by Hayes, Liv
“Do you think we could meet up this afternoon, Alex? It’s important.”
“Is it?”
“Alex…” she paused. A door closed. I could hear the click, the tell-tale roar of Orlando traffic telling me that she had stepped outside. “I really need to see you.”
“What about Mason?” I asked. “It seems you have your plate full already.”
Cait went quiet for a second. I listened as a horn blared, a shrill yell grew distant, and she returned.
“It’s important,” she repeated. “So, could we? I’m having a hard time enough as it is.”
“Hm.”
“Alex,” she stressed. “Please.”
I drudged up a long, exacerbated sigh. Combing a hand through my hair, I glanced out the window – midday sunlight streamed through the glass, glazing the hardwood floors.
“Fine,” I said. “I’ll meet you at Flamingo’s in about an hour. We’ll have a cup of coffee. You’ll tell me whatever it is you’d like to tell me, then you’ll politely leave me alone for the rest of my life, Cait. I’m not going to dredge up old bullshit.”
She got quiet again, then just said:
“Okay,” quiet as a mouse. “I’ll see you in an hour.”
When we hung up, I flung the phone onto the counter, walked into my bedroom, and undressed. I was annoyed, and still tired, and unhinged by the constant, clinging reminder that everything was different now.
I felt something, too.
What had I done? I had screwed Mia on the desk of my office, where any orderly with the proper key could have walked inside, and what was sexy about that? I had sex with a patient. I had broken perhaps the biggest rule in all of my years spent meddling and training and losing countless hours of sleep. Countless days and months and what felt like decades, for what? So I could throw it all away? Throw it all away on a university student with a pretty face and infectious smile?
I thought about the consequences. I thought about the nature of how people meet, and how nuanced and layered and impossible some things felt. I thought the teachers that ended up getting caught fucking around with their students, and how they were disciplined, but most of the time it was a slap of the wrist. If the student was legal, they might not have the most desirable record, but they could still teach if they had a car and were willing to relocate. And if the feelings are true, they can make it through the gamut with just a few scratches.
As for doctors? Weisman might have been fucking a student, but she was not his student, and also not a patient. And the nature of forbidden liaisons, when considering the realm of occupations, were also riddled with different repercussions.
I knew that a doctor fucking his patient was among the ranks of ‘biggest fuck-up of a lifetime’ in the area of poor decision making. Age didn’t matter. Doctors were not privy to the Romeo and Juliet law. If discovered, I could lose my license entirely. I would be black-listed, potentially sued. And the $400,000 I spent on my schooling? I couldn’t wrap my head around that. All that debt. All that debt for nothing. A life-long dream, dissolving like a cyanide tablet in a water glass. Drink up.
I would, in short, lose everything I had worked for. So why would I risk a decade spent gradually clawing my way to this point, only to let it slip between my fingers so quickly?
I looked down at my hands, feeling a mix of help me and I can’t be helped. I knew, as much as I knew that I would suffer loss at some point in my life, whether it was a colleague or a loved one or even myself. I knew that I should have felt not just remorseful, but afraid of what I had done. I should be fearful, and suffocated by guilt, and left with no desire to ever see Mia again. Because even if I were to walk away, have her assigned to another doctor, and never speak to her again, what was had already transpired. The deed was done, and there was no going back.
Nausea spread over me. I should have never given her my phone number. I should have never called her any of those silly pet names, or smiled at her in that deliberate way I reserved for…
Who had I reserved it for? No one, I realized. No one.
My little fox.
Fists clenched, I stood, resisted the urge to punch a wall, and forced myself to shower. I was so wrapped up in my own slippery understanding of potential demise that I couldn’t even enjoy the memories: Mia, on her back, her legs around my waist, her eyes closed. The way she gripped my shoulders, or the way she moaned.
The taste of her skin, the tangy smell of her shampoo. Mango, maybe. How she kissed me, looked at me, gasped my name.
Let go.
