Elle

Chris and I went on our first vacation together.

I love going to the beach in winter where other people are practically non-existent. We rented a house that had a hot tub and fireplace. We played house, and pretended that everything was perfect in our own little world.

“What are we doing?” I asked Chris. To be fair, the question *did* seem to come from left field, but I’d been thinking about nothing else for the last two days.

“Ummmmm…cooking dinner.” He replied, clearly not grasping my deeper meaning.

“No. I mean here. us. this. We’re pretending to be a happy couple. But the truth is we’re never together. We’re never alone. When I come see you, you are at the hospital. We don’t go to the movies, or out to eat, or hang out with other couples. We can’t make plans or even do mundane things together because we’re never together. Or at least never together out in public.. I am so tired of the distance between us”

What do you suggest?” Chris asked, clearly caught off guard because I had never brought any of this up before

“I applied to be on the transport team at work”

This is true. I applied at the urging of my co-workers. I hadn’t told *anyone* that I’d passed the first two rounds of interviews/tests.

“It’s a big deal. I’ve only got flight training left to do before I’m ‘official’, but it comes with a two year contract.”

“Oh. I just kind of assumed that you’d move back eventually.”

“But why? Why did you assume that *I’d* be the one to give up my career goals to accommodate you? You’re already established. You know what you want. I don’t. I’m still trying to figure it all out. Transport is a young person’s field for sure, but I’m still not sure I want to become a physician.”

“But why not. You’d be an amazing one. Trust me. You’re already better than some of my colleagues.”

“Because it’s a lot. I don’t want to be in school forever.”

I feel this conversation was going to turn into an argument and an argument is the last thing I wanted to happen while on vacation with Chris. So I just dropped it. We ate dinner in relative silence.

“Hey Chris, do you want to go for a walk on the beach?

“What? That’s crazy. It’s cold out there.”

“Well that’s the beauty of a beach in the winter. It’s usually deserted.”

I grabbed a blanket and my coat and headed out the door. With or without Chris, I was going to enjoy the beach. He caught up to me and took my hand.

“Hey Liza, I’m sorry. All this took me off guard. I don’t like this distance between us either, but moving is hard. For both of us. We would have to get a new state license and background check and well, none of that is going to happen quickly. I just want to be with you.”

“But why does that mean I have to give up on all my dreams.”

“It doesn’t”

Chris pulled me closer and kissed me. The wind started to get more intense. “Let’s go back”

“No. Let’s stay. I brought a blanket for a reason.” I smiled at him, perhaps he saw the glint in my eyes.

We stopped and spread the blanket on the beach and watched the storm roll in. It was big enough that we could wrap it around us too. We held each other close, and then it started to snow. On the beach, and a snow covered beach is weird and beautiful. And not something I get to experience often. Or ever. I turned to Chris and said “this is everything.”

And it is. Everything else faded away. The distance. The future. All that is here is the now.

Long-distance relationships are not easy.. I don’t think it would be possible without cellphones and pagers. A quick “RU UP?’ lets us chat at 3a. I think everyone can agree on that. It’s even more challenging when one person works night shift and the other works 24-hour shifts. The best thing about our schedules is that it allows for some chunks of time off that we can spend together. Also 3am is not the time for overthinking; for us, it’s when people [babies on my end; adults on his] have finally gone to sleep.

Hospitals are a weird place anyway.  In some ways, time stops. We’re still living in the 1990s with our reliance on pagers and cellphones. Technology and 3am calls keep us together, but I miss the days when we worked together and Chris would hang out in my office and we could talk about random things in person. What I wouldn’t give to be able to see him as I hear him. Its so strange to have seen him this very morning at the bookstore and yet know it will be 2-3 weeks before we see each other again.

I wonder if it will always be this way. In order for me to do pursue my passion, I have to give up on another port of my life. It was a thorn in the relationship with Justin as well. Everything was great in the beginning until we started about the future. While I could do my job in major city with a teaching hospital, I can’t move every year. And while Justin was a NHL player, players can be traded in season and out. And after his playing career, all he talked about was going back home to Canada. And while not completely opposed to immigrating to Canada, I’d have to give up my future. And Justin always talked about kids. He said he would love to have three, but understood if that didn’t happen, Just like every other relationship, that left me out in the cold. Better to have ended it sooner rather than later, I guess.

