Chapter three

The elderly man and I sat next to each other in silence for a few moments. I was about to leave but had barely moved before he reached out to stop me.

"I´m sure the woman who is accompanying you won´t notice your absence," he said, gesturing to my mother, asleep peacefully a few seats behind us. "Would you care to give me some company, if you're not too tired, that is?"

"I guess so..." He seemed nice and in need for a chat. I could do that.

"Why did you become a doctor?" he asked after a few moments.

"I beg your pardon?"

"How did the love of medicine grow on you?"

"My mom bought me a toy stethoscope when I was four," I said without a second thought.

"Really?"

"It had a red diaphragm..."

He suppressed a smile. "What more there is to that story? You're not telling everything."

"Well," I paused, "when I was four I was pushed in the playground for some reason. I don't recollect the details of it, but I was taken to the hospital to be sutured since I had a small wound in my scalp. I was fascinated by everything. I cried the whole time until a man in what seemed to be green pajamas, which now I recognize as scrubs, told me in a very reassuring voice that he was going to make it better. I don't know how much time it took for me to stop crying, but eventually I did. I asked him what he had hanging around his neck. When he answered, I couldn't even say it right! So I asked him if I could have a "spoke" like his. My mom bought me one in the following day, and that was it."

"You never wanted to be anything else?"

"No, not really. I mean, I love writing and there was a time I dreamed about becoming a famous author. But for now I just can't imagine my life without medicine involved somehow. It's what gives me a reason to wake up and get out of bed! I'm so lazy in the morning that surely without the proper incentive I wouldn't get up at all!"

"But you can't expect me to believe that you love your work that much just because it was the fulfillment of a childhood dream."

I hesitated, considering how to answer that. I eventually admitted, "Obviously my reasons for choosing medicine and actually going through medical school are quite different."

"Would you care to develop that thought a little?"

"When you're in high school thinking about your life prospects and projects you don't really have the notion of what you have to go through to accomplish it. You just see the nice part! As most teenagers, I saw everything through innocent eyes and I pictured medicine exclusively as a way of helping people. All I cared about was the sense of mission, so to speak. I didn't know anyone actually working in medicine, so I wasn't able to talk to anyone about it."

"And now?"

"In a way that feeling didn't fade. But there are different undertones that you add to the whole picture." I didn't want to explain any further than that. I wasn't sure he'd understand me, and I didn't want to be misinterpreted by a total stranger.

"I see," he said evenly, looking away from my eyes. There was a hint of something... else in his tone? He glanced toward Ashlee as she quietly approached us.

"Can I be of any service, Your Grace?"

"I would like to take my cup of tea now. If you'd be so kind to bring me one."

"Certainly, Your Grace."

He didn't say anything else while she went to fetch his tea. He started drinking slowly, savoring it, then looked at the fine porcelain cup he held in his hand. His eyes unfocused for a moment, then abruptly turned back to mine.

"Are you not happy with your choice?"

"Of me becoming a doctor?" He nodded. "I suppose so."

"Suppose or know so?" His eyes had a childish glint that accompanied his mildly defiant tone.

"Know so." I felt the urge to explain myself, but there was something off about his body language that prevented me from saying more.

"Nothing is ever perfect. Even when things are different from what you expected them to be, you always had, have and will have a choice." He paused, pondering his own words, then added, "The way you live your life will always be your responsibility. You see, Bella, I was told that living a happy life is an utopist dream. Of course I had my happy moments, but I was raised believing that aspiring to a happy life is the way to disappointment, that that feeling of disappointment is inevitable if you pursue an illusion and that the best you can hope for is a sense of contentment, period."

"And are you?"

"Am I what?"

"Are you content with the way things turned out for you?"

"I believe I was otherwise too engaged to contemplate my contentment."

"I´m sure you had your moments, you said so yourself… that you had happy moments."

"I did."

"And will have." I regretted saying that the moment the words evaded my lips. His face aged twenty years in the three seconds it took for him to grasp what I said.

"I will not." He looked again at his cup and calmly sipped a little more of his tea. "It´s cold." He gestured and the cup soon was out of his hand. "We should define 'happy life'. I know that it´s not the sum of happy moments.

"It´s almost tacky to say it but you don't really value what you have until you've lost it. There are seldom moments that when asked – are you happy? – you would answer 'yes' without a second thought. Years later, if you were asked again about that specific moment, you may change your answer. Time can have that sickening effect of sweetening memories. It surely cannot be applied as universal law but it happens often. For instance, I was bullied when I was in school, but at that time my grandmother, who genuinely was my mother figure while growing up, was still alive. Was I happier then? Being bullied doesn't seem so unbearable now." Were his eyes bright with tears? He never made eye contact. Was he avoiding it? It was disturbing. Did I say something wrong?

"We must define happiness, then, to be able to look for it and to appreciate it while it's standing there before you?" I asked.

"Maybe... Not being able to know you're happy may be sad in a way. If looking back you know for sure – man, wasn't I happy then?! – it can be extremely frustrating but does it diminish the value of the feeling? Do you feel it with less intensity because you can't name it? If you needed a special medicine that was stored inside a vase within thousands of different vases, would you be able to find it? What if your life depended on it?"

"Why not just try them all?"

"That´s the easy answer… but it tells me that there is still hope in you, and I´m glad to hear it. You're realistic but you don't simply accept what you have, do you? You'll be happy, you'll see."

Was there still hope in me? I suddenly remembered that I left my mother alone and worried that she might have already woken up. He must have sensed that I was worrying about her, because he quickly glanced back and reassured me that she was still sleeping.

"You look so tired. Why don't you should rest a little? I'll wake you up if your mother wakes before you do. I'm enjoying your company too much to be deprived of it so soon."

"I won't be much company when I'm sleeping," I replied.

"I travel alone all the time and it will be nice to have someone with whom I'm now acquainted next to me. Maybe the urge to sleep will rub off on me. I have some trouble sleeping."

I couldn't refuse him. There was something about him that made me feel safe, so I thanked him and asked him not to let me sleep for more than a couple of hours. As I slowly drifted to unconsciousness, I thought I heard him say softly, "You look so much like her," but my eyelids were so heavy that I didn't have it in me to ask him who he was talking about.

AN:

Thanks to my Beta Scooterstale here you have the next chapter, fully edited. She has a great story: Breaking Dawn from EPOV. It makes SM run for her money, trust me.

As always, I don't own twilight or any of its characters… THoLHM is mine.

See you soon and please Review