𝟼 𝚖𝚘𝚗𝚝𝚑𝚜 𝚎𝚊𝚛𝚕𝚒𝚎𝚛

𝙿𝚊𝚕𝚘 𝙰𝚕𝚝𝚘 - 𝚂𝚝𝚊𝚗𝚏𝚘𝚛𝚍 𝙷𝚘𝚜𝚙𝚒𝚝𝚊𝚕 𝙲𝚎𝚗𝚝𝚎𝚛
𝙿𝚊𝚕𝚘 𝙰𝚕𝚝𝚘, 𝙲𝚊𝚕𝚒𝚏𝚘𝚛𝚗𝚒𝚊, 𝚄𝚂𝙰

𝙰𝚙𝚛𝚒𝚕 𝟷𝟼𝚝𝚑, 𝟷𝟿𝟼𝟼... 𝚜𝚘𝚖𝚎𝚝𝚒𝚖𝚎 𝚊𝚛𝚘𝚞𝚗𝚍 𝚕𝚞𝚗𝚌𝚑

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Three years into a bachelors in biochemistry and even I couldn't figure out what lunch-lady Joe had put in the meatloaf.

The jiggly concoction of onions, ketchup, and "meat" sat menacingly between my buttered peas and a jagged piece of cornbread, daring me to make the first move. And while it seemed harmless, I watched carefully as the gravy spread out across my tray and crept ever closer to my frontline of peas.

"Stop staring at your food," Kimmy grumbled as she flipped a page of her impossibly thick textbook. As always, she was hunched over reading, trying to block out the world around her and not wasting time on eye contact.

"I swear it moved," I mumbled back as I laid my chin on the tabletop, watching the shadows of the palm trees sway as the California sun soaked through the cafeteria skylight and warmed the back of my neck.

Kim only shook her head, eyes unflinching as they scanned over the lines of her textbook in a robotic fashion. I squinted, studying her movements, looking for loose wires and mulling over the possibility that Kimberly Lam could actually be a machine of some sort. Sent from the future to study us and then destroy us.

She definitely has the personality to match, I said to myself, narrowing my eyes further.

At lunch her mathematically straight hair was always tied up—somehow being held together by a single pencil—as her pale skin reflected light like unscuffed plastic and, while most of her body was as still as a statue, her left leg bounced as she focused.

Must be a problem with her hydraulics, I smirked, searching for an antenna in her dark hair as my stomach gurgled angrily.

As nice as the hospital cafeteria was, the food could kill you. And while there were no proven cases, I wasn't willing to take that chance.

So as my stomach threw a tantrum, I shut my eyes and inhaled the oh-so-familiar smell of disinfectant and still air. It wasn't as busy as it usually was. The lunch rush had just passed and so the nurses, lab techs and hospital staff dominated the oval room. Shadows of swaying plant life from the nearby courtyard moved past my closed eyes as the light that reflected off the art déco columns struck my cheek.

As the waxy scrape of another flipping page struck the air, my stomach let out another obnoxious grumble.

"Just eat it," Kimmy sighed.

"I refuse. It looks like something the genetics department threw away," I stated matter-of-factly, opening an eye and dipping a pinky into the pool of fat, "This could be a botched experiment for all we know."

"Annie," Kimmy sighed again, flipping another page impassively and hunching her shoulders deeper into the book, "There are some questions this universe never intended to be answered, and what's under the gravy might be one of them. Just eat and don't ask questions. That always gets you in trouble anyway."

I folded my arms in defiance and sunk further into my chair as I let out a puff of air.

"There's nothing wrong with having a curious mind, Lam. Plus, Toni always steals some actual food from the Ted's a couple tables down. I'm perfectly content to just sit here, close my eyes, and wait for a bowl of chocolate pudding to appear." I smirked, sinking into my chair and letting my head fall back until the cafeteria flipped upside down. "You didn't see where Toni and the bowl of pudding went though, did ya?"

Kimmy let out what could have been a laugh or some kind of mechanical issue as she jerked her head to our left.

Perched on the edge of a counter and surrounded by a dozen men was the girl who radiated the essence of the Flower Children. Her form-fitted Wranglers were covered in doodles, her orange hair cascaded down her back in chaotic curls and her brilliant smile beamed against tanned-freckled skin.

I kicked Kim lightly under the table and without missing a beat she answered, "She's selling herself for a lemon tart and a slice of apple pie again... In case you were wondering."

