Noel has spent his life floating in the background. In foster care, he was the glue that held his little family together and in the operating room, he makes sure he's supporting the doctors. After years of feeling useless, he begins to believe that...
My feet ached, my back was crying out from standing up for so long slightly hunched over at an odd angle, and my eyes stung from looking at monitors all day. Even though I was uncomfortable, I loved every second I spent in the hospital, not as a patient. I sat on a computer compiling notes that I had made on an arteriovenous malformation (AVM) patient who had given Dr. Houdeck a few problems during surgery but had pulled through and hopefully wouldn't be back anytime soon. The administrative portion of my job was honestly the least exciting part of my day, but it was important that the chart reflected everything so that the night crew was aware of a patient's most recent medical state if something were to happen when all of the main staff were at home. As my hands pushed the buttons mindlessly as if on autopilot from years of training Dr. Houdeck walked over to me to speak about something.
He had on a fresh set of clothes, and I could smell the scent of his amber cologne. He was a handsome man, but that didn't do much to shroud his overweening personality and god complex. Years of being touted as the best neurosurgeon in the Midwest region had gone to his head. He sometimes referred to himself as the superior and made his intern and newer residents call themselves subordinates followed by whatever number he gave them since he felt it was needless to remember their names since most of them would be weeded out through the intense journey of becoming a neurosurgeon.
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"Hey there hopefully soon to be Dr., but for now Nurse Noel," he said leaning over the counter with a flirty smile that did not affect me. He along with management had been urging me to apply to medical school. We had a shortage of anesthesiologist, and they were working to convince all of their qualified, motivated, and over performing CRNA's to go back to school to be trained. It would be at the hospital's expense along with an incentive of receiving our regular salary just for going to school and keeping an acceptable grade point average. I had graduated high school already with all but ten credits to get my bachelors through advanced placement courses, college classes during the year and summer. I had managed to obtain my bachelor's degree during the summer of my high school graduating year. After that, I got into the CRNA program from which I graduated third in my class and then went into training.
I was honestly sick of school and loved doing my job since we had some of the same duties and I wasn't hurting for money. I knew the smart thing to do was to get the free degree, but I was holding out for as long as possible. I wanted to enjoy a little bit of time not worrying about test and deadlines. I hated the anxiety I would get before test, practical, and exams.
"Leaving Dr. Houdeck," I asked him as I revised my written notes making sure I hadn't missed any important details. My eyes never left the screen in the hopes that he took the hint.
"Yeah I have a subordinate do my post-op rounds, and I told you to call me Rashaad. Anyway I'm going to get a drink, would you like to join me you've had a long day yourself haven't you," he said with a smile.
