16. Charlie
CHAPTER 16
CHARLIE
T he sound of a ticking clock was a relaxing one for some people, but for Charlie, it only ever reminded him of his father’s study. Nothing relaxing ever happened in his father’s study. He waited there now, listening to that huge clock ticking away in the background while his father shuffled through papers doing God knew what before speaking to his son.
This had always been the way it was. His father would call him in and make him wait. When he was a kid, Charlie had just assumed his father was a very busy, very important man. Now that he was older, he had come to the conclusion that making his children wait was something Jon Sullivan did intentionally — probably to “build character” or something like that. The two words Charlie would use to describe his father were cold and demanding . But his brother had always assured him that was the only way his father knew how to show love.
Apparently, their grandfather hadn’t been much different. And the family had churned out doctor after celebrated doctor over the years. So, as they say, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it . The Sullivan family worked the way it was supposed to, and no matter how Charlie felt about it, that was the way it would continue to work.
“So…” Jon tapped a pile of papers into a nice, even stack and slipped them into a file folder before closing them into his desk. “How has the residency been going?”
“Really well, actually.” Every time he spoke to his father, Charlie felt like he was in some kind of job interview. He had to word every answer carefully — pay attention to buzzwords, avoid certain implications — otherwise it could all go wrong so quickly. “Dr. Ralter is an excellent attending, and I believe he has been impressed with my work so far.”
“Good. And where do you think you fit in relation to the other residents?”
“I believe I’ve outperformed all but one of them.”
His father looked up with a frown. “Is this the same resident who was competing with you last time?”
Charlie couldn’t help a smile. “Yes, it is.”
“Hmm…” His father gave him a scrutinizing look. “You should have pulled ahead of that one by now.”
“I don’t know,” Charlie said. “I think it’s good for me to have a little competition. It helps to motivate me.” He saw Megan’s face in his mind’s eye and forced back another smile. “ She helps to motivate me. In fact, we’ve been encouraged to apply for a research fellowship at Our Lady of Mercy. She’s my only real competition, so I encouraged her to apply, too. It’s going to be interesting to find out which one of us comes out on top.”
All while Charlie was talking, his father was slowly opening a desk drawer, pulling out a decorated wooden box, and opening that, too. He took out two cigars and clipped the ends of them. “I think this is cause for celebration,” he said.
Charlie struggled to follow him. “I don’t know what you mean.” His father was never celebratory about potential. That was something Charlie knew for sure. Something else was happening here.
“You’re getting that fellowship.” His father held a cigar between his teeth and lit up. “Brandy?” He stood to cross his office and open a glass display case that Charlie was all too familiar with.
“Oh, no thank you.”
“You sure?” He took out a snifter and poured himself a glass. “It’s my best vintage.”
Charlie narrowed his eyes at his father and did his best to read the man’s body language. Unfortunately, like always, there was little there to read. His father was a closed-off man who never let down his guard. Charlie had figured that out as a child. He would watch his father closely to determine whether or not he was about to be in trouble, but his father never gave anything away.
Jon Sullivan was a tower of a man with white hair and a firm hand. He seemed like much less of a tower now that Charlie matched him, but somehow, he still made Charlie feel small.
“Can you explain what all this is about?” Charlie asked from his chair.
“The fellowship.” His father sat back at his desk, striking quite the figure with his cigar and his glass of brandy. “I happen to be good friends with a senior doctor at Our Lady of Mercy. The man can’t golf to save his life.” He chuckled. “Well, he owes me a favor, and I’m going to cash in. The spot is yours.”
It took Charlie a moment too long to realize exactly what was happening. His father was going to pull some strings on his behalf. In other words… “That’s cheating,” he muttered.
Jon Sullivan took a puff of his cigar. “Using the resources at your disposal is hardly cheating. It would be wasteful not to.”
“Your golfing buddies are not ‘resources.’ This is nepotism.”
“Charles,” his father said in that tone that told Charlie he was already on thin ice. “Our family has been in medicine for generations. Because of the work we’ve done, countless lives have been saved. You can’t compare that to a bit of nepotism. There are shades of gray?—”
“Shades of gray,” Charlie echoed derisively. “I just want the best resident to get the job. It will most likely go to me, but it should be a fair fight. If someone else is better suited, they should get the fellowship. What about all the good they might have done if someone like me hadn’t gotten in the way?” He was thinking of Megan, but he didn’t dare say so.
“No matter who they are, they won’t have the same training, the same years of experience from previous generations backing them up. No one will be able to contribute to the field the way you will. Trust me, Son. You’re better suited.”
Now his father’s face was turning a shade that meant Charlie should give it a rest, but Charlie couldn’t. “It’s just not fair.”
“Fair should not be your primary concern, boy. Your primary concern should be for patients, your patients specifically. Get used to advocating for them, often at the expense of your own principles. Let this be a lesson to you.”
Charlie bowed his head. He couldn’t help imagining Megan and others like her, the chances they might have had if people like Charlie didn’t snatch them out from under them. “My competition is also capable of great things. She’s good, Dad — really good. She’s diagnosed a number of conditions I missed, and she’s great with patients. You should see her with kids. I’ve never seen someone who had such a way with children.”
Jon dropped his cigar in his heirloom ashtray, leaned back in his chair, and crossed his arms. “I see,” he said. “This explains your recent interest in pediatrics. It isn’t about some new passion for the field, is it? This is about a girl. Bad form, Son. Never let a woman get in the way of your ambitions. It’s better that you learn this early on. Find a good woman after you’re set. If you get distracted now?—”
“I’m not getting distracted.”
