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Literature. Maybe I'd write a book. Maybe I'd
find some cozy job working for a publisher or something.
    So there
you go: a semi-solid life plan. Fingers crossed.
    But my
attempt to study on that lazy afternoon turned into an hour of scrolling
through my Facebook newsfeed, which turned into my wondering about where
exactly Dr. Greene went to school, and who he was before we'd come face-to-face.
    I thought
about his lab-coat, and how cool it was, really, that he could walk around –
the pinnacle of respectable positions, really – with his name sewn onto
his jacket. It's like, hey, look at this mother-effing coat. Do you know what
it says? I'm a doctor, for God's sake. Someone fetch me a pair of trendy
sunglasses.
    Caving on
impulse, I beamed over to Google and punched in his name. It came up without a
hitch:
    Dr. Alex
Greene, Orlando, Florida.
    He
received his Pre-Med degree at Harvard, and attended medical school at John
Hopkins. John Hopkins . He was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts and spent
his residency practicing Internal Medicine, focus on Cardiology, at Mass
General. He had published several articles on heart stents and the treatment of
various murmurs.
    Cambridge,
I thought to myself. Cambridge, Mass. Cambridge, UK. The tiny coincidence (did
it count?) made me smile.
    Clicking
back, I sifted through the few images that were available – mostly small,
pixel-y shots, but they were still very much him. A bit of stubble, full lips,
vibrant eyes. The shock of dark hair and wry smile. A man, not a boy. A man who
had accomplished, so it seemed, a great deal. And I wondered how old he was.
Early thirties, maybe?
    Glancing
around my room, I couldn't help but feel slightly juvenile. Everything smelled
of Victoria Secret body spray, and the floor was covered with clothes both
washed and in need of washing – but because I never actually put my clothes
away, I couldn't tell.
    I
contemplated the morning, and how Dr. Greene seemed sincerely interested. I
could see it, I could feel it. I couldn't have been that delusional, could I?
    But what
did he see? Because what I saw, as I met my own reflection in the mirror that
hung on my bedroom door, was a twenty-two-year-old girl. A twenty-two-year-old
girl who watched too much Netflix, and liked to eat ice cream out of Tupperware
containers instead of actual dishware, and didn't wear sexy pajamas or even
owned clothing nearly as nice as Dr. Greene probably did. A girl who could belt
out Taylor Swift's “Blank Space” like nobody's business, but had no real grasp
on science, or the mechanics of the body, or the grand inner-weaving that
composed the human frame.
    A girl. I
was a girl.
    And he
was a man.
    I was his
patient, and he was my doctor.
    So where
could it go, anyway?
    I sighed,
shut my laptop, and lay back.
    His words
still pressed some untouched button deep inside of me. The brush of his fingers
was still hot against my wrist.
    But there
was nothing to be done about it.

 

Chapter 4
    ALEX

 
 
 
 
    First,
do no harm .
    Alright,
so that's actually a myth – a common misconception often attributed to the
Hippocratic Oath. But even as doctors, we use it. We tuck it away in our
pockets like a Post-It note; a reminder of the oaths we take, and the paths we
walk as medical professionals.
    The most
fucked-up part of it all is that we're human, with human bones and human blood.
Yet still, there are those that we meet with whom we can have nothing to do
with. Even if the feelings are real. Even if we want them.
    I had
just come back from a run, and the sun was still low behind the buildings. It
was going to be a hot day, and I could already smell the heady trace of highway
smog in the air – the heat just made everything worse. It colored the people
with a thick sense of irritation. People were, on the whole, pissy-er in the
summertime. And God, the rain.
    I
blinked, glancing down towards the streets, where people were scattered like
grains of rice. From where I stood,