Holy Ground (Taylor's Version)

Chapter 3

Dear book that for some reason has a unicorn on its cover, 

Two things happened today. Well, it's more one thing that led to events and it was more just a continuous event, but I'm going to separate them. 

First off, my patient died. I was working with Dr. Shepherd again today. I had been avoiding my goal of having a polite conversation with him and focused on my patient. She is- she was an adorable three-year-old girl with curly blond hair and really bright blue eyes. They were the type of eyes that would probably have dimmed with age, but now they won't get the chance. 

She had a life-threatening brain-destroying condition. I don't know how to spell it so I won't write it down but it was really bad. Our surgical plan was to literally take out half her brain. Because of her age, she would have been able to survive without many defects, but now she won't be getting that chance. She could have survived, but it was brain surgery. People just- die in brain surgery. Dr. Shepherd didn't do anything wrong, I didn't do anything wrong. It just happened. 

I think that's the worst. It would be better if there was something to blame. Maybe if the parents were negligent, I would be able to say that it was their fault. Or if one of the surgical team fucked up, it would be to blame. Instead, she just died. Not a single person could have stopped her. The randomness of it is killing me. Nothing is certain, you can't count on anything staying. 

I've spent my whole entire life working on my education. My mother placed me in school when I was two years old. Then I went to grade school, middle school, high school, college, med school, now I'm in my residency. All this time I've been building myself up. Investing in my life. I said that I would be able to enjoy my life later on when I'm better established. When my career is good, I'll have money. I'll be able to enjoy my life later on, but what's the point if it can just end now. 

I would tell myself that this is the wrong way to live my life. That I need to start living my life now, and I should be trying to be happy. Life is too short to put off being happy for some far-off future, but the idea of trying now is terrifying. What if I ruin it for later on? Or what if I fail at being happy now? The hope of at some point being happy is better than the knowledge that you will never be. 

After the devastating experience of watching an innocent life slip through your fingers. A life that it was my literal job to save, I had to continue. I was supposed to just suck it up and pretend it didn't fuck me over. This whole thinking about death thing wasn't going to help me get through my day. And it's only going to be worse if I have to have a conversation about my feelings. If someone asks me if I'm okay, I'll just give them a smile and quickly say that I'm fine. Since there will be a clear shine of tears in my eyes they will give me that look. The look where they are trying to decide whether or not to fight me on the subject. But eventually, they always decide not to. It's a whole can of worms they don't want to get into. 

Except this time, someone did fight me on it.

I was washing my hand in the scrub room. Everyone was quiet. I don't think there was a single person here that wasn't affected by this death. She was three years old for god's sake. Dr. Shepherd joined me in washing our hands, scrubbing the death from our hands. 

"Are you okay?" He asked. His face turned to me and it had that sincere look he always had. 

I smiled and said, "I'm fine."

He scoffed, "You shouldn't be."

"Well-" I shrugged. I didn't want to get into it. I could handle this on my own. 

"Are you actually fine or do you not want to talk about how you are feeling?" He asked. Damn. 

"I'm f-" I started. 

"Before you answer that question- I think it's important for you to know that if you are actually fine, that's a sign you shouldn't be a doctor. If you could watch that child die and be completely unaffected by it, you might be a psychopath. I don't want to work with psychopaths." He explained. 

"If I say I don't want to talk about it, will you make me talk about it anyway?" I asked. 

"Yes." He responded. 

"Then I'm fine," I responded stubbornly. 

"You're not." He said as he wrung out his hands. The annoyance clear in his tone. "would you actually rather have your boss think you're a psychopath than talk about your feelings?"

I looked up at him. How am I supposed to respond? How do I get out of this? Why is he doing this to me?

"Do you have someone to talk to?" He asked. 

I still didn't respond. I technically do. There are a few people I could talk about this with, but I won't. 

"You need to talk about this. If you don't, it will eat you alive. You'll burn out before you have a chance of becoming a good doctor." He said. 

"I don't- or I do. I do have some to talk to." I answered. 

"And will you? Talk to them?" He asked. 

I gave him a pleading look. Maybe I should lie- promise that I'll discuss all my mushy gooey feelings and have a tea party or something. 

After a few minutes of silence, he finally turns towards the door and says, "follow me."

We walked in silence for a few minutes. We went towards the elevator and down a few floors, walked down a few hallways until we ended up in a part of the hospital I had never been in. The chapel. We were the only ones there. I expected there to be a plethora of weeping widows and parents but it was abandoned. At the front of the chapel, there was a small table with candles on it but not a single one was lit. 

"This is the closest thing in a hospital to holy ground." He says in a quiet reverent voice. I want to protest being here. I am absolutely not religious. Not even a little bit. My mother raised me to believe in nothing but science, I don't agree with my mother on a lot of things, but we can agree that the idea of religion is not for either of us. "I was raised Catholic." Oh god. "Don't worry, I'm not trying to convert you or anything." He said quickly. "I don't believe in God myself, but my mother did. So I had to go to Sunday school and get all the sacraments. I'm sure you've seen or heard of confession. It's when you go into a small room with a priest and you tell him what you did wrong and he forgives you for God. Then when you are done, you both leave and the priest isn't allowed to comment or have any reaction to what you said in confession. You could have confessed to murder and he would not be allowed to have any reaction to this outside of confession." 

I stared at him confused. 

"That's what I'm offering to you. Just tell me what you're feeling, and I won't have any reaction. No matter what you say, after this, I will not let it affect our professional relationship even in the slightest."

"Okay-" I say slowly. Should I trust this?

"Just go with it. You'll feel better, I promise." He said. 

After a few minutes of silence, I finally said, "She just- died."

"Yea- she did." He nodded. 

After the surgery, I had the weirdest conversation of my life. With Derek Shepherd no less. He made me talk about my feelings. He didn't take no for an answer. Literally, no one ever has been that successful about getting me to talk. I cried in front of him. Sobbed actually. I haven't cried like that in front of anyone since I was maybe five years old. I honestly don't even know how he convinced me to do it. 

There was just something sincere and caring about him. His eyes. They were looking right at me, into me even. Like all of his energy was focused on me. He gave me this long speech about confession and how we were on holy ground so I could talk about whatever I wanted. I don't know how it worked. I have no idea how I'll even face him in the future. God, what the fuck even happened?

Goals for tomorrow: Avoid Derek Shepherd, research therapists (because you neglected to do so today)

(That was depressing, let me know what you thought!)