So it wasn’t a surprise to see him wearing scrubs. Yet I figured if he were going to propose, wouldn’t he want to wear something nicer? Also, it made me feel ridiculously overdressed in my Ultimate Little Black Dress when he was wearing freaking scrubs.
A waitress started talking to Joel as I approached the table. She was all of twenty-two with curvy hips and blond hair, and before I got to my seat, her hand was on his shoulder. Joel in regular clothes got second looks, with his penetrating blue eyes, shy smile, and lean but muscular build. But in scrubs, he was absolutely irresistible to women.
“Hey.” He lifted those blue eyes when he saw me. He looked tired, but that was also nothing new. “You’re here.”
The waitress reluctantly pulled her hand off my boyfriend’s shoulders. I was unsurprised by her reaction to me because I got it all the time. The eyes traveling up and down my body as she appraised her competition. But at last she left us alone.
“How was your shift?” I asked as I settled into the chair across from him.
His face brightened the way it always did whenever the subject of his work came up. Joel loved his work more than anyone I knew. Even when we first met, back when he was a first year medical student, he knew he wanted to be an ER doc. He lived for his work. It was absolutely the most important thing in his life.
How things have changed since then. Now that he has her.
“I diagnosed a dural venous sinus thrombosis,” he said. “Two days ago, they let this girl walk out with just some Fioricet for her headache. I caught it though.”
“So…” I grinned at him. “You saved her life.”
“Well.” He lowered his eyes. One thing about Joel was that he never oversold himself. “Maybe. I’m sure someone would have figured it out eventually. And then I passed her on to neurology, so if anyone is going to save her life, it’s them.”
“Of course you did,” I insisted. Because while my boyfriend was always reluctant to tout his own achievements, I had no trouble doing it. I would tell anyone who would listen about the Great Dr. Joel Broder. I wasn’t bragging—I believed everything I said. I was so proud of everything he had achieved during the time we were together. In my eyes, there was nobody better than him. No better doctor. No better man.
No better person to spend the rest of my life with.
I still believe that. In spite of everything that happened next.
“There are lots of people I don’t save,” he said.
Without him saying the words, I know what he’s referring to. One month ago, a man dropped dead in his ER. A young man—about our age, give or take a year. He came in complaining of vague chest pain that had been triaged as “likely heartburn.” Joel hadn’t even seen him yet when a “Code Blue” was called. Joel rushed to the room, but wasn’t able to save him. Cardiac arrest, he said.
Joel took it really hard. He went into our bedroom, lay down on the bed, and stared up at the ceiling without speaking for several hours. I couldn’t get him to eat dinner, even though I made his favorite: spaghetti with homemade marinara sauce and meatballs. It takes me nearly two hours to get that recipe perfect, but it’s Joel’s favorite. How do you get the meatballs to taste so good? （The secret ingredient is buttermilk—a tip from my Italian grandma. I never told him that though.）
I woke up at two in the morning that night, and he wasn’t in bed or even in our apartment. When I frantically called him on his cell, he said he was “taking a walk.” He didn’t return until sunrise—I know because I sat up waiting. It took days for him to start acting normally again. And it was clearly still in the back of his mind at all times.
I didn’t entirely understand it. He’d seen dozens of people die during his career in medicine. Maybe even hundreds. Why did this one death shake him so badly?
“He was a doctor too,” Joel said to me now. “Did I tell you that? He worked as a hospitalist downtown. One of our ER docs went to med school with him.”
“Oh,” I said, because I wasn’t sure what else to say. I didn’t want to talk about death. Not now. It was the least romantic thing I could think of.
He took a swig from his copper-colored drink. I didn’t know what it was, but it wasn’t his usual wine or beer. It looked and smelled like… bourbon. I’d never seen him drink hard liquor before. Well, that wasn’t true. But not since he graduated medical school.
It was my second clue something was amiss. Yet I ignored it and plowed forward anyway.