It was quite a warm morning at the cemetery. Under this lovely sunlight, stood a group of people sniffing and hugging one another as they let go their loved one. It had always been a sad scene. Losing someone and never would be able to see them again was heartbreaking. But that was life; it bounded to happen that way.
Death might separated the live and the corpse but somehow, they'd still live in your heart. They'd still be there- forever.
Two ladies walked hand in hand with confident steps toward the certain tomb. One of them- the taller one held a bouquet of white rose's- her oppa's favorite flower. Her other hand tighten her grip on the latter's hand protectively. Somewhat scared that the angel of death might took her away from her. It didn't make any sense but she just had to do it.
She felt Jennie's thumb stoked the back of her hand, calming her. She gave her a quick weak smile as she kept on walking. Lisa had promised him to bring Jennie with her should she accept her heart forever. So here she was, standing before Jungkook oppa's gravestone with Jennie.
"Oppa, hey," she put the flowers on top of the grass. "I- oh... I-" she glanced at the black dressed people.
She had seen death since forever, she had lost her patients a lot than she could even handle, she somehow immune to the heart wrenching scene when she had to announce 'we did everything we could, she/he had give everything their got,' usually the family understood by that sentence that their loved one didn't make it- that they were gone.
She gulped hard. She didn't know what had come over her to be so overly sensitive today.
"Lisa-ah, are you okay?" Jennie's voice came out in gentle tone, concerned.
"Yeah," she shook her head to clear up her mind. She squeezed her companion's hand lightly, assuring her.
"Oppa, as promised, I brought Jennie with me. What do you think of her?" A soft wind blew.
"I know you'd think she's pretty," she chuckled a bit. "Wait," Lisa gestured Jennie to sit at the cold cement. "It's not that I'm crazy or something, it's just that- this is how I communicate with him. You know I talk, he's dead but I know he's listening. I mean I don't know how, it doesn't make any sense but he must be listening- I mean he's-" she rambled.
"Lisa-ah," Jennie stopped her. "I get it," she soothed her. "May I talk with him too?"
"Yeah, sure," Lisa nodded.
"Hey oppa," she could feel the wind fondled her face, she smiled. "How are you? We all are good here, I hope you are well too. Lisa told me a lot about you, some good, some bad," she giggled. "One thing for sure, though. Lisa adores you very much. You know her longer than I do, you certainly know how rare that is, right?"
They spent more than half hour talking and laughing with the wind. Lisa proudly told him that they were engaged and the talk about marriage date was on its way. They bid their goodbye as Jennie bowed a bit before joined Lisa.
Lisa started her car when she felt Jennie's hand on her thigh. She turned to her with a confused look upon her face.
"I wish I got to know him."
Her memory flew back to a few years ago at this very place when she was the one whom standing, struggling so hard holding back her tears as the coffin downgraded to the dugouts with a broken arm and crushed heart.
Jungkook oppa was the brother she never had. They weren't blood related, they weren't childhood friends or anything, but he was her protector, her enemy, her ally, her rival- her best friend. Losing him caused her drown in the weakest point that ever happened in her life. He was a great company. Unfortunately, he was gone too soon.
"Me too," she mumbled. "Me too."
*****
"Welcome aboard, Dr. Kim Dahyun!" The staff and other attending clapped for her cheerfully. Dahyun bowed at them, showed her gratitude. She had got her email from the board and they passed her exam.
She was relieved. Her long fight to be a real cardiothoracic surgeon had come true. All things that she sacrificed finally paid off. She got to stand by herself now.
By the corner of her eyes, she caught a glimpse of a tall woman at the corner, leaning by the wall smiling proudly at her. She nodded her head a little then gave her a thumps up. She excused herself from the crowd, making her way towards Lisa.
"Hey unnie."
"Welcome to the real world, Dahyun-ah," she playfully said. "Jennie sends greetings to you. She said congratulation."
"Thank you, unnie. Tell her it means a lot to me," it seemed that today she wont stop smiling even just for a seconds.
She waved her off. "Stop thanking me, you earn it. Also, you look good in that dark blue scrub."
"Really?"
"Yeah! You deserve it." spoke seriously.
"Thanks," she blushed. "Anyway, are you free this weekend, unnie? Lets have dinner together with others, on me."
"Celebrating, aren't we?" Lisa chuckled.
"After the hell I've been through? I think a little bit of celebration is not much."
That made her laugh. "Sure thing then. Oh..." she suddenly remembered something, "What about next week? My parents in law are coming here this weekend."
"No problem, unnie. Next week is okay too."
"I'll get back to you on that okay? Well, I have to do my round this morning. I'll see you around, my new fellow cardio surgeon." Lisa teased her then pushed her back and stood straight.
Lisa was going to go visit her patients when she turned left and walked into the attending lounge instead. She had to pee first.
As she closed the toilet door behind her, she saw Seulgi tasting her coffee then chewed the sandwich- a rare view considering she usually had breakfast at home.
"How's Wendy doing?" Lisa took a seat beside Seulgi.
"Good." she replied shortly. Her fingers were idling on her phone's keypad. "I guess." she mumbled quietly at the last part.
"What was that?"
Seulgi took a deep breath then turned her head towards her best friend. She opened her mouth then closed it again, she didn't want to say something bad that could make Lisa misunderstood.
"I honestly don't know how she's doing," she combed her hair using her fingers tiredly. "We fight, she stays at her parents house at the moment."
"Want to talk about it?" The cardio doctor offered something that actually was out of her expertise.
"It's just the usual stuff"
"Which is?"
"Work, time, me neglecting her- according to her," Seulgi pretended to read whatever paper that was in front of her.
"Oh that," she knew it flawlessly.
"She's a doctor, she should've known about what I do," Seulgi shook her head. "I'm tired arguing the same thing over and over again."
