“Scalpel.”
After placing the scalpel in Dr. Reynolds hand as ordered, I carefully observed Mrs. Churchill’s vitals as he began to make his first incision. When my gaze lowered to the table, I swallowed at the sight of her scars, from a previous surgery.
“Is there much scar tissue?” I questioned without thinking.
Dr. Reynolds briefly looked over his shoulder and then back to the patient. “Nothing more than I can handle.”
I nodded and watched, transfixed as Dr. Reynolds first did away with the scar tissue that had accumulated over the years in preparation for putting in the breast implants. I thought about Mrs. Churchill’s son, now out in the waiting room with his wife who’d arrived right as we were wheeling his mother down the hall.
What he didn’t know, because his mother hadn’t wanted him to, was that this wasn’t Mrs. Churchill’s first surgery on her breast. Nearly two decades ago, she lost her right breast to cancer and had worn a prosthesis ever since. She and her husband opted to keep the cancer a secret from their then teenage son. How the hell they managed to pull such a thing off, I’ll never know, but they had. Since then, Mrs. Churchill’s husband passed away from liver cancer himself, and Mrs. Churchill spent years debating on whether or not to get this surgery, until finally making a decision. She just had never let her son in on the full reason why she wanted it.
“You’re not using the textured breast implants for this operation?” a voice called from the back of the room.
Dr. Reynolds didn’t even bother to pick his head up to look from what he was doing. He shook his head. “No.”
“Why not?”
I couldn’t see the bottom half of his face, as it was covered by his surgical mask, but I imagined his lips pulling back into an irritated frown. “Do you think it would be a wise decision to place a product into a patient that has the potential to increase their chances of anaplastic large cell lymphoma? Especially, when that patient has a history of breast cancer? Does that seem like a logical thing to do, Dr. Holland?” Reynolds’ eyes remained on his patient as he asked.
A clearing of someone’s throat could be heard from the corner of the room where Dr. Holland, a second-year resident, stood. “N-No, I don’t believe it would make sense.”
“Glad you approve of my decision.” Sarcasm dripped from every word of his retort.
“Perhaps, Dr. Holland would like to move a little closer to get a better view of what’s happening on the table,” I suggested. It wasn’t a secret that since a second-year resident nicked a patient’s artery in one of Dr. Reynolds’ surgeries the previous week, he would barely let a resident come near his operating table. Let alone assist in the actual surgery.
“This is a teaching hospital,” I finished.
For the first time since he started, Dr. Reynolds did take his eyes off the patient, to look over his left shoulder, down at me.
“Suggestions on how I should run my OR, Nurse Grace?”
I wanted to roll my eyes so badly but chose not to. “I wouldn’t dream of it, Dr. Reynolds. But as I said, thisisa teaching hospital.”
“Dr. Holland, are you learning from your position?” He asked the resident the question but his eyes held mine.
“Um, I could actually—”
“What was that?”
“Yeah, I’m great over here. Learning a lot.”
I frowned.
“See, Dr. Holland is learning a lot, Nurse Grace. Memorial’s teaching program remains intact.”
It seemed since our little exchange at the grocer, Dr. Reynolds enjoyed using my name every chance he got.
“Whatever,” I mumbled.
“Maybe you could sing to us, Nurse Grace, to keep us all entertained.”
My head popped up at his suggestion, stunned. He hadn’t said it loud. In fact, he said it low enough for only me to hear. That was when I remembered he’d spotted me at the grocer singing Whitney Houston. Maybe he was just referring to that.
“No thanks. Singing in the OR isn’t my typical style. I like to keep my act contained to the produce section of our local grocer,” I joked.
“That, among other places.”
Again the hairs on the back of my neck stood up. It wasn’t only the words but the way in which he said them. As if he knew a secret nobody else knew. I quickly flipped through my mental rolodex, trying to recall if I ever shared with my coworkers that I performed at a local night club, bi-weekly.
