Going Under

by Sonia Henry

  He has written, You like? Have a great weekend, sexy, underneath my not-unimpressive (if I do say so myself) Italian lace-clad breasts.

  ‘Give it back!’ I shriek, making a desperate grab for my phone while also trying not to draw anyone’s attention to the fact that we aren’t having a heated argument about the best antibiotic protocol for post-op cholecystectomy patients.

  Max is laughing so hard he’s crying. ‘Of course I won’t send it. I just wanted to see your reaction.’

  He hands me my phone and I press delete, only my hand is shaking so much from the close call that my finger slips …

  I let out such a loud scream, the people at the table next to us look over, concerned.

  ‘Fuck, I think I’ve sent it! I’ve sent it to him! Delete it! Call Vodafone! Get it sent back! Is that, like, a thing?’

  Max is bright purple by now and he’s having trouble breathing. ‘It’s too late, Kit,’ he says. ‘It’s gone.’

  ‘Oh my God! No! This can’t be happening!’

  ‘It’s not such a big deal,’ Max reminds me. ‘He’s seen your tits in real life anyway.’

  ‘This is different!’ My stomach is churning with anxiety. ‘What the fuck am I going to do?’

  ‘Wait!’ Max says, looking down at my phone, which is sitting on the table between us. ‘He’s replying!’

  ‘WHAT?!’

  ‘Look! I can see the three dots that mean he’s typing.’ Max sounds excited. ‘Do you reckon he’s sending you a photo of his cock?’

  I nearly scream again but as we look at each other I feel the laughter bubbling up. I try to suppress it but fail.

  ‘He might be in his rooms, between patients,’ Max says. ‘He’s probably masturbating!’

  ‘Shut up!’ I hiss, trying to look angry but unable to stop laughing.

  We both stare intently down at the phone, waiting for the dots to reveal the sentiment behind them.

  There’s a ding.

  ‘It’s here!’ Max says. He grabs the phone.

  ‘Give it back!’ I screech.

  Max rolls his eyes. ‘Kind of boring really.’

  We both look down at the message.

  Babe … you’re killing me. That is sooo fine!

  ‘Wow, he’s calling you babe these days?’

  I shrug. ‘Maybe that’s what a tit shot does to men, mate. You should try it.’

  Max looks at me. I look at him. We both look down at my phone and start laughing again, so hard I feel the muscles of my abdomen cramping.

  I’m a very bad example of a junior doctor, and so is Max, I remind him as we take the lift to our respective destinations, still giggling.

  ‘This hospital isn’t the centre of excellence,’ Max says to me seriously. ‘It’s the centre of sexcellence.’

  I walk into the ward, still laughing to myself.

  Sex, death and nude selfies. Not a bad book title, if you think about it.

  forty-seven

  I walk towards operating theatre six, dreading what’s to come. I’ve been so gloriously momentarily distracted by my eventful morning that I almost forgot the array of awful situations facing me: the Joker and the Smiling Assassin; Dr Prince; my future.

  I’m starting to wonder where my future lies in medicine. The hospital has become a place I’d rather avoid. I’ve learned this year that working as a doctor in a big hospital means that the most important person in the equation is your boss, the patient comes somewhere in the middle, and the least important person is you.

  What are my options, realistically? I ask myself. I have to complete my intern year, otherwise I won’t be eligible for my full medical registration. I could take some time off next year, maybe, in residency, but then I’d struggle to get onto a training program—and if I still really want to be a surgeon, I can’t afford to take time off to go travelling or write my book.

  Will I ever write my book? I ask myself, feeling my soul cracking a little bit more. When I was young, I loved writing detective stories. I invented a character called Detective Hamburger who could crack even the most challenging of cases. I suddenly wish Detective Hamburger was real and that he could solve the questions I have about my life and future.

  Someone should have warned me, I think to myself, that once you stand on the platform that says Medical School and board the train, there are no further stops. You can’t get off the train again, not even for a bit of a scenic stopover. Destination: eternity.

