Chapter 66
After the gallery ghost’s icy fact-bomb, I forced myself to act cool, muttered ‘What do you guys know?’ and closed the window.
But the comments lodged in my chest like knives.
‘I’ll think positively about it’ is just the most polite way to say ‘get lost’ in social life.
I failed.
But I couldn’t give up like this.
Lee Min-jae’s crazed eyes and the cursed words, ‘Our department’s future depends on your shoulders,’ wouldn’t leave my head.
Right, there isn’t just Park Seong-jeong.
There are still more interns.
And so my desperate, ugly courtship of the interns continued.
I prowled the ER like a hyena, searching for any intern who looked like they needed help—or even just looked like they were struggling.
Just then, I saw intern Choi Min-seong over there printing a patient’s 12-lead ECG and pulling off the long printout.
I rushed toward Choi Min-seong at the speed of light.
“Hey, Min-seong!”
“Yes, doctor?”
“Give me that EKG paper. Let me take it to the station on the way. You’re busy.”
I snatched the printout from his hand.
Choi Min-seong looked at me in bewilderment for a moment.
His eyes seemed to say, ‘Why the hell is this bastard suddenly being nice?’
I gave Choi Min-seong the gentlest, most merciful smile I could muster.
My one-sided good deeds didn’t stop there.
At the triage desk, I saw intern Park Seong-jeong organizing a mountain of emergency patient triage sheets.
That was another classic menial task.
I appeared like a hero once again.
Of course, by my own self-serving narration... it was closer to playing hero than actually being one.
“Seong-jeong!”
“Yes, doctor....”
“Don’t sort the triage notes, don’t! That’s the senior’s job! Let go!”
I tore the stack of charts from Park Seong-jeong’s hands.
“EM is such an advanced department with none of those antiquated bad habits, so all these menial tasks are done by the seniors! You go see one more patient! That’s your job!”
At my words, Park Seong-jeong’s face filled with a mix of confusion and emotion.
But I could clearly see the nurses watching this whole scene from the side, their shoulders shaking as they tried not to laugh.
Funny?
I’m gritting my teeth and doing my absolute best right now.
Don’t laugh, you bastards.
That’s when I was furiously trying to build my image.
From the station’s corner, Kim Ji-hoon, who had watched everything from start to finish, looked at me like I was some kind of bug and said,
“Hey.”
“Yeah?”
“You should probably stop soon.”
“Stop what?”
“That nice-senior cosplay. Even I’m cringing just watching it.”
“Cosplay? You little shit! I’m helping my juniors out because this is coming from a genuinely kind heart!”
At my indignant reply, Kim Ji-hoon clicked his tongue.
“You were so kind, huh? Then how did you so cleanly handle that patient with something up their ass?”
“....”
I was momentarily at a loss for words.
This bastard was cowardly hitting me with brutal facts.
Let’s do this fair and square—with lies.
“Mm, that was for educational purposes! It was the senior’s deep intent to give the intern valuable experience!”
“Bullshit.”
Kim Ji-hoon said that and then stole a sip of my mix coffee sitting beside me.
Slurp.
Kim Ji-hoon then stole another sip of my mix coffee and let out a sigh.
“Ha... how many people are going to apply this year, I wonder....”
At the sudden muttering, I frowned.
“Why? What’s got you worried?”
“What’s got me worried?”
Kim Ji-hoon looked at me like I was some innocent fool who didn’t know the world.
“Don’t you know the interns are almost all done already? Application season is coming soon. Next year’s fate of our department depends on those fresh-faced punks.”
With a tilt of his chin, Kim Ji-hoon pointed at the interns over there scrambling to move patient charts.
“What if not a single one comes?”
I was dumbfounded by Kim Ji-hoon’s self-deprecating remark.
“What are you talking about? We filled all the spots, didn’t we? There were four openings, and all four of us got in—me, you, Jo Soo-yeon, and Choi Min-jun. We weren’t short last year either, so why are you worrying already?”
My attempt to comfort him only made Kim Ji-hoon look even more despairing.
“You idiot.”
He said.
“That was a miracle.”
“What?”
“How many second-years do we have now? Two. Just two! We started with four, but one quit after six months and ran off to a clinic, and another just disappeared one day! And the third-years are three, and the fourth-years are three too! In the last five years, our year is the only one that ever completely filled the department’s TO. The weird part was that we filled it, you bastard!”
..Huh?
Come to think of it, that made sense.
“But why were we able to...?”
