by Saumya Dave
Out of the corner of her eye, Suhani sees a text from Mom pop up on her phone.
Have you had a chance to have a serious talk with Natasha? Dad and I still have no idea what she’s even doing with her life. Maybe her friends know since they’re the only people she cares about.
Suhani takes a deep breath. She really doesn’t have the energy for a Natasha vent session right now.
SUHANI: Don’t worry. I’ll talk to her.
Mom replies with a GIF of Priyanka Chopra blowing a kiss.
SUHANI: Speaking of serious talks, we should have one about your GIF choices.
MOM: People tell me they love mine!
Suhani puts her phone facedown on her desk.
“It’s really been one of those shit weeks.” Vanessa rolls her eyes and sits in one of the jade-green tufted chairs Suhani got for her patients.
They talk about the recent grand rounds lecture on antipsychotics, which hospital committees they’ve applied for, and how things are going with their therapy cases. Although one of the necessities of any job is having someone to vent with in an unfiltered, cathartic way, being able to do that with other psychiatrists is especially entertaining. Zack laughed the first time he realized how often Suhani and her co-residents casually threw in phrases like “that was such a covert narcissist move” and “he has sprinkles of obsessive-compulsive and dependent personality disorder.”
“So,” Vanessa says as she examines her oxblood-red gel-painted nails. “It’s good you’re meeting with Dr. Wilson soon. Did you hear that the Dans are now running for chief?”
“What? Both of them?” Suhani asks.
The Dans, Dan Fitzpatrick and Dan Marlin, are the quintessential southern gentlemen of Atlanta Memorial Hospital’s psychiatry program. They’ve got a combination of good manners and Abercrombie & Fitch looks, which means every nurse is in love with them. Dan Fitzpatrick’s dad is one of the top anesthesiologists at the hospital. Dan Marlin comes from Buckhead old money and is family friends with Dr. Wilson.
But they never expressed any interest in being chief. Why now?
“Crap. There’s no way I’m beating them,” Suhani says. “Dr. Wilson’s apparently making every candidate have a list of reasons of why they think they deserve it. Even the thought of just saying it out loud makes me so uncomfortable.”
“But it shouldn’t,” Vanessa says. “I can’t believe someone who just won an award has to convince herself that she deserves something. Only women think they have to torture themselves this way. Men—fine, not all men, but many—go for more than they’re qualified for. Seriously. I read about it this weekend.”
“Of course you did,” Suhani says. Vanessa’s always reading about workplace psychology. She was “leaning in” before it became an official thing.
“And you’ve got this,” Vanessa says. “I know we all have our own story about why we wanted to go to med school and how it’s our calling and blah blah blah. But you actually live it. You do so much for your patients; you work harder than anyone and make psychiatry your life.”
Suhani shrugs. “You give me way too much credit.”
She always knew she wanted to be a psychiatrist. Not just because of Dad, but also because of things she learned from Mom: the fulfillment of learning someone’s story, building long-term relationships, and being the person to be counted on. She even loves the parts that are supposed to be stressful, like calming down an agitated patient or mediating heated family arguments. And more than anything, psychiatry gives her the chance to make sure she can be there for people who hit rock bottom the way she once did.
“Well, I know I have to try,” Suhani says. “Chief will be my first real chance to make a change in our system. Make sure residents feel supported, that we can get more female leaders in the field and, hopefully, see if there’s a way to bring more attention to women’s mental healthcare.”
“You will,” Vanessa says. Her equal parts tough and tender disposition always fill Suhani with confidence, with a steadfast faith that she really can do anything she puts her mind to. She starts mentally drafting her list of reasons for Dr. Wilson. Hardworking, cares for resident well-being, wants to make a big impact for people who really need mental healthcare. Check, check, check.
Their conversation jumps from topic to topic. After Vanessa shows Suhani the profile of her latest Bumble date, a Turkish plastic surgeon, she leans back in the chair. “How’s Zack?”
“Fine.” Suhani shrugs. “He brought up the idea of having kids.”
“Wow, really?” Vanessa asks. “What did you say?”
“I didn’t know what to say! I don’t even know how I feel about them. No, wait, I do know the thought of having them anytime soon scares me. I mean, we’ve talked about how if we ever had them, we’d want them to know both of our cultures, and Zack’s always said he would do everything possible to make sure my career isn’t derailed. But it just totally threw me off guard when he brought it up.”
She waits for Vanessa to nod in agreement or say something that confirms how Suhani feels is valid.
But Vanessa frowns and scrunches her lip, the same focused look she gets when they’re having class discussions about complicated patients. “Um, Suhani, I understand what you mean about being scared of having kids. But do you think you’re also really scared of having a marriage like your parents’?”
Suhani’s breath catches in her throat. “Where did that come from?”
“It’s something I’ve been wondering about for a while,” Vanessa says. If she was talking about anyone else, this is when Suhani would laugh and say, And this is what we therapists call confrontation!
