After I'm done with Mrs. Jefferson, I discover that my first patient, Alex Chandler, has been moved up to a room on the main floor. I head over to see him, to make sure he's gotten a dose of acyclovir and is feeling more comfortable.

Chandler does look better than he did earlier. He's lying in bed, his brow still sweaty but not as markedly so. Again, I can't help but think to myself that he looks like someone I would have gone to school with. I suppose it's a mistake to stereotype people who get HIV. It can happen to anyone. Don't they always say that?

"You look better," I tell him.

He nods. "The morphine helped a lot. Thanks."

"No problem," I say. "It was criminal that they let you suffer like that."

"Yeah, well..." He sighs. "I'm HIV-positive, so obviously I'm a drug addict to them." He shifts in his bed and winces with pain. "You just don't realize how fast your life can turn around."

I've only got ten minutes before the cafeteria closes for lunch hours, but somehow this seems more important. Plus, I have to admit, I am super curious. How does a nice, clean-cut guy get HIV?

"What happened to you?" I ask.

"I'll tell you what happened to me," he says. "Never trust a woman." He laughs weakly then winces again. "Sorry. I'm bitter, I guess."

"It's okay," I assure him.

"My fiance cheated on me," he says, shaking his head like he still can't believe it. "A bunch of times. Like an idiot, I didn't have a clue. Two months before the wedding, she tells me. She's HIV-positive. I never used a condom with her-I mean, why would I? She was almost my wife." He sighs, and rubs his face. "I was about to get married, I was an investment banker-I had everything going for me. That was three years ago, and now look at me."

I look at his face and see the dark circles under his eyes. I know he's on Medicaid. I wonder if he lost his job. I feel like it would be wrong to ask those questions, and all of a sudden, he groans and looks very uncomfortable again.

"Are you all right, Mr. Chandler?"

"No," he gasps. "This is... the worst pain ever. Christ."

"Do you need more morphine?" I ask. I calculate in my head how much he's gotten. I want to relieve his pain, but not stop him from breathing.

"Demerol has really helped me before," he says, between shallow breaths.

I nod then run out to write the order for Demerol. More than ever, I feel determined to try to help this guy. After all, if this could happen to him, it could happen to anyone.

_____.

The cafeteria is closed for lunch by the time I get down there. I almost cry until I remember the food cart parked in front of the hospital at all times. I know Alyssa has told me never to leave the hospital on penalty of death, but I think the food cart three yards away from the front door should be allowed. It's either that or faint from hunger.

As I get down to the lobby, I expect to smell the usual stomach-curdling aroma of fried food from the cart, but instead I smell nothing. There is a white cart parked in front of the hospital, but it's not the food cart. It's an ice cream truck-it's even playing the ice cream truck jingle. My choices right now include eating ice cream for lunch versus lasting another five to six hours without food.

I'm getting ice cream.

As I walk to the truck, I nearly slam into Nina, who is coming from the opposite direction. Meaning, she has done the unthinkable-she has left the hospital while on call.

"Oh!" Nina says when she sees it's me. Her cheeks turn pink. "Hi, Jane."

"Were you... outside?" I ask in a horrified whisper.

"No, of course not," Nina says. She tries to smile but keeps up the faade for exactly five seconds before breaking down. "Okay, I was. I went out. I had to."

I just stare at her.

"Val-you know, my cat?" Nina begins. I nod. "He's diabetic. He was all sluggish for a while and we couldn't figure it out. I thought it was his thyroid but it turned out-well, anyway. He's diabetic and needs daily insulin shots, so I have to sneak out when I'm on call to give it to him."

"You give your cat insulin shots?"

Nina nods. "Sure. It's no big deal. I just pull the skin away and he doesn't even feel it. It's actually very easy. For a while, we were doing fingersticks too to monitor his blood sugar, but I just can't anymore. I mean, I feel guilty about it, but as long as he gets the insulin, he should be okay."

I laugh. I can't help it-there's just something funny about imagining Nina giving her cat fingersticks. "Maybe you missed your calling as a veterinarian?"

"Oh no," Nina gasps. "I could never. It's way too sad when something bad happens to an animal." She frowns at the expression on my face. "That sounded bad, didn't it?"

"Slightly."

Her eyebrows scrunch together. "You won't tell on me, will you?"

"Of course not."

Nina sighs in relief. "Thanks, Jane. I'm not even worried about my senior resident. I'm just worried about that witch of a roommate of yours, Julia. She'd rat me out to the program director for sure." She looks over at the ice cream cart. "Let me buy you a popsicle."

I can't say no to that.

I take my sweet time selecting a popsicle, since this is apparently going to be my entire lunch. I haven't eaten a popsicle in a long time, probably years. They all look so delicious. Finally, I pick out the orange creamsicle. I'm practically salivating when they hand it to me.

Nina laughs. "Did you skip out on lunch today?"

"Am I that obvious?"

"The nurses usually will let you have some crackers from the nurse's station if they like you," Nina says.

"And what if they don't like you?"

We walk back into the hospital as I rip the wrapping off my popsicle and take a bite. It's so cold that it's a little bit agonizing to have it in my mouth, but I'm so hungry that it tastes like the best popsicle I've ever eaten in my whole life.

I hear a noise blaring over the loudspeakers: "Code Blue! 3-South, Room 318. Code Blue!"

Nina looks at me. "Aren't you part of the code team tonight?"

Shit, she's right.

And then I start running.

