Author's Note: Enjoy!
Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight.
Chapter 57
The intern and two nurses came running up to me. The intern was around my age, and he was extremely good-looking. But he looked scared.
"What's your name, handsome?" I asked.
He flushed slightly and answered, "Aaron Courtney."
"Have you ever been in surgery, Aaron?"
"A couple, with Dr. Jackson," he answered. "But I was only observing. I've never done it in person."
"Well, you get to help me in person today, Aaron," I said. "Go scrub up."
He gulped as he ran to wash in the sinks. I turned to the nurses. "I hope he's good."
One of them smiled. "He is. He's just scared that he'll end up killing the patient."
I grinned. "I'm the one that's operating. And he's scared?"
Ten minutes later, I was beginning the surgery with an anxious intern and two nurses. Jasper was next to me, along with another colleague of his and two other nurses.
"Make it quick," Jasper mumbled. "We'll keep an eye on her heart, so don't worry."
I nodded. I looked up and smiled to see Aaron grimacing. "Don't worry, Aaron. It'll be fine. Even if something goes wrong, I'll take the blame, so loosen up."
Aaron peeked at me, then smiled slightly.
"Alright, let's start," I sighed. "Scalpel." He handed it to me, and I began to concentrate.
I would not have a dead heart disease patient and her baby on my conscience on my first day at Columbia.
The mother had a couple cardiac arrests during the C-section. But luckily, we got her little girl out of her body and stitched her back up. At that point, Jasper took over.
"Good luck," I whispered as I walked toward the back of the surgery room to help the nurse weigh the girl in. Her prints were stamped onto her paper, and I filled in her height and weight.
The nurse got her wrapped in blankets and began feeding her baby formula. She sucked on it greedily.
I smiled, relieved as the nurses exited the room with the child. I glanced at Aaron, who looked doubly relieved.
"Come on, buddy," I said. "Let's go wash up."
We washed in silence. Then, as I was leaving the OR, he called, "Dr. Swan."
I turned back.
Aaron looked embarrassed. "Thank you."
"Thank you?" I repeated. "For what?"
"For giving me a chance. For believing in me. For encouraging me."
I smiled. "I'm thankful to you as well. Without you, we wouldn't have saved the baby. She's healthy, thanks to you. Great work today, Aaron." I winked at him before continuing on my way.
As soon as I arrived on the sixth floor, Grace literally seized my arm and hissed in my ear, "What were you thinking? Only an intern and two nurses in a surgery? Are you crazy? You're in so much trouble."
"Yeah?" I challenged, staring at the board of directors and the director of gynecology standing in front of me. Gwen and Carlisle were standing off to the side, looking down at the floor.
"What if you're fired?" Grace asked. "It's your first day here!"
"Then I get fired," I said easily. "But I have some things to say as well. I'm not backing down so easy." I marched up to the men.
One of them looked at me. "So this is the young woman."
"A bit too young, I think," another mumbled.
"I'm sure you're aware that you are in trouble, Dr. …?" the first one glanced at my name tag. "Swan?"
"I'm well aware of it, sir."
"Why is it that you went against regulations and went ahead with the surgery?"
"A patient was in danger," I said simply.
"I don't know how your hospital did it wherever you're from," he said sternly. "But at Columbia, we don't tolerate it. Only an intern…! This cannot happen!"
"Oh, I assure you, I would've gotten in trouble at UCLA as well," I said coldly. "And especially since I went ahead with the surgery without authoritative permission, I'm sure the consequences are doubly severe. But sir, what was I supposed to do? Leave a woman in danger? It wasn't my fault. All the doctors were busy and refused to come to my aid. What else could I do? I had to use the best intern around."
"Now you listen here, young lady-"
"I don't think it's proper of you to get so angry about this, sir," I said evenly. "I'm a gynecologist. I am someone who saves lives, and I'm someone who brings new life into the world. And I did my best today to do my job. Just because I disobeyed some rules to save a person's life doesn't mean that I've committed a crime, does it?"