“You’ve told me so many times how your mom has all these regrets about leaving her acting career, how she left her entire life for love. And you’ve always felt so much pressure to make sure all her sacrifices weren’t in vain.” Vanessa clasps her hands together. “I know you and Zack are always good at the core. . . . I’m just curious about whether getting married brought things up in you about your parents’ marriage.”
Before Suhani says anything, Vanessa adds, “And, look, we’ve all got stuff we bring to a relationship. I mean, hell, my dad left my mom when I was five and I can’t commit to a guy. It doesn’t take someone from our profession to see the link. But with Zack’s parents being divorced, too, I understand how getting married makes him want to build something of his own as a way to, you know, heal.”
“I’ve analyzed all of this a million times and never once connected everything together like that.” Suhani wishes she’d written down Vanessa’s words. “Did anyone ever tell you you’re a really good psychiatrist?”
Despite the lightheartedness of her words, Suhani knows that she’ll spend the rest of the day dissecting everything Vanessa said. But even though she’s right, Vanessa doesn’t know the other reason, maybe the biggest reason, why Suhani can’t even think about having kids.
She touches her phone as she pictures the text message from Roshan that she still hasn’t answered: I need to talk to you.
There’s a knock at her door by Marie, the front desk manager. “Dr. Joshi, I’m sorry to interrupt, but your patient is here. He’s having a crisis and needs to see you early.”
Marie’s permed hair and teal-blue eye shadow always remind Suhani of the mom character in a feel-good family show from the eighties.
“I’ll be right there.” Suhani nods as Vanessa leaves her office. Her next appointment is with Dean, a forty-year-old software engineer who has weekly panic attacks. She reviews the breathing exercises that have helped him in the past and double-checks his most recent Lexapro dose. Before she meets him in the waiting room, she scrolls through her last texts with Zack.
SUHANI: Can we talk about some stuff tonight?
ZACK: Of course. What stuff?
Zack is always up for talking about feelings or, really, about anything. Every milest
one of their relationship has been preceded by a long talk. Before Zack first met Mom and Dad, he and Suhani sat in a coffee shop for an entire afternoon and discussed why Dad might be skeptical about him and what they’d have to do to prove that they were in a serious relationship. A year later, Zack listened patiently when Suhani explained that it would be inappropriate for him to kiss her in front of the aunties, eat meat in front of her family, and wear shoes in the house.
SUHANI: Nothing important. Tell you more tonight at home.
ZACK: I’ll be home late. There’s a CBD company that’s taking us to drinks to try and convince us to partner with them.
SUHANI: Sounds fun!
Zack’s a director at YourCare, a start-up that links people to doctors all around Atlanta through a single web portal. Although his hours are hectic, he’s still able to do luxurious things like go to the bathroom whenever he needs to or eat unlimited fancy snacks in the company’s kitchen.
ZACK: Remember to schedule your meeting with Dr. Wilson. And here’s a Corgi going after a ball with all this determination. It’s like you with everything.
Suhani clicks the video link and her screen fills up with an adorable puppy chasing a tennis ball. Its short legs and smile give her a quick breather from the day. For the first time in days, things between her and Zack finally feel the way they used to. Easy, tender, secure.
SUHANI: Ha! So cute!
A question tugs at her. When was the last time she surprised Zack with something? Her mind passes back over the conversation with Vanessa. Was she right about Suhani’s being scared of having the same marriage as her parents? Were there things about her past that made her keep her guard up? She doesn’t want it to be that way.
After her appointment with Dean, Suhani confirms a pickup order for chocolate chip cookies from Tiff’s Treat’s, Zack’s favorite, and makes a silent promise to have them warmed and waiting on a plate when he gets home.
She scrolls back to Roshan’s text. He needs to know there’s no place for him in her life. She tells herself there’s no reason to be scared. Not anymore.
Determination pulls her out of her chair. It only takes her twenty seconds to get out of her office and down one flight of stairs to the neurology department.
Roshan’s office door is closed. Her heart rate increases as she sees his gold nameplate on the door. He’s really here. In her hospital.
Suhani clears her throat and knocks on the door.
“Come in!” His baritone voice sends a shiver up her spine.
He’s sitting at a large mahogany desk and scrolling through something on the computer. There’s something about seeing him there, absorbed in his work, that makes her sadder than she expected to feel. She briefly sees him the way most people do, as a dedicated and caring doctor.
Roshan glances up with a look of surprise, then disdain. “Uh, hi.”
His white coat is on a hook next to him. The walls of his office are barren, which could be either because he hasn’t had time to put anything up or because he doesn’t care to. Roshan was never into aesthetics. Even in med school, he had the bare minimum amount of furniture in his studio apartment.
“I got your text and figured it’s better we talk in person. Because I have to talk to you, too.” Suhani walks into his office and closes the door.
“About?” Roshan turns off the computer screen and raises his eyebrows. She wants to analyze his expression, know what he’s thinking. But she tells herself it doesn’t matter.