  I just need a holiday, I think a bit desperately. If I could just go away for a few months and sit with my thoughts, and process them, I might have a better sense of what to do. It doesn’t escape me that my year as an intern has provided me with a lot of material, maybe even enough for a novel. Everyone loves a bit of medical literary sauce, right? I should start writing things down more, I remind myself. Sometimes, when something particularly mental happens, I make a note in my phone, but really I need to start a full-blown diary. Maybe tonight, when I get home. If I don’t drink too much.

  I push open the door to theatre six, bracing myself for the worst. To my surprise, the Joker’s there but the Smiling Assassin isn’t. Maybe, I think hopefully, she’s found a better job with another surgeon somewhere else.

  There’s a different woman in her place.

  ‘Where’s the usual registrar?’ I ask.

  No one replies. I notice one of the nurse’s eyes tracking towards me, looking nervous.

  The Joker totally ignores me. ‘Hand me the right equipment next time,’ he scolds the scrub nurse.

  I wonder what’s going on. I’ve never not seen the Smiling Assassin in the operating theatre. Maybe she’s at the police station, I think optimistically, reporting the Joker for sex crimes against vulnerable junior female doctors!

  ‘Well, are you just going to stand there or are you actually going to do something useful?’ the Joker fires in my direction, looking angrier than usual.

  I dutifully walk outside to the sink to start the tedious process of scrubbing in. The Smiling Assassin’s probably on sick leave, I think; the kind of stress she was under would give anyone an ulcer.

  It’s nearly 7 pm when the list ends. I walk straight from the operating theatre to the pub. I tell myself it’s okay to be drinking alone, as it’s been an extremely trying few weeks.

  ‘Kitty?’

  Of all people, Nicole from admin is walking towards me. I wonder if I should pretend that I’m meeting someone. Boozing alone after work in my scrubs probably isn’t a great look. Fuck it, I decide. I don’t care anymore.

  ‘Are you by yourself? I’ve just come in to use the ATM. I’m having dinner over the road with some friends. Come and join us if you like.’

  ‘Nah, I’m all right. I just felt like a drink before I went home. Long week, you know?’ And it’s only Monday, I think …

  Nicole sits down next to me, looking concerned. ‘Is this about the doctor?’

  I’m not sure what she means. Does she know about Dr Prince? Lucas Lang? Is she testing me? Could she know something?

  ‘Which one?’ I ask, feeling slightly on edge.

  ‘The overdose …’ She sounds awkward.

  ‘Right … Yeah, I had heard.’

  Nicole looks uncomfortable. ‘I’m really sorry. It must be hard for you.’

  ‘What? Why would it be hard for me?’

  ‘Kitty …’ She stops. ‘Don’t you know?’

  ‘Know what?’

  Nicole’s eyes fill with concern. ‘It was your registrar. I thought somebody would have told you.’

  For a moment, I just gape at her. And then it hits me. Sitting at the bar, with Nicole from admin being weirdly kind, I start to cry. My whole body is shaking and I can’t seem to stop it.

  Nicole gets me to my feet and walks me home.

  ‘God, you live close to the hospital,’ she remarks as we turn into the front yard. ‘Must get a bit much sometimes.’

  She sits me on the couch. I’m so confused and overwhelmed, I don’t know how to m
ake sense of my thoughts. I just ramble, with no idea what I’m saying. ‘I should have told someone,’ I keep repeating. ‘I should have told somebody. Winnie was right. I should have told someone.’

  ‘Told them what?’ Nicole presses.

  ‘She was being taken advantage of by one of the senior surgeons,’ I say, even now worried I’m going into too much detail. I wipe away the tears that keep forming. ‘She said not to tell anyone, and I didn’t. But I should have, shouldn’t I?’ I repress a sob. ‘Is she all right?’ I ask, trying to get myself under control. ‘Will she be all right?’

  Nicole looks anxious. ‘I think so. They had to intubate her, though. I think it was pretty serious.’

  I picture the Smiling Assassin lying in a hospital bed, a tube shoved down her trachea and the harsh noises of the mechanical ventilator breathing for her. I imagine her waking up to the horrible realisation she has a piece of plastic down her throat, and her coughing and spasming, trying to rip it out. It’s the natural instinct of any patient to do that. As a doctor watching that, you feel strangely removed. It wouldn’t happen to us, because we are the people who operate the machine and give the drugs and have the control and power.