The corners of my lips turned up into a smile as Toni placed a quick peck on one of the boy's cheeks, one hand on his shoulder and the other adding a tart to an already heaping plate of desserts. And with a smack of her sandals, she hopped off the table and practically skipped back to us.

"How many did you score?" I said, throwing my head forward and sitting up straight, my mud colour bangs falling into my eyes.

"Five," Toni said proudly, "Two from the narcs in Infectious Diseases and three from the fellas in Janitorial. They look a bit rough but Johnny said he stole 'em from lunch lady Joe this mornin', so dig in ladies''.

Although I grimaced at the idea of Johnny from Janitorial stuffing key lime pie into god-knows-where, the flaky and buttery crust called to me with an angelic Crisco shine and I immediately devoured it.

"Just, don't tell me who this one came from, I'd rather keep the mystery alive," I teased through a mouthful of pie as I slid the plate to Kim with a smile, and a second later felt her volley it back.

As much as Toni and I enjoyed the anguished back-and-forth banter with Kim, we weren't sure she felt the same way about us. In fact, between the side glances and rolling eyes, we knew we weren't her usual crowd or even her second choice in friends, but we had to stick together.

For solidarity's sake.

Because as we floated in the open waters of sugary treats and sunshine we were surrounded by a sea of blood-thirsty men. Three women. We'd started with twelve but between rigorous exams, torturous hours and the constant and never ending opinions of men, our numbers had dwindled to three, so we had to stick together, because we were the only ones that understood what it was like.

As we finished our "lunch" a guppy by the name of Richard Peterson started to swim in our direction.

"Afternoon ladies," he sneered, his hands in the pockets of his slim fit trousers as he pointed out his elbows to block our path, "Hope you girls had enough to eat because Dr. Church and I left you quite the mess to clean up in the lab. That is what you do isn't it?"

His voice was deep and smooth, and if it wasn't for the disturbing personality underneath his radio perfect tone, some might even have considered him attractive. Luckily, the thick layer of Brylcreem in his hair and the odd tinge of baby powder kept all the women in the hospital at a safe distance.

"Cute, you can say that to my Masters Degree in a couple years when you're still prepping samples, Dick," I bit back, adding extra emphasis on the wonderfully accurate name, "Because we're doing actual research. And if progress means cleaning a few beakers, then I don't mind getting dirty," I could hear Toni snort behind me and Kim gave an approving page flip, as the tips of Richie's ears flushed.

If archenemies could exist like they did in the Adventures of Superman, then Rich Peterson was mine. Since the first day of classes when both of our hands shot into the air, and the professor chose me, Richard had been trying to rub every small victory in my face. Every test score, well-written paper and even the acceptance letters from the hospital's research program we traded back and forth between us and offered a challenge for both of us to beat the other. It was petty, sure, but there was just something about him that made my blood boil, and letting him win at anything felt like an injustice to every hardworking student in our program.

However, as big as we both wanted to seem as we stood head to head in the corridor, we both knew that we were at the bottom of the research food chain.

In this instance, we were both bluffing; and we both knew it.

Dr. Church was doing great research in functional electrotherapy—testing electrical charges on paralyzed and weak nerves—but he'd never let a knucklehead like Richie run, let alone be around, any of the tests. We were, technically, doing hard research for Dr. Dunwitty, digging up case studies and transplant histories from other hospitals, but only because he couldn't be bothered to do it himself.

Our eyes stayed locked, neither of us wanting to break first until Toni put a hand on my shoulder and said, "Come on, Annie, let's split. He's not worth it."

I nodded my head and brushed passed Rich, but not before he could get one last word in.

"Enjoy the library, ladies. Me and my fellas will be logging lab hours while you three do Dunwitty's busy work. You heard about Dr. McLeod's trial, right? The researchers with the most lab time will be the top picks for his team. Real patients and proper fieldwork."

All three of us stopped at the mention of his name.

Dr. Desmond McLeod.

He was the newest doctor, and an esteemed Scottish psychiatrist. And while I could practically hear Toni swoon behind me, Dr. Desmond was worth a lot more than just his looks.

He pushed the boundaries of therapeutic medicine and psychotherapy. The man was a god in his field, and he knew the human mind like no one else ever could.

Even Kimmy looked up, and I stared at Rich in awe for the first and only time. How this greaser knew about the most esteemed member of the faculty's selection process was beyond me, but the dummy had just unknowingly changed our lives.

