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Just called in one of the substitutes for the afternoon, and as soon as she gets here, I’ll head over. You want to go to your place or mine?
I had a feeling he was already at his place, so I wasn’t surprised when he asked me if I would be okay to come over there. I assured him I would, and I would see him in twenty minutes.
I got to his apartment, but my heart still raced as I got out of my car and headed inside. I rang the bell for his unit, and he let me in. It was obvious he had been crying, and though he looked perfectly fine himself, I knew something had to be really, very wrong.
“What’s going on?” I demand. “Are you alright? What happened?”
“I lost a patient today,” he said, his tone low.
“Jesus Christ, Trevor. You scared the shit out of me! I nearly drove into a pole driving over here as fast as I was going. I thought there was something wrong with you or something,” I said as I put my hand on my chest. I tried to slow the racing of my heart, but I was still catching my breath.
I felt for the patient he lost, I felt for their family. I felt for Trevor himself having to go through something like that. I knew that it was one of the biggest fears he had on the job, but I had no idea it would tear him apart like this if it ever happened. I was sure he knew being a surgeon as he was for a deadly disease such as cancer, he would understand that this was the sort of thing that would happen.
But, that also felt entirely heartless to say, and I knew I had to tread carefully. I didn’t like seeing him in so much pain, but I really had no idea what to say to him over it. He had already told me the day before that this was an older woman, and she didn’t want to have the surgery anyway.
It seemed that she was ready to pass on, though I know he didn’t want to be the one to help her make the pass. He was walking back and forth in front of me, then he sat down on the couch and hung his head.
“I just don’t know what I did wrong. I was so sure of this surgery. I was sure it was what she would need that would ultimately make her life a lot more comfortable in the future. I wanted her to be able to live out her remaining days without being in constant pain all the time. She was already so lonely without anyone in her life. If there was something – anything – I could do that would ease her life in some way, I wanted to do it. I felt that doing the surgery would be the perfect thing to take care of the chronic pain, and perhaps she would be able to go out and make more friends. Something that would help her not to be so lonely.”
I sat on the couch next to Trevor as he rambled on and on about the surgery and what he thought had gone wrong. I felt bad not being able to say anything that would make it better, or that would help solve what happened for him, but I did want him to know that I was there for him.
“You can’t blame yourself for this, you know that, right?” I asked. “You know she was old, she was sick. You know she was ready to go. She even said so herself, didn’t she? And you know that she wouldn’t hold it against you that she passed. In fact, if it is what she wanted, you probably made her really happy today. She’s not in any pain anymore, so you can be at peace over that.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Trevor scoffed and turned away from me. I sat back slightly, confused that he would say something so harsh to me. I knew I wasn’t a doctor, but I also knew that what I was saying made sense, and I was trying to help him see the logic in that.
I didn’t have to be there to see what went on or be a doctor to be able to tell him that he wasn’t to blame for what happened. But, he was already pissed off with the situation, with himself, and with life, so there was little I could say or do that would help out with the situation.
Even though I knew getting angry with him wasn’t the right answer, I couldn’t help it. It felt as though all the stress and anxiety that had been clinging to me since I found that note came bubbling up to the surface, and I yelled at him for it.
“I know you’re a good doctor, and I know that she was old! I don’t have to be there to know that this wasn’t your fault, and you don’t have the right to talk to me like that anyway. You asked me to come here, remember?” I asked.
“Maybe that was my first mistake,” he said.
“You take that back right now!” I snapped.
“No,” he said. “You don’t have any idea what goes on in the OR. There are real emergencies in there and people like me are supposed to know what to do when that happens. I go through years of training and learning to be able to know how to handle that situation when it comes up, and instead, I didn’t do anything. I let her die there on the table, and there’s no changing that now.”
“You’re just pissed off about the situation, and you’re taking it out on me,” I said. “I don’t know why I let you take me out of school just to yell at me that I don’t know what I’m talking about. Maybe you should have talked to one of your doctor buddies who does know what you’re talking about so you can both agree that you know what’s going on and what you did and who’s to blame. Shit!”
“Maybe you should just go back to your class,” he snapped at me. “I asked you to come over because I was in need of you. You are the one person who gets me as much as you do, and you are the one person who knows what to say or do in these situations. That’s why I wanted you to come here.”
“Sorry I’m not a mind reader! Maybe I really should go to my class and be done with it! Then you can just go on down to a big shiny life down in Texas and forget all about us up here! You lost the patient you were so worried about, so why bother staying on any longer?”
“Maybe I will!” he yelled.
“Then do it! Go! See if I give a damn what you do!” I yelled back.
There were now tears streaming down my own cheeks, and I wished I hadn’t come to talk to him in the first place. Of course, nothing would have held me back when I saw the text that he sent, but now that I knew what the real issue was and heard the things he was saying to me, I would have told him to calm down and talk to someone who could help him before he came to me about it.
I wasn’t a trained professional in any medical sense, so I had no idea what to say to him that would be able to get him through this. But, I also wasn’t going to put up with the way he was talking to me as though I didn’t know a thing about the situation when I really did have a good idea of what was going on and what happened.
Not to mention the entire reason I had come here was to give him the comfort I could and help him see that it wasn’t his fault. If I knew my intelligence was going to be attacked by coming to his place, I would have stayed at the school to get through the rest of my day before coming over here later when he had more time to calm down about everything.
But now, there was no taking back the things that had been said, and I was too pissed off and hurt with the way he treated me to even think of apologizing. I had come here to help, and instead I had been the one to be hurt and that pissed me off. I had a lot on my mind as it was, and I didn’t appreciate going out of my way to help out someone only to have it blow up in my face.
I was sorry for the situation, but it didn’t need to cost me my relationship, and now that we had broken up, we were done. I wasn’t the kind of girl who would be calling him and crying for him back tonight when I was lonely and sorry about the mean things that I told him.
If we were breaking up, then we were breaking up as far as I was concerned, and that meant we were done once and for all. I didn’t like going back and forth with anyone, though I was even more pissed off with this breakup now that I had given him my virginity.
