Murmurs rippled through the room, and whoa, okay—wow. Separating conjoined twins? A once-in-a-career case, that’s what he’d called it, and it was. Putting that on my resumé, even if all I did was pass a scalpel? Holyshit. I tasted adrenaline at the back of my throat as Garcia clicked to the next slide.
“Round one,” he said. “Thursday at two. Blind scoring. Timed knot-board, lap box peg transfer, and central-line mannequin. No names, just numbers. Only the top five advance.”
My heart skipped half a beat. Tie stitches fast, move tiny crap around with chopsticks while staring at a screen, and stick a needle into a fake neck without hitting anything important. I’d trained for this—med school, yes, but also late at night with online tutorials and a hand-me-down surgical training kit I’d scored off an older med student. I wasn’t flashy, but I was fast and precise.
Five out of twenty-five. I could maybe actually do this.
“Round two,” Garcia said, and all chatter died abruptly. “Friday at eight. Case presentation by the final five. Ten minutes, followed by rapid-fire questions from a panel of fellows and attendings.”
The slide listed five names: Garcia himself, two attendings, and two supervising fellows. Including—well. Fuck.Jesse Maddox, MD: Senior Fellow, Pediatric Surgery.
Now it was acid that I tasted. This was… Jesus Christ, the universe was having a good old laugh somewhere off in the distance, right? I stared for another blink, then forced my gaze down to the empty coffee mug.
“When they say case presentation,” Tessa hissed, “do they mean, like, a PowerPoint? Because I suck at PowerPoint.”
“Here’s what it’ll look like,” Garcia said right into Khai’s whispered “Doubt it.” Next slide. “At seven sharp, if you made the cut, we’ll call you to the front. You get the patient case, spaced out so you each have exactly an hour to prep—no phones, no internet access. We’ll be watching every breath you take, just like the song.”
No one laughed, tension stretching thick like a rope. Amusement glimmered in Garcia’s eyes even as his tone remained matter-of-fact. “Once your hour’s up, you’ll be called in one by one. Ten minutes to present, five minutes for questions from the judges. Your fellow residents—the ones who didn’t make it into the top five—will get to watch. And hopefully learn something.”
Oh, for fuck’ssake. I’d been prepared for awkward flutters of boot-camp interaction with Jesse, and more of the same when I’d rotate through pediatric surgery. But this? Jesse judging, quizzing me in front of everyone? Fucking hell. He’d promised neutrality, sure—but I’d dropped to my knees for him, he’d had his fingers and cock up my ass. How do you park a memory that graphic?
Garcia wrapped up with a final bark. “This is about precision under pressure. Losers get coffee and PTSD, victor gets a story to tell their kids one day. Questions?”
No one dared to twitch.
“Great,” Garcia said. “Lap sim groups in ten. Dismissed.”
The lights came up as chatter exploded. For a second, both Tessa and Khai were silent, then she glanced between us. “Okay, strategy. Finn walks us through some dexterity drills, Khai keeps us calm, and I’m pretty good with presentations as such. Just not fucking PowerPoint.”
I blinked. “You want to team up?”
“It’s not exactly a team event.” She lifted a shoulder. “But mutual coaching increases all our odds, right? Like, yeah, I want to win this. But if it can’t be me, I’d rather it’d be one of you than that dude I was paired with yesterday who said that my hair indicates ‘a lack of maturity.’”
“Probably just projecting,” Khai put in. “So, group study later? I’ll bring paper bags we can breathe into.”
Warmth snaked into my chest. “Deal.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught Jesse consulting with Garcia at the podium—profile sharp, exuding an air of easy confidence. When he glanced up, his gaze swept the room once, passed over me and paused a fraction too long. Heat flared in my cheeks as I quickly looked away.
“That’s Maddox, right? One of the judges.” Tessa had clearly followed my line of sight. “He recalibrated my posture yesterday. Was quite nice about it, too.”
“Uh, yeah.” I rubbed a hand over my neck. “Haven’t really spoken to him.”
Other than that night he thought I was a hooker and also fucked my brains out. Possibly some of the best sex of my life. But, yeah. Other than that? Nope.
Oh, hell.
Next to us, Khai locked his phone with a resolute air. “Found a Reddit thread on these kinds of pressure tests, what sort of ethical curveballs they might throw at us.”
“What’s the verdict?” Tessa asked.
“A mix of clinical instincts, emotional stability, and not sounding like a psychopath.”
“So, no pressure,” I said, and Tessa laughed.
“Let’s meet at my place—I’ve got vodka.”
Empirically speaking, my alcohol-fueled judgment was questionable. Still. “It’s a plan,” I said, and Khai nodded.
