Aryan

I woke up to the alarm on the phone blaring into my ears. Fuck, I groaned and woke up and saw the time it was 8.30 a.m. The sunlight peeked through the curtains and beamed right into my eyes. I had a boxing session with Rahul at 9.30 and then my shift starts at 12. I would likely be on a long shift today and I didn't mind at all because I would only be coming home to an empty house and although Shvan and Toffee would keep me company, it still wasn't the same without her. I turned off the alarm on my phone and messaged Mia, she must be on her way to Bali by now. When she told me was leaving today, at first I was angry and then I was upset. Due to that I started rambling like an idiot. I dont even know why the fuck I was even behaving like that. I sounded like a concerned boyfriend that was offended when she didn't tell me about her plan earlier and she wasn't even my girlfriend......yet.

When I was done, only then she proceeded to explain her situation to me and that's when I realised she wasn't doing it on purpose. The best of that whole conversation was when she told me she doesn't hate me anymore and I call that progress. I knew I was going to miss her for the entire week. Her beautiful smile and scent that consumed my thoughts every single day, her sarcastic remarks about everything I do for her even though I only did it out of pure concern for her health. I don't know how and when it happened but she slowly crept her way into my heart and now it's only consumed by my feelings for her. I longed for her to know how I felt about her but I didn't know how she might react to it. I was afraid she might start running for the hills if I told her because what if she didn't feel the same way? What if she only saw me as her Doctor and nothing else?

'If she only thought of you as her Doctor she wouldn't have allowed you to behave that way with her' my mind said. Against my better judgement, a part of me felt that she might feel the same way and I had a few ways to test the theory but I guess I would have to wait until she comes back from Bali.

My first round of my boxing session with Rahul was pathetic. He punched me square in the face because I wasn't concentrating and also because he was mad at me that I didn't tell him about the whole Mia situation sooner. He had every right to be mad at me, he was my best friend after all but at the same time, this whole thing was a huge pain in the ass in the beginning and I did not really want to talk about to him because Rahul might have tried to intervene and it would have caused an even bigger problem and another reason was because we were too busy and hardly had time to catch up properly.

"That's for lying to me." Rahul angrily said and stared at me.

"I'm not mad at you, I deserve it." I winced in pain. "Just give me a minute." I got out from the ring and walked towards the bench where my duffel bag was, I pulled out my water bottle and chugged it down and then I took the phone out and saw a message from Mia.

"Landed an hour ago and it took a while for me to connect with the hotel's wifi. Sorry for the late response, Doctor. By the way I'm fine, don't panic 🙂."

I sighed at her response, finally she replied to me. I was glad she was safe and okay, now I can breathe in peace. I replied to her and tossed my phone back into my bag and jumped back into the ring again.

"Look who's back, ready to get your ass whipped again?" Rahul laughed at me and he was already in position with his arms up.

"Bring it on." I challenged him and now with all that weight and tension of worrying about Mia lifted off I knew I would be able to concentrate better in the ring.

Rahul threw the first punch, a powerful jab aimed at my face but I ducked it immediately and countered it with a sharp hook to his ribs earning a loud grunt from him.

"Nice one." Rahul muttered but he quickly retaliated with a left cross but missed me because I avoided it fast. However I staggered back but managed to regain my composure quickly.

The exchanged blows between us intensified, each punch thrown by me towards Rahul with precision and purpose. I needed to let myself loose and blow off all the pent up steam and emotions brewing inside of me. Midway through the round, Rahul overcommitted to a right hook and left his side exposed and I took advantage of that and delivered a crushing blow to his ribs once again, followed by a quick jab that snapped his head back. Rahul staggered and I started throwing a series of punches which caused him to fall back onto the ropes.

"Time out bro." Rahul was breathless.

"Giving up so soon?" I teased him.

"I'm no match for you when your head is in the game, great fight nevertheless. You got me back good."He got up and congratulated me.

"Come on, coffee is on me." I helped him to get up and we both walked back to the locker room to change and get ready for our shifts.

I was back at the hospital to start my afternoon shift, as usual the hospital buzzed with typical chaos on a weekday afternoon. The halls were alive with beeping monitors, nurses and doctors running around, patients interacting with them. My first task was of course my usual rounds with my patients and one of them was Annie, when I walked into her room she once again reminded me to sign her will and Avinash would be contacting me again real soon. I kept my conversations fast and light with her because I didn't feel like discussing this again right now. I eventually agreed to sign her will if it would make her genuinely happy although it will come with a lot of consequences so I needed to consult with someone regarding this matter and the only person I can think of is Mia, she would definitely know what to do in a situation like this.

After my first set of rounds, I moved onto my second one which would be with my new interns and med students in the ICU ward. I briefed them about every single patient we met to make sure they understood well about all the patients they would be monitoring and right now we were standing outside Mr. Arul's room. He is a 48 year old just recovering from a heart attack.

Inside the room Mr.Arul greeted us with a weak smile. I approached and greeted him and introduced everyone to Mr.Arul

As I conducted my examination on Mr. Arul, I explained the entire process to the interns and medical students. I listened to his heart and lungs, checked his pulse and reviewed his charts. I also explained the next step of his care plans in simple terms so that Mr. Arul would be able to understand better.

After the rounds, I headed to the catheterization lab where I had to perform my first procedure of the day, a coronary angiogram. I scrubbed in alongside Dr. Gaurav, the attending cardiologist.

"Dr. Aryan, are you ready for the procedure?" Dr Gaurav questioned me.

