Pulse

by Hayes, Liv

  I sat up in bed and covered my face, freaked out by how quickly this girl had managed to leave her imprint on my fucking brain.

  Control yourself, man. Control yourself.

  I repeated this mantra. Several times. Still, I couldn’t stop myself.

  Shaking hands, frantic thoughts, shallow breath. It was the first time I indulged in thoughts of Mia – the scant sight of her exposed shoulder, her pretty mouth – and came within moments. Heaving, orgiastic, with a feeling that spread throughout my whole body.

  Goddamn.

  I felt disgusted afterwards. I was almost tempted to assign Dr-fucking-Weisman to attend to her in my stead.

  But then, finally satiated, I thought of Mia’s last words to me:

  You’re a very nice doctor.

  No, I wasn’t.

  But she didn’t know me.

  Chapter 3

  MIA

  Aimee arrived that morning, carrying a bouquet of pink carnations that smelled like nothing.

  I took a look at the small card attached to one of the stems and groaned.

  “Don’t tell me,” I said. Aimee blinked.

  “I told Evan that you were in the hospital.”

  “Oh, God. What did he say?”

  The screen of Aimee’s LG lit up her face, and she read through the line of text:

  “I hope it wasn’t my fault,” he said. “Tell her I hope she’s alright. If I pay you back, could you get her some flowers or something for me?”

  With that, she dropped the phone in her purse, and smiled bleakly. The carnations, which were already browning at the petal’s edges, looked even flimsier in the pale light of Evan’s blatant douchebag-ery.

  “Are you okay?” Aimee asked.

  “I’ll be better when we graduate and I never have to share a general space with that asshole ever again,” I said. “Also, I love that he feels responsible for my chest pains.”

  “So what was it, anyway?” Aimee asked. “What was Dr. Dreamy’s prognosis?”

  “You’re ridiculous,” I said, laughing a little. “I don’t know. That’s what I’m waiting to find out.”

  Aimee reclined against the bay window, her feet propped up on the edge of my bed. She wore these Grecian sandals, and her toes, as usual, were perfectly painted this shade of coral blue.

  Glancing down at my Panda-printed socks, it made me feel slightly insecure. Weirdly self-conscious. I felt a little cold, and a little uncomfortable with the layers of tape pressing the IV needle in a way that kind of pinched. I was both ready to go home and anticipating Dr. Greene’s arrival, thinking about how he had promised to check in on me, and how strange it all was that I was so quickly over Evan and so rapidly able to preserve with perfect clarity Dr. Greene’s every small movement and faint gesture from the night before. Every smile, every inflection of every word, was already pressed into me like a sculptor takes to clay.

  Honey, he’d called me. Pressing the stethoscope against my chest, his mouth parting slightly, his eyes – it almost felt – purposely avoiding mine. The brush of his fingertips against the inside of my wrist.

  I recalled how he looked when he first walked into the ER, holding his clipboard against his chest and looking so surprised. They say it only takes a few seconds to truly know if you’re into someone, and maybe he was into me.

  My chest tightened again. The EKG began making a beeping sound, and both Aimee and I turned, startled.

  “Is everything okay?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “It hasn’t made a sound like that all night.”

  But neither of had to do anything. As if having heard it from the hallway, or maybe he was simply a man of perfect timing, Dr. Greene came walking in, his head partly cocked to the side. His hair was in a gorgeous state of disheveled; his deep-emerald eyes heavy from what was probably lack of sleep. Still, he was a perfect roughly-six-foot (though truthfully, maybe an inch or two shy) tower of fair skin and sinewy limbs and a mouth like ripe fruit.

  I had to stop myself from staring, and suddenly I forgot all about my Panda-printed socks or the fact that I was wearing a hospital gown that was three-times too big, or the fact that I hadn’t even brushed my hair yet.

  He smiled, his eyes grazing mine, and I knew it was only for me.

  “No worries,” he assured. “It just needs to be reset.”