“Wasn’t it because of that drama back then? The kids watched it and all got hyped up, like, ‘Emergency medicine is insanely cool!’ and came swarming in. And right then, Professor Cheon Eun-jeong, who gave insanely good lectures, sold EM like a pro. Heck, Jo Soo-yeon came to EM because you talked her into it.”
..Mm, fair point.
And I was the one who dragged Jo Soo-yeon into emergency medicine.
Sorry.
“But this year? The drama’s over, and Professor Cheon hardly gives lectures anymore. Among the interns, our ER is already rumored to be an absolute hell you should never go near. There’s no way it’s really zero, right? Someone has to come, at least one....”
Kim Ji-hoon’s voice grew smaller and smaller.
A vacancy.
Not being able to fill the quota.
A word no different from a death sentence to residents.
A shortage of manpower directly leads to more overnight duty and less rest for the people left behind.
If nobody joined next year, then me, Kim Ji-hoon, Jo Soo-yeon, and Choi Min-jun...
The four of us would have to endure an even more hellish nightmare for the next three years.
I suppressed the anxiety bubbling up inside me and patted Kim Ji-hoon’s back.
“Hey, stop freaking out. It’ll work out somehow.”
And then I looked toward the station.
If it was zero... wouldn’t our overnight duties next year increase by at least 1.5 times?
Damn. Just imagining it was horrible.
That was when the two of us sat side by side, picturing the bleak future ahead and sinking into the abyss of despair.
“Uh... excuse me, doctor.”
A strange voice, somehow clear and youthful, called out to us.
Looking up, I saw a woman in a white coat standing beside the station, clutching a document envelope tightly in her hand and staring at us.
“Ah, yes. What can I help you with....”
I was about to answer absentmindedly when I saw her face and stopped.
Huh.
That face.
Neatly tied-back hair, bright eyes behind round glasses.
Baek Eun-seo?
The three characters on her name tag.
Mm... where have I heard that name before?
It definitely looked familiar.
A face that had flashed past in an unforgettable situation.
I desperately rummaged through my brain cells.
When was it.
When was it?
Ah.
That day.
The very day I got possessed by the scalpel god and cut someone open in the ER resuscitation room.
The terrified intern who stood in the middle of that hell, frantically hauling gauze while blood flew everywhere, right when the seniors were shocked and I was talking banmal like crazy!
The shock of that day had been so great that I barely remembered the faces of the others there, but that frightened, rabbit-like intern’s face had stayed faintly in my memory.
“Uh, w-what’s the matter?”
I stammered without realizing it.
The document envelope in her hand felt ominous.
Could something have gone wrong because of that day, and she came looking for me?
Did I get her punished in the intern evaluations or something?
“It’s about the residency application.”
She spoke up.
“It was supposed to be sent directly to the Office of Education and Training, but according to the notice, emergency medicine, clinical pathology, and pathology are supposed to submit the paperwork directly to the department admin office for collection, so I was wondering where the admin office is....”
Resident... application?
My brain stopped for a moment, unable to process the meaning of the word it had just spat out.
“Ah... ah, really? An application? Then right now... um....”
In a trembling voice, I asked the most important question.
“You’re applying to EM? Or maybe as your second choice...?”
Please. Please. God.
Buddha.
Allah.
If you haven’t abandoned me, please.
Baek Eun-seo met my desperate gaze and answered with a bright smile.
“Ah, I’m applying to EM! It’s my first choice!”
The whole world seemed to go into slow motion.
It felt like a halo was shining behind Baek Eun-seo.
No, unless my eyes were wrong, a halo really was shining.
An angel descended upon the ER.
Our messiah.
A living saint who would guarantee my days off next year.
I desperately kept my expression in check to suppress the fireworks and madness that were about to burst out of me.
I barely kept the corners of my mouth from twitching upward by biting my lower lip.
“Oh! Right! Good thinking! That’s a really great decision!”
I jerkily pointed over there with my finger.
“There! See that admin desk over there? Just take it there! Go tell them you’re here to apply to emergency medicine, and they’ll kindly guide you!”
“Yes! Thank you, doctor!”
Baek Eun-seo bowed politely at ninety degrees and trotted off toward the admin desk.
Then I turned to Kim Ji-hoon, who was sitting beside me, dazed.
And I grabbed his shoulder.
“Did you see that!!! Did you see it, Kim Ji-hoon!!! She’s coming!!! That angel just said she’s coming!!! It’s not zero!!!!! We survived!!!!!!”
I grabbed Kim Ji-hoon’s shoulder and shook him like a madman, almost shouting.
Not zero.
A first-year is coming.