morning, she came in to the hospital with a newly shorn head, khakis with a brown leather belt, and a plaid, short-sleeved shirt. Of course, the first person she saw on her way to the locker room was Dr. Rich Mortimer, who couldn’t help the shock when he saw her hair, his mouth hanging open.
“Your hair…”
“Yeah, I’ve wanted to do this for a long time,” she said. “Now seemed like the right time.”
He looked her up and down, his face expressionless. Pointing over his shoulder, he nodded toward the lounge. “I’ll see you inside?”
She bit her lip to keep from grinning. “I’ll definitely see you inside.”
It would be difficult to make a gender statement wearing scrubs. She already wore a compression garment so her boobs weren’t the first thing people saw. But she was glad he’d seen her in her standard female-to-male transgender outfit. Eddie had called it that, “Your little outfits,” insulted because she wouldn’t wear his clothes.
“In the first place, Ed, your clothes are too big, and the whole thing is I don’t want to completely hide my body. Thanks anyway.”
So she shopped the FTM (female to male) catalogues to get clothing that wasn’t easy to find in stores, like the compression undershirts. She felt strongly about living her authentic life, but on her journey, it wasn’t easy. Whatever she did, it had to feel right.
She dressed in the female locker room because she was still a female. So many dilemmas, and she didn’t want to add conflicts were none were warranted. No one knew her yet, so she hoped the change in hairstyle wouldn’t become a big issue. But when she entered the lounge, Rich Mortimer was waiting for her. He wasn’t just waiting for the residents, he was waiting for her.
“Do you want to grab your lab coat? We’ll start rounds.”
“Okay,” she said hesitantly, wondering about the other surgical residents. “I’ll be right back.”
“Meet you in the hall,” he said softly.
She noticed they were being observed, which was a little unnerving. He was the chief resident, and she was the peon, so it was natural that they’d be going out into the hospital together.
Grabbing her lab coat, she stuck a box of mints in the pocket after popping one in her mouth first. Out in the hall, Rich waited, leaning against the wall, already a familiar, compelling figure. Against her will, his presence was a little unsettling, a little breathtaking.
“So, Dr. Saint, I was shocked at first, but I’m digging your hair.”
“You are?” She ran her hand through it, feeling that the top she’d so diligently tried to straighten was springing into curls again. “I’m not used to it yet.”
“It’s a big change,” he said, looking at her intently.
She just nodded, not willing to do any in-depth confessions the second day. He could be a radical conservative who hated the idea of diversity. There was no way of knowing this early, and not on the way to doing rounds.
In the elevator on the trip to the surgical floor, he talked about himself a little bit; he’d graduated from University of Minnesota and had gone to medical school there at UCSD. He was divorced from his wife of two years. They had a four-year-old son. She was an OR nurse at the surgical center in North County. They didn’t live together.
When he was done, he said, “Your turn.”
“Single. Never been married. Any more than that, you’ll have to buy me coffee.”
The elevator door opened. “That is definitely a deal.”
She snickered, thinking that probably the minute she told him she was transgender, he would change the subject or run. Lately, her favorite reading when she was trying to unwind was an LGBTQ forum, and she would be ready for anything. If he chose to penalize her for her sexuality, she was ready to fight him. But she prayed it didn’t come to that because then it would mean telling her mother, Lisa. And she didn’t think she had the courage to do that just yet.
The residents went from room to room, visiting the in-house patients who would be having surgery on the general surgery service that day, a conglomeration of fourteen surgeons who shared eight rooms in the operating room. She’d scrubbed with Dr. Mack Bushnell yesterday. The surgeon du jour was Benjamin Kravitz.
“He’s a little acerbic,” Rich warned, “but you’ll be fine. It’s the other two knuckleheads I’m worried about. Where they hell are they, anyway?”
“Do you want me to text them? They might be looking for