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“We will. I am so excited for this year. Our wedding, renovating the 8th Avenue apartment…”
We kissed. “You are so good to me,” I murmured against the skin of her throat, kissing my way up to her ear. “So willing to accept my hectic schedule.”
“You deserve it,” she said, her voice warm. “Of course I accept your busy schedule. I know you’re a neurosurgeon. You have the Foundation. The Corporation. Your music. Now you have me, too. I know you’ll schedule me in. What kind of relationship would we have if I didn’t accept you just the way you are?”
We kissed, softly, affectionately. Then she tightened her arms around my neck and kissed me more passionately, and that ignited my desire for her, my body responding to the need in her kiss.
I was looking forward to the fellowship, the opportunity for research and for getting more experience. Hopefully, Kate and I would both be completely engrossed in our careers during the day and would return home each night eager to be with the true love of our lives – each other. I had worried that she’d feel neglected but she had her own very busy life and plans.
With that concern out of the way, I felt elated and pushed Kate down on the sofa, lying on top of her, kissing her deeply. All worries about the fellowship faded away while I lost myself in Kate.
If you would have asked me, I would have said it was the happiest time of my life up until that point – the weeks after we returned from Africa and I was back in Manhattan getting re-established in my practice and starting, the research project…
That happiness was shattered all too soon by one Dr. Lisa Monroe, resident in neurosurgery at NYU.
On the first day of the fellowship, I met the other fellowship candidate, and the residents – eight of the brightest medical graduates who had done their internships and were now going to specialize in neurosurgery. We would be assigned four residents each and would be responsible for them for the year.
On my way to my office, after we had a joint meeting of residents and fellows, Dr. Monroe, an attractive woman with black hair, blue eyes and a very intense expression, followed me down the hallway.
She caught up with me when we reached the elevator.
“Dr. Lisa Monroe,” she said and extended her hand once more. “We met earlier at the luncheon.”
“Dr. Monroe,” I said and took her hand, shaking. She had been a medical student at Columbia.
“I’m really glad to be working with you,” she said, her voice low.
“You’re with Brodinski?” I said, remembering she was assigned to his group for the semester.
“I would have preferred to be working with you, given your experiences,” she said.
“Oh, how so?”
“You were in Africa; you do robotic surgery.”
I nodded. “Brodinski seems like he’ll be great to work with. Lots of experience and he’s done some robotics as well.”
She nodded and that was that.
While she wasn’t one of my residents, we would often scrub in on cases, since residents had the right of first refusal for all appropriate surgeries. If I had a case, she could scrub in if she wanted to gain experience.
She seemed vaguely familiar to me, but I couldn’t place her. I assumed I’d seen her around at Columbia for she’d been a medical student when I was teaching, and she did her internship at NYP. I must have seen her but I couldn’t remember where.
Over the next while, we were often together during
rounds or weekly conferences going over cases. She always stood close to me and tried to engage me in discussion about patients or procedures. I assumed she was just a bright student hoping to show off her knowledge and skills. Surgeons, as a rule, are brimming with self-confidence. You have to have that kind of confidence in order to cut into the human body, especially the brain. So I took her attention as just a new resident eager to please and to show off.
On a bright sunny Manhattan morning in mid October, just a week before my wedding, I saw her standing at the edge of the group of physicians gathered for the first grand rounds for all residents and fellows, held by the faculty and senior pediatric neurosurgeons. I felt her gaze from across the room, and when our eyes met, she smiled. I glanced away, not interested in her nor did I want her interested in me.
After rounds were finished, I left on my way to the conference room, having forgotten about her, only to hear her call out my name.
“Dr. Morgan.” She caught up and walked by my side. “Good morning, Dr. Morgan,” she said, as I strode down the hallway to the boardroom where we were scheduled to meet. “Can I call you Drake?”
“Hello, Dr. Monroe.” I didn’t look at her when we got to the room and went inside. “Of course. Can I call you Lisa?” I said, trying to be friendly.
“Of course.”
“How is your day?” I asked, not that I was curious, but wanting to be polite.
