Who'd Have Thought

by G. Benson

  “Yes. It’s very funny. I just hate lying.”

  That took the smirk off Sam’s face. “Oh. Well. That’s an issue.”

  “No, it won’t be. I can do it,” Hayden said, probably much too quickly. “Really, I can.” Elbows on the table, she brought herself a lot closer to Sam and looked her right in the eye.

  Take whatever is under the surface and use it. Adopt another personality altogether.

  She’d won an award at her school for drama for a reason. “I told them we were dating. And that I liked you.”

  Sam had gone very still.

  “I told them you were funny and nice and that we clicked.”

  Sam sat back in her chair. “Okay, good. And will you be able to tell them next week that we’re married?”

  Hayden dropped her head on her arms. “Yes.” Her voice was muffled. “Yes, I’ll do it.” She raised her head. Why were Sam’s cheeks pink? “I can do it.” Hayden gave a nod, as if that could help her affirm it. “We’re getting married.” She grinned. “And we’re so excited.”

  Sam rolled her eyes and, again, Hayden was struck with how…relaxed it made her look. “Well done.”

  “Your turn.”

  “We’re getting married.” Sam straightened her shoulders, her eyes on Hayden’s and looking down at her almost fiercely. Hayden had a sudden understanding of how it would feel to be her underling, and it bordered on horrifying. And a little…empowering. “Yes, we’re very happy. It’s been building for a while.” Her look hardened even more. “Now, stay out of my business.”

  Hayden burst out laughing, and Sam gave a wry smile.

  “Oh, yeah.” Hayden pulled her beer closer. “We’re utterly convincing.”

  “We may need to work on this.”

  “You think?”

  CHAPTER 7

  “Clear!”

  Hayden lifted her hands from the patient’s chest and stepped back. The nurse at the defibrillator glanced once around the bed and hit the shock button. Everyone in the room was focused on the monitor, all hoping to no longer see ventricular fibrillation. Hayden’s shoulders tensed when she saw the screen return to the chaotic rhythm of before the shock.

  “Recommence compressions.” The voice of the ER doctor running the code was steady and calm as she stood back and observed everything. “Someone take a new set of ABGs and we need more epi.”

  Hayden stepped forward, focusing on nothing but the sternum under her hands. She counted aloud for herself and for the anesthetist currently bagging the patient. Not that they’d need it. They’d be as focused as Hayden.

  “One hundred. Someone take over.”

  Luce, who had been on the other side of the bed, stepped up, their knees resting on the edge of the mattress in order to gain leverage. They started compressions, and Hayden looked around, giving her arms a break. The protocol was to always cycle through two to three people giving compressions to ensure the procedure remained effective. Everyone quickly grew tired.

  The nurse who had stepped forward to take the blood samples stepped back. “New bloods done.”

  Someone grabbed them and ran them to the lab for immediate analysis.

  “Pause compressions.”

  Luce paused, hands hovering over the patient’s chest. Hayden’s gaze was back on the monitor.

  “We need to shock again.” The doctor’s voice came.

  The nurse at the machine adjusted the settings according to the instructions the doctor gave, eyes back on the bed. “Clear.”

  Luce stepped back. The doctor who was still bagging paused and stepped away. With one last sweeping gaze at the team, the nurse pressed the button.

  All eyes were glued on the monitor again.

  “That’s a sinus rhythm.”

  Even as the doctor said it, Hayden’s shoulders were relaxing. Her hands were shaking slightly.

  “Good work, everyone.” The doctor’s eyes were still glued to the monitor, checking oxygen saturation, pulse rate, and blood pressure. “Right, you only need to stay if this is your patient.”

  Hayden stayed, the code team stepping back. The patient made a noise, fighting at the tube in his throat, his eyelids fluttering.

  “Tranquilo, Señor Gonzalez.” Hayden’s hand fell on top of his. He wasn’t fully conscious. Her words were a last hope to calm him while the tube was pulled from his throat.

  “Hayden,” the ER doctor said, “we’re going to transfer him to the cardiac unit. He needs to be monitored.”