I touched myself, panting, frantically clinging to the vision of fucking Mia, this time harder, more desperate, as she begged me to come inside of her. As I begged her to come for me.
I didn’t even know what she looked like underneath the clothes. All I knew was how she felt, tight and wet, and how she sounded. So sweet, like a little pixie. A little water sprite.
I came in waves, water spilling over my hands, dousing away the evidence.
When it was over, I washed, tousled my hair (because I didn’t really give two damns about combing it), and threw on a pair of jeans and a plain undershirt. No physician’s garb; no scrubs, no white coat, no prissy shoes. Then I left, wishing, as I slid into my Porsche and turned on the radio, that I was off to visit someone else.
Another sigh. Gentler, this time. And slowly, as I drove, a feeling of understanding began to solidify slowly over my bones, like mercury. A slow death, an agonizing sickness.
But I asked for this. It was my fault.
Cait was seated by the window when I walked in. For someone that had never really managed a stable life for herself, she always looked well. Her hair was done, and she wore a pair of those deceptive pants that also look like a skirt, and a casual T-shirt. She sipped an iced green tea while watching the people go to and fro, and I watched her for a second before rapping my knuckle against the counter.
When she turned, I was able to get a full look at her. And it took less than a millisecond before, beneath the purposely baggy-chic T-shirt, I noticed a bump.
“You’re pregnant,” I declared. She didn’t need to tell me. This wasn’t going to be one of those conversations. “I’m sorry. Congratulations, Cait, that’s wonderful.”
I sat down next to her, my bout of nausea increasingly exacerbated. I didn’t order anything to drink. I just stared straight through the window, rigid, already partly knowing the next words that she was about to say, but hoping to God that this would be some benign discussion about how I had left some old clothes or photos in one of the boxes she’d taken when she left.
“It’s yours,” she said, soft enough that I barely even heard her. “It’s your baby.”
“No, it’s not,” I spat quickly. And I know it’s terrible. I know it is. But I didn’t even regret saying it. “It can’t be mine. You were fucking Mason months before you split with me.”
I took in a long breath, composing myself.
“How far along are you?” I demanded.
“Six months.”
“Six months,” I repeated. “Jesus Christ. So you were pregnant before you even left me.”
She said nothing.
“And it’s not Mason’s.”
The silence was deafening.
“How,” I said slowly, trying to keep myself from shoving my chair back and storming out. “How does someone do something like this? How could you not tell me?”
“I’m so sorry,” she started. “I just didn’t know what to think, and I was so miserable, Alex. I didn’t even think I was going to keep it, and then I couldn’t bring myself to…”
She covered her face with her hands, and just like that, broke down. I regarded her with only an uncomfortable acknowledgment that she was upset, but had no desire to comfort her. I was livid.
“You can understand how I might be skeptical,” I told her. “And you might understand how I’m not exactly taking this as you may have hoped.”
“I hoped for nothing,” she said, sudde
nly cold. “I knew you would behave like this. Like you didn’t give a fuck, because you never have about anyone. You don’t feel things for people, Alex. You never have.”
“Then why ask me to come here, only to drop a bomb like this?” I raised my voice, and a few people looked over. I darted my eyes towards the window again. “Why even tell me that you’re pregnant?”
“Because I can’t do this alone.”
“It seems you were ready to do it with Mason,” I said. “And you seemed pretty damn in love with the guy.”
“I was.”
“I don’t,” I paused. I paused before the words sputtered out. “I don’t feel anything for you, Cait. I’m sorry.”
Tears were streaming down her face. I knew I was behaving badly. But I was sick, and I was confused, and yet another hole had been punctured in my chest.
“I’m sorry,” she repeated. “I should have told you.”
“That’s a given,” I said. “I’m all for you doing whatever you feel is best for you, Cait. But choosing to bring life forth without disclosing that it happens to share my genetic makeup is pretty fucked up.”
I took a napkin from the dispenser and handed it to her. She blew her nose loudly, shuddered, and wiped her face.
“I don’t what to do,” she confessed. “So I called you. I’m sorry.”