"Your kidding," I said breathlessly, blinking to wake myself, "Actual clinical trials? For what? The hospital newsletter mentioned he's furthering his research in schizophrenia and depression a few months back but-"

He held his finger up to my lips to silence me, and my nails bit into my palm in response. As much as I wanted to punch him, I knew a right hook to his jaw would ruin my chances of getting my name on Desmond's list.

"Jesus, Edwards. I don't think I've ever seen you this hot for a guy before," he hushed with a coyote-like grin, "You don't have to worry about the trials because you won't be picked. I'll be pulling twelve-hour shifts at the lab, and there's no way you can beat that. Oh, and Edwards, I'd be careful with the sweeties, you won't have that figure forever."

He reached his hand out to wipe a crumb from the corner of my lip as I clenched my jaw and slapped his hand away. In my mind, I screamed so loudly that his body flew across the room with sheer force as the walls of windows around us shattered.

"Twelve hours in the lab," I mocked, mimicking his obnoxious baritone as I watched him walk away. Looking down at my watch, I cursed under my breath; we were going to be late, and if Dunwitty actually noticed, we'd be in for it.

As we started down the hall, I ran over the math in my mind. It took us thirty minutes to walk to the dorms each morning and night. On average, we'd get six hours of sleep, if we were lucky, in between classes and working four-hour shifts in Dunwitty's lab five days a week. Not counting breakfast, lunch and dinner we were losing precious time, at least nine hours a day that Richie and his pals would have on us. And that's when I got the idea.

As Kimmy returned to her book and Toni looked up at me with concern in her pale green eyes, I spun on my heels with an ever-growing smile and asked,

"What do you girls think about a slumber party?"

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"This is a terrible idea, Annie," Toni stated, balancing on the edge of a stool and testing its limits.

"No, this is an amazing idea," I countered as I dumped out the contents of all of our purses onto the tabletop, "If we sleep in the lab then we won't need to go back and forth from the dorms. We can do our school work here, shower here, even eat here. It's a flawless plan."

After checking multiple rooms, we'd found an unoccupied lab on the fourth floor. It was hidden away in a maze of corridors and an abandoned renovation project the hospital lacked funding for. With a single sleek table in the center of the room, towering bookcases and an array of tools for testing patient blood samples, it wasn't the most homey of places, but it would work in a pinch.

With a clatter of pens and spare change bouncing off of the marble surface, I dug through our rations. And sadly the totalling loot equalled three glass water bottles—handed out to us by a candy striper earlier that day—a handful of Toni's pins for anti-war protest and the feminist movement, some old chewing gum from the bottom of my bag, and $2.74 in small change that mostly belonged to Kimmy.

"You're going crazy, Edwards," Toni said, "Seriously, when was the last time you got some sleep? Don't take this the wrong way, but you look horrible."

I waved her away as I shrugged off my cardigan, my eyelids heavy as I bundled clothes into a makeshift pillow. We'd managed to find a cot in a nearby office and despite the ten minutes of shut eye I'd gotten at lunch, she was right. My muscles were dragging me down as I rubbed at my eyes, trying to shrug off the exhaustion from nearly a week of sleepless nights.

"I'm fine, Toni," I tried to reassure her as I looked down at my makeshift bed with pride, "I've just been having some weird dreams lately, that's all. Tell you what, since this was my fantastic idea, I sleep first while you guys get started on Dunwitty's extra credit stuff."

"No thanks," Toni laughed as she started for the door, "You know I love you Annie but this is crazy. There's a comfy bunk and a cute boy waiting for me at the dorms, but I'll bring you ladies some goodies in the morning. Promise."

'Traitor," I sung playfully, moving my arm to cover my eyes as the pink setting sun danced across my vision, "What about you, Kim? You leaving too?"

With a shrug and her head hanging over a microscope there was a mumble of something like, "it's not like there anywhere else I should be." So I took that as a yes as I reached for one of the water bottles.

Greedily, I chugged the still cold beverage, surprised to not detect the usual taste of chlorine as an odd tang sent goosebumps down my arms but I reached for the second bottle anyway. My tongue tingled slightly as my head hit the pillow, the mixture of textures of jackets and bags brushing against my skin as I snuggled in for another sleepless night.

But, for a change, I feel into a deep sleep. As suddenly the pink glow melted away and I found myself standing in a field of cold white.

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"How many did she drink?"

'All three, Doctor. But we don't know which part of the control group the bottles belonged too."

"Fascinating. I love it when people pick up the reins of discovery and pull them for you. Don't you?

"Yes, Doctor."

"Monitor her closely. And call me immediately if anything changes"

"Yes, Doctor."