  He walked over, pressed a few buttons, and the beeping stopped. Dr. Greene took a glance at the screen, then glanced down at his shoes. They were polished as the rest of him.

  “Thanks,” I said. “I was worried for a second there.”

  “How are you feeling, Miss Holloway?” Dr. Greene asked.

  “You can call me Mia,” I reminded him.

  He appeared, just briefly, stinted. I could feel Aimee watching the both of us, seemingly amused.

  “How are you feeling, Mia?” he asked, this time more softly. “Did you sleep well?”

  “Yes, surprisingly.”

  Thoughts of the night before came seeping in, brimming with evening colors. I recalled Dr. Greene’s smile, or how his lips pressed together when he listened to my pulse. Like he was holding back words he’d never dare tell me.

  “Well, good news,” he said. “The blood-work and Chest-X ray came back normal. So far, that’s a good sign.”

  “So is that it?” I asked.

  “I’d like to have you in my office this week for a few other tests,” he removed a pen from his coat pocket – starch-white, perfectly clean, his name (Dr. Alex Greene, MD) embroidered over his heart – and clicked it a few times. Almost like an anxious tick. He glanced at Aimee, then back at me. Rigidly, he combed a hand through his dark, ash-brown hair. “I’d like to have a more detailed Cardiac sonogram done. We’ll have a look at that, then go from there, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  Dr. Greene smiled, and there was a smidge of goofiness to it. His eyes lit up, and I saw it again: a small glimpse giddy affection.

  Honey.

  “And,” he said, his tone a pitch higher, like there was something to celebrate. “You can go home now.”

  “Thank God,” I said. “I feel so gross.”

  He said nothing. Just glanced down at his clipboard, scribbled something, and cleared his throat. Aimee, ever-watching, tapped a fingernail against the window. I could spot the small smirk starting to pull at the corner of her berry-stained lips – it was the kind of smirk you could spot from a hundred miles away. She’d have something to say when we were out of dodge.

  “I’ll pull the car around while you get changed, then?” she posed.

  I glanced at Dr. Greene, and he nodded.

  “I’ll have them hurry up with your discharge papers,” he said breezily. “I have the power to quicken the process, you know.”

  “Well, you are a doctor,” Aimee said slyly. “Handsome to behold, too.”

  He laughed, but there was almost a kind of discard to the sound. As if she were a bit of dust he wanted to brush from his shoulder.

  And, although I felt a small twinge of guilt, I was glad to watch her leave the room; I wanted to see the contrast. The contrast between how he looked at me with her around, and when we were alone.

  When the door closed, we looked at each other again. At first, he looked slightly uncomfortable; he smiled, but it was wide and almost gawkish. Like he was figuring out how to do this for the first time – talk to a girl.

  “Hello,” he said again, after a few seconds had passed.

  “Hi,” I said again, suddenly conscious of the wires, like vines, sprouting from my chest. The line on the EKG started to jump, and I felt inescapably given away. “I’m sorry.”

  “Why are you sorry?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, flushing. “I just am.”

  He waited a moment before seating himself next to me. The line started to jump higher, and his Cheshire-like-grin grew. He thought it was funny.

  “Would you like me to set you free?”

  “Are you allowed?”<
br />
  Dr. Greene shrugged lightly.

  “Typically, Mia, I leave these jobs to the nurses who – I will be honest – are slightly more experienced,” he took a small breath. “But, yes. I am a doctor, and am able to remove EKG electrodes. I’ve had some practice.”

  “Okay.”

  He cleared his throat again, this time, looking as if he were a little embarrassed.

  “I’ll need you to…” he paused. “Lie back for me.”

  Lie back for me.

  I obeyed him, the gentle doctor’s command. With a quick precision, he plucked each of the EKG wires from the electrodes that were still stuck – just stickers, really – to my skin.

  When he pulled back, his eyes widened. His mouth, serpentine and full, was a shade darker.

  For a half-second, our faces were close enough that I could have leaned forward and kissed him.

  “Give me your hand,” he instructed firmly.