"Yes Dr. Gaurav." I replied to him.

"Dr. Aryan, what is our next step if we find a significant blockage?" Dr. Gaurav asked me, his eyes flicking up from the angiogram screen.

"We'll consider balloon angioplasty or stent placement, depending on the severity and location of the blockage." I answered him confidently, my hands steady as I guided the catheter.

The procedure went smoothly and I felt a surge of satisfaction as we successfully managed to place the stent, restoring proper blood flow to the patient's heart. Once the patient was stabilised and transferred to recovery, I took some time to update the patient's family, offering them reassurance and answering their questions. After I was done with that, I took a quick break and headed to the cafe downstairs to grab a sandwich to eat. While I was waiting in the line to pay for my sandwich, I checked my phone to see if I received any more messages from Mia and there were none. I will admit that I was a little upset but I guess she was busy, she did say it was a work trip and that there was something important she needed to deal with. I battled with myself if I should text her just to check up on her again but she might ignore it knowing her. I eventually decided against it and told myself I would text her at night before I went to bed. I tucked my phone away, paid for my sandwich and was walking back to my floor when I once again bumped into Shana.

"We have got to stop meeting like this." She laughed.

"You really have to learn to look up from your Ipad when you are walking." I told her.

"Back to continue with your rounds?"

"Yes, how about you?" I answered and asked her back.

"I just finished my second one, about to take a coffee break provided no one pages me on the way there." She grumbled.

"I suggest you better run then because trust me there is a high chance they will."

She laughed and her gaze lingered on me a bit and I don't know why but it made me feel uncomfortable. I usually enjoyed it when girls looked at me but not anymore. The only girl's gaze I wanted on me was somewhere in Bali, not even bothered to send me another text about her day.

"I should probably go, you know I have rounds and patients and stuff." I said awkwardly.

"Yeah you totally should, don't let me keep you up." She gave me one last glance before walking away.

By the time I was done for the day, it was already 1.45a.m. The ER got extremely busy all of a sudden and I was paged multiple times throughout the day. Though I don't mind running up and down and dealing with all the chaos this life comes with, sometimes it would be nice to wind down a little. I should take a break, go out of town for a bit or something, or go on a holiday to a different country. Maybe I could take Mia with me if she would like to come with me. I haven't thought about her the whole day because I was too occupied at work. I was walking towards the car while checking on my phone for any messages from Mia and I found one sent 5 hours ago and my heart instantly fluttered.

Mia : Back to the hotel now, had my dinner and probably going to watch a movie and maybe catch up on some work.

I quickly typed out a message and sent it to her. She might be asleep though but at least she will see it in the morning.

Me: Good to know fiore, I just finished my shift and headed back home now. Goodnight and sleep well.

Mia: Wow, you just finished? Well you should get some good rest as well.

Me : Why are you still awake?

Mia : Just wrapping up some work. I'm going to head to bed soon.

Me: Okay, can I call you later?

My heart was beating pretty fast when I asked that. I have never called her before except for that one time when I was angry about her skipping out on breakfast because she was too busy but I never called her for personal reasons. I just wanted to hear her voice and ask her how she was actually doing.

Mia: Yes, you can. I will be waiting.

My heart did a 180 when she said okay. So the first thing after I reached home was to call her because I knew Mia hated waiting. She was an impatient girl. We really need to work on that.

Me: Hello fiore

Mia : Hey Aryan

Me: So how was your day? Tell me all about it.

Mia: Well it was long and a lot of complications to deal with and Rohan is just extremely upset and stressed out.

"Who the hell is Rohan and why the fuck she is helping out some guy I didn't know about" my mind screamed but I calmed myself down and wanted to ask her for more clarifications before jumping to conclusions on who he might be and when I asked Mia she explained the whole reason why she was even there in the first place. Rohan Masrani was the new CEO of Masrani hotels and resorts. They had 5 star hotels all around the world. Recently they were in the middle of building a luxury resort in Bali and the Young empire was hired to do the back end networking and cabling for the resort and all of a sudden there was a huge fire accident and the main lobby was burned down. So Darian asked Mia to fly in to check on the situation as well as help Rohan in any way the Young empire could. When she was done explaining, I let go of my breath that I didn't even know I was holding in. I was just glad he was a colleague and nothing else.

Me: I see, Rohan must be super upset, I mean he just became a CEO and this is his first project and it's kind of destroyed.

Mia: Yeah but we are trying our best to reassure him that we can get things back on track, he probably might have to move the opening dates but I'm sure his team can handle it and also we suspect it to be arson.

Me : Really? Do you guys have any suspects?

Mia : Rohan is talking with the local police at the moment and they are trying to find some evidence you know. We even asked some of the nearby shops if we can look into their CCTV's to see if we can find anyone suspicious.

Me : I see...Mia please stay safe regardless and don't strain yourself.

I was worried about her safety and health and the new story she told me only made me grow more anxious.

Mia : I will Aryan.

I could practically feel her rolling her eyes at me.

Mia : You need to learn to relax, you always seem so worried about me, it's not good for your health.

Me : Somebody has to worry about you and I took upon myself to do it.

Mia : Oh so noble and kind of you Aryan, do you want an award for that?

There we go, sarcastic Mia is back.

Me : The only reward you can give me is by staying alive and healthy.

Mia : I will do my best for you Doctor. Now I have to go to bed and get some rest, I have a long day tomorrow. Goodnight Doctor, and don't worry about me too much.

Me : Goodnight fiore. And with that we ended our call and I headed off to bed as well.

The things this girl does to me.