Through the Jungle Vine

I go to lunch every day at the same table in the same outdoor area. When you think about it, being a doctor is not that different from being a middle-schooler. Same weird injuries, same crummy food, and same noisy lunchroom. And in general, same rumors and gossip. Just, you know, more mature than our math teacher's dating life.

Sometimes a lot more mature. And a lot more messed up. Like yesterday, my friend, Molly, told me that one of the nurses was sleeping with a college professor to help her boyfriend get into his class. And then, a few weeks ago, I heard a rumor from my other friend, Connor, that his friend, Reggie, impregnated one of the head doctors at the hospital and is getting promoted because of it. Reggie never got promoted, but the head doctor seems to be touching her stomach a lot lately, and Reggie and her are hanging more frequently than ever. Won't know for sure if it's true or not for a few months, but you get the point. Gossip ages with the people who tell it, and as you have seen, the people who tell it have really perverted personalities.

After I got a sandwich that looked a little too soggy for my liking and an apple of equal qualities, I sat down at a table. The table I sit at with my friends is outdoors. One of the perks of this hospital is that it has an outdoor balcony in the cafeteria that overlooks the whole city. It really is a treat, and it almost makes up for the food texture. Once I sat down, my friends came filing outside afterwards. There was Molly, Connor, and a few others. They all walk out in their identical sky-blue scrubs, holding trays of soup, some with sandwiches like me. We all usually sit together, but today I don't know what demon possessed them, but they all came out, looked at me, and sat at another table. They talked and ate, occasionally glancing at me with looks of what might have been sympathy or fear in their eyes. This fazed me enough as is, but seconds later I realized something that might be the source of their concerned looks. It was already 12:13, and Kendall wasn't here.

Kendall was basically my sister, to give you some context. We came into the hospital together, and coincidentally were often forced into cases together. When two people are forced together, their instinct is to either have sex or talk. Me and her did the latter, and we've been friends ever since. Kendall's not the girly gossip type, which is very rare for a person in their 20's. Or at any age. She's sweet, down-to-earth, naturally talks like she's a sitcom character, and most importantly, she's always on time. Except for today. She always comes exactly at 12:00 for lunch, and now it's 12:15 and there is no Kendall in sight. Just a table full of gossips, and an overbearing mood of confusion and fear.

On the verge of calling 911, which would be really stupid because I'm already at a hospital, I walk over to the table seating all of my uneasy companions and I ask what's wrong. They all look up, as if acknowledging my existence for the first time. But most of those looks are fake because I know they've been quick glancing at me for that last 15 minutes. The first person to speak is Molly. She says she has very bad news, and she tries sugarcoating it, but me being the inpatient person I am, I just tell her to skip to the point. And now that I heard the point, I wish I hadn't asked.

Apparently, Kendall, full-of-joy Kendall, cute-crier Kendall, my-best-friend-since-day-one Kendall, might have cancer. The full story is that earlier today, she came to work, looking very tired and some think a lot skinnier than usual. I got to work late, so by the time I came, Kendall would have been halfway across the hospital, treating a patient. And when I think about it, this might have been the first time we weren't on a case together. She was tending to her patient when suddenly, she ran out of the room, coughing uncontrollably. Doctors and nurses rushed over to help her, but it only got worse. She was coughing and coughing, until suddenly it was more than coughing. It was coughing with a substance in it. And next thing they knew, there was a girl who was fine minutes before, coughing up blood onto the floor. Sweet, funny, gorgeous Kendall, stuck on the floor, coughing up blood without any explanation as to why. They took her to a bed and sat her down. No one heard or saw anything after that, but they assume now they are running tests on her. Judging by the signs, a few people at the table believe she might have cancer, specifically lung cancer, and that at this point, it is probably very advanced.

This might be some of the worst information you could ever hear about a friend, by far. But I was confused more than I was concerned for my friend. First of all, in the beginning of medical school, they made us do a course where we analyzed our classmate’s family history to find out if they might have hereditary diseases. Someone else did Kendall, but when they presented, it said she was most likely clear of cancer. On top of that, Me and Kendall made a pact a few years back that if one of us was ever sick or injured at the hospital, the other would be their doctor. And Kendall doesn't get embarrassed easily, so she wouldn't have broken that pact because of a little blood. If that was true, at this point, I would be at her bedside, telling her her test results. But I'm not.

