Chapter 40
Isabelle
Two days after my dad dropped by to remind me of the interview that I—apparently—didn’t even deserve, I was in Boston for
the Winthrop fellowship interview.
Walking alongside Charles Winthrop in the large atrium at the Boston Medical Center’s lobby, I felt almost like I was having
an out-of-body experience. Sunlight streamed through the wall of windows on one side. The clean and clinical lobby sparkled
as morning faded to a bright afternoon.
I took a deep inhale. This was what I’d wanted for so long.
I expected it to feel different. I was supposed to be nervous, but I wasn’t. I was a natural.
I expected that I’d feel something similar to coming home. A feeling of a final puzzle piece falling into place. But I didn’t.
This felt like every other interview or hurdle I had to clear. And when I looked at it like that, suddenly it lost all of
its luster.
“And after the fellowships, most of our fellows go on to practice and continue critical research . . .” Charles Winthrop went on with closing the interview.
Three hours of interviews with all the people I’d spent the last few years working myself into the ground to impress, and it was great.
I was happy. Happy with an asterisk because I was wondering if there was somewhere else I could have been happier. “The path to quite a legacy.”
Hearing those words—ones I’d heard in some manner or another over the past decade—was like the lights coming on after a movie.
The world created in front of me disappeared and reality came back into view.
Charles Winthrop finished the final tour, shook my hand, and smiled proudly. “Thank you for coming, Dr. Mercado.”
It took all of fifteen minutes into my first interview for the Winthrop fellowship for the realization to be unavoidable.
The one that had sprouted in the last few weeks and blossomed into something so obvious I couldn’t ignore it anymore.
I didn’t want this.
I wanted my own name. I wanted to make my mark, and I’d always assumed this was how I would do it. I’d beat my dad at his
own game and become the Dr. Mercado referenced in all the textbooks.
But I wasn’t going to find it here. I was only going to spend my life in some bizarre competition with my dad, telling myself
it’s a better career than one lost in the mix of life like my mom’s. As if those were the only two options. Because for a
long time, they were the only ones I let myself see.
“Thank you for having me.” I mustered all the polite excitement I could and shook his hand. Even if my father ensured I had
this interview, it was my own successes that made me a competitor for this spot. I would at least revel in that.
I took the next train back to New York and went straight to the same place I always spent my afternoons when I had some time off.
I needed to talk to Austin. But first I needed an actual idea of what I wanted because everything felt so blurry. The idea
of letting go of Winthrop was already scary enough. But at least I knew it didn’t feel right, and it wasn’t that I was being
blinded by my feelings for Austin; if anything, he’d taken my view from portrait to panoramic.
And I hated how I spoke to him. Maybe I just needed Selena to talk some sense into me and make me feel like less of a monster.
“I was wondering when this was going to happen.” Selena licked the salt off the rim of her zero-proof margarita mocktail.
“I was hoping it wouldn’t.”
She put the glass back down.
Selena’s house on the Upper East Side was massive. There was an outdoor terrace that ran the entire length of the back of
the house, enclosed by a towering brick wall. On summer nights we either opted for the first-floor terrace or one of the balconies
where the skyline could be seen.
We used to have margaritas on nights when I wasn’t on call. When she moved in with Henry, our margarita nights continued,
and Henry worked late or made himself scarce so we could have some time together.
“What do you mean?” I stirred my alcoholic margarita, because after the argument with Austin a couple nights ago, I needed something to take the edge off. Tonight was the first night I wasn’t preparing for an interview or working and I could relax.
When I got there, I told Selena I was thinking about something else post-residency. I had a year till then; I could go into
practice or I could choose a different fellowship. It put me under a daunting timetable, but I already had one in mind.
“With Blake, you started that one fight.” Selena leaned forward to scoop some guacamole on a chip and crunched it loudly.
“I was there that night, for dinner, when he visited and suggested you consider UCSF after your training.” She let out a long
sigh. “Instead of telling him it hurt you that you had to be the one to make a sacrifice for your relationship, I think you
started an argument about the ranking systems for residency programs.”
I took a long sip from my straw.
That night, I’d felt like he was trying to push me into a corner. At the time, all I knew was that I was compromising, and
I didn’t want to.
“So . . . what did Austin ask for that you can’t give him?” Selena pushed her straw around her glass.
My heart rattled against my ribs.
“Nothing.” I looked down at my glass. He didn’t want anything from me. He wanted me to open up and be with him in any way
I was able and that was all. “He’s been great and it’s making me realize . . . I guess I never thought about what it would
be like to not go after the Winthrop fellowship . . .” I pfted out a breath.
“You’re reconsidering what you want because someone may have shown you all that you can have.” Selena put into words what I was stumbling over.
“Yeah, some man.” I scoffed. “This isn’t a cheesy Christmas movie, and I am not giving up my plans for a guy.”
Selena’s face brightened with a deep and airy laugh. “Did he ask you to?”
