It was a fine morning. The sun was bright and the air was cool. But despite knowing that this was a good start to the day, Carolyn Keller was still nervous.
She had just began her role as a psychiatrist at Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital in New Jersey and it was a far cry from the smaller hospital in rural New York that she had been at for the last ten years.
Moving had been a difficult process. Her father, Tiberius, and younger brother, Arvin, had moved from their home town of Montréal several years ago for Arvin to attend university and for Tiberius to climb the ladder of success in regards to his job as businessman and benefactor. It was the latter that made Carolyn aware of the job opening at Princeton-Plainsboro, which she applied for immediately. She couldn't give up the opportunity to be closer to her beloved family.
However, her actions didn't come without consequences. Her strained marriage was tested to its limits; Adam, her soon to be ex-husband, was an alcoholic and felt threatened when Carolyn acted on her own initiative to better her career for the benefit of herself and for her daughter- seven year old Maisie.
Luckily for Carolyn, she was occupied and didn't have the time to think about her familial issues. Her second morning on the job consisted smooth sailing: psychologically evaluating patients- both those in the psych department and those from other departments whose doctors had requested consults- in order to prescribe treatment. In the space of three hours, she'd already seen close to twenty patients. In the afternoon, she was to be introduced to clinic duty which was something she had always enjoyed.
She also met her colleagues, who were all (thankfully) kind and welcoming, and gelled well with a woman ten years her junior named Teresa McKinnon, who was originally from Arizona.
"The winters are certainly different here!" She had joked, making Carolyn wonder what it was like to spend the Christmas holidays in a warmer climate.
In light of her hectic morning, Carolyn was indescribably relieved when lunch came, famished for a large meal that would keep her going until she got home for dinner later in the evening. Her Auntie Elsie would be making her famous vegetable soup (Carolyn's favourite dish since she was eleven), which was the only reason she wanted the day to hurry up.
The cafeteria was busy and the queue was annoyingly long. Luckily for Carolyn, she'd decided to pack her own lunch. She found a relatively quiet spot in the corner and sat down with a huff before hungrily tucking in to her sandwich and fruit. It wasn't long before she became occupied with her own thoughts, blocking out the chaos of the cafeteria and thinking about her fresh start.
Carolyn hoped that Maisie was having a good day and that she was settling into her new school. The young girl seemed content so far, but there was always a worry that things might go south. She came home after her first day, rambling with such enthusiasm about her day and rhyming off all of her classmates' names, which made Carolyn indescribably happy.
After a short while of daydreaming, however, her thoughts were interrupted by a familiar voice- a kind voice that she hadn't heard in nearly twenty years.
"Carolyn?"
She looked up, her heart exploding with joy and a big beam appearing on her face. "James?! Oh, my god!"
Carolyn had known James Wilson since they were at medical school together. They used to sit for hours on end in the library, immersed in stacks of books and helping each other out in the dead of night when they were stuck with work. Studying was a pain for Carolyn, but it was always that bit better with takeout food and her friends by her side.
Wilson smiled as Carolyn got up to hug him, laughing at her giddiness. He'd grown from a handsome young boy with slightly squishy cheeks into an even more handsome man with the same soft brown eyes that Carolyn used to gaze into with affection and admiration.
"Do you mind if I sit here?" He then asked.
Carolyn smiled. "Not at all. We could catch up if you've got time for lunch."
"Absolutely," he replied, plonking himself down opposite her and smoothing down his tie. "How long has it been?"
"Oh, too long."
"And you're actually working here?"
"Yeah. I'm a proper psychiatrist now!" She chuckled, flashing her ID badge that was attached to the pocket of her white coat. "It was my first day yesterday, you see, and I think I'm more nervous now than I was then."
"You'll ease into it," he said reassuringly. "You'll forget about all your nerves by the end of the week because you've been so busy."
"God, I hope you're right... I don't even have to ask what you're doing here. But don't tell me you're working for a jackass head of oncology. The head at my last workplace was so full of himself."
Wilson laughed. "Actually, I'm the jackass head of oncology."
Carolyn felt embarrassed by her comment, looking apologetic for a moment before grinning excitedly.
"No way!" She exclaimed. "Oh, James, that's fantastic- congratulations!"
Sheepishly, Wilson smiled and uttered his thanks. He was always so modest, so it didn't come as a surprise to Carolyn that he was relaxed about having such an important job. She knew that he was probably under a lot of pressure and had many patients relying on him.
However, Wilson quickly switched subjects, moving the focus back to Carolyn.
"How has your own work been, anyway?"
"Really good, thanks," she responded. "But I also specialise in palliative care now, too."
Astonished, he raised an eyebrow. "What made you choose that direction?"
"Seeing all the hard work and kindness that went into taking care of my mom as she was dying made me want to give something back. It's a great field to work in, but I don't do it as often as psychiatry; I'm kind of glad I don't because I'd end up crying all the time."