She has to project strength, the way she should have years ago. She has to get this conversation over with and return to her life. Her happy, full life. “You appear out of nowhere at my hospital. What the hell do you want?”
“Excuse me?”
“Excuse you.” Suhani crosses her arms. “What are you doing here?”
“Work, if you couldn’t tell.” Roshan motions around his office.
God, that sarcasm. His straight lips and furrowed brows take her back to the night they met. She forgot how he looked at her as though he could see straight to her thoughts, in a way that made her feel raw and alive and vulnerable all at once. The qualities that made Roshan scary were the same ones that made him sensitive: the intensity to which he felt pain, the way he remembered details, how guided he was by his emotions.
“And that’s it? Really?” She taps her foot on the scuffed floor. Just being around Roshan riles her up. She can’t help but compare that to how she is around Zack. Content, easygoing Zack.
“Really,” Roshan says. “I told you I always wanted to come back to Atlanta.”
He did tell her that years ago. It was the first thing they ever connected on, being the only people from Atlanta at their med school.
“And you just happened to get a job where I work?” Suhani asks.
“The best hospital in the state? Yeah, I did take this job when they recruited me,” Roshan says.
Her heart rate slows down. Maybe that’s all this is, a dumb coincidence.
Roshan clears his throat. “I texted you because after I saw you the other night, I thought we should at least talk if we’re going to be working in the same place. Then again, we could have talked years ago, if you hadn’t just left and ignored me without any explanation.”
“I didn’t owe you an explanation,” Suhani says as she recalls how she ghosted him before she even knew what ghosting meant.
He’s holding a pen labeled atlanta memorial hospital. “It seems like you’re happy now.”
“I am,” Suhani says, relishing that she means it.
“You know, I spoke to people from your class at UCLA. A couple of them mentioned you took some kind of official leave right after we broke up. You just dumped me and then left school for months. Clearly there’s something you didn’t tell me. I spent so long trying to understand why you’d do something like that.”
“It doesn’t matter now,” Suhani says.
There’s a tingling sensation in her limbs as she thinks back to how she filled out the paperwork for a medical leave, then spent days curled up in her bed. She wasn’t sure if she’d ever feel happy again.
“It obviously mattered enough. I know it was something important, something I probably had the right to know about,” Roshan says. “Otherwise you wouldn’t have tried so hard to keep it from me.”
“I don’t think there’s any point in getting into any of that.” Suhani throws her hands up in the air and then tells herself to act as detached as possible. A bead of sweat rolls down her back. “I should have had better judgment from the beginning and known that you were never capable of being in a healthy relationship.”
Roshan has the same intense stare he had at the end of their first date, when he told Suhani about how he’d always resented his mother for leaving their family. She should have seen that conversation as a red flag but instead, she told herself to give him credit for being vulnerable with her. They spent an entire Friday night on her creaky futon, sharing a bottle of Cabernet, discussing their family histories, then looking up potential residency programs for him. The night ended with the most exhilarating sex she’d ever had, sex that was both primal and tender, free of inhibitions. She later told herself that that was who they really were, that the moments he let his anger take over didn’t define him, and with time, he’d change. It took her months to realize that she couldn’t stay with someone just because of who they were at their best. Sooner or later, dating a man for his potential only took you so far.
“I never said the way I treated you was okay. And, yeah, it took me too long to realize I had a problem. A serious one.” Roshan lowers his shoulders, and for the first time ever, he seems embarrassed. “But let’s not pretend you did nothing wrong.”
“I did plenty wrong,” Suhani says. “I trusted you to be a decent guy. I wasted months putting up with you.”
She savors the feel of each accusation leaving he
r mouth. He should have heard them years ago. But instead of ever calling him out, she kept all of it inside. This was their secret. To everyone at UCLA med school, they were the perfect couple. The perfect desi doctor couple.
The expression on his face hardens. “You know what? You show up here to what? Try and make some statement against me? Don’t stand here and act like you aren’t messed up, too. You stayed with me. You could have left earlier.”
Suhani gulps. She used to feel the same way when she’d read about women in her position. But she learned it was never that easy. Because Roshan brought her to such a low point that she often forgot she had a choice.
“Does everyone here think you’re Miss Perfect?” Roshan asks. “Or does your program director know how you just left in the middle of a rotation and took a leave of absence?”
Suhani’s voice is soft as she says, “He knows I went through something.”
“Really? In detail?” Roshan raises his eyebrows.
“Are you trying to scare me, Roshan?” Suhani challenges.
“Not at all. All I’m saying is that maybe you should take a step back before using that holier-than-thou attitude. You’ve made plenty of mistakes, too.”
What is he really doing here? Is she being paranoid? She’s taken back to the woman she used to be with him, the kind who constantly doubted herself.
“I’m well aware of that. And I came here to tell you to leave me alone and stay out of my life.” Suhani turns around and leaves.
This isn’t the way it was supposed to go today. She felt powerful whenever she envisioned this conversation. She had planned to march into his office, give him a piece of her mind, and walk away with a smug sense of satisfaction.
