AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Right now, I know I can’t say it to her when she’s awake. Not when I don’t have my life together. I don’t have the situation with my dad sorted out. We’re still going through the stress of wilderness training.
We don’t even know what a lasting relationship would look like between the two of us.
I’m terrified of falling for her and losing her. Losing her means losing a part of myself, and I don’t think I could survive that. I saw what losing my mother did to my father.
But something tells me that when it comes to Jessie, I’ve never had a choice. I love her and there’s nothing I can do but hold on for the ride and hope it all works out in the end.
All I know is that when I look at her, I can see forever shining in her eyes.
17
JESSIE
Amug of coffee the size of my head is calling my name. I’m going to need it before I sit with my patient and hold his hand and watch him die.
I swallow the lump in my throat and duck down an empty hallway for a moment. My stomach ties itself into knots just thinking about losing Joshua. He’s young. Too young to have the kind of life that he has.
He was rushed into the hospital this morning with multiple gunshot wounds. Although, rushed probably isn’t the right word. Whoever brought him here came in with tires screeching against the pavement. They opened the back door of their car and tossed him out in front of the emergency room doors.
I was the first out the door to him, people with a stretcher close behind me. I wanted to burst into tears then and I still want to burst into tears now.
Though things like this happen, it’s extra hard when it’s a teenager. Impossible. There’s no right answer to why it happened, and you know it’s going to happen again in the future.
Joshua is holding on, but it won’t be long before he passes.
We did what we could in surgery, but there was too much bleeding. Way too much.
Even with the surgery being a success, it looks like he’s not going to make it. When we called his mother, she said it was his own fault for getting wrapped up in the gangs again.
Tears roll down my cheeks even thinking about it now. Hot tracks trace down my cheeks as I look up at the lights. Even though I try to will the crying to stop, it keeps going.
A couple of the nurses glance at me with sympathetic smiles as they hurry down the hall. I duck further into one of the window alcoves, needing a moment to myself.
Being a doctor is going to be this hard. I knew that when I went to school. I knew that when I chose the emergency department. I’m going to lose people.
There is no way I’m ever going to get used to it though. I just have to learn how to save the tears for home.
I need to get the coffee and get back to his room. Dr. Reynolds was nice enough to allow me to sit with him after my shift ends.
I’ve got five more minutes before the shift is over. Enough time to make a coffee before heading back to Joshua.
Losing a patient is never going to get any easier.
I take a deep breath and gather myself, trying to mentally prepare for the bright yellow walls. The last thing I want to do right now is go into a cheerful room full of my peers and try to pretend that everything is alright.
They should have painted the room a soul-sucking black. It would fit better. Something that makes it seem okay to be miserable.
I stuff my hands into the pockets of my lab coat, trying to calm my racing heart. Laughter echoes from the break room. It seems nearly impossible to walk in there and pretend that everything is going to be alright.
I have to do it though. That’s the job. I have to put aside my personal feelings and pretend that at the end of the day, everything is going to be alright. Joshua is going to die tonight, but tomorrow there will be a new set of patients with a new set of problems.
All I need to do is hold it together long enough to make myself a cup of coffee.
After taking one more deep breath, I pull my hands out of my pockets and walk into the room. People surround one of the circular tables, laughing at something. I skirt around the edge of the room and over to the coffee machine.
There are more people stuffed into the break room than I have ever seen before. Nurses and doctors fill nearly every corner. Most days, people do whatever they can to avoid facing the bright yellow walls.
Not today.