Wilson chuckled. "Sounds like you. I remember one late night when you cried over a bug that wouldn't move so you thought it was dead. Turns out it was just a bit of fluff."
Carolyn smiled awkwardly. "I might have been drunk that night."
"I'm fairly certain you were sober-"
"My mom would have killed me if I was drinking on a school night! And she'd yell at you for being irresponsible."
Carolyn's mother was her the light of her life. Bertha was always there to make Carolyn feel better after a bad day and taught her many things like how to cook and how to pick yourself up and carry on. So, naturally, when her mother passed away, Carolyn felt like her world collapsed and nothing mattered anymore. There was a hole in her life that could never be filled and the absence of her mother hurt more than any pain she had experience before or since.
"Speaking of your mom," Wilson then began after a moment of comfortable silence. "Did you visit when she was here?"
She nodded. "I did a couple of times."
"How come I never saw you?"
"I lived in rural New York and good doctors at the hospital I was at were scare. They needed me all the time and I could only come here when I could. You probably weren't working when I came to visit my mom."
Wilson smiled thoughtfully. "She told me once that I'd see you again one day. I never imagined it'd be in this hospital, though."
"She really said that?" Carolyn asked, somewhat taken aback. "I thought she would have tried to get us back in the same room as quickly as possibly... She never mentioned you, which I find strange."
"Maybe she was waiting for you to find out yourself."
Carolyn laughed. "Yeah. Sounds like something she'd do. She kept me guessing when I really wanted answers, but she always said that everything was more fulfilling if you did the puzzle solving yourself."
She then took a quick glance at her watch as Wilson sat pondering. She hadn't realised that the time had passed so quickly and was downhearted to have to leave Wilson so soon.
"I'd best be off," she then uttered. "Wish me luck: I've got my first dose of clinic duty."
"You don't need me to wish you luck," he commented. "I'm sure you'll do just fine."
She thanked him as she got to her feet and picked up her lunchbox. "Well, it was lovely seeing you again, Dr Wilson."
He smiled. "And you, Dr Keller. See you soon."
On her way to the locker room, Carolyn thought it so wonderfully strange that she'd crossed paths with Wilson after all these years. After they parted ways as young adults, she wasn't sure she'd ever see him again. But seeing him now and reminiscing over their time at med school instantly brightened up her day. The only problem now was that she knew she wouldn't be able to stop thinking about her fateful chance encounter.
Once Carolyn had made it to the locker room, she opened up her locker, shoved her lunchbox inside and applied a fresh layer of lipstick before hurrying down to the clinic.
Her first patient was a nine year old boy, who had fallen out of a tree and scraped his forearm, causing it to be covered in dirt and blood. He looked terrified and winced through the pain, holding his mother's hand in the meantime, but once Carolyn had cleaned the wound and bandaged it up, the boy got to his feet and thanked her with a crooked smile.
Carolyn then followed them out, waving goodbye, and began to head over to the nurses station. However, she stopped in her tracks when she heard an angry voice shatter the air.
"Hey! Come back here!"
Carolyn turned to see Dr Cuddy, the formidable and straight-talking Dean of Medicine (who Carolyn thought was actually a very nice and admirably successful woman), storm out of her office in pursuit of a tall lanky man. He was dressed casually in a shirt that seemed to have stuffed in the bottom of his wardrobe, faded blue jeans, and a pair of trainers. His hair was unkempt, flecked with grey, and he was also using the aid of a cane to help him hobble across the clinic as fast as he could.
"You are not using experimental treatment on your patient," Cuddy snapped, pointing a finger at the man. "I can't let you risk anything- not the patient's life, not your job, not this hospital's reputation. Do you understand me?"
He rolled his eyes in retaliation. "You want this kid to get better? Then let me take that risk."
"No. You'll have to find another way to solve your problem. Especially since you don't have a definite diagnosis!"
"I will do once you let me use this treatment!"
And that's when Carolyn recognised him. She never thought she'd see the Dr Gregory House in the flesh. He was widely regarded as the best diagnostician in the whole of the United States, maybe even the world, and the department of diagnostics at Princeton-Plainsboro was set up especially for him. Whilst a great doctor, House was not a great man; he was rude, cold, dismissive, and many of his patients had taken up lawsuits with him. But that never mattered to House: he would always defend his diagnoses even if it meant facing severe consequences.
Carolyn knew that giving up his empathy to ensure he did his job to the highest standard was a sacrifice that presented itself easily. She understood why he'd make the choice, but she didn't completely agree with it and she wasn't alone in having that opinion.
She also somehow got the feeling that what she was witnessing was a typical conversation (or rather more of an argument or standoff) between House and Cuddy. And she had a feeling that she'd be seeing more of these squabbles in the future.
But for now, Carolyn pushed the thought to the back of her mind, grabbed another file from the nurses station and called for her next patient...