  “No problem.”

  And she was only an hour into her shift. At least it had ended well. She bustled around for fifteen minutes, following protocols, administering medications, and ensuring he was stable, making sure Mr. Gonzalez remained calm and hooking him up to a portable monitor.

  His family wasn’t there yet. She confirmed that his fluids were running correctly and his pain medication was sufficient, murmuring words in Spanish to him the entire time. The transfer was quick and easy, Hayden handing over to the nurse in the cardiac unit. She left him in their capable hands and returned to the ER.

  Her hands had finally stopped shaking. It always took a while after a code for everyone involved to relax, even with a positive outcome like this one.

  “Hayden.”

  Hayden headed over to a treatment room where Luce’s voice had come from. They were restocking the crash cart that had been decimated in the code. It was always left a mess of empty syringes, packets littering the drawers, things half pulled out and discarded.

  “Well done,” Luce said.

  Hayden grabbed the clipboard. She started checking things off as Luce placed them on the cart. “I’m just glad it worked out.”

  “Didn’t he come in for something irrelevant?”

  “Yup. Presented to the ER with a broken finger. Crashed randomly.”

  “Lucky. If he’d been on the street, he wouldn’t have made it.”

  “Fortunate.” Hayden checked off a few more things.

  “You okay?” Luce paused in their stuffing the bin with empty packets.

  “Yeah, on an adrenaline drop now is all.”

  “Want a coffee?”

  Hayden looked at her watch, then pulled out her to-do list. “I have to check on a patient, but after that I could probably take a break. Jan said she’d cover when I wanted one.”

  Despite the random code, the ER wasn’t so busy that morning. Strange for a Sunday.

  “Great. Well, I’m finished here. Thanks for your help. I’ll check if the code team is covered for me to take my break.”

  “See you soon.”

  Hayden left the clipboard on the bench and walked out. Coffee would help. It always helped. She checked on the status of her patients. One had been transferred to the ward while she’d been in the code—bless the nurse who did that for her—and the other two were stable and asleep. The teenager who had broken her leg thinking she could jump down two flights of stairs on her skateboard was more than asleep: the pain medication had knocked her flat; she was out cold while she waited to go to surgery, her parents sitting next to her bed looking half-relieved and half-exasperated. Hayden couldn’t blame them. She’d done something similar when she’d been younger, and her parents hadn’t known whether to kiss her for being fine or kill her for being stupid.

  She’d gotten a bit of a both. Her dad had covered her cast in drawings, designs he’d made up in his head. A week later, he’d gone on one of his business trips.

  Back when they’d thought they’d been business trips.

  Shaking her head, she mouthed “Thank you” toward Jan. Luce was waiting by the elevators, and together they slipped in right as the doors closed.

  “You have fifteen?” Luce asked.

  “Yeah. You?”

  “Yup.”

  “Great. That’s just enough time to ask out Coffee Girl.”

  Luce shook their head. “Very funny.”

  “To kiss her?”

  “Har-har.”

  “Smile at her?”


  “I can barely remember how to coordinate my hands to pay her and pick up my coffee, so no, probably not.”

  “You’re hopeless.” Hayden nudged them with her shoulder to take any bite out of her tone.

  “As if you can talk—oh. Wait.” Luce’s face lit up. “You aren’t so useless. How’s Thomson?”

  It took everything in Hayden not to flinch and check which doctor was standing at the back of the elevator. She hadn’t paid much attention when they’d gotten in. But it wasn’t supposed to matter. As far as the world knew, they were dating.

  “She’s good.” That one eyebrow was raised in her direction, and Hayden was glad the doors opened so she could pretend not to notice it as they left the elevator, and also pretend her answer hadn’t been weak. She took in a deep breath. Okay. She could do this. “Really good, actually.” She hoped it was Oscar-worthy. “We had drinks the other night.”

  “Oh yeah. Only drinks?”

  Hayden gave a demure look, putting on a pretentious voice. “Gentlefolk never spill their secrets.”

  “So you didn’t get any.”

