Page 1 of Brain Damage

PROLOGUE

If someone had asked me before this happened if it would hurt to be shot in the head, I almost certainly would’ve answered yes. Of course, yes.

It makes sense. A piece of metal rapidly shooting through flesh and bone… how could it not hurt? During my intern year, I spent time in the emergency room and I saw people who had been recently shot. None in the head, but one in the shoulder, one through the knee, and one unfortunate bullet ripped its way right through a man’s stomach. I didn’t need to ask any of those people if the bullet hurt. I could see it in their faces.

I wasn’t someone who had to worry about being shot though. The patients I treated in the emergency room weren’t upper-middle-class female doctors living in million-dollar apartments overlooking Central Park. They all lived in a poor section of the city, where bullets whizzed through the air as commonly as raindrops.

I, on the other hand, was safe, insulated. I wasn’t the sort of person who would be shot in the street while going to buy soda at the local newsstand. When I died, it would be from a stroke or cancer, or if I was lucky, my heart would stop beating one night in my sleep when my hair was as white as my pillow and my face was crisscrossed with deep wrinkles.

Or so I thought.

Back to the initial question of whether it hurt to be shot in the head. Because there is a lot I don’t remember, but this part I remember very well.

I remember staring at the gun, not really believing that it would go off, not believing that this could happen to me. And then I remember the explosion, seconds before the bullet discharged, passed through my skull, shattering it to pieces, soaring through gray matter, white matter, neurons, ventricles, then back through my skull again, and finally lodging itself in the well-insulated wall that kept our neighbors from hearing the noise of the gunshot.

And none of that hurt. The truth is, I didn’t feel it at all.

What hurt is everything that came after.

1

BEFORE

There are times when I truly do hate being a doctor, and one of those times is right now, right this minute, while I’m staring down at the groin of a forty-five-year-old man who smells like he hasn’t bathed in weeks.

One of our nurses, Jessica, is standing next to me, “assisting me,” although in truth, she’s actually here to protect me from getting groped by this half-naked man. It’s happened before, and I’ve gotten sick of it.

Yes, the life of a dermatologist is very glamorous.

“It’s a fungal infection,” I say, averting my eyes from Mr. Leroy’s groin and gratefully redirecting them to his round face.

A fungal infection. Which Mr. Leroy’s primary care doctor should have diagnosed himself. What a waste of my time.

I try to back away, giving myself a little distance between me and the fungus, but I slam into a wall. Our examining rooms are tiny. Miniscule. Several of my coworkers have complained to Roger, our boss, that we can’t work in such tiny spaces, but tiny spaces mean more examining rooms to stuff patients into, which means we can see them faster. It’s all about the bottom line with Roger.

“That’s what Dr. Hanson told me,” Mr. Leroy says. His jaws are working together like he’s chewing something. Did he start eating while I was looking at his groin? Oh God. “And he gave me this tube of spermicide for it.”

I purse my lips together, and glance over at Jessica.

“He gave you what?” I ask.

“Some spermicide,” Mr. Leroy repeats, still chewing vigorously. “And I’ve been putting the spermicide all over the rash for like a week, but it’s not any better. So I figured I should see a skin doctor.”

I can tell that Jessica is struggling not to laugh.

“You mean fungicide?” she asks.

Mr. Leroy shrugs and rubs his chin. “Oh yeah. Maybe.”

I have no idea whether Dr. Hanson gave Mr. Leroy a cream that wasn’t strong enough or else he actually did give the poor man spermicide. Either way, I know fungus when I see it. The moist skin folds of Mr. Leroy’s groin are ripe with it. If I were a fungus, that’s definitely where I would want to live. (Not being a fungus, I live in a very nice apartment by Central Park in New York City.)

I write Mr. Leroy a prescription for a tube of high potency fungicide and explain to him how to use it. I also say a few words about hygiene, certain that they will be forgotten the second he leaves the room. He could probably also use some counseling on getting his diabetes under control, but I’m not a miracle worker. Besides, I’ve been told by Roger that I’ve got a ten-minute quota for each patient, and I’ve already used up nine of those minutes.

As I hand over the prescription to Mr. Leroy, I suddenly see the beginning of moisture forming in the corners of his eyes. A second later, they’re full-on tears. And all I can think is: What the hell?

It’s not like patients don’t cry in here. I’ve had to hand over more than a few cancer diagnoses in my time, and I’ve got a box of tissues in the corner of the room that gets replaced on a regular basis. It’s something they teach you in medical school: How to comfort a crying patient. Except the first time you actually see it, you panic. You don’t know what to do aside from patting their shoulder and saying, “There, there.”

But after several years in practice, I’ve got it down to a science. The compassionate arm rub, the box of tissues, the sympathetic and caring voice. It’s not like I’m going to make anything all better, but if I can make them feel even a little better, I’ll take it. Even if I have to go over my ten minute quota. (Screw you, Roger.)