Beautifully Awake

know any better, his eyes told a story as screwed up as my own. Was this the same man from two seconds ago? If so, I liked Dr. Compassionate a little more.

Another hot flash detonated. If it wasn’t a stroke it was early menopause. Maybe three years of self-induced hormonal shut down backfired and left me even more screwed up.

“I want repeat labs in the morning and all her scans uploaded in the OR before I get there. This goes off without a hitch. Got me?” he barked.

Guy took the hit for the team. “No problem.”

Silence. More silence. I didn’t have to look up to know I was in his crosshairs. Welcome back, nervous stomach. I needed a margarita, like right freaking now.

“Ms. Porter. Do you want to add anything?” His storm greys traveled down the entire length of my body, only to slowly rebound back up to my own eyes. Our close huddle was getting too claustrophobic.

“Umm. No, she’s all good from my end. Her insurance coverage gives her five days in-patient and she should be eligible for rehab too.” I pulled that answer out of my ass.

“Good to know.” More silence. Was he checking me out? Because his eyes nailed me to the wall. No, that’s crazy talk. “Who’s next?” he asked.

Guy answered while pressing his hand to the small of my back. “We’re done on five. Rest of the patients are up on the sixth floor. Let’s go.” Without delay, we joined Sam at the stairwell.

“Fine. Let’s move.” Chase snapped, sounding pissed for some reason. He snaked his hand from his pocket and raked it through his already disheveled hair while gazing down at my legs. His expression was one of annoyance. Was he pissed at me? What the hell did I do?

“And Ms. Porter ... you might want to rethink your shoes, I don’t want to be here all night.” He pushed through the steel door and took two steps at a time.

Mortifying. What was wrong with the freaking elevator?

3 Rosa's

“Hey, what took you so long?” Sierra stood with her adorably popped belly to wave me over to where she and Kate were sitting. After the most humiliating forty-five minutes of my life, I was beyond ready for a margarita. Make that a pitcher of margaritas. Intravenous tequila infusion sounded even better.

“Hey girls. Sorry I’m late. Rounds were-” No appropriate description came to mind, so I abandoned the thought mid-sentence. I gave them each a quick peck on the cheek, while simultaneously lifting Kate’s half empty margarita glass off the table. The waiter in the distance waved. He got the point. That’s right, I needed a glass. STAT.

“No problem, we just got here. Sit. So dish. How’d it go?” Sierra had zero patience. Straight to the point. Always.

Luckily Miracle Waiter appeared with a clean glass in record time. I poured myself a generous sized glass of golden yummy from the pitcher sitting on our table.

“Cheers.” I clanged Kate’s glass and Sierra’s seltzer-filled wine glass. The glass made her feel like she wasn’t missing out or so she said. Then I downed my liquid gold. I definitely needed that.

“So, Kate was just catching me up on CJ,” Sierra said, while opening the menu.

I was so engrossed in my own hormonal drama I almost forgot everything Kate had shared about her relationship earlier that day at lunch. Wasn’t I friend of the year?

Kate worked in the recovery room, and we quickly became friends after I was reassigned to all the surgery services. Sierra took an instant liking to her as well. It was impossible not to, Kate was a doll.

Sufficiently numb with two doses of my good friend liquid courage, I was able to block my day and focus on Kate and her on-again-off-again loser boyfriend. I tried not to be judgmental when it came to other people’s relationships and their choices, since I made more than my share of monumentally poor choices. But CJ and the way he treated Kate tested my resolve.

“I know what you both think, you don’t have to say it ... I deserve better. In my head I get it. But the rest of me doesn’t. Some days he is beyond amazing and sweet and totally present in the moment. Like I’m his everything. But then, out of nowhere, he flips and becomes a complete stranger who couldn’t care less if I jumped off a bridge. We go months with things being dreamy. Then out of nowhere, he’s picking a fight over the stupidest crap. Excuse my language. But it’s as if he wakes up and decides he hates my guts that day. I’m so confused. I really thought he was the one. I want him to be the one.” Kate rubbed her temples like she was fighting off a migraine while her real struggle was fighting back tears.

Sierra and I exchanged a quiet glance and knew it was time to change the subject. Nothing we might say was going to change her mind. Not tonight. She wasn’t there yet. All my social work training taught me that she had to come to certain realizations on her own. On her own time. I couldn’t press fast-forward on her life story any more than I could press rewind on my own.

Kate had been complaining about her mysterious boyfriend CJ’s bipolar antics since we became friends. Saying she could do better was an understatement.

Kate was a real life Joey Potter who deserved her Dawson. She used the word dreamy, for god’s sake. Instead she wound up with a certifiable douchebag. A complete letdown in every sense, he couldn’t even find the time to meet her friends. Not that we minded.

He was always too busy or too tired. They supposedly met in the hospital, and she hinted that it was a source of embarrassment for him. Grow up. Get over it—everyone gets sick. Sierra and I had our own theory. This CJ guy was either truly bipolar or cheating on her. My money was on the latter.

“Fuck him. That’s what I say. Fuck him! Now let’s drink!” Sierra excelled at changing the subject.

Kate’s lips parted into a small grin and let out a quiet chuckle. She managed to blink away the tears. Then Kate and I did as we were told. We drank.

Two pitchers of margaritas later and entirely too much information about vaginal discharge in pregnancy, a very sober Sierra was a good distraction. Kate forgot she was settling for an asshole, and I only thought about Dr. Intensity a dozen or so times over the two hours. I couldn’t wrap my head around why I allowed this man to have such an effect on me.

In between Sierra’s rendition of Girlfriends Guide to Pregnancy, my mind kept skipping back to everything Chase Colton. That voice. That face. That body. That freaking body. That was not the body of a surgeon. You didn’t get to look like a Greek god from hours of holding a scalpel. I couldn’t picture him spending all his free time at the gym. He seemed a lot of things, but vain was not one of them.

After a total of one hour in his company, I knew nothing more than he was an early riser and could be seriously intimidating. But there was no denying I saw a glimpse of a soft side when he spoke to Kelly.

And then there were those eyes. Those damn eyes. Two flecks of muted silver crystal that leveled me to the ground. But they were clouded by something—a heaviness, a darkness. I was drawn to the story behind those eyes. His stare was mesmerizing. I envisioned that body on top of me, gazing down at me with that intensity, touching me. Could those hands heal me?

My stomach was on fire and it was not the nachos. It was as if my extinguished pilot was just re-lit, and there was no thermostat to control my furnace. I shifted in my chair and drained the water glass in front of me. It drowned nothing. This man was under my skin.

I was a million miles away when Sierra dropped her fork in victory, rubbing her even more popped belly. Impressive. Polishing off a Rosa’s enchilada was no small feat.

“Yum-my. Oh gosh. Lil—I can’t believe we forgot to ask. How was your day?” Sierra turned and looked at me sheepishly.

Hmm … what was there to say? Oh just fabulous. They spoke Sanskrit and it was depressing as all hell. Everyone had brain tumors. Not to mention my new attending was hot as balls and I hadn’t stopped thinking about him touching me in unspeakable ways the entire time we’d been here. And let’s not forget, I made a complete ass out of myself in front of the team and was in dire need of a CVS pit stop. If my libido’s reaction to this man today