  I try to imagine what she was feeling before she took the valium with the intention of ending her life. I see her eyes as we stand locked in a silent battle outside the operating theatre change rooms and recall the words she spat at me. If you tell anyone about this, I’ll ruin you.

  We are all just teetering on a precipice. Estelle and I have talked about the feeling of standing on a thin wire—well, it turns out the Smiling Assassin—‘Rachel’ I remind myself, using her name for the first time—was standing there right next to us, invisible. It doesn’t matter how competent she seemed in theatre or how forceful she could be on the ward. Throw into the mix the disastrous situation with the Joker and the stress of surgical training, and she’s slipping off the wire, tumbling down into the abyss.

  I know why she did what she did, because I’ve been tempted myself. I’ve never reached the point of jumping, but I’ve definitely lifted one foot off the wire occasionally. I have; Estelle has; Max probably has too.

  ‘Can I go and visit her?’ I say, feeling a sudden urge to see for myself that she is still alive, still breathing, her heart still beating and her neurons still firing.

  ‘I’m sorry, but her family has said no visitors.’ Nicole looks apologetic.

  I nod, breathing slowly.

  ‘God, Kitty, it must be difficult being on neurosurgery again what with this and Dr Prince.’

  I look up at her.

  ‘You know about Dr Prince, right? Apparently, his heart attack was really serious. If they hadn’t got him into surgery when they did, he would have died.’

  Of course I knew about Dr Prince, but the words ‘he would have died’ pierced through my soul.

  The wire creaks, and all at once I am falling. In my mind’s eye, Estelle catches me, and I grip onto her hands for dear life, my legs flailing in the wind. Maybe it’s the booze, or the sheer amount of overwhelmingly bad news, but I completely lose it.

  Struggling to speak through my sobs, I tell her everything, starting with the Joker and the Smiling Assassin and including my feelings for Dr Prince. To her credit, she doesn’t even seem fazed when I tell her that Dr Wolfgang Dietrich, her German flame, came over for dinner.

  ‘Did he ask about me?’ she wants to know.

  ‘I think we discussed it briefly,’ I lie.

  ‘Have you been in touch?’

  ‘A bit.’

  She shrugs. ‘It sounds like you’ve had a lot going on.’

  When I get to the bit where I kissed Dr Prince, her eyes widen but she doesn’t say anything.

  ‘I’m such an idiot,’ I say pathetically when I’ve finished. I wipe my nose on my scrub shirt. ‘It’s all my fault.’

  ‘Of course you didn’t cause his heart attack. God, Kitty, you’re a doctor—you know better than that.’

  Nicole is actually being pretty reasonable. I feel bad for having had misgivings about her. She waits until Winnie gets home before she leaves. She promises me she won’t tell anyone what I’ve told her, but if I want to make a complaint about the Joker, she says, she’ll help me write it.

  ‘Thanks, Nicole,’ I say as I walk her out. ‘You’ve been really nice.’

  ‘It’s okay,’ she says, giving me a hug at the door. ‘I see how hard it is for you guys. As doctors, you’re not given much support. People expect you to be so perfect all the time.’

  As soon as the front door closes, the door to Winnie’s bedroom opens and she emerges. ‘What was that about?’ she asks. ‘Why were you crying? Is that the woman from admin with the sexy clothes?’

  I’m reluctant to tell Winnie what has happened, remembering uncomfortably how adamant she’d been that I should report it. If only I’d listened.

  ‘You were right,’ I say, giving in and sliding down the wall to sit in the hallway. I stare at a crack in the plaster and suppress a sigh. Me and the house, my beloved old house, we are both falling apart.

  Winnie looks at me. ‘Right about what?’

  ‘The Smiling Assassin tried to kill herself,’ I tell her flatly, seeing no other way to put it.

  Winnie opens her mouth but doesn’t say anything.

  ‘I know you told me I should tell someone. You were right.’

  ‘Oh, Kit,’ Winnie says, her face crumpling with sympathy. ‘I didn’t want to be right.’