The director of gynecology glanced at Carlisle, then at Gwen. Finally, he looked at the board of directors. "She's right, folks."
"Martin!" one of them said, looking aghast. "How can you say that?"
"Because she is," he said simply. "A patient was in danger, and our department was busy. She simply did what she had to do." He turned to Carlisle and Gwen. "Whose student is she? She started today, I believe?"
"She's no student of Columbia, sir," Carlisle said. "She has transferred to our medical center for an indefinite amount of time."
"She's under my wing, sir," Gwen added. "She's a student of my friend's over at UCLA, and I agreed to take her in. Therefore, I will take responsibility for her."
I immediately felt bad. My eyes flickered over to her, and she smiled slightly, shaking her head minutely. Telling me that it was going to be fine.
"That's not necessary," another board member said. "The young lady has convinced me. She has a way with words." He smiled at me before turning to his colleagues. "What do you think, gentlemen?"
They seemed to agree, and now, they seemed rather impressed by my nerve to stand up to them.
"Good," the elderly director said. He glanced at Carlisle and Gwen. "Take care of her, you two. Though she has broken several rules today, she seems like an intelligent, skilled girl. Doctors like these don't come easily these days."
I blushed slightly at his compliment.
The director of gynecology smiled, pleased. Gwen smirked proudly. Carlisle looked up to smile at me warmly. Even after eight years had passed and the history between his son and I still lingered, he still looked at me like nothing had changed.
The board all filed out, and Grace relaxed. "Thank goodness. I thought you were going to be fired!"
"That's never going to happen, Gracie," her aunt said, looking at me proudly. "You did the right thing, Bella. Great work."
"Some excitement you've caused on your first day at work, Bella," Carlisle said, winking. "The family will be interested to hear that."
"I'm sorry," I said. "I didn't mean to cause a lot of trouble."
Gwen chuckled. "Are you kidding? I'm going to call Shelly right now and tell her all about this. No doubt she'll want you back in a jiffy, saying that she can't let a genius like you making a reputation at Columbia. But no way am I letting you go back to UCLA." She winked before throwing an arm around her niece and dragging her away.
"I'm very impressed, Bella," Carlisle told me. "I always knew you were intelligent and quick-witted, but I didn't know you had such a gift."
"Gift?"
"You were always reserved and quite shy," he said thoughtfully. "But now I see that you've changed while you were in California. Since there was no one around to help you in LA, you've grown used to the idea of having to take care of yourself. And you learned to speak out and make everyone listen. I'm proud of you."
My gaze lowered, embarrassed. "You have no idea how scared I was. I thought I was going to be fired on my first day."
He chuckled, patting my shoulder. "I don't think you'll be leaving here for a while."
I looked up again. "Thanks, Carlisle."
He nodded, his expression softening paternally as he studied me. He smiled sadly, and walked away.
Somehow, I knew that when he had smiled, he had been thinking about Edward.
I rushed back upstairs when I heard the news. No doubt Jasper was beating himself up right now.
I ran to the operating rooms quickly, and I skidded to a stop when I saw the familiar figure of my brother. His shoulders were hunched as he talked to a man around his mid-thirties.
Slowly, I walked toward them. And as I got closer, I was able to make out their conversation.
"I'm so sorry," Jasper was saying, his expression miserable. He was looking at the ground, unable to look into the man's eyes. "We tried our best…but it was too late. There's no other excuse I can tell you."
The man looked grieved as tears brimmed around his eyes. He took a deep breath. "Thank you for doing your best, son. I'm just grateful that you didn't give up on my wife."
"I'm sorry," Jasper whispered, his voice choking.
I realized that the woman hadn't made it. Giving birth to her daughter had been her final act. My heart went out to her husband, and my brother.
The woman's husband, the child's father… It seemed as though he had loved his wife a lot.
