doctor just because I’m a bad dater.
“I’m fine,” I insist. “Tell me your plan.”
There’s a crackle of static, and then her chipper voice is back, all awkwardness between us forgotten.
“I will,” she says, “but I’ll text you so you can eat and not have to talk at the same time.”
I check out my diet soda and protein bar, snag a seat in the musty cafeteria, and nibble bites while the texts roll in.
“Run the list,” I order.
Hyacinth
Okay, phase one of Operation Match Day: eligible bachelors!
Starting with,
Student Doctor Antonio, a 19-year-old man with a past history of being Cornfield’s top BS-MD candidate, rumored to be a savant or perhaps an alien. Symptoms include a general dislike of people…
I almost spit out my soda.
PERCY
Bitch, 19!? Am I a cradle robber?
Have you forgotten I’m 27?
Hyacinth
Hey, I don’t judge.
Consult a parent and delete
Booo! Okay, here:
Dr. Kai Washington, 36-year-old man with a past history of graduating from Cornfield Legends with Alpha + OmegaVerse Honors, currently presenting with anxiety for the past 5 years, coinciding with his General Surgery residency beginning, escalating with his transition to chief.
Symptoms include a man seen yearning over plastic surgery fellows, occasionally spotted crying in the on-call room…
Hyacinth, 36 is pushing 40. If he were a woman, he’d be labeled geriatric in pregnancy.
…
Count your days, youngin
Don’t forget your best friend is 30
Sorry
Love you
Admit to millennial women, they’ll love him
Don’t threaten me with a good time
Next,
Interleukin ‘Luke’ Wu, 26-year-old man with a past history of being the biggest gunner of Cornfield Legend’s M4 class, dermatology wannabe, presenting with an unquenchable desire to have it all: seen unsuccessfully trying to pick up Can’t Read Can’t Write Can’t State students at the bar recently.
Symptoms include telling everyone about his future salary, unironically browsing the skincare section of Seraphim, and telling everyone he knows about the wonders of the epidermis…
Please, I beg, don’t set me up with a man named *Interleukin*
Also, we know him? He’s unbearable??
Just think
You can name your kid JAK-STAT, ‘Jack’ for short
Discharge immediately with no follow-up
Hear me out on this one
A few minutes pass before she rolls out the next text.
Dr. Kane Goodyear, 25-year-old-ghoul, past history of being his D.O.
school’s valedictorian, currently in his intern year.
Symptoms include an irritable attitude and generally flat demeanor beginning around March 15th last year.
So vitriolic, he reportedly made an *attending* cry at a conference.
Family history includes doctor daddy and M3 sister…
I choke on my protein.
Dr. DEMON? Again?
He has a real name? I called him Dr. Demon the whole time.
Girl
Maybe that’s why he rejected you
Act stupid, and he’ll treat you like you’re stupid
I know it didn’t work the first time. But David and Kane both want to be general surgeons next year. So the best way to get to him would be to get to his competition
Why would Hyacinth insist on giving him another chance? I stare dumbfounded at my phone screen, abandoning my food. Is there truly nobody else out there worth dating?
Absolutely not
Turfing to psych and getting the hell out of this
And then I tuck my phone into my pocket, gulp the last of my caffeine, and hurry back to the operating theaters.
3 HOURS PRE-BARGAIN
When I get right upper quadrant pain, I chalk it up to the usual body aches from working too hard and resting too little, and shrug it off.