"I know," Lisa said full of sympathy.
"What I do, at the end of the day is for her too, you know. I wish she could be more understanding. It's not like I play around behind her back. I love her, I tell her everyday, isn't that enough? How could she be so selfish?! Aish, I can't take it anymore. If she doesn't want to be with me anymore, then so be it!" She hit the table angrily.
"I feel you, Seulgi," Lisa patted her shoulder gently.
"You do?" She asked confusedly. "I thought you're doing okay with Jennie?"
"Of course we're okay," she replied.
"Then what the heck feeling you felt?" Seulgi was irritated.
"I was just trying to cheer you up, okay? Showing empathy and all that?"
"I should've known," Seulgi sighed desperately. "You're useless."
The plastic surgeon stood up as she grabbed her lab coat. She tied her shoe then glanced her appearance one more time before turned at her back towards the door without looking back.
Lisa groaned at her friend's act. She quickly put on her running shoes and ran for Seulgi.
"Seulgi-ya! Yah!" She shouted through the aisle.
"What?" Seulgi spoke impassively.
"I heard Gucci is on big sale today."
"And you're telling me this because?"
"Because you love Gucci, duh!" She shoved Seulgi jokingly.
Seulgi stopped at that. "You're buying me two," she said as she walked further.
"Yah! I didn't say anything about buying it for you." Lisa matched Seulgi's pace.
"I thought we're best friend. I thought you wanted to console me, guess not," she shrugged.
Lisa groaned. "Fine! This short devil."
"See you after lunch then. Oh, you're driving too," Seulgi threw her a mischievous smile then gone.
*****
"Mrs. Wang, 57 y.o. Post valve replacement due to severe mitral valve regurgitation day four. All vital sign are stable, no complain today, doc."
"No pain at all?" Lisa asked her patient.
"There's discomfort here and there but nothing I can't bear. It's no trouble," the lady replied.
"Good then-"
Her phone ringed. She hesitated to pick it up but ended up answered it anyway.
"Hey, busy?"
"Kind of, something come up?"
"Nothing, I just want to call you."
"I'll call you later okay?"
"Okay. Lisa-ah, I'm-"
She didn't hear the last part.
"Well..." she cleared her throat. "I want to do echocardiography one more time to make sure the fluid in your pericardium is lessening. If everything is perfect, then you're good to go home," Lisa smiled kindly.
Round was one of the routines the doctors did. Especially at teaching hospital, there were at least two types of round; educational round and medical round. Today, Lisa did both. Since she had postponed her educational round last week, she mashed it up this morning.
The fourth year resident knocked on the door and opened it as she let Lisa walked in first. It was the last patient she had to visit and she couldn't be more thankful for that.
Too much to her surprised, Jennie, Chaeyoung, a guy she'd love to punch and a few more people were there too. Lisa hadn't had the chance to ask since they were abruptly bow to the patient and excused themselves out of the room leaving the patient with his kids. She did manage to catch Jennie's eyes, though.
"Later," the lawyer mouthed.
The room suddenly felt so big and quiet.
Lisa reached out her hand to her resident whom busily reading his patient's history on his tablet. "I can help you with that, if you want."
The resident startled as he quickly shook his head, hiding the device behind him.
"Again, from the top," she ordered.
"Mr. Lee, 59 y.o., with long QT syndrome on PPM for four years. Four days ago, she fell into syncope due to Torsade de pointes. It fixed by Dr. Yoo and he consulted to us about the mitral and tricuspid severe regurgitation."
Lisa nodded as she did quick examination on him.
"Can you speak in Korean? The language I can understand?" The middle aged man asked in confusion.
"Ah, of course yes. I'm sorry for that, Mr. Lee," Lisa apologized. Lisa cued the other residents to bring the monitor near her patient. "As you can see, this is how a normal heart works," she showed the man an animation of normal heart beating. Lisa touched a button and it showed the sectioned view. "And this is the valve, it separates heart into chambers. This one is mitral valve," she pointed the valve on the left, "and this one is the tricuspid."
"Because of the history of heart disease before, your heart is become bigger. It pulls the valves to the side and it caused the blood flow in and out of these two chambers freely when it supposed to stop when this valves is closing. Your valves can't close up properly. See?" she showed the animation again. "It makes the heart work harder to pump the blood through your body. There will be the time when it become very weak and de-compensation."
"Dr. Yoo asked any opinion about your case. I've read your file, your chest X-Ray and echocardiography and my advice is- if you agree- do the surgery. My plan is to repair your valve- but if we're in and your valves can't be repair, we'd insert this tiny little metal to replace it. It'd work as your new valve. We're hoping that the surgery will give a better improvement of your heart performance."
"What if I don't want to do that?"
"Some cases like yours, it'll lead to heart failure in time that we can't be predicted. I'm capable to do the surgery because its function is still around 51%, if it fall down far from it, it'll be too late and we wont be able to do anything about it."
"But if you fail now, I'd die too, right?" He looked away.
"I can't guarantee you life, Mr. Lee. I'm giving you option, it's your call to make the decision."
"Can I think about it first?"
"Of course, you can talk with your family. We're ready whenever you are," Lisa smiled softly and patted his shoulder, giving him support.
Lisa stepped out of the room then walked to the nurse station that thankfully is near. She signed the patient's status and checked everything in the way.
"Anything else?" she asked the tall nurse, he said no.
"Well, you're all dismissed. Prepare your case," she turned toward the super handsome guy whom was scheduled to present his second case today. "I'll be there in short."
Her residents bowed then left.
"Ahh, Dr. Shin." she called out the chief resident. "Can you take a look on Baby Park in NICU? See if her condition is stable? Call me as soon as possible."
"Will do, doc."