  “Shut up, Luce. Look, here’s your lady love.” Hayden smothered a laugh as Luce balked when they walked up to the coffee cart. “Can I wing-woman for you?”

  “No!”

  “Please? For the love of all that is awesome?”

  “No.”

  Hayden sighed. “Fine. But you have to do the ordering so you’ll at least talk to her.”

  She pushed the money into Luce’s hand. It was enough for both of them, thank you very much; if she could afford anything, it was the super-cheap hospital coffee. Hayden gave Luce a gentle push in the small of their back toward the cart. With a final grin in their direction, she detoured to one of the tables, sat down, and kept her eye on Luce. She’d almost feel bad, watching them take in a deep breath and wait in the short line. But they really were adorable.

  And useless with pretty people.

  Luce turned around and narrowed their eyes at her. Hayden got the hint and reverted to her favorite thing when waiting: people watching. Hospitals were great for it. A doctor walked past, muttering to himself, tapping away at a tablet. A woman pushed herself past on a wheelchair, her hair wild around her head. A man sat at a table near her and exclaimed loudly, “Seriously! The baby was nine and a half pounds. Linda’s amazing!”

  Ow. Nine and a half pounds? Linda was more than amazing; Linda was a damn rock star.

  On the other side of her was the twitchy intern who always followed Sam around. He was staring at a tablet, dark smudges under his eyes noticeable even with his brown skin, his lab coat a little too wrinkled, his hair disheveled. The standard intern look.

  “Hey—” she paused. It wasn’t like she could call him ‘twitchy intern.’ “Uh, guy.”

  Thankfully, he looked up at her, bleary for a second, until a hint of recognition crept over his features. “Oh. Hey. Hayden, right?”

  Well, now she just felt bad. He knew her name. “Yeah. What was your name? Sorry.”

  “No problem. I don’t think I’ve ever told you, it’s Leon.”

  “Nice to meet you properly, Leon.”

  The way of the hospital. Especially when you worked in the ER. You could lose a patient or save a patient with someone, and never really find out who they were as they disappeared off into whichever part of the hospital they’d come from.

  “Likewise. How are you this fine Saturday?”

  “It’s Sunday, Leon.”

  He gaped, looked down at the tablet in his hands, and back at her. “Really?”

  “Really.” She tried and failed miserably not to laugh at him. “Seriously.”

  “Damn it.”

  “Life of an intern.”

  He slumped over the table, pulling his coffee toward himself, and stared woefully at her. “It really is.”

  “It’ll get better.”

  “I’m clinging to that idea.”

  Hayden quickly glanced at the coffee line. Luce was still one person away from ordering and would hopefully try and chat for a bit. Or smile? Anything. Whatever they did, Hayden had time for the sneaky idea she’d had.

  What a perfect time to probe.

  “Your attending never let you have a break?”

  “Thomson?” He shrugged awkwardly, still sprawled over the small metal table. “She’s not known for it. We do more time than anyone else’s interns when on her service.”

  “Sounds rough.”

  He straightened, his red eyes wide. “What? It’s awesome. I’ve learned so much, way more than I do with anyone else in any other specialty.”

  He looked so sincere. Like a tiny puppy. “Oh?”

  “She’s hard-assed as hell, don’t get me wrong. We’re all terrified of her. She made two of us cry our first week. And by us, I mean I was one of them.” He gave an unembarrassed smile. “But she pushes us constantly. Everything’s a chance to learn with her. I’m just so freaking tired.”

  And he kept going, as if there was so much to say about Sam.

  “There’s little room for mistakes, and if you don’t know the answer to something, she hands your ass to you, normally with only a look that makes you feel like your skin is peeling off. So yeah, it’s rough. Yeah, we’re all exhausted. But I wouldn’t trade her for anyone else’s service when I manage to get on it.”

  Wow. So Sam was one of the best teachers? Whose interns and residents were so scared of her they cried? Interesting.

  Leon gave a huge yawn. “Yesterday. Wait.” He slumped back on the table, his chin resting on his arms. “Not yesterday, if today’s Sunday. I mean the day before. Was it? Whatever. The other day, I used my husband’s cologne as soap. I don’t even know why I had it in the shower with me.”

