habits of my heart (h.s.)

five

Exam anxiety was nowhere near on my list of favorite things, but unfortunately, it seemed to take a certain liking to me.

For the past week, I had been studying obsessively for my biology midterm, either holing myself up in the library or my bedroom. The exam was pretty much the biggest test of my life thus far, especially since my professor announced that the score people received on it was generally a good predictor of how they did on the MCAT.

"I didn't even know that you wanted to be a doctor," Niall commented, glancing up from his bowl of cereal. "Who knew you were such a genius?"

"I'm definitely not a genius," I shook my head. "I probably won't even pass this exam."

"You definitely will--hey, Harry. Did you know that you're living with a genius?" he asked Harry, who had just walked into the kitchen, eyes glued to his phone.

"You're not a genius, Niall," he said blankly, not even glancing up from his screen.

"Not me, you twat. Aly. Did you know that she's a genius?"

Harry looked up at that, and I tried to ignore the churning of my stomach when our eyes met. "A genius, huh?" he said. "Impressive."

"I'm not--"

"She's going to be a doctor," Niall announced. Yeah, if I passed this test, maybe. "Like on Grey's Anatomy and shit."

"I know what a doctor is, Niall."

"Just wanted to give you some perspective."

Harry rolled his eyes at me, in a can you believe this guy? kind of way. My lips twitched, but I didn't say anything. I expected that to be the end of our short-lived conversation, but to my surprise, he sat down at the table next to me and grabbed my book out of my hands. "Atlas of Human Anatomy," he read aloud. "Wow. I never knew you wanted to be a doctor, Alyson."

"Yeah, well." I didn't have much to say to that. I didn't even bother correcting him about my name--I had given up on that. "It's not like I just say I want to become a doctor and then I am one. There's a lot of studying to do. I haven't even finished pre-med."

"Have you applied to med school yet?" Harry asked me.

I nodded as the familiar ball of anxiety began to roll around in the pit of my stomach. "Yeah, I submitted them last month. I hear back in the spring."

"Where'd you apply?"

"Um, Harvard. Stanford. Johns Hopkins. Duke. A bunch of schools." I probably won't get into any of them, I added silently.

Harry blinked, seemingly taken aback. "Wow. Those are some good schools." He paused for a minute before adding, "Any in New York?"

"Yeah, NYU and Columbia. Why? Do you want me to stick around?"

"No--"

"I've grown on you, haven't I?" I teased him. "You have no idea what you'd do with yourself if I moved to Baltimore or Durham."

"More like you don't know what you'd do with yourself," he snorted. "Baltimore's shit."

"No need to be so judgy," I said. "Are you saying that if I moved to Baltimore, you wouldn't come visit me? Ouch."

"It would have to take a lot more than you to get me to go to Baltimore," Harry retorted. "Sorry."

"What the hell do you have against Baltimore?" I exclaimed, trying not to laugh. "It's not that bad."

"Yeah, seriously," Niall chimed in. "Baltimore's great. I lost my virginity there, you know."

There was a loud cough behind us, and we all turned around to see Natasha and Dani, who had just come out of their room. Well, it was Natasha's room, but it might as well have belonged to both of them, because Dani was over all the time now. Despite her ever-growing presence, we had been reminded on numerous occasions, however, that she was not Natasha's girlfriend. I just hoped she knew that.