mirror or close friends to tell them about it?
“I don’t know … really.” And I don’t know for sure. I know a lot of the nurses whisper inappropriate comments about him. Inappropriate because of sexual misconduct rules at the hospital and inappropriate because they’re married with kids and attending church on Sundays.
My opinion of his hotness stays in my head. No one can fire me for my thoughts … except when I let them slip out to patients like, “Yeah, you might die.” A rare occurrence that happened only once, just after I started and at the end of a very long day when my brain felt ready to explode. In my defense, the boy was fifteen and knew he was dying. He just wanted one person to give it to him straight. And that just so happens to be my specialty.
But I never join in the break room chatter about Dr. Hotness Hawkins (not my label) and the speculation of his penis size in relation to his hand size and finger length ratio. There is nothing scientific to back that up. That I did mention in the break room once, but it wasn’t well received by my coworkers. I think they used the word “killjoy” to describe me.
“Finish what you started to say.”
“Oh shoot.” I grin as the doors open to my floor. “No time. Bye, Dr. Hawkins.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Meatballs
Elijah
Five days after our chat outside of the hospital and in the elevator, more alluding to my gossip popularity, I decide to call Dorothy. No solid reasoning backs my decision. I just know that my incessant need for things in my life to make sense has gotten me nowhere.
No clarity.
No family unit.
No wife.
No hope that it’s all just a bad dream.
So I change directions and let instinct guide me. My instinct says Julie would shed several tears if I died, but short of that, she wants nothing to do with me. My love rubs her like a splintery piece of wood someone impaled into her chest. Every move I make only intensifies her pain and angers her.
“Hi, Dr. Hawkins.” Dorothy answers on the first ring, probably because I’ve followed her guidelines for the best time to reach her. I have a feeling she has a lot of guidelines. Fine by me. I’ll take all the cues and guidance I can get. If she doesn’t brutally murder me with the truth first, I find it quite possible that her honesty could unshackle me from my self-doubt.
That self-doubt sucks. It’s a creepy little bastard that lingers in a dark corner waiting to chase me into the street, where I have a high probability of getting struck by a bus. When someone says “It’s me, not you,” it’s a blinking neon sign that there’s something so fundamentally wrong with you, that they’d rather take the blame than let you find out how they really feel about you.
“Dr. Hawkins?”
I clear my throat. “Yes. Hi. How are you?”
“Tired.”
“Oh, is this a bad time? I can call you when you’re less tired.”
“Okay.”
I stare out my bedroom window at the sunset over downtown Portland, a ridiculous grin pinned to my face. Maybe Dorothy is on the autism spectrum, lacking the social filter of neurotypical people, or maybe she prefers complete honesty over frivolous lies.
On my days off, I like to sleep in as long as Roman will allow. But my mom has a gift for waking me up with an early phone call. She asks if I’m sleeping. I always lie and say no because I don’t want her to feel bad for waking me. Maybe I should say yes and follow it up with an honest “but that’s okay.”
“Or I can make this really quick so you can get to bed.”
“Okay.” Her personality continues to feed my amusement—my joy.
Even if she is honest to a fault, she at least has an aptitude for agreeability.
“Great. Would you like to have dinner next week?”
“I like to have dinner every week,” she deadpans.
I chuckle. Is she joking? Serious? I don’t know. I like that I don’t know. It makes the possibility of getting to know her that much more appealing.
“Me too. Roman is a fan of dinner too. He likes spaghetti. We’d love for you to have spaghetti with us next week on a night that works with your schedule.”
“Well, Mondays are chaos. Tuesday might work if I put some extra study time in on Monday. Wednesdays don’t work because it’s pet night at the car wash. When you purchase