“Bullshit.” His father leaned in, resting his forearms on the desk in a familiar way that made Charlie shiver. The harsh language only made matters worse. The man didn’t use harsh language unless he really meant it. “It’s written all over your face. You forget sometimes that I’ve known you your whole life. You’re falling for this girl, which has probably given you an inflated sense of her competency.”
“It hasn’t.”
“Not that it matters. You don’t want to get the fellowship because you’re worried it will upset her and ruin your chances with her. You’re going to sabotage your own career for some?—”
“Watch it!” Charlie stood, and his father actually looked startled for once. “Careful how you talk about her. She and I have already agreed not to let this fellowship come between us, so you’re wrong about my motivation. And I do want this fellowship, more than anything. I’ll work my ass off to get it. I just want to know I earned it, that it wasn’t handed to me. Anyway, wanting to play fair is not the same as sabotage. It’s important for me to know, unequivocally, that my position in life was earned honestly — with my own qualifications and not just my family name.”
“You say you want this fellowship?”
“Yes,” Charlie answered. “Obviously, I want it.”
His father rose from his desk. “Then it’s yours. Prove yourself in your fellowship, not beforehand. This isn’t a game, Son. I’d appreciated it if you stopped treating it like one. I’m going to make the call.”
He left the room, and Charlie didn’t stop him. He hadn’t lied about wanting the fellowship. He also wanted to make his family proud, whatever the cost. He rationalized that maybe his father was right. Charlie was standing on the shoulders of giants, and maybe it was selfish to pretend otherwise, to pretend he’d earned all of this himself. Maybe he really was selfishly putting his principles over patients.
His father’s voice drifted in from the room next door. There was the usual laughter and jovial bantering, and Charlie knew the thing was as good as done. He slowly gathered his things and walked out of his father’s office. The conversation was over, and Charlie didn’t want to pretend he had any kind of relationship with his father right now. He felt absolutely useless, angry, and frustrated.
He made his way outside and into the garden. The family estate was enormous. How strange it was to only realize that as an adult. When he was a child, Charlie had never thought of himself as one of those rich kids who lived in a mansion. He’d rejected the stereotypes that portrayed people like him as selfish, greedy, and spoiled. And now he was being handed a fellowship that he hadn’t fought for, possibly stealing it out from under someone who had fought her whole life for everything she had. If anything epitomized being selfish, greedy, and spoiled, wasn’t it this?
The vast lawn spread out before him as he made his way across the grounds. He wasn’t even sure where he was headed, just that he had to get out of that house. He sat at the edge of the stone steps on the hill and dropped his head into his hands.
He heard footsteps approach from behind him. He wasn’t sure he was ready to face his father, but then he didn’t seem to have a choice. “Dad?”
“Nope. Not Dad.” The voice belonged to Justin, Charlie’s older brother.
Charlie glanced up at him and saw another giant reputation he was expected to live up to. “I didn’t know you were here.”
“You think you’re the only one who gets called in to meet with Dad?” Justin sat down beside him and nudged him with a shoulder. He looked so similar to Charlie that people often incorrectly assumed they were twins. But they weren’t. Justin was several years older with a wife and a baby, and an excellent surgical career under his belt.
“I assumed you were already in his good graces,” Charlie said, looking back over the lawn toward the forest on their property.
Justin chuckled under his breath. “Oh, no one’s ever really in Dad’s good graces. He’s…”
Charlie found a word for him. “Autocratic?”
Justin laughed again. “Well, I was going to say he’s got high standards for his children, but autocratic works. Was he hard on you today?”
“Not really.” Charlie bowed his head, ashamed he was being this sensitive in front of his older brother, who had always borne more of the weight of their father’s expectations. “He’s pulling some strings to get me into a fellowship.”
“Oh, that’s great,” Justin said. “That means he thinks you’re capable of smashing it. You know that right? He wouldn’t recommend you for a position you might fail. It would look too bad for the family. This is just his way of telling you he believes in you.”
Charlie sighed and shook his head. “I almost wish he wouldn’t. There’s this girl…”
“Say no more.” Justin patted him on the knee. “He doesn’t want your love life to get in the way of your work, right? I got the same talk when I met Carrie. You just have to tell him to back off. Do well, and show him he was wrong to worry.”
“It’s not that,” Charlie said. “Well, it is, but it’s… She’s a resident with me. I know she’s going to apply for the fellowship, and I know she deserves a fair shot. She’s good, really good. It feels so rotten just pulling the chance out from under her like this, you know? She’s not had an easy life, and she’s worked hard for everything she has. She would have worked hard for this, too. But I’ve just stolen it from her, haven’t I?”
“Hm, that is a pickle,” Justin said. “Dad won’t let you throw this chance away.”
“And I don’t want to. I was going to fight for the fellowship myself, but I wanted the fight to be fair. I wanted to win it because I was the best, not because Dad knows who to go golfing with.”
Justin leaned back on his hands, and just for a moment, Charlie saw him as a kid again — confident and way too smart for his age. “I think your solution here is obvious.”
“And what’s that?”
“Whatever you do, do it well enough that not even you can doubt you would have won the fellowship. Then it’s the same ends with different means.”
Charlie arched an eyebrow at his brother. “You think that’s a good solution?”
His brother shrugged. “I said it was obvious, not perfect. She doesn’t have to know, and if you do well enough, she’ll never question how you won. The trick is getting yourself to stop questioning it, too.”
“Yeah.” Charlie leaned back beside his brother and took a deep breath of the fresh air. “That’ll be the trick, I guess.”