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“I watch too many wildlife programs when I’m at home and need to zone out and forget about networks and security.”
The light reflects off the red and purple storefronts opposite. Two women are laughing as they exit, one peering into a shopping bag. Manhattan suddenly feels full of the possibilities of spring. Is she right? An awful wild hope claws up my chest that in the last few years I’ve buried under my career and my medical degree. But I don’t want to reawaken the desire forthatconnection, for anamazing guy. My expectations are stupidly high, and it sits raw in my gut that David put that expectation there, and then wasn’t that person. Guys like the one I want don’t exist.
Jo must read something in my face because she reaches out and touches my hand. “I understand, Kate, and I have the utmost sympathy for you. But don’t be held back by David or your goddamn parents, okay? They demand so much of you, don’t give them your relationships with other people as well. Maybe David wasn’t the right guy, but perhaps you’ll find someone like him whowillbe right for you.”
I’ve sworn to myself that I’m not going down that road again. Men like this, who derail their own lives and carry everyone else along for the ride, the ones who never think about other people, are a liability. I’m touched that she sees me and the pressure from my parents so clearly, that she’s stuck her neck out to be blunt with me, but the last thing I need is a gray wolf.
“I won’t,” I say. “I promise I won’t.”
5
Kate
Iglance down at the number making my phone vibrate.Mom. Over half of my family work in medicine, and although that’s good because we can discuss problems and cases, their combined expertise is impossible to live up to. There was never any question about what I’d do for my career, and I’m fine with it; most of the time, I love it. But I never want to take their calls. Oh, I’m sure they care in their own peculiar way, but it all comes with a raft of expectations. Conversations are loaded: They appear to demonstrate a concern for me, but they also burrow down into my life until I’m pinned against a wall with nowhere to go. And I’m struggling in the ER, so talking to them could just make it all worse. I’m not having panic attacks, I remind myself firmly as I pick up the phone.
“Mom.”
“Sweetheart,” she says. “How are you? How’s emergency medicine?”
I examine the pale blue paint on the kitchen wall. My mom rarely phones for a social chat. As a family physician, she’s often preoccupied with patients, and I understand this. Someone who’s sick always takes precedence. There are people who would tell you that your family should come first, but the person I’m saving has loved ones too, right? Why should I put mine before theirs?
I give her an update on what I’m doing, omitting any references to problems in the ER or Janus and Jo, or a certain guy who seems to be occupying a lot of my thoughts.
“How’s that lovely friend of yours … Jo? The one who works in technology?”
My mom says “technology” with a weird emphasis; like tech is some new-fangled thing that young people do that needs to be endured, as if she doesn’t use it to treat her patients and work with it every day of her life.
“She’s doing well. I was round there the other night for a meal.”
“Oh! How lovely of her to feed you.”
“Her business is going well,” I say, and I stare at the pile of mail sitting on the kitchen counter, the textbooks waiting for me on the table. Jo has finished college and has a successful company and has hooked one of the best men I’ve ever met. No one would describe Fabian as a good man. A lunatic perhaps, even dangerous … but good? No. But unfortunately, that just makes him all the more attractive. Ugh. I need to stop with the Fabian daydreaming.
“That’s nice. Not quite medicine though, is it, darling?”
I grin at the blue wall now. I could debate that with her, and sometimes winding her up by reminding her of very successful people who left education at sixteen is fun. Today, however, I don’t get a chance.
“Anyway, I’m calling about Javier’s wedding, darling. It’s a month away now and well … your aunt called me.”
I inwardly groan as I move toward the lounge looking for the embossed cream invite—the kind of thing you’d put behind a clock or above a fireplace if you had one, which I don’t! Javier is my cousin, and we’ve always had this insanely competitive relationship with my uncle’s family: The stories are legendary about my dad and his brother when they were young. I’m sure I’ve stuffed the invite in a drawer to forget about it, and I move through to my bedroom, opening and closing drawers, my hands damp and slipping on the handles. A month! Where is the damn thing? Where is this wedding even going to be?
My father will want to demonstrate how well we’re all doing. This is the first reason I hadn’t responded; the second is that Javier works on Wall Street and is a pretentious asshole. I’m failing at Emergency Room 101. How can I sit with them all and pretend everything’s fine? I grip my phone tighter. My mother is so proud of how many of us have chosen to be doctors, and there’ll be so much questioning and posturing.Yuck.
“Are you thinking of bringing anyone?”
My mom’s voice is hesitant, and my search falters. Oh God! Why didn’t this occur to me? Ever since an ex answered my phone early one morning (so clearly sleeping with her daughter) and she gave him the third degree about his major (art, for which he scored, like, minus three million points) and his prospects (which he didn’t take too kindly to), I have not mentioned another man in my life. The artist, Euan, and I split up not long after. He was chilled and fun, but he started to question why he was with me after my mom gave him a grilling.
My mother and I dance around things in an effort to keep the peace, but not Euan: I blamed her when we broke up. Maybe it wasn’t fair of me. I don’t think the relationship would have lasted, but the way he was treated made my blood boil. He was lovely and kind, and they made him feel inadequate. I didn’t tell them about the David debacle, and I thank my lucky stars for whatever made me keep that romance out of the parental spotlight when I was so besotted with him.
“Of course, Tod is coming with his family. Seb is bringing his girlfriend, and I think Georgie has invited her latest man.”
Bless my siblings. And Georgie is seeing someone? Why didn’t I know this? I rub my eyes, and it’s on the tip of my tongue to say something, but I don’t want to give my mother an in with Georgie: She wouldn’t thank me. I need to call her. Tod is my eldest brother, an amazing surgeon and married to the good-natured Lily, with a pair of recently born twins—my first, gorgeous, nephews. Seb has been with the girl he’s with since he graduated and is refusing to marry her, much to my parents’ chagrin.
But Georgie is our rebel. As the youngest, she rejected all the Thurman academic pressure by first becoming a hippy, then spurning college and turning into an environmental activist. I envy her. But as all this news sinks in, I suddenly realize why my mother has called. Fucking hell. Why is everything a competition in this family? She wants me to bring someone, so I don’t stand out among my siblings, so it looks like every part of my life is successful.
I squeeze my eyes shut. “There is someone I was thinking of bringing,” I say, my throat dry, and as soon as the words are out of my mouth, I want to kick myself.
“Wonderful, darling,” she says, voice light. “I’ll let your uncle know. Lovely to talk to you and catch up.”
