“Is this today’s pizza?” I flip open the greasy white box sitting on the breakroom countertop. Who am I kidding? I don’t care how old it is. It’s going in my mouth.

“I worry about you, Sloan,” Carol, the ER nurse says, rolling her eyes at me as she thumbs through a magazine. Her bleached blonde hair is pulled up in a tight bun and years of a tanning bed addiction has her constantly orange and a little bit shriveled, but the look fits her abrasive and feisty personality to a T. “When are you going to find yourself a nice man to take you out to dinner or something so you can stop scavenging for scraps? Don’t you know how to cook?”

Sure, I can cook, but that requires money, and right now, I’m not exactly blessed in that department. Living in such a small town, the only residency and fellowship available locally for my specialty is an unpaid one, and although in the past that wasn’t a problem, I’m definitely starting to feel the pinch now.

If anyone at the hospital knew of my current living situation, they’d probably be floored. As happy as I am to have Arthur behind bars and out of my life, the trial left me with a whole lot of nothing.

No family to fall back on.

No job.

No savings.

Just piles of student loans and a fistful of credit cards that are borderline maxed out. I don’t have anything fun to show for it except a shitty one-bedroom apartment and a car that’s on its last leg.

A side job really isn’t an option when you’re in a training program as intensive as I am in right now, although I moonlight a couple times a month at a local clinic so I can keep the debt collectors at arm’s length.

At least I have my freedom. My freedom, and nine more months until I’m finished with this fellowship and take my boards and then I can officially call myself a trauma surgeon.

Nine more months of hauling ass, kissing ass, and doing everything I can to prove to my mentors that I’m the best and most competent surgeon they’ve ever worked with. Thanks to the giant hiccough that was Arthur’s trial, which not only resulted in missing way too much work but also tarnished my reputation in the process, I have to work twice as hard as everyone else to do it, but that’s ok. I have nothing else going on in my life but complete dedication to this program.

I grab a huge slice of pizza from the box and inhale it in three bites.

“I don’t know if I’m impressed or disgusted,” Carol wheezes as she laughs. I’ve worked side by side with Carol for most of my residency and fellowship, and if I know anything about her, it’s that the woman loves her menthol cigs. I can’t blame her. To hack it in the Dixon Emergency room as long as she has, you almost need a vice. For now, mine is questionable breakroom leftovers. I start on my second slice.

“What about Dr. Turner?” she asks, tapping her hot orange fingernails off the table. “I bet he’d take you out for a pizza and slip you the old pepperoni stick, too, if you know what I’m saying?”

“Carol, seriously?” I laugh. Dating colleagues is definitely against hospital policy. I’m sure whatever grotesque hand gesture she’s making right now is as well. “You better hope nobody sees you doing that or you’re gonna end up in HR faster than I can eat this.”

There’s really nothing wrong with Doctor Turner. He’s a perfectly normal, perfectly good-looking, perfectly stable guy who’s great at what he does. Any woman would be lucky to have a man like him.

But I’m ruined.

Men like Dr. Turner aren’t the kind you just hook up with and never talk to again, and in my current situation, that’s about the only thing that appeals to me. I’m not ready for love. I’m not even ready for a second date.

I’m too busy.

I’m too broken.

The second I forget who I am or where I came from, somebody manages to dig up my mug shot photo and pin it on the office bulletin board. I hear the whispers and the snide under-the-breath comments. They’ve died down significantly in the last five years, but I’m afraid I’ll never get out from under that dark cloud.

Nice guys aren’t really my wheelhouse.

“You didn’t tell me there were cupcakes, Carol!” I whine, digging around in the big pink bakery box.

“Those have been there for like a week. I’m surprised they haven’t hit your radar yet. How in the world do you stay so thin?”

They are so stale, but I can’t resist the chocolatey frosted goodness they probably once were.

“Good genes?” I shrug. Or being chronically broke and too exhausted at night to boil water to make ramen.

Dr. Peterman pokes his head around the breakroom door.

“I’m so glad you’re in here, Dr. Sullivan,” he says. “We have one incoming. Are you ready to scrub up?”

“Sure thing, Doctor!” If anything excites me more than free food, it’s the opportunity to put my skills to use in the operating room. “What are we looking at?”

“Motorcycle accident. Nineteen-year-old male. Passerby found him in a ditch off of I-80. ETA about twenty minutes.”

It’s my time to shine. I wing the cupcake into the trash can and try to get myself centered. Surgery is so much easier when you look at it from a logical standpoint instead of a human standpoint—putting the pieces of a puzzle back together just like they’re supposed to be. I wave goodbye to Carol and make my way down the cold sterile hall. I pop in my headphones and put on my pump-up playlist. It’s time for us to go to work.