His name was Julian Reyes. He was twenty-eight. He was a construction foreman, and he fell twenty feet off scaffolding onto rebar. He has multiple fractures, internal bleeding, and a lacerated spleen. They rushed him into surgery at 3:17 a.m. I was attending on call. I scrubbed in. The OR lights were merciless, white-hot, no shadows to hide in. When they cut away his clothes, I saw him properly for the first time. Broad shoulders, sun-darkened skin, a dusting of dark hair across his chest that narrowed into a trail disappearing beneath the waistband of his torn work pants. Even unconscious, even bleeding, he was stupidly beautiful. Sharp jaw, full lips slightly parted around the breathing tube, lashes fanning long against high cheekbones. The kind of face that makes you forget protocol.
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