  I offered him my left hand, the one free of bandages, and he burst out laughing.

  “No, honey, your right. I’m going to remove your IV.”

  Honey. Again. We were both giggling like little kids, and with careful hands, he peeled back the tape, and apologized when it snagged.

  “I’msorry,” he said all at once, then slid the needle out. “All done.”

  He pressed gauze to the small puncture, and wrapped it with that weird tape that isn’t even sticky. Still holding my hand, he brushed his fingers over my knuckles, his eyebrows fallen and lips cut in a soft slant.

  Then, realizing what he was doing, he drew away. Would it be insane for me to say that something in me twisted – just a little?

  “So I’d like you to call my office,” he said, removing a small index card from his lab-coat pocket. I wondered what else he could fit in there. The pockets of a doctor’s lab-coat almost seemed equivalent to a clown car. “They’ll probably tell you that there’s a wait, because I’m typically booked up by about two months, but let them know I’m willing to fit you in.”

  “You can do that?”

  “I can,” he answered. There was a hint of pride in his tone, and rightly so, I guess. “It’s my office. I can do what I want.”

  With his two ever-green eyes still fixed on mine, he sighed. A soft little sigh, almost like a million songs I’d heard before.

  “So you work at the hospital in the mornings, and at night, and in the afternoons, you see patients at your office,” I said, then folded my hands. “Don’t you get burnt out?”

  He smiled.

  “It’s worth it,” he answered.

  If my heart were a set of strings, he could have played them like a harp. And for a few seconds, it was just us – the patient, the doctor, and the pressing realization that there was nothing we could do about it. The dynamics of our relationship, whether we wanted to rip it apart and set it on fire, were already sealed.

  “You’re all taken care of, aren’t you?”

  We both turned towards the nurse, jolted. And though she smiled politely, there was something about her unprompted appearance that made me nervous. We’d done nothing wrong, but it still felt as if we had been caught.

  Suddenly, as Dr. Greene straightened up, I was forced to wonder if I had imagined everything. The warm eyes, the flirtatious smirk.

  “I took care of it,” he said, his voice cold with authority. Not a hint of soft affection. “Miss Holloway is ready to go home now, Grace. If you’d be so kind, I’d like to sign her discharge papers and get her on her way.”

  That was it. Something that typically seemed to take hours was wrangled in the span of ten minutes. And before I knew it, I was dressed, signed-out, and released. The orderly arrived to take me to Aimee’s car, and I spent my last moments floating through the halls that were flooded with a honey-colored sunlight.

  Dr Greene followed until we reached the elevator, his eyes cast downward.

  And for some reason, even though I knew I had done absolutely nothing wrong, I felt badly. Not just for me, but for him.

  As the doors opened, he cut me one last glance.

  “Goodbye, Mia,” he said.

  I turned to him as the elevator doors began to close, but couldn’t bring myself to actually look at him. Something inside of me was already hurting.

  “Goodbye, Dr. Greene.”

  “You know who he looks like?” Aimee asked as we stepped into my apartment. “Robb Stark. Like, if Robb Stark was a doctor.”

  “You’re ridiculous.”

  “If by ridiculous, you mean observant,” she said, then watched me as I slid out of my sandals, walked over to the couch, and wearily sat down. “He likes you, you know.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “That doctor,” she said. “Doctor of the North. He was totally trying not to stare at you.”

  What was I supposed to do? Indulge it? No. No, that wouldn’t have been a good idea.

  “You think?” I asked. “Anyway, he’s a doctor, and I’m me, so it’s not like it’s anything worth talking about.”

  Aimee curled a strand of hair around her finger, her toes pointed straight as an arrow. Looking around the apartment, I could still spy bits of Evan – an empty can of Coke that I hadn’t picked up, or a stray magazine. I knew she could see him, too. The ghosts that still lingered.

  “I need to get back to campus,” she said, and I said: “I know. I need to shower and get to the library, too.”

  “Shouldn’t you stay and rest? Take the weekend off?”

  I sighed.

