Page 28 of Obeying

I stand in front of my closet for ten minutes trying to figure out what to wear—which is stupid because I wear scrubs, so there's nothing to figure out. But then I look at my arm, and I know what I'm actually deciding. I grab a long-sleeved jacket, the lightest one I have, and put it on over my scrubs. It's too warm for it. June in this city doesn't call for layers, but the bruises on my arm are darkening, and I'd rather sweat through a twelve-hour shift than answer a single question about them.

I look at myself in the mirror before I leave. I practice smiling. It looks wrong.

I try again. Better. Good enough for a hospital hallway.

The walk from the entrance to the locker room feels longer than usual. I keep my head up and my pace normal. I don't look at anyone too long because I'm afraid of what I'll see in their faces.

The shift is its own kind of brutal.

People are looking at me. Some are kind about it, quickly glancing away when I catch them, offering too-bright smiles and the "how are you doing?" that means something different today than it did last week. Some are just curious. They lean toward each other at the nurses' station when I walk past, and the conversations stop a beat too late when I round a corner.

I smile through all of it. That's what I know how to do. I endure. I perform fine. I answer questions during rounds, check on my patients, and write my notes. I do all of it with my jacket zipped to my chin and my face arranged into something that says I'm okay, please stop looking at me.

I move fast between patients. Head down, clipboard up, always going somewhere. If I keep moving, no one has the time to get a good look at me. I round corners without looking and cut through hallways I don't normally use, and I'm almost at the stairwell when someone steps into my path.

Priya. She doesn't say anything at first. She just looks at me, and it's not pity on her face—it's actual worry. Worry that comes from someone who cares, not someone collecting gossip. Of course.

She pulls me into an empty hallway, voice low. "I heard what happened yesterday. Are you okay? Do you need anything?"

"I'm fine. Really."

She looks at me. Then at my jacket. And back at me. She doesn't ask about it. She just steps closer and squeezes my shoulder.

"I'm here if you're not fine," she says. "Whenever that is. Tomorrow, next week, three in the morning. I don't care. You call me."

I nod. And I want to say something more than thank you because Priya has been so good to me since I got here, and she doesn't know how much it means to me.

"Thank you, Priya. I mean that."

She smiles. "I know you do." She squeezes once more and lets go. "Okay. Go take care of your patients. And text me later, okay? I mean it."

"I will."

She gives me one last look, like she's making sure I'm actually standing upright, and heads off toward her floor. I watch her go, and I am grateful for her friendship.

I make it to the afternoon. I go to Walter's room because I need to see him and apologize for what happened, but when I get to 412, the bed is empty.

"He's down in radiology," his nurse tells me. "Follow-up imaging on the hip."

I'll come back another time. I owe him that conversation.

I check the clock. Just a few more hours, and then I can go home and close the door and stop performing.

But the afternoon is worse than the morning. The gossip has spread. I can tell because it's not just my floor anymore. Nurses from other departments glance at me when I pass them in the stairwell. A doctor I've never spoken to from ortho stops me near the elevator and says, "Hey, I heard what happened. You doing alright?" I tell him I'm fine. He nods and walks away, and I keep moving.

Ten minutes later, a charge nurse from the ICU finds me at the nurses' station. "Dr. Portland? I just wanted to check in. If you need anything, we're all here for you." I smile, thank her, and go back to my chart.

Then a resident I barely recognize from another program catches me in the hallway. "Oh my God, are you the one whose boyfriend showed up? That's insane. Are you okay? What happened?"

"Ex-boyfriend," I say. "And I'm fine. Thank you."

I keep moving. I keep smiling. I answer the same questions with the same words, and my face is starting to hurt from holding the expression. Every time someone new approaches me, I lose another piece of whatever I'm using to hold myself together.

Then Margaret, an older nurse I've worked with a few times, touches my shoulder and says, "Hang in there, sweetie."

And that's it. That's the one that does it.

Because people used to stop me in hallways for different reasons. In med school, it was congratulations on an exam score or a professor wanting to tell me my research proposal was one of the best he'd seen. At St. Andrew's, it was attendings pulling me aside to say I was one of the best they'd seen. People used to know my name because I was good at what I did. They looked at me and saw someone worth watching.