There was no avoiding, when I turned to her once more, the inescapable proof that I was, to my new knowledge, a father-to-be.
“I’ll help with the expenses,” I told her. “And when the baby is born, I’d like a paternity test. I’m sure you can understand why.”
She nodded.
“Where are you living?” I asked.
“Well, on my mother’s couch until I can find a new place,” she said. “But I have a few things lined up.”
I had to tell myself, a strumming mantra, not to vomit as I withdrew my check-book, tore out a check, and wrote out an undisclosed amount.
“Take this,” I told her. “A down payment and first month’s rent on an apartment. A few pieces of furniture for the nursery. You’ll need to find a job, because I’m not taking care of everything, Cait. But I’ll do my part. And if there’s anything you need for the baby, you know my number.”
Then, because all of the life had already drained from my veins, I stood and walked out. I said nothing else, because I couldn’t.
Inside the Porsche, trying to keep myself together, I took my phone and scrolled through my contacts until I reached Mia’s name.
A second’s pause, a hard swallow.
It should have been easier. All of the evidence, all of the knowledge, was laid before me like a spread of rusted nails. She was too young. She was a patient. She was the symbol of everything that could take away, like a raging storm, everything I had built. All that would be left in the aftermath was ash and rubble.
But she was also innocent and deserving of someone on her level – not a grown man. Not a doctor. Not a man with baby on the way.
Delete.
And just like that, I attempted to discard her.
Chapter 9
MIA
I finished my Literature final at two in the morning, with my eyes heavy from sleep and my brain near melting point. My copy of The Little Prince sat on the floor by my feet. I think I actually fell asleep at some point between typing the final word and hitting save, but I’m not sure. I was exhausted and ready for the semester to be over. There was too much junk that had accumulated, and too much that I just wanted to move on from.
Chiefly Evan. But also, well, all of it. And still, I was dreaming of Cambridge. And I was still swimming in the deep-end that was Dr. Greene.
He had never answered me back. Sure, maybe I was over-thinking the whole thing. He was a doctor. He worked a million hours in a given week, and his typical schedule probably didn’t pad much time for him to sit around texting me.
I got a little bit sad, then tried to remind myself that there were other things going on. Like finals, and the end of a school year, and the promise of a different place entirely come next fall. In the UK, Dr. Alex Greene would be nothing but a vague, distant memory. A, remember that time when? He’d become one of those fuzzy thoughts that pop up in the middle of something mundane, like ironing clothes or folding kitchen towels, that make you think to yourself – did that actually happen, or was I just imagining the whole thing?
Shutting my laptop, I crawled in bed wearing a pair of sweatpants and my favorite, slouchy American Eagle T-shirt. At one point the shirt had been snug and fit well, but now it stretched and hung off my shoulder and fit sort of weirdly. So it became a pajama shirt.
I kept flicking the light on and off, bored and restless, before sinking into my sheets. The words of the essay I’d just finished seemed to chip away like dried paint, to the point where I honestly couldn’t even remember what I’d written, or if it was even any good.
My focus had been on the relationship of the Little Prince and his Rose, and the Fox. I’d used a lot of quotations, of course, but my favorite one by far was:
“It is only with the heart that ones sees rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.”
Too right, I thought. Though I hadn’t found my Rose yet, or met my Fox, or even contemplated what was waiting for me in the real, Adult World when graduation ended…the sentiment of seeing with the heart felt appropriate.
Oddly enough, when I handed in my paper the next morning, I didn’t even feel tired. I felt light-footed as I stepped out of my French Lit class, feeling sorry for the kids who hadn’t bothered writing their paper in advance and were now stuck sitting around for two hours, forced to pull their final papers out of their…well. I didn’t feel anxious when I walked out of Ethics, after flipping through six pages of long-winded questions like ‘do you think Kevorkian’s methods were justified?’ or, ‘Is all life equal, and if so, why?’