  Hayden laughed loudly at his sheepish grin. “Really?” she asked.

  “Seriously.”

  “Nice.”

  “He didn’t think so. It wasn’t cheap cologne.”

  His tablet started beeping, and he jumped up as if burned. “Labs are back for a patient.” His eyes had lit up. “We think it’s a huge tumor. It’s awesome.”

  Luckily, no non-medical people were around in that moment to hear him, besides the overly excited new dad who was still on the phone. “Good luck.”

  He threw her a wave. “Thanks. See you around.”

  He ran off in time for Luce to sit opposite her and slide a coffee over. “Making friends with the twitchy intern?”

  “He’s on Sam’s service at the moment.”

  Luce snorted. “Sam. Can’t get used to that.”

  Now was a good chance. Hayden took a deep breath. “Well, you better. I—”

  “Wait.” Luce was smirking. “Were you probing him for information?”

  Hayden felt heat creeping up her neck. “No…”

  “You’re a shit liar. You were.”

  “I—I was curious.”

  “That’s your word of choice these days.” Luce took a sip of their coffee, tossing their head to flick their bangs out of their eyes. “Curiosity killed the cat, you know.”

  “Stupidest saying ever.”

  “Yeah, okay, it is. But whatever. What were you curious about?”

  Hayden took another deep breath. How do you tell your friend that knows you have a grudge against the idea of marriage, even if they don’t know why, that you’re getting married? But this was part of it. Luce had to know. And again, it wasn’t really a lie. Marriage was on the cards. Just…everything else was a damn dirty lie. “Well, I was curious because…” Hayden’s mouth was so dry she thought she wasn’t going to be able to get the next words out. “I’ve made a rash decision. One I feel good about.” Lie number one of this conversation. Well, the money made her feel good. After their drinks the other day, Sam had transferred the money immediately. The next day, there the twenty thousand had been: more money in her account than she’d had in a very long time. She’d done nothing with it yet, even though the list of things she needed to pay was endless.
But she just liked looking at it there.

  “Okay.” Luce dragged the end of the word out. “What decision is that?”

  “Well, like I said, one I feel good about. And that’s why I was talking to the twitchy intern. Because, you know, I feel good about the decision, but was…checking some things.” And now she was rambling. Luce had put their cup on the table and was watching her, lips pinched. Hayden tried to smile. She made herself. “So, Sam, uh—” Oh, fucking hell. She was going to throw up all over the table. It took everything in her to keep looking happy. But not maniacally so. That wouldn’t help anything. She needed to go for contented. “Sam asked me to marry her. And I, uh—” Luce’s mouth was dropping open “—well, I said yes.”

  Everything went deadly silent. Luce didn’t stop gaping.

  Still gaping.

  Would talking help here? Who cared? She had to say something. This silence was going on for way too long.

  Hayden opened her mouth, but before she could, Luce broke the silence. By bursting out laughing.

  Hayden watched them double over, cackling madly. Well. Really, what else had she expected? Luce laughed so hard they gripped the edge of the table and the nearby man whose partner had pushed out an oversized baby gawped at them.

  “Uh, Luce?”

  Still laughing.

  Hayden cleared her throat. Nothing changed. “Luce?”

  Wiping their eyes, Luce straightened. All Hayden could do was try to not look too sheepish. As suddenly as it started, like a burble, the laughter died away. “Why aren’t you laughing?”

  “Because I’m not joking.”

  “I’m sorry, what?” Luce was still breathless from their gale of laughter. “You’re getting married to the woman you’ve always kind of hated and have been seeing casually for only a few weeks?”

  “Yeah.” If she was going to get through this, she needed to embrace it. “I am.”

  “No way.”

  “Yes way.”

  “Hayden, I…” Luce stopped speaking, their lips pressing together as if trying to trap whatever torrent of words were building there. It lasted all of a split second. “You haven’t even slept together.”

  “Hey! Okay, one: you don’t know that.”

  Luce pointed that powerful one eyebrow at her in disbelief.