TLV Inbox

[transfundere]

"Please leave a message. Should you require immediate medical assistance, please seek closer help and I will attend you as soon as possible."

Comments

[cactusy]

I mean, if he'd expected me to have him as a roommate. I've had roommates before, I went to eight years of college and I was in the Marines, but-- I don't know.

[Glancing up from the TV, she adds:]

I was thinking I'd get some food started, then we can watch while it's in the oven. You good with that?

[transfundere]

Of course. I would never object to my host's plans. But thank you.

[ He's also pretty content to sit over by the TV and pet the dogs. ]

[cactusy]

Figured if it's about the smell for you, having something cooking in the oven for a while would be better than just watching me eat it.

[As she moves into the kitchen area, she tries to think of how to adjust: to take her bafflement over his wardening style and turn it into something more sociable.]

Uh-- so I've had roommates before, like I said. Most modern American college kids live in dorms, and in med school I rented an apartment with a few other girls. Did you live at home when you were studying medicine?

[transfundere]

For some of my time. Then, when I took my apprenticeship under Dr. Carrel, I stayed with another of my fellows.

[cactusy]

Oh, yeah? Did you get along, or was he a pain in the ass?

[transfundere]

We got on rather well, actually. I... think it was because we had both grown up with siblings. We were used to... sharing, as it were. Co-habitating with someone.

He had his quirks, obviously, and I have mine, but by and large, we were both too exhausted to make much of a fuss.

[cactusy]

Med school's like that in the future, too. Some things never change.

[transfundere]

I had little doubt.

I also had a breach where I was a doctor in a more modern era and that made sure I knew.

What brought you to medical school? Given you currently do not practice?

[cactusy]

I wanted to be a doctor since I was ten. Emergency medicine, specifically.

[transfundere]

A desire we share, then.

I assume something happened to change the course of things?

[cactusy]

[Shaw's hands still on the jar of spice that she's holding, just a half-second of hesitation as she considers how to answer.]

Wasn't right for me.

[She says, as she shakes nutmeg into the casserole dish. Then she amends:]

I wasn't right for it.

[transfundere]

[ There are any number of reasons why that might be the case and given the difficulties of his profession, he knows that most of them are intensely personal and for someone who felt the calling only to find themselves unsuitable, often painful. He won't pry for more. ]

You seem to have found another calling. Unsurprising, in someone clearly intelligent, passionate, and possessing the sort of drive that you do.