When it was all over, I walked through the the halls, all sardine-packed with students and flittering with chattering voices. Aimee and I bantered over what we would be wearing to graduation, which was officially in a little over a week, and what was I going to do about my apartment, and what was I going to do with my life if I didn’t get into Cambridge?
“God,” I muttered. “I don’t even want to think about it.”
Occasionally I peeked at my phone, hoping for a text from Dr. Greene, but nothing ever popped up. Each time, I felt a small jab.
“Anyway,” Aimee said, twirling a strand of cornflower-blonde hair around her finger. “I declare a celebration tonight.”
A bar, of course. More drunk kids bashing their fists against a jukebox, or screeching like crows at the amateur Deejay. Motives and actions fueled by cheap liquor and self-deprecation.
“Sounds good,” I said. Only it didn’t. Not really. But Aimee was my friend, and I was feeling just enough self-indulgent melancholy that when I looked down at my phone for the seven-hundredth time and saw nothing – I thought, maybe a cocktail would help.
In the swampy AC of the university store, I relinquished what textbooks I could sell back for hard cash. In Aimee’s suite, sprawled out on the blessedly cool tile, I counted the bills while she shimmied out of a crop top and glanced at her silhouette in the mirror. She was even thinner than I, though she had curves in all the right places. I envied her, honestly. I sometimes felt depressed by my being all elbows and knees. It was only recently, recalling the feeling of my chin tilted upward, face cradled against Dr. Greene’s fingers, our eyes locked – that none of those things mattered anymore. The flaws felt sexy. The plain Tshirts and skirts and jeans felt posh and pretty.
“I’d wear a crop top, but I don’t really know if I feel like broadcasting mid-drift,” Aimee said, tossing a shirt into a bigger pile of shirts. “Maybe layer it with a cami? Mia?”
I raised my eyes, not exactly listening.
“Layers work,” I said. “You’ll look great in whatever you decide to wear.”
She groaned, yanked on some lacy-lookin
g top, and turned to me.
“Sometimes I really do feel like you’re out to orbit,” she said, and I said: “That’s the second space reference you’ve made in relation to my absentminded behavior.”
“Yeah,” she said. “But what’s going on, really? What are you thinking about?”
Green eyes, rough stubble, waves of burnished-hair the color of espresso. A white lab-coat and strong hands. A pulse-beat like a ticking clock. Oh, and how my heart could have exploded.
I glanced at Aimee, shrugging.
“Nothing particularly,” I lied. “I guess I just need to snap out of it.”
She knelt down, her thin legs buckling in a way that made her knees look slightly knobby. She touched my face gently, and I could smell the sweetly fruity spray on her skin. Bath and Body Works.
“You miss Evan,” she said softly. “I know you do.”
Wrong, I thought. So wrong. But what I could I possibly tell her without declaring, like a fog-horn, I made a tentatively huge mistake.
“Yeah,” I said, smiling. “I guess I still do a little bit.”
I listened the entire car ride to Chiller’s as Aimee belted out Hozier’s “Take Me to Church,” and thought to myself, can’t someone take this guy to goddamn church already? I was getting tired of the song. I sat with my head against the window, eying the skyscrapers built by Giants.
The bar itself was a sea of freshly-painted faces and glittering lights. We opted for the bar, and I drained a tall Mojito, crushing the fresh raspberries into mush with my straw. I could taste the muddled mint on my tongue.
Aimee ordered a round of mango-flavored shots, and I downed it like water. Two drinks in, and I was already buzzing.
“No more,” I told her. “This isn’t fun. This is a night with our heads hanging over a toilet bowl waiting to happen.”
Another shot down. I couldn’t help but feel childish and stupid and at the same time, why should I have cared? You’re only young once, and all that rambling.
So when I was offered a fourth shot, I took it, and before I knew it, I was on the dance floor, twirling beneath the lights that made me feel glowing, ethereal. I could smell the collective scent of pheromones and perfume and sweat. We were all just looking for something, I realized. An escape, momentary or otherwise. A brief lapse into free-falling happiness.