Page 34 of After Everything
I pulled up a chair and sat down at her eye level. I wasn’t standing over her, I wasn’t rushing. Just present.
"In through your nose," I said, demonstrating. "Hold it for four counts. Out through your mouth. Can you do that with me?"
She nodded, tears streaming down her face, and tried to match my breathing.
We sat there for three minutes, breathing together, until her hands stopped shaking and her shoulders dropped.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I just… when they said I needed to see the nurse practitioner, I thought…"
"It's okay," I said. "That's a completely normal reaction. But I want you to know that an abnormal mammogram doesn't automatically mean cancer. There are a lot of reasons for a callback, and most of them are benign. We're going to walk through this together, okay?"
She nodded again, wiping her eyes.
I spent the next twenty minutes explaining the next steps, answering her questions, making sure she understood everything before she left. When she finally stood to go, she hugged me.
"Thank you," she said. "You made this so much less scary."
"That's what I'm here for."
After she left, I updated her chart andchecked the time. 4:30 PM. Two more patients, then I was done for the day.
I loved this. All of it. The patient interactions, the autonomy, the feeling that I was actually making a difference instead of just following orders. Being an NP was everything I'd hoped it would be.
My phone buzzed. A text from Jess.
Dinner tonight? That Thai place you like? I have GOSSIP.
I smiled and texted back:
7 PM? I'm intrigued.
Perfect. Prepare yourself.
I finished up with my last two patients (a routine physical and a follow-up for high blood pressure) and signed off for the day. The sun was still out when I left the office, one of those perfect spring evenings where everything felt possible.
I stopped at the farmers market on myway home. Picked up fresh vegetables, a loaf of sourdough, some flowers for my kitchen table. Simple things that made my apartment feel like home.
My apartment. Not huge, but mine. One bedroom in a quiet neighborhood, hardwood floors, good natural light. I'd painted the walls myself: a soft gray in the living room, pale blue in the bedroom. Hung artwork I actually liked instead of the generic prints David and I had picked out together because they matched the couch.
I had a couch I'd chosen. Dishes I'd picked out. A life I'd built from scratch.
And I was proud of it.
I was walking down the sidewalk, canvas bag full of vegetables, when I saw him.
David.
He was coming out of a coffee shop half a block ahead, laptop bag over his shoulder, looking down at his phone. He hadn't seen me yet.
My heart jumped, but not the way it used to. Not with that sick, twisting panic. Just surprise. The shock of seeing someoneyou used to know in a place you didn't expect them.
He looked different. Thinner, maybe. His hair was shorter. He was wearing jeans and a button-down instead of a suit, and he looked... tired. But not the exhausted, falling-apart tired he'd had the last time I'd seen him. Just normal tired. End-of-the-workday tired.
He glanced up from his phone and saw me.
We both stopped walking.
For a moment, neither of us moved. Just stood there on the sidewalk, ten feet apart, staring at each other like we'd both seen a ghost.
