Chapter 3
But after a failed surgery left a patient disabled, the family got someone to break Kevin's leg as payback.
He told me. "I got fired from the hospital, lost my license, and now I can't even hold a scalpel.
"I was crushed for a while. But look at me now. I can still teach you how to read anatomy charts.
"Seaside University isn't as good as Northbridge University. I'll admit that."
My eyes grew misty, and I choked back a sob.
All the frustration I'd been bottling up finally spilled out.
He handed me a cup of coffee.
I took it and wrapped my hands around it. "Thanks."
Peter went on, "You're luckier than me. You still have a future ahead of you.
"Northbridge University isn't that far away. You can use Seaside University as your starting point and start over.
"I'll help you, but you have to pull yourself together.
"Don't even think about doing something stupid."
I wiped my eyes with the back of my hand. "I'm not."
His voice was still stern, but warm too.
"Turn around and look," he said.
I turned around.
Lucy and our class representative were hiding by the rooftop door.
The wind was biting, and seeing the worry on their faces made me feel a little guilty.
"Hey, genius, we're here for you too," they called out.
They walked over, each holding a cup of coffee, grinning from ear to ear.
It felt like those days in middle school, when the whole crowd of village elders would wait for me outside the classroom.
The next day, Lucy came with me to the salon.
I had my thick childhood bangs thinned out and cut into see-through bangs.
I pulled my long hair back into a high ponytail.
My forehead was bright and clear. I should've let it shine ages ago.
With my teachers and classmates backing me up, I finally got back on my feet.
I always grabbed a seat in the front row, and my notebooks were bursting compared to the textbooks.
In lab class, my hands were steady as a machine when I practiced IVs on the dummy.
Secretly, I stashed the Northbridge Medical School grad brochure under my pillow.
Every night, before I went to sleep, I'd take it out and read it.
I stopped wallowing in self-pity and started working hard to close my gap with Northbridge Medical School.
On weekends, I picked up shifts at the hospital as a caregiver to make some extra money.
Once, when I was suctioning a patient in critical condition, he started coughing like crazy and splattered me from head to toe.
I didn't even flinch. I wiped it off my face and kept working.
At that moment, I finally understood why my dad always came home with mud on his legs.
The corners of my books curled up like little waves, and I'd taped the covers back together with tape more times than I could count.
Autumn faded into winter.
It was the last lab before winter break, and I was in the middle of inserting a nasogastric tube into the practice mannequin.
Suddenly, Kevin tapped me on the back.
"Someone's here to see you," he said.
At the end of the hallway stood Ethan, someone I hadn't seen in what felt like forever.
He was bundled up in a black down jacket, carrying a thermos.
"My mom made some soup," he said.
I turned to leave, but he grabbed my arm.
"Natalie, are you still mad?" he asked.
I saw snowflakes clinging to his eyelashes.
"I know it was wrong to mess with your college application, but it was all because of Jennifer..." he tried to explain.
"Ethan, stop," I cut him off, my voice sharp.
I yanked my arm free.
I snapped, "It's been six months, and you're still making Jennifer your excuse for what you did to me.
"If she told you to jump off a cliff, would you do it?
"Did she hold a knife to her own throat and force you to change my college application?"
I hardly knew Jennifer.
Most of the other students were too intimidated to talk to her.
Ethan always said she was sick and frail.
He always said, "Jennifer can't breathe when she's around too many people.
"She can't get too worked up. It could get really bad."
No one ever got close to Jennifer.
Ethan always insisted, "It's my responsibility to protect Jennifer."
I was the only fool who couldn't see he'd do anything for her.
Ethan said, "The night we checked the SAT results, Jennifer kept crying. She was 60 points short of Northbridge University's cutoff.
"She kept crying, saying she was useless, that she'd messed up the exam and could only get into a second-tier college.
"I was terrified she'd lose control. I was afraid I couldn't handle it..."
I cut him off, my chest aching. "Enough. Get out of my face. I don't want to hear it."
I stared him straight in the eyes.
I shouted, "Did you ever think that I'd cry too if I didn't get into Northbridge Medical School?"
Ethan froze, going pale.
"You've always been so tough, like the sun, always shining. I thought you'd..." he stammered.
I forced a bitter smile and pointed at the door.
I snapped, "Get out. I'll never let this go. I'll never forgive you."
I turned and walked away.
I heard him call my name behind me, and he sounded beaten.
When I got back to the lab, Kevin was refilling his cup.
"Did you have a fight?" he asked.
"Just ran into someone I know," I said.
I sat down and kept practicing, my fingers shaking as I ran them along the dummy's veins, again and again.
Kevin slid an extra cup of coffee over to me.
"Try it. Back when I got dumped, this was the only thing that kept me going through surgery," he said.
The coffee tasted bitter, but somehow salty too, like tears.
One day, I saw Ethan at the nurse's station in Seaside Hospital, accompanying Jennifer for a check-up.
He leaned over and expertly put the oxygen mask on Jennifer.
Like back in high school, he'd always bring me water, open the bottle for me, and somehow it was always the perfect temperature.
He always knew when I was on my period and would have hot drinks ready for me before I even asked.
When I was grinding through practice questions late at night, he'd stay in the study room with me to make sure I didn't pull all-nighters.
Was all of that care fake?
I didn't wallow in sadness for long. Instead, I threw myself into my studies, believing that hard work would eventually pay off.
In my junior year, I published a paper on chronic disease care in a well-known medical journal.
The paper caught the attention of a professor at Northbridge Medical School.
He emailed me to ask if I'd be interested in working as his research assistant.
The day I got that email, I stayed in the lab until three a.m.
Staring out at the patchy shadows outside the window, I laughed through tears. Finally, I could let it all out.
Who would've thought I did make it from Seaside University to Northbridge Medical School?