“No, but he makes me want to,” I answered. And I was scared where it would end. I’d mapped out the trajectory of my entire
career. What other plans would I end up diverting for a life with him? My mom had deviated from her plans for her relationship,
and she couldn’t undo that. What if I let go of my timeline for Austin and I ended up regretting it? “And even if I never
have to give anything up, what if he does for me? What if he gives up a life he wants?”
I couldn’t live with that.
I didn’t know what my future would look like anymore, but I did know that motherhood came at a price for high-achieving women.
I saw it with my own mom. I didn’t know if I wanted children, but I never wanted to put myself in a position where I’d close
the door on a career opportunity forever. Maybe I was selfish, but I wanted to focus on my life. Nobody ever faulted a man for doing that.
“Love is hard. I don’t know if I can add another challenge to my life,” I added.
“Love isn’t hard.” Selena paused contemplatively. “Life is hard. Love makes shouldering everything life will throw at you
easier. If that’s not the case, then it isn’t love.”
“What do you mean?” I scratched my head, confused. I looked at my margarita, then Selena. “Did I have too many of these?”
Selena laughed.
“I meant what I said. Love isn’t hard. It just needs a little investment,” Selena explained. “You found something . . . someone.” She tiptoed around her words
like she was walking a field of land mines. “That makes you want to compromise, and I get why that’s scary. But when that happens, they don’t feel like compromises or sacrifices anymore,
because they’re not. They’re an investment in your own happiness.”
“What if it’s five years down the line and I keep investing, but I’ve changed my whole life around for our relationship?” I swallowed against that visceral fear. “What if I can’t get
it back?”
Selena cocked her head to the side. “Look, Isa, if you’re this spooked at making a change, I can’t imagine you’re going to
do anything drastic. And I’d like to point out”—she raised her hand—“I’m here in case you do have a bout of love-related amnesia.”
I sat there under the heavy weight of her words, feeling like a child for not having come to all of this on my own, but also
worried because that wasn’t all of it.
“What if we get a few years down and then he realizes I can’t give him what he wants?” My mind filled with how adorable he
was with Jo. What if I couldn’t make the time for a family? I still wasn’t sure if I wanted one. “Like kids.”
Losing Austin now hurt. If I fell even deeper than I was now, that heartache would completely devastate me. But holding on to him, only for him realize later I was offering a life that was less than what he wanted, was just as bad.
“Does he know that you may not want to have kids?” she asked.
“Yes.”
This was a lot. Too heavy for only having known him this long, but at the same time it felt like a conversation we needed
to have because everything with him felt like that.
Heavy. Stable.
Selena sighed and pushed her lips to the side of her face in thought. “Do you think he’s an idiot?”
Taken aback, my body froze for a moment. “Of course not.”
“Then did you stop to consider that he’s already thought of that and wants a life with you more?” Selena grabbed another chip
and loudly crunched it. “Did you ever stop and think he doesn’t see a different kind of family as a sacrifice, rather an investment?”
Austin would thrive at fatherhood. Like how I’d be great in the Winthrop fellowship. Losing out on either felt like a loss.
And I couldn’t be the reason someone else didn’t get what they wanted out of life. I already had that sinking feeling I stole
that joy from my mom. I couldn’t steal it from him, too.
“Either way, it feels like a waste of perfectly good potential,” I admitted.
“Isa . . .” Selena’s voice lowered. “You sound like your dad.”
I barked a laugh, startling Selena. She was right, and I guessed the irony was kind of funny. “I spent so long avoiding becoming
my mother, I didn’t see this coming.”
“What good is potential if you’re stuck doing something you don’t want with it?
” Selena’s serious face lit with a loving smile.
“And don’t forget, you’ve made sacrifices for me.
Skipped interesting cases when I needed you that year when everything went to shit with the press.
You didn’t take a single day off for over a year so you could be present at the wedding.
Did that feel like giving something up?”
“Of course not.”
“Why?”
“Because I love you.”
Selena’s eyebrows lifted in victory. “See? They may seem like sacrifices on the outside but when you’re in it, they’re investments.
And only you get to decide what’s worth investing in.”
My throat bobbed.
I wanted to hug Selena for being there for me and yell at her for being right at the same time. Instead, I took a deep breath
and tried to keep every emotion that rushed through my veins in check. “Jeez, don’t get so serious. It’s just a guy.”
“You like him.”
“More than I thought I would,” I admitted quietly. Regret ratcheted up my throat, clogging it a bit. “And then I screwed it
all up.”
I spiraled because he had the audacity to encourage me to do what I wanted over anything else. He was invested in me while I was invested in some idea of what my future should look like.
“Make it right. Apologize,” she said plainly, simply. Because it was simple. With Austin, everything was what it seemed. “But
before you do, I think you should talk to Blake.”
I winced. “Really?”
She sighed.
“I think you need closure.” Selena turned her glass on the table and looked down at it instead of looking at me, like she
was bracing to say something she knew I wouldn’t like.
“Clear up whatever residual resentment or anger you’ve been holding on to and let it go. Not for him, but for Austin. Don’t
start a relationship with him while still feeling anything other than indifference for your ex.”
I nodded and now that I had an idea of what I wanted to do to fix things, I could finally relax a bit. I hoped Austin understood
and didn’t scare easily.