Hospitals are all about codes, and I spent several hours during orientation learning all of them: Code Red: There's a fire! Run for your life! (Or save patients, whatever.) Code Yellow: Bomb threat. Holy crap.

Code Dr. Strong: Someone is beating someone else up.

Most of the codes vary between different hospitals, but Code Blue is pretty universal. It means someone is maybe dying and needs to be resuscitated. And I'm supposed to save them. Somehow.

Prior to my intern year, I took a course called Advanced Cardiac Life Support. Basically, it teaches you how to run a Code Blue. It teaches you how to give a patient's heart an electric shock and administer life-saving medications. After the course, we took a test and I got 100%. I was so proud of myself.

That was about two weeks ago. I've now forgotten every single thing I learned in the class and I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to do at this code.

I run up the stairs because there's just no time to wait for the elevator. I mean, how embarrassing would it be if I'm twiddling my thumbs at the elevator while a patient is in ventricular fibrillation? But the consequence is that when I arrive at the third floor, I'm seriously out of breath. I have to hold onto the wall for a minute while I cough and gasp for air. This is kind of pathetic. I'm beginning to worry they might need to call a Code Blue on me.

I do manage to catch my breath though, and I make my way to Room 318. The patient isn't one of ours-it's a man I've never seen before. He's extremely yellow. I don't think I've ever seen a non-cartoon human being quite so yellow in my life. He's almost glowing.

He's got IVs coming out of both arms, and pads on his chest to prepare for electric shocks if needed. Right now, there's a male nurse pumping on his chest, as another nurse manually gives him oxygen.

Dr. Westin is at the head of the bed, running the code. Alyssa is a few steps back, watching him run the code. I'm pleased to find that I beat out Connie, who is nowhere in sight.

"Hey," I whisper to Alyssa, eager to point out my promptness. "I'm here."

Alyssa turns. She gives me an utterly disgusted look. "Are you holding a popsicle?"

Yes. Yes, I am.

Between my hunger and my eagerness to get to the code, I guess I never ended up throwing away my orange creamsicle. So here I am, in the middle of this patient being resuscitated, clutching a popsicle in my left hand. I'd probably be better off if I never came at all.

"Sorry," I say.

A nurse taps me on the shoulder. I can tell she's angry by the aggressive way she taps me.

"Did you do that?" she asks, pointing at the floor.

Okay, so not only did I bring a popsicle to a code, but the popsicle has been dripping all the way here. I've left a little trail of orange and vanilla ice cream behind me on the floor. It leads all the way off the unit.

"Yes," I admit, hanging my head.

"Clean it up," she orders me.

Connie arrives a minute later and gets to do chest compressions. Whereas I spend the rest of the code on my knees with paper towels, cleaning up the trail of ice cream.

Hours awake: 8 Chance of quitting: 47%

Chapter 13.

"Tell me about your last admission," Alyssa says to me.

The Code Blue is over. The patient was intubated and swept off to the ICU in critical but stable condition. He's not dead is all I know. Now we're sitting on 3-South, my popsicle is long gone, and I'm starving. But at least I'm not tired and I don't have to pee. I figure I'm always going to be ignoring at least one of my body's needs.

"Okay," I say. I fumble in my white coat pocket for my notes, but then I remember how Alyssa hates it when I read my notes, so I decide to wing it. "Mrs. Washington is a 59-year-old female who-"

"Who?"

I hesitate. Crap, wrong President. This wouldn't have happened if Alyssa would let me read my notes when I present to her. "I mean, Mrs. Jefferson is a 59-year-old female who-"

"Don't say 'female,'" Alyssa interrupts me.

"Huh?"

"When you call her a 'female,' what do you mean by that? What is she-a female dog? A female horse?"

I stare at Alyssa. "No, she's a female human."

"Right, and what's the word for that?"

I bite my lip. Is this a trick question?

Alyssa rolls her eyes. "A woman, right?"

"Oh. Right."

Alyssa sighs. "Go ahead."

"Um," I say. "Mrs. Jefferson is a 59-year-old woman who-"

Apparently, I'm not destined to say anything more than that first half-sentence because that's when Alyssa's pager goes off. She goes to answer it, eying me like I might scurry off if she's not careful. As if I'd have the courage to walk away from Alyssa.

I don't know what this phone call is about, but it's not from the ER and it's upsetting her even more than my calling Mrs. Jefferson a female.

"How much?" she barks into the phone. "No, you're right, that is a lot. Absolutely, I agree. No more than that. My intern will go talk to him."

Alyssa slams down the phone. "Jane," she says. "You are giving Mr. Chandler way too much narcotics. We're cutting him off right now."

"He's in pain though," I protest. "Don't we have to treat his pain?"

"I'm not going to sit here and argue with you, Jane," she says. "Go talk to him and tell him to stop bothering the nurses for pain meds. He can have what's already prescribed, nothing more."

"But what about Mrs. Jackson?" I ask.

"Who?"

Crap, wrong President. Again.

"I mean, Mrs. Jefferson," I correct myself.

"No, you need to go take care of Chandler right now," Alyssa says. "He's giving the nurses hell."

I can't even imagine such a thing. I'm beginning to get familiar with the nurses on that unit and they tend to be a bit lazy. I can imagine that they're sick of fetching pain meds for Mr. Chandler, so their solution is to call him a baby and rat him out to my superior. Still, I've got to do what Alyssa says.

When I reach Alex Chandler's room, he's got the lights out again and he's watching television. He shuts it off when I enter the room. He flashes me the tiniest of smiles as I gown up to go inside.