Molly - Sarah Monzon Page 0,19

as she vigorously shook her head and tightened her grip on my leg. Who knew preschoolers were part boa constrictors?

Chicken lady let out an impatient huff. No way would she stick around for the time it would take to get Chloe to raise her face and mutter an apology. Painting on the most repentant look I could muster, I turned toward her. “I’m really sorry, ma’am.”

She rolled her eyes and placed the chicken breasts in her cart before stomping away.

I peeled Chloe off my leg. “Your cart pushing privileges are revoked, young lady. Time to ride.”

She groused a little but let me lift her into the seat, and we continued to make our way up and down aisles at an appropriate speed. I didn’t have a list of ingredients because I hadn’t thought to find a recipe to follow before coming to the store. That meant I had to go down every aisle to see what sparked my memory about what went into spaghetti and meatballs. I turned into the cereal aisle. Captain Crunch didn’t belong in Italian food so I lengthened my stride.

“Unicorn cereal! I want the unicorn cereal.” Chloe stretched to reach for the pink box of sugar disguised as breakfast food, the magical white unicorn sitting beside a giant bowl of rainbows tempting every little girl as she passed.

“Not today, Chloe.” I gently lowered her arm into the safe confines of the cart.

If only reasoning with a four-year-old were that simple.

Her bottom lip jutted out past the top as she peered up at me. “But I want it. Please. It’s unicorns and rainbows!”

“Not today,” I re-iterated, more firmly this time.

Her lip quivered. Eyes welled with tears.

I tilted my chin up so as not to look at her. Maybe if she didn’t have an audience her little dramatic performance would stop.

Wrong.

A Hulk-sized temper tantrum ensued. Screaming. Tears. Flailing. The whole nine yards. A mom passed us, and our eyes locked for a moment. She didn’t say anything, but she didn’t have to. I could mentally see her hand rising, three fingers out in the Mockingjay salute. No, the odds were not in my favor right then.

I quickly steered the cart away from the cereal aisle and tried to distract Chloe from her fit. Nothing I did seemed to work. My blood pressure rose as people either openly judged or gave us those I’m-trying-to-make-it-look-like-I’m-not-looking-at-you-but-I-really-am side squints.

I stared down at the child in my shopping cart. Face red and wet, hair wild about her head. How could she be so sweet one minute and like this the next? It was like she’d come into the store a cute mogwai, but the grocery store had been all bright lights, water, and eating after midnight, turning her into a gremlin.

Wanting desperately to contain this public display, I hurriedly gathered the rest of the ingredients, paid, and peeled out of the parking lot.

Good-bye, Grocery World. Hello, literally any other grocery store on the planet.

6

Ben

An eighty-hour work week—that’s all the hospital was allowed to work the interns and residents per the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education. But when I’d gently reminded Dr. Feinburg of that fact after he’d assigned me to continue care for the patient admitted earlier, I’d been loudly and matter-of-factly put in my place. Following a patient from admission to release, even if the process took thirty to forty hours straight, was more beneficial to the resident’s education than observing several patients over shorter periods of time. Apparently.

Dr. Mitchell didn’t have a problem extending his shift, Dr. Feinburg had pointed out with a sneer. Nor had Dr. Suthers complained about eating, sleeping, and showering at the hospital for the past fifty-one hours, he added with a macabre gleam in his eye.

But neither Dr. Mitchell nor Dr. Suthers had a young daughter they were trying to raise all by themselves. Dr. Lee had two children, but he also had a wife to help shoulder the responsibility of parenthood and make sure his sons were never left unattended. Chloe only had me, woefully insufficient as I was. Which was why I’d respectfully declined the patient and accepted Drew’s offer to cover the case.

I shuddered to imagine what sort of punishment Dr. Feinburg would think up for what he no doubt perceived as insubordination. Stool sample collection duties or worse. Didn’t matter. I couldn’t spend a hundred and thirty-six hours out of a hundred and sixty-eight hours a week at the hospital like some of my colleagues. Sleep deprivation already dulled my mental