Page 6 of Just One Look

Jordan said, “Am I or am I not married to a surgeon?”

“Uh … you are?”

“Yes. I am. And unless there’s some sort of mass casualty event—God forbid, obviously—you’re not getting called in tomorrow, because you’re not oncalltomorrow. It’s the day after Christmas and a Friday, which means nothing will be happening out there.”

“No,” she said, “it meanseverythingwill be happening out there. People taking their new guns out for target practice. People taking their new dirt bikes out for a spin. And by ‘people,’ of course, I mean ‘men.’”

“Please,” Jordan said. “Make me happy. Stay. I can’t stand to think of you across the street alone on Christmas.”

“Is my house sterile?” she asked. She shouldn’t be asking it here and now, not in the midst of their celebration, but she did anyway.

“Well, yeah,” Jordan said. “I assumed you liked it that way.”

“It’sneat.So I like things neat. What’s wrong with that?”

“Hey,” Jordan said. “You get to have what you like. It’s your house.”

Later, though, when it was just the three of them, and she was sprawled on the couch with a glass of Grand Marnier, because itwasChristmas, and Miles Davis was playing something jazzy in the background, she asked them, “Do I have no life?”

“Neither of us has ever had a life, remember?” Clement said. “A hundred hours plus a week for years on end tends to do that to you. It isn’t that much better now, except that our life is surgery, which we love because it matters.”

“Yes.” She might possibly be a little drunk. “But maybe I just don’t know any different, because, you know …”

“Because your father’s a surgeon,” Jordan said, “andhedoesn’t have a life. And your mom died when you were four, so you’ve got no examples.”

Yeah, they weren’t going there. “And youdohave a life,” she said, “because you have each other.”

“That’s a pretty scary yardstick,” Jordan said. “If you have to have a partner to have a life. Not sure that’s the way it’s supposed to work.”

“You have all this, though,” she said. “A Christmas tree. Decorative elements. Dinner.Fancydinner.Homemadefancy dinner.”

“Because I married a teacher,” Clement said. “To be my reality check. And so far, he’s willing to pick up the slack.”

“Well,” she said, “I guess I need to figure out how to have a life, too. Or at least get my washing machine fixed. Hey, I have another day off tomorrow and nothing to do with it. I need a project. Maybe that can be it. Organizing my new, full, real-deal life.”

“Yeah?” Jordan asked. “In one day? How do you intend to start?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I’m not too good at risk.”

“Excuse me,” Jordan said. “Neurosurgery? You cut intobrains.”

“That’s controlled risk,” she tried to explain. “Based on a realistic assessment of my knowledge and skill, and evaluation of the limits of what’s possible. Notriskyrisk. Like … I never roller-bladed, as a kid. Well, Idid,but only at a rink. The idea of going downhill, or where there were streets to cross or bumps in the sidewalk? My dad would show me pictures of kids who’d made reckless choices. He had an excellent library to choose from.”

“Here’s the thing,” Jordan said. “You get to write your own story now. He’s not here. And there’s a big difference between a scraped knee and whatever it was he showed you. Seriously? What a tool, scaring a kid into rigid submission like that, and I won’t evenmentionhaving you start college at sixteen, because what’s the point in wasting your brainiac time on all that messy childhood? So we’re starting out a few steps behind here. Hmm, what kind of risk would feel more scraped-knee-like? Obviously, we’re still doing our same job, because passion and commitment and devotion and all that.”

“Not to mention eight years of school and seven more of training to get here,” Clement put in. “And two years as an attending. Making a total of seventeen years and half her life.”

“Not to mention that,” Jordan agreed. “So … what? Dating definitely has to come into it. Makeover. Inappropriate sexual encounters in inappropriate places.” He sighed. “Delicious.”

Clement said, “Hey.”

“We can still have inappropriate encounters,” Jordan said. “Even better, because I know you’ll be good at it. That’s the problem with getting your kicks that way. Usually, the other party’s not putting in the full effort. Grab and go. It’s even worse for women, because orgasm is harder to come by, especially with a selfish partner who’s only interested in gettingtheirkicks. The female orgasm can be fickle, right, Elizabeth?”

“Uh … no,” she confessed, for some reason she could not fathom. “Not really. Not for me.”

“Oh,” Jordan said. “Then go ahead and be inappropriate, I guess.”

“That’s not changing mylife,”she said. “It’s not getting my laundry done.”