I glanced toward the dining table. Several boxes of Chinese food were open. Anna sat alone in one of the chairs, eating while drawing intently on a white pad with colored pencils. A few empty cartons suggested Logan and Aurora had already eaten.
“‘We’ can get started?” I asked, confused.
Aurora, however, had already begun. She carefully selected an ornament from a box and was searching for the perfect branch.
“Let’s decorate the tree,” Logan said, as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
“Let’s? Weren’t you going to the hospital?”
“It’s already the 22nd. I thought I’d start my holiday a little early. I’m not officially hired yet, and my research is well ahead of schedule… I don’t see the harm.”
“You’re starting your holiday? I thought you didn’t stop, even on holidays.”
“I rarely do. Sometimes I go to my mother’s for Christmas lunch with my brothers and then go back to work.”
“Do your patients seriously always schedule surgeries or have the misfortune of getting sick on Christmas Day?”
“To be honest, it’s usually my slowest day. Sometimes I assist the ER team. Last year, I was deep in my research and used the quiet day to make more progress.”
As he spoke, he finished with the lights. Then he picked up a few ornaments and began hanging them.
I did the same, selecting a little angel in a white dress. As I tied it to a branch, I commented, “You take this workaholic thing very seriously. I loved teaching, but the last thing I wanted to see on Christmas was a text from a student asking if the partner project could be done in a group of three.”
He laughed, and I couldn’t help but notice how much lighter he seemed since the day before. The constant weight of stress he’d been carrying appeared to be lifting.
And I had to admit, he looked incredibly handsome when he smiled.
“Do high school students still ask those kinds of questions?” he asked. “I remember my classmates pulling the same stuff.”
“Teenagers are timeless,” I said with a shrug.
“My work is important to me. Not only on a ‘I love my job’ way. But it’s… difficult to explain.”
“You can try, if you want. It’s going to take us a while to finish this.” I gestured to Aurora, who was now sitting on the floor, meticulously arranging each ornament as if curating a museum exhibit. “And Anna seems very focused on her food and her drawings… and maintaining her signature scowl.”
He lowered his voice so the girl in question wouldn’t hear. “Yeah… I only got her to come out when the food arrived.”
I thought about asking what had happened, but decided to save it for when she wasn’t around.
“So,” I pressed, “explain this ‘unusual’ love for work.”
He paused, seemingly weighing where to begin—or whether he should tell me at all. After all, we weren’t exactly friends. Just two days ago, I would’ve said I hated him, and the feeling was undoubtedly mutual.
Finally, he began, “My father’s family has a long tradition in architecture. They own the largest firm in the country, built by my grandfather and passed down to my father. And you may have met my mother, too…”
“Who doesn’t know Trinity Turner? Even though it’s a bit of a classic now,Fated by Surpriseis one of my favorite films.”
“Yes, Trinity Turner,” he confirmed. “Being the son of a Hollywood star meant I grew up in thespotlight. The whole country seemed to expect my brothers and me to go into either the arts or architecture. I was asked about it from childhood, as if I only had two paths. When I chose a third, everyone treated it like a rich kid’s whim. In college, neither my classmates nor my professors took me seriously. People would ask if my family was going to build a hospital just for me to ‘play doctor.’”
“So the stupid questions don’t stop after high school, apparently.”
“The point is, I love medicine. I genuinely love saving lives. But I’ve come to want more than that. I don’t just want to be a good doctor, or even a great one. I want to make a name for myself. I want to be the best.”
“I see…” I didn’t fully understand that drive, but I wanted to be supportive, so he’d keep talking. “What’s the focus of your research?”
“Alzheimer’s. A method to completely reverse the disease’s progression when detected in the early stages.”
“That’s fascinating… Derek did some research like that.”
