Page 2 of Hearts on the Table
“Um, what the fuck was that?”
“Reese denied her OR request for Mrs. Marquett until she could consult me on it. And I’m on the EVLP now.”
For a self-professed “friend” of mine, Jones didn’t have to sound so smug about it all. Not that I was surprised. As the only cardiothoracic surgery fellows of our year, we were constantly paired together. Despite working so closely, I’d never grown accustomed to his smarmy vibes.
“We can salvage this, though. Let’s grab some drinks and talk about the Marquett case.” He tousled his chestnut-brown, prince charming hair, eyes scraping up the front of my scrubs.
Exhibit A.
“Jones, you little shit, I wasn’t talking to you. You’re not helping anything, and she doesn’t want to go out with you. Especially not after she just got bitch-slapped during rounds by an attending.” Rija scowled, and I once again thanked God for her existence. I was in no mood to deal with Jones tonight.
Everyone else tip-toed around him, hesitant to piss off the grandson of the head of Cedar’s surgical quality board. He made it a point to remind everyone, as often as possible, that his grandaddy, Robert Sturmond, had almost single-handedly made the shiny new hospital I stood in a reality.
Thankfully, when everyone else walked on eggshells around him, Rija didn’t hesitate to verbally smack him around a little bit.
“Double whammy, huh?” Rija reached out to rub my shoulder as Jones shuffled out the door. I felt bad enough that I let her console me for a few seconds before I crossed to the coffee bar. Her hand fell.
“I don’t even want to talk about the EVLP. I’m going to have to get with Cooper to see if he can pull rank. And when I asked about the OR for Marquett, Reese told me to getJones’sinput on it. As if I didn’t just conduct that successful bypass graft two weeks ago by myself? Frack that. I should have just waited and asked Cooper when he’s on call tomorrow.”
Cooper would have given me OR priority in a heartbeat, as long as he’d be able to make some cuts. Nearing the end of my fellowship, with interviews just around the corner for an open attending surgeon position at Cedar, I was desperate enough for surgical time that I’d hand him the scalpel myself.
She nodded, considering me. “I know you don’t cuss, so I’ll go ahead and say it for you: what the hell, Reese? Fuck off!”
“Thank you!” One of the great things about Rija—she had a mouth like a sailor and I always appreciated the assist. Sometimes, telling someone to “frack off” just wasn’t as effective.
“Any time. Sending you to Jones was a low blow. You’re perfectly capable.”
“Thank you,” I breathed while I grabbed a tea bag. The familiar habit of filling my beat-up insulated mug with hot water soothed a modicum of the rage swirling inside me. “Stupid Reese. What does he know, anyway?”
“Well…” Rija quibbled, fiddling with a few buttons on the fancy chrome espresso machine.
“What?” My voice was as flat as Reese’s, which was an accomplishment. Just thinking about his slow, bland take down in front of the residents boiled my blood. “Talking to him is like trying to speak to a bowl of oatmeal. How did he even get a job here?”
“Ouch,” Rija sputtered out a laugh, eyes darting around the empty black leather couches and pristine white tables of the lounge. “Pull those punches a little, lady. He’s not a bad surgeon.”
I scowled at the hot water in my cup. So, maybe he wasn’t the worst surgeon on the floor. But I was too caught up in my feels to admit that, yes, Reese was in fact a very competent doctor. He’d have to be to end up here, at one of the most prominent cardiac programs in the country.
“I mean, maybe he’s not the most exciting guy in the world. But he takes care of the baby residents. It’s that ‘Northwestern’ in him; the teaching hospital DNA. The residents learn more from him than all the other attendings, combined.”
Ok, fine. Reese was also a good teacher. And he had a habit of pointing us in the right direction and letting us figure things out for ourselves, which I usually enjoyed. But right now, in this moment, he’d humiliated me in front of freakin’ Jonesandmy residents, and that made me want to key his car.
“Aaaand…” Rija handed me a cup of ice, leaning back like I would bite.
“What.” I anticipated betrayal.
Rija flung her hands up to her shoulders. “I’m just saying Jones is an ass, but he isn’t a complete dummy, either. He just had two CAD cases last month. Let him look at the files. Can’t hurt, you know?”
I sipped my tea. Apparently, there weretwocars to key tonight.
Rija steered me out of the room. “Listen. You’ve been here since five a.m. and were supposed to go home an hour ago. Let Jones look at the files, chat with Cooper in the morning, and let the anger go. Be the bigger person. Even the great Lainey Carmichael can take an L every once in a while.”
She gave me a little push towards the staff locker rooms. I glared at her, knowing somewhere deep, deep,deepdown that maybe she was right. Maybe.
“Jones still sucks, though,” I growled. She patted my head.
“Yes he does, sweetie. I’ll tell him to fuck off again when I see him next.”
I slumped into the lockers to grab my stuff. Keying two cars in my current state would have been too much work, anyway.