Jasper… I knew that he'd done his best. And seeing someone die under his care had been repeated numerous times over the past few years as a cardiologist. But I knew from experience that a doctor never got used to it.
"Can I ask what happened to the baby?" the man asked. "Did it…" His voice trembled at the thought of being all alone. "Did it…die…as well?"
"No," I answered instead, walking forward.
The man and Jasper both looked up. Jasper looked miserable. Too miserable.
I stopped in front of them. "No, sir. Your wife gave birth to a beautiful baby girl shortly before her death. Her usual gynecologist was unavailable, so I delivered the baby instead." I smiled slightly. "Congratulations, sir…and I'm sorry for your loss."
The man's eyes softened as he studied me. "Thank you, young lady. You have no idea how grateful I am to you. Thank you."
I bowed my head. "I truly am sorry that we couldn't do more to save your wife. Truly."
He sighed. "Don't beat yourselves up and blame her death on you. We both knew about her heart condition for months now. It was a possibility of having to prepare for something like this. And though I'm sad, I think I can let her go now. I guess the only thing I can do now is to raise the kid myself."
He patted Jasper's shoulder gently. "Thank you, son. Thank you." He nodded at me before starting to walk away. Then, he paused and glanced at our name tags.
"Are you two related somehow?" he asked in a strange tone.
Jasper didn't seem in the mood to answer, so I answered instead. "We're siblings, sir."
"Your names…"
"Adoptive siblings," I clarified. "But it doesn't matter. Because he's my brother."
The man smiled. "It's nice to hear that. Because blood isn't the one that makes you siblings. It's the relationship behind it. Good luck to both of you." He nodded before walking away.
I turned to Jasper. "You okay?"
He sighed. "No. I feel really bad. I have another death on my conscience."
"At least you didn't have the entire board of directors on you," I said lightly, trying to distract him. "Well, actually, death is much worse, but still… I nearly got fired." I laughed slightly.
"I told you not to use the intern," he said glumly.
"It's okay," I said. "I made a good impression of myself, and they let me go." I touched his arm gently. "I'm sorry, Jasper."
He looked really upset. Sighing, I hugged him. Automatically, he wrapped his arms around me as well and relaxed as he leaned on me.
"Thanks," he mumbled. "I needed the comfort. I'm really glad to have you just one floor below me."
I laughed, rubbing his back. "I'm glad too."
I plopped down on the couch wearily, sighing heavily. My little Golden Retriever stood in front of me, his head cocking as his beautiful eyes softened, asking me silently what was wrong.
"You have no idea, Rollie," I mumbled. "Today was an exhausting first day."
Rollie sat on the ground, his head still tilted adorably.
I smiled tiredly. "I nearly got fired on my first day, and Jasper had another death on his conscience. And I feel especially bad because we were operating together on the same patient."
I felt silly, talking to a dog, but I knew that Rollie was different. He understood.
His ears flattened in sympathy, and I scratched his head lovingly. "Thanks for listening to me, buddy. Anything interesting happen to you while I was gone?"
He perked up, then padded out of my line of sight. Curious, I waited. He brought back a piece of paper, holding it gingerly in his teeth.
"Thanks, honey," I said, taking it.
It read: I filled up your closet this afternoon. And I kept Rollie company for a while before I left. Hope you don't mind. Alice.
"So Alice was here, huh?" I said, crumpling up the little post-it.
"Arf!"
"What did you guys talk about?" My expression hardened as I glared up at the ceiling. "Edward?"
He didn't do anything, but merely sat there. He watched as I became lost in thought, drowned in my past memories.
There might have been a time when I'd truly been happy. With the same young man in question.
I closed my eyes in despair. After all these years, and after everything that I'd been through, I still couldn't believe that I wasn't able to forget him.
I hoped, for my sanity, that he wouldn't try anything funny. I wouldn't be able to resist him for very long.
AN: You'll smell the aura of revenge very soon. Leave me reviews!