  “Maybe. I just can’t stop thinking about…about things. And stuff.”

  “You’re a shoe-in for Cambridge. You know you are, Mia.”

  “Am I, you think?” I stretched my limbs, happy to be freed of all wires. Only the electrodes were still stuck to my skin, like leeches. “Because I’d say the odds aren’t exactly in my favor.”

  Aimee rolled her eyes.

  “I love you,” she said. “Now get some sleep. Take a bath. Maybe spend a little time fantasizing about Dr. Stark and his beautiful, manly, doctor-ly face.”

  “Goodbye, Aimee.”

  She blew me a kiss, and was gone. Like the wind. That’s all she ever was.

  I took a long shower, peeling the electrode stickers off and trying not to wince. Beneath the jets of hot water, every touch of my own fingertips reminded me of Dr. Greene, and his own hands.

  I wondered how he would touch me, if he could.

  Lie back for me.

  Lips flushed with blood, gentle commands, firm hands and jagged breath.

  That was the first time in what felt like aeons that I came by myself – and the truth is, it was better than any orgasm I had ever experienced with Evan.

  Stepping out of the shower, I toweled off and dressed in a pair of comfy pajama pants. I rummaged through my drawer of sweaters until I found my favorite hooded sweatshirt – heather-gray, with the UCF logo – and yanked it on.

  Catching my reflection in the mirror, I took a deep breath and tried to ignore the hastening tick of my own heartbeat. I studied the front of my sweatshirt and forced myself to think about more pressing, immediate matters. Like finals. Like graduation.

  My mom was thrilled when I got into the University of Central Florida – though she herself, practically a world away and living in Arizona, would have to get used to her only child leaving the nest. And on a full scholarship (which I thanked largely to both an impressive essay and my spending every single summer vacation attending various collegiate-related excursions), I didn’t even need to pay for this apartment. I had a full ride, and it was glorious, and sure, I should be proud. I should be hopeful. My GPA was stellar, my attendance on point, and my recommendations boastful.

  Maybe, just maybe, I did stand a chance.

  I grabbed my laptop, cozied myself up in bed, and tried my best to study. When that failed, I flipped through a few chapters of Anna Karenina. When that grew tedious, and I tossed the book aside, I found my thoughts trickling back into the occasio
nal nagging anxiety that came hurdling down like an asteroid whenever I thought about the future.

  I’m already well-versed on the common factoids about English majors: there’s no money, and our heads are mostly filled with air, and have fun with all that student loan debt, and et cetera. But I loved English, I loved literature (Salinger, Nabokov, Fitzgerald – my forever ménage) and love was always enough to sustain me through the past four years as I watched Aimee pursue her Political Science degree and safely nestle herself into all the right internships and potential job slots. She had her security, but I had my books, and my blind passion, and doesn’t that count for something?

  I thought about my future career. If I got into Cambridge, I’d inevitably work towards getting my certification to actually teach. Maybe I’d work my way towards becoming a Professor of Literature. Maybe I’d write a book. Maybe I’d find some cozy job working for a publisher or something.

  So there you go: a semi-solid life plan. Fingers crossed.

  But my attempt to study on that lazy afternoon turned into an hour of scrolling through my Facebook newsfeed, which turned into my wondering about where exactly Dr. Greene went to school, and who he was before we’d come face-to-face.

  I thought about his lab-coat, and how cool it was, really, that he could walk around – the pinnacle of respectable positions, really – with his name sewn onto his jacket. It’s like, hey, look at this mother-effing coat. Do you know what it says? I’m a doctor, for God’s sake. Someone fetch me a pair of trendy sunglasses.

  Caving on impulse, I beamed over to Google and punched in his name. It came up without a hitch:

  Dr. Alex Greene, Orlando, Florida.

  He received his Pre-Med degree at Harvard, and attended medical school at John Hopkins. John Hopkins. He was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts and spent his residency practicing Internal Medicine, focus on Cardiology, at Mass General. He had published several articles on heart stents and the treatment of various murmurs.