Chris and I grew up literally 5 minutes apart. Neither of us wanted to every go back We worked together for 3 years before he said he liked me. Why couldn’t he have said this before I moved away. Now our lives revolve around cellphones and pagers and the odd hospital schedules

On March 15, I went on a date with Chris. You know what they say about the Ides of March. Actually, that has nothing to do with anything. It’s just a convenient way too keep track of the date.

The pretext was that Chris asked to see my photos from my recent trip to Italy. He’d ordered Italian food, bread, pasta, and even tiramisu for desert. He transformed the call room into a picnic of sorts– as if you can have a picnic in a hospital. After dinner we screencast my photos to the TV, and we toured Italy. Me for the second time in a month.

And I felt something. I’m not sure what it was. But after Jeremy. And James. And even Justin, spending the evening with Chris was a different.

We toured the Alps in Turin. And sailed the canals of Venice. Admired art in Florence and hiked villages in Cinque Terre. We made our way to Rome and ate our bodyweight in pasta, pizza, and gelato. Then we hopped a train down to Sorrento and Naples–birthplace of pizza.

And then Chris asked me the million dollar question, “Why did you go alone?”

I’ve rehearsed this answer a million times. Is a question I get from nearly everyone.

“I’d rather go alone than never go at all. And I’m not going to sit by waiting for ‘someone’ to go with me.”

“But aren’t you worried?”

“About what? People? Travel? Being by myself. No, I’m not. I travel 4 hours to see you. I’ll travel 9 to see David. Or eat gelato. Or see Mt. Kilimanjaro. There’s is a whole big world out there and I want to see as much of it as possible”

But Chris was hearing nothing I said.

“You drove 4 hours to see me?”

“Well, it’s 4 hours between here and there. And I live and work there. And what reason do I have to be here. Other than you”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, oh”

Chris looked at me. I looked everywhere except those green eyes of his.

“Eliza, …”

“Chris” we both spoke at the same time. I kept on “I have to go. I’ve already stayed too long. And it’s a 4 hour drive home.”

I gathered up my stuff and headed for the door. I reminded myself I was still in a hospital. I’ve already had one relationship begin and end within the confines of the hospital walls. This is how people get a certain kind of reputation. All these thoughts were going through my mind when Chris placed his hand on my shoulder, and as I turned around, he kissed me.

Soft and gentle at first, kinda questioning if this was the right thing. Then with a lot more urgency. probing, even.

A kiss can mean so many things. But what did this kiss mean. After 3 years of being co-workers and casual friends…after moving 250 miles away, dating in a new city, finding a job I really, really enjoy (and I’m good at!) NOW, TODAY is the day he decides to do something.

It was a really good kiss, though.

 

I’ve never been nervous going to the hospital before.

Of course, I’ve never been on a date in the hospital before.

Tuesday, I met with my old boss Gus about picking up some extra hours at the hospital where I used to work. I usually have 8 days off every other week and I hate the city I live in. Besides, I’d like to get a little more ER time. The NICU and PICU are awesome and I love pediatrics, but I feel like I’m losing some of my skills.

As I was leaving, I ran into Chris. Literally. He was coming down the hallway of the new addition and I was walking down the same long hallway where we first met.

‘Um, hi” I said. Chris look distracted. He didn’t say anything.

“Well, have a good day then”

I continued on my way, wondering exactly what was going on with Chris. He’d never been this way with me. Maybe my leaving really did affect him. Maybe coming back here was a bad idea. I can come up with a lot of maybes.

“Liza….wait. Wait” I was lost in my thoughts and kept walking. I felt a hand on my shoulder and instinctively my left hand curled into a ball and launched into a punch. Chris intercepted the punch. “What the hell?’

“I’m sorry” I stammered. “I was lost in thought and you grabbed me.”

“I’m sorry. I called your name and you kept walking”

“That doesn’t give you the right to grab me. I don’t care who you are”

‘I’m sorry. Let me make it up to you. Liza, please”

We stood there in the hospital parking lot–each one waiting on the other to say something.

“I go back to NC tomorrow.”

“When will you be back?”

“I don’t know that I will”

“Well, I guess that means tonight, then”

“You’re working.”

“Yea, but I gotta eat. I can order food and we can eat together in the call room”

“Like a date?”

“If you can call the call room a date spot, then yes”

“What time?”

“I usually don’t get a lot of calls between 6:30-8:00 so how about then”

“OK. I call you when I get here.”

So I guess I have a date. Or something. With Chris. After knowing him for 3 years, I am just as nervous as the day I ran into him.