  ‘Yeah, but you were.’

  ‘How is she?’

  I shrug. ‘She’s in intensive care. Overdose.’

  ‘Shit.’ Winnie grimaces. ‘At least she’s still alive.’

  ‘You can say it,’ I tell her. ‘I fucked up.’

  Winnie sits down next to me in the hallway, looking thoughtful. ‘No, you didn’t,’ she says, too kindly. ‘I don’t think anyone truly understands, me included, exactly what it’s like to be in that position.’

  ‘But you did.’ I can’t shake the guilt. Since when had I lost my empathy? When I started medical school, if someone have told me I’d be too afraid to report a potential sexual assault, or sexual coercion at the very least, I would have laughed in their face. Look at me now. The brave and powerful Dr Katarina Holliday.

  ‘It’s all just so extreme,’ Winnie points out. ‘Jack professes his love for you and nearly dies; she professes her hate for you and tries to kill herself; you’re constantly dreaming about dead bodies and having to look at dead people. Like, it’s fucking weird, man. When you take away all this medical bullshit and pretence, that’s exactly what all this is. It’s fucking WEIRD.’

  To hear the words is a strange relief. It simplifies everything. Doctors are once-normal people who get stuck in totally fucking weird situations—and it makes us all crazy.

  forty-eight

  I look at my watch, mesmerised by the second hand as it ticks onto 2 am. I rub my eyes. Just for something different, I’m sitting on the surgical ward, listening to my pager go off. I’m exhausted. All day and night my thoughts have been crowded with images of the Smiling Assassin’s face. It’s like she’s on the ward with me.

  Please call the private hospital on 7806.

  I read the message on my pager and wonder why the private hospital is calling me at two in the morning when I’m the intern covering the surgical wards at the public hospital. The private hospital is a painful ten-minute trudge up the road. It’s not that far, I guess, but the two hospitals exist as separate planets. The private is an otherworldly paradise, the garden of medical Eden, where the patients can choose a wine that matches their hospital dinner, and the doctors are paid huge amounts of money.

  I dial the number, curiosity almost breaking through my exhaustion.

  ‘Hi, it’s Katarina Holliday,’ I say into the phone.

  The nurse on the other end is breathless with relief. ‘Are you the surgical intern? At the public?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘We have a c
annula that fell out,’ she says—the words every intern dreads. ‘No one can put it back in and the night doctor has gone home sick.’

  I picture the long walk to the private and immediately try to deflect responsibility. ‘Are you sure it’s me you call? I don’t even know if I’m allowed over there,’ I say, stalling.

  ‘You’re the surgical intern?’

  ‘Yes,’ I admit, sensing defeat.

  ‘Our protocol is if our doctor isn’t here and the intensive care registrar is busy, we call you.’

  When a nurse invokes a protocol, there’s little point in arguing.

  ‘Is the intensive care registrar busy?’ I ask, already knowing the answer.

  ‘Yes,’ the nurse replies flatly. ‘So as soon as possible would be good.’

  Sighing, I stand up and start the trek through the dimly lit ward down the stairs and out the front doors to climb up the hill to the private hospital. Surely there are better things to be doing at two o’clock on a Thursday morning. For example, I could be having sex with a nice man, who I would have met because I had a normal life where I wasn’t at work all the time. Or I could be at a bar with some friends meeting said man. Or, even better, I could be asleep in my own bed.

  Entering the private hospital, I locate the nurse who called me and she directs me to room 834. I gather up the cannula equipment and head down the corridor. Just as I’m about to turn into room 834, I notice the door to the room opposite is open and the light is on. Peering in, I see the patient is standing up, wrestling with his IV pole.

  I’m about to step into the room and offer him some assistance when he looks up and our eyes meet.

  For a moment the world spins, and I drop my equipment on the floor.

  I don’t know how to react, so I tear my eyes away from Dr Jack Prince, patient, hastily gather up the equipment I dropped, and charge into room 834.

  ‘Hi, I’m the doctor from the public hospital just here to put a drip in!’ I exclaim, my face flushed and my heart pounding. I start to put in the cannula, my hands shaking.