Page 20 of Dr. Intern

He cuts me off, his voice heavy with exasperation. “Please stop.”

I lean closer to the mirror, admiring the smoothness of my face thanks to the Botox I got earlier in the week. “But I was just getting to the good part.”

Parker’s tone turns serious. “I know Mom was fine paying for your lifestyle, but you can’t do that anymore. Please tell me you understand that spending fifteen thousand dollars in a week is not sustainable.”

Truthfully, I never really considered money when I was spending it in the past. And yes, I recognize that is a super annoying thing to say. But I’ve always had whatever I wanted or needed.

Sure—Mom might have funded my shopping habit, considering my salary at my old advertising firm was pennies on the dollar, but I’ve never gone anywhere near as overboard as I have this week. I just don’t want to be alone, and if I’m spending money, people are distracting me for a few hours.

It feels nice.

“Yes, idiot, I understand that,” I reply, spinning to admire my new silky pajama set.

Money can’t buy happiness, but it can buy a hell of a lot of lingerie.

“Good,” he says, his tone finally more controlled. “Listen, I know you’re struggling. And I’m sorry that I haven’t been around this week. But please promise me that you’ll stop spending money like it grows on goddamn trees.”

I’m barely listening when I turn off the bathroom light. “Got it. Goodnight, P.”

He sighs. “Goodnight. I love you, you know?”

Maybe he tells himself that.

“I know.”

Chapter 8

Beau

If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to get constantly railed before the sun rises, I would recommend becoming an intern in an orthopedic surgery residency. I’ve been up all night, taking pages and scrubbing in on surgeries.Now, I have to do it all over again while somehow remaining competent enough to not completely fuck up or kill someone.

They call morning meetings with our chief resident pimping, but really they’re just putting a name to blatant verbal abuse.

Each day we run through the case list—the patients who came in overnight, the patients who are scheduled for the day, and the follow-ups who are still hospitalized. The chief resident asks you question after question, hoping to trip you up or find a gap in your knowledge. Eventually, they succeed, resulting in a loud torrent of slurs and degradations.

And listen, I get it—they’re teaching us the same way they were taught. But if you’re purposely asking me a question that I don’t know the answer to, just to prove that you’re smarter than me, well, congratulations . . . you’re four years ahead of me in your training, so I’d fucking hope you’re smarter than me.

“Buffington,” my chief resident, Walker Chastain, yells from across the room. His dark eyes flicker with irritation, like he knows I was about to fall asleep in my chair. “Care to explain to me why you ordered twenty-four hours of azithromycin for Mr. Peterson?”

God, this sucks.

“Uh,” I grunt, looking down at my notes as I try to remember who the hell that patient is. “To prevent infection.”

The three other interns in my class chuckle, though I know it’s not critical. It’s because they’re just as delirious as me.

Walker runs his fingers through his jet-black hair, the expression on his face fluttering somewhere between annoyance and disappointment. “Tell me about that case.”

I pause, hoping the answer will magically come to me. On any given day we have over sixty cases under our care, so patient names aren’t always top of mind. It’s much easier to think of them by specific case descriptions. If he had said the seventy-year-old male, two days post-op from a hip replacement, that might have jogged my memory.

“When you played rugby in college, did it completely obliterate all of your brain cells?” Walker asks, narrowing his gaze on me.

I know this is rhetorical, but I can’t resist a smart-ass response.

“Some of them, probably,” I admit, a cheeky grin forming on my lips. “But mostly just my self-confidence, since I have this crooked-ass nose ruining my pretty face.”

He rolls his eyes at me as my coworkers stifle their laughter.

“If you don’t get your shit together, I swear to God—”

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