Chapter 2: Coffee On My Birthday

I almost didn't come.

That's the part I left out of the version of this story I'll probably tell my sister later. The "I woke up, threw on the sweater, and took a Lyft straight to Cedars" version is cleaner. Prettier. Doesn't include the fact that I stood in front of my closet for forty-five minutes trying to figure out how a person with one arm in a sling and visible track marks from an IV looks "casually put together."

Spoiler: they don't. They look like a hospital ghost.

But I came anyway. Because the follow-up email said Dr. Black, and apparently I'm the kind of person who takes a Lyft across Los Angeles on a Wednesday morning for a man who said nine sentences to her in a single conversation and made her feel like the most interesting patient of his entire shift.

I'm not delusional.

Cedars-Sinai at 9:45 a.m. is its own little ecosystem.

There's the lobby crowd, tourists in flip-flops clutching coffees, looking up at the ceiling like they expected a chandelier made of miracles. There's the staff, moving in efficient little pods, badges swinging, coffees in hand, expressions on please don't talk to me, I just started my shift. There's the usual mix of wheelchairs, anxious family members, and one guy loudly arguing on his phone about an insurance claim.

I joined the elevator queue. Rode it up to the fourth floor. Surgical wing. Tried not to look too aware of the fact that my heart was doing something weird.

Receptionist: "Hi, name?"

"Me" I cleared my throat. "My last name is Park. First name Emma. Emma Park."

She clicked. Clicked again. Smiled politely in the way people do when they're stalling.

"Dr. Black is running about ten minutes behind."

"Oh," I said, like a normal person. "Okay."

I sat down in the waiting room and pretended to read a magazine I had zero interest in. Something called Cedars Quarterly, with a stock photo of a woman laughing on the cover. I was halfway through an article about knee replacements when the door opened.

Tall. White coat. That hair. Those tired eyes.

Dr. Aiden Black.

I put down the magazine like I'd just seen a celebrity, which, let's be honest, in my own personal soap opera he kind of was.

"Emma Park," he said. Not looking at the chart. Looking at me. "Come on back."

Did he just... No. No, Emma. He just remembered the name of a patient. That's literally his job. Stop.

The exam room was smaller than I expected. Cream-colored walls, a tall rolling stool, the kind of paper that crinkles when you sit on the exam table. There was a little framed photo of a beach on the wall, Santa Monica maybe, and a stack of tongue depressors in a cup. Very clinical. Very him.

He washed his hands at the sink. Rolled up his sleeves. I tried very hard to look at the beach photo and not at his forearms. I failed.

"So," he said, drying his hands. "How are we feeling?"

"Like someone dropped a piano on my ribs."

"That's about right."

He walked closer. Stopped in front of me. His hands were warm when he gently checked the bandage on my ribs. He pressed just enough to make me wince, and instantly eased off.

"Sorry."

"It's fine. Pain?"

"Seven today. Six if I don't laugh."

He gave me the look. The look that said do not be funny with me, Emma, I am a serious surgeon. It did something embarrassing to my insides. I'm choosing not to examine that.

He moved on. Checked the stitches above my eyebrow. Asked me a series of questions about breathing, sleeping, appetite. I answered them all honestly, except for the appetite one, because the truth was I'd eaten nothing but toast and sadness since the accident, and I didn't want him to know that.

"Your healing is right on track," he said, writing something into his chart. "Stitches come out in a week. Another two weeks of light activity. No driving."

"No driving? For two weeks?"

"You can take a Lyft."

"I live in Los Angeles. I am a Lyft."

Something twitched at the corner of his mouth. Not a smile. Aiden Black does not smile. Aiden Black does controlled facial micro-expressions only.

He turned to put the chart on the counter.

And that's when I saw it.

On the small side table, next to a container of tongue depressors and a sphygmomanometer I refused to think about, was a coffee. White cup. Caramel drizzle art swirling on top. A little foam heart. Still steaming.

He picked it up and held it out to me.

"I thought you might need this. You looked tired."

I stared at the cup like it had personally insulted my family.

"How did you know how I take my coffee?"

"You told me. In recovery. You said, and I quote, 'I take my coffee like I take my men, sweet, complicated, and probably going to disappoint me.'"

I HAVE NEVER BEEN HAPPIER TO BE ALIVE IN MY LIFE.

"I did not say that."

"You were heavily medicated."

"You memorized that?"

The look he gave me right then was unreadable. Then again, maybe I was reading into it because I wanted to read into it.

"I didn't memorize it," he said calmly. "I just have a good memory."

A good memory. A man with a good memory does not bring his follow-up patient an exact-custom coffee three days later. That is not a good memory. That is interest.

Or it is excellent customer service.

Or I am delusional.

Take your pick.

He set the chart on the counter and walked back to the door.

"Same time next week," he said. "We'll do a full review."

I opened my mouth to say something normal, something professional, something like thank you, doctor, see you then.

What came out was: "Any chance there's a different doctor?"

He stopped. Turned. Looked at me with the faintest flicker of something, surprise or offense, that vanished before I could name it.

"No," he said. "There's not."

Then he almost smiled. "See you next week, Emma."

And he left.

I sat on the exam table for an extra full minute, because my legs had decided to file a formal complaint about standing. I was holding the coffee. It was still warm. I hadn't even tasted it yet.

Then I heard them.

Two nurses. Voices low, but not low enough to make it past the door.

"Dr. Black's next patient is in Room 4, right? He never does follow-ups."

"I know. He's got his attending doing them."

"So why's he seeing her?"

"I don't know. He asked for the file last night. Like, actually asked. He never asks."

"Patient 402?"

"That's her."

Footsteps. They walked off.

I sat very still. My coffee was sweating through the paper cup.

Patient 402.

Like I was a chart. A case. A name on a list.

But also, he asked. Last night. He asked for my file.

I stood up, finally. Walked out into the hallway on legs that were somehow more stable now than they'd been ten minutes earlier.

The lobby felt different. The whole building felt different. Like I'd stepped into the same building twice and one of them was a hospital and the other one was a clue.

I got into the elevator. Pressed the button for the lobby. Held the coffee with both hands.

See you next week, Emma.

Why did he keep showing up? Was it because I was a difficult case? Because of the file? Because he remembered the coffee order from when I was high on morphine?

Or because of something else?

The elevator doors closed.

I took a sip of the coffee.

It was perfect.

Damn it.

To be continued...