CHAPTER 14
Miraculously, Lesli had matched at Columbia, too, so after
graduation, we both traded our student IDs for badges that read
resident physician. Being an intern carried pride but also enormous
responsibility. At the bottom of the residency hierarchy, we were
punching bags for everyone above us. Attendings barked orders, senior
residents expected perfection, and every misstep was magnified. The
stakes were so much higher—our decisions carried real consequences,
both medically and legally. Fatigue became constant—measured in
skipped meals, trembling hands, and the constant fear of getting
something wrong.
Still, there were plenty of small victories along the way: my attending
praising me for catching a subtle arrhythmia on an EKG that everyone
else had missed; successfully threading a central line under pressure in
the ICU; calmly taking command of a team when a patient went into
sudden hypotensive shock.
Each of these moments affirmed what I could already feel: I wasn’t
just surviving intern year—I was excelling under fire.
It was also the year Lesli and I befriended Greer, a fellow intern,
from Harvard Medical School. Greer was the yin to our yang, breathing
fresh air into our duo. Somehow, she always looked rested, even postcall,
showing up in Chanel and full makeup while Lesli and I looked like
greasy ghosts. Greer insisted that we have lives outside the hospital.
Having grown up in Manhattan, she introduced us to the glamorous side
of the city, booking theater tickets, Sunday brunches, and downtown
dinners.
Somewhere along the way, I followed Lesli’s advice and “got under”
a few men. I even fell for one of them—an older photographer named
Leo—but we broke things off when he decided to move to London.
There was no way I’d ever do long distance again.
—
By the third year of my residency, my impostor syndrome had mostly
faded. By then, I was running my own continuity clinic, following the
same patients over time, and scrubbing into complex gyn surgeries:
fibroid removals, hysteroscopies, and laparoscopic endometriosis cases.
But patient interaction was still at the heart of what I loved—helping
people create families and offering hope where there had only been
heartbreak.
That spring, I decided to apply to fellowships in Reproductive
Endocrinology and Infertility. Lesli was on the fence about her
subspecialty, but one night over dinner, I floated my idea. “Join me in
REI, and one day we can open our own clinic.”
“Well, that’s intriguing,” she said, her eyes lighting up.
“We could enlist Greer, too,” I said.
Lesli smiled. “She could fund the start-up.”
“She sure could.” I grinned.
—
Early in my fourth year, I began applying to REI programs. I focused on
New York—Columbia, Cornell, and a smaller academic hospital on the
Upper West Side. Lesli cast her net slightly differently, targeting a
Brooklyn program with strong clinical volume but less research, while
Greer aimed for the prestigious Brigham and Women’s in Boston.
—
One afternoon in December, I was hiding in a supply closet, surrounded
by IV tubing and latex gloves, scarfing down a granola bar, when my
phone buzzed in my pocket. Erin’s photo lit up the screen—backyard
sunlight, her head tilted, laughing.
I let it go to voicemail, too drained to answer.
The two of us didn’t talk often, our lives diverging more with every
passing year, but I could tell she was proud of what I was doing. I was
proud of her, too. She’d moved back to our hometown, and for three
years running, she’d ranked as one of the top producers in her hospitality
company, selling conference packages, hotel stays, and catering services
at a remarkable pace. It reminded me of our Girl Scout days, when she
somehow managed to sell more cookies than Lucy, Anna, and me
combined.
On the relationship front, we were both single, though Erin had an on
again/off again situationship with Russ Kowalski, a guy from Arrowhead
in the grade above us. I wasn’t a fan—he’d always seemed like a
troublemaker—but I kept my doubts to myself. All that really mattered
was that she sounded happy.
As I finished my granola bar, the phone buzzed again, Erin’s picture
reappearing.
I took a deep breath and swiped to answer.
Silence, then a shaky hello.
“Are you okay?”
“No,” she whispered. “I’m pregnant.”
The word landed like a blow.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes. Two tests. Both positive.”
“Jesus,” I whispered.
“I know.”
“Russ?”
“No. Just some guy I met at a bar in Chicago—I was with Cara. It
was a wild night. I was wasted.”
“Shit, Erin,” I blurted out, thinking of course she was with Cara—my
least favorite and the most shallow of her college friends.
“I know. It was so stupid. Please don’t think less of me.”
“I don’t think less of you,” I said. “Have you told the guy?”
“I don’t have his number. I don’t even know his last name. All I
remember is Ben.”
“You don’t remember any other details? Where he works?
Anything?”
“No. And neither does Cara.”
“Okay,” I said, my voice careful. “What’s your plan?”
She let out a long sigh. “I can’t get an abortion, Billie. I just can’t.
Especially not when my mom raised me on her own.”
I closed my eyes. As much as I respected her decision, I was also
terrified for her.
An image of us flashed: thirteen, on her bedroom floor with a stack of
Cosmopolitans, scripting our someday lives—weddings, kids, raising
them side by side.
It wasn’t supposed to happen like this. Yet here it was.
“You’re not alone, Erin,” I said.
She stifled a sob. “Do you mean that?”
“Yes. Absolutely. I mean, c’mon! This is my specialty!”
“I know.” She sniffed. “It really is perfect, isn’t it?”
“Yes,” I said, even though nothing about the situation was perfect.
“Will you help me through this?”
“Of course I will,” I said.
“Thank you, Billie,” she said. “I love you so much.”
“I love you, too,” I said, my eyes filling.
When the line went quiet, I sat there on the linoleum, phone still
warm in my hand, the supply room humming with the faint buzz of
fluorescent lights.
