I saw her every day after that. Rounds at seven. Rounds again at four.
She learned everybody’s name on that floor. The nurses. The aides. The janitor, Mr. Okafor, who mopped her room every afternoon at two. She knew his kids’ names. She knew his wife made the best jollof rice in Texas.
She had opinions about everything. Which nurse gave the gentlest IV sticks. Which cafeteria pudding was edible. Which daytime talk show host was secretly mean.
Her room was covered in drawings. She drew with colored pencils on the backs of meal menus. Birds, mostly. Cardinals and blue jays and hummingbirds. She taped them all over the walls.
“I’m going to be a wildlife illustrator,” she told me once. “When I’m done with all this. I got into the art program at UT Austin. I deferred.”
“You’re very good.”
“I know,” she said. Then she grinned. “That’s a joke, Dr. Lucas. You’re supposed to laugh.”
I’d known her about six weeks when she caught me checking my phone during afternoon rounds.
It was the loan reminder. That little red notification. Payment due in three days.
“Bad news?” she asked.
“Just a bill.”
“What kind of bill makes a person look like that?”
“Student loans,” I said. “I worked every weekend through medical school. I’m still paying for it.”
She made a face.
“They should give you a refund,” she said, “for that handwriting.”
I laughed. Out loud. One of the nurses looked in the door to see what happened.
Then Alicia got quiet.
“Everybody calls you lucky,” she said. “To be a doctor. My aunt said it to you yesterday. ‘You must be so proud.’ Like you won the lottery.”
“I am proud.”
“I know,” she said. “But I don’t think they know what it cost you.”
I didn’t know what to say to that.
So I checked her IV line. And I wrote something on her chart. And I left.
Adrian Hawthorne is a celebrated author and dedicated archivist who finds inspiration in the hidden stories of the past. Educated at Oxford, he now works at the National Archives, where preserving history fuels his evocative writing. Balancing archival precision with creative storytelling, Adrian founded the Hawthorne Institute of Literary Arts to mentor emerging writers and honor the timeless art of narrative.