This hospital, as I said, is middle school all over again. And in middle school, or any school for that matter, there are always rumors that start as one thing and end as something different. People naturally don't have energy to find out things, and also naturally want to be popular. A simple "Kendall was nearby" and "blood on the floor" could have made a whole chaotic story like the one I just got told. The whole thing was a little suspicious to me, and if I was going to comfort my best friend on her diagnosis of lung cancer, I want to make sure that the “lung cancer” is really something to be sure exists. And with 15 minutes left for lunch, I was going to find out.

I thanked Molly for telling me what happened, and I told her I was going to investigate it more. She seemed to buy it, so I got started on looking for the source of the possibly true rumor. At this point, I know you might be thinking that I'm inconsiderate and should at least go check on Kendall, but for your information, Kendall is on the other side of the hospital right now and finding her would probably be a puzzle in itself. Also, when I hear news about somebody, I usually like to look into it myself. I'm a naturally skeptical person. So, if you call me telling me that you're pregnant, just expect me to search up the accuracy of the pregnancy test you used before saying congratulations.

I start by going around the hospital, asking people if they heard anything about Kendall, hoping to get different rumors to prove my theory. I ended up getting a lot of the same "lung cancer" rumors, a few saying that she actually started peeing blood too. It was like the more that I asked, the crazier they got. But there was still no progress because they all basically had the same plot. Except for one guy who said that he heard that she killed someone, which is why the blood was on the floor. And, ignoring that very absurd story, I almost concluded that Kendall did indeed cough up blood on the floor.

That was until I heard something else. I wandered across the hospital and ran into a person I know named Sylvia. She was the same age and status as me, just not really the type I would consider "a friend". Putting that aside, though, I asked her if she had heard anything about Kendall. She was very annoyed by my asking and probably also by my presence, but she did give me a different story that was not as absurd as the murder one. She said that she went to the locker rooms to freshen up before lunch and that she found a bloody pair of scrub pants in the trash. This may or may not be connected, but she was paged before I could get any more out of her. I stood there for a minute, thinking about what could have happened, and I started pacing towards where I thought Kendall might be.

I'm not stupid, okay. I'm a doctor, so in my opinion, I'm the opposite of stupid. Anyways, what I'm saying is that I know what this might mean. But it was just so absurd to me. How could Kendall have been pregnant? She was young, free-spirited, not the type to get pregnant even if she was the motherly type to have a baby. But I can't know for sure until I find out for myself. I started briskly walking towards the section of the hospital Kendall would probably have been. Once there, I started going to every supply closet I could find. If Kendall had a miscarriage, she would either tell someone (but that most likely didn't happen) or she would look for supplies in order to fix this herself. Kendall was only the independent type when she needed to be, and this was a moment where she probably was in a very independent mood. I was halfway through looking in supply closets when I heard the sound of soft crying through the doors of one of the closets. I put my hand on the doorknob, and turned it, preparing myself for whatever I might see, knowing that I would help her no matter what.

But to help someone, you probably have to see them first. The supply closet I wandered myself into seemed to be an abandoned one, or one not used as much. I tried turning on the lights, but they wouldn't turn on. Then I started searching for another light, all while softly saying Kendall's name to see if she would respond. The crying continued, and after about the third time I called for her, Kendall responded. She turned on her phone light to show where she was and I walked towards her. She was a sight to behold, sitting on the floor, crying, with faint blood marks on her new scrubs. As I said, Kendall isn't the girly cry-in-a-corner type, but no matter what, I'm always the sit-down-and-comfort-her type.

I sat next to her, put the phone to the side with the light still on, and put my arm around her neck. She put her head in my lap and I took my arm back. She was crying softly, and I sat there and comforted her. She lay there for a few minutes, still crying, and I started petting her hair, telling her everything was going to be fine. Around the time she got up to sit down by herself, I asked if she wanted to talk about it and she said she was ready to now.

The actual story was that around a month ago, Kendall slept with a guy from a bar in a city nearby. He left the minute they woke up and Kendall, being her 27-year-old self, was unfazed by the night. A week later, she started having morning sickness and the rest is history. Judging by the fact that we’re here a month later, crying in a closet because of her lost pregnancy, I assume she was planning on keeping the baby. Her motherly instincts were probably the thing blinding her from seeing the struggles of raising a child at her age, and right about now you would probably expect me to say that Kendall is the kind of girl that would keep her child, but right now, I really don’t know what to assume anymore, about Kendall or anybody. Maybe Kendall is the kind of girl that would get an abortion. Maybe Kendall is the kind of girl who would sleep with three guys just so she could create a whole “Mamma Mia” situation for her child. Well, that last one is probably not a Kendall thing to do, but I would never know. This whole situation started out as my best friend probably having lung cancer, and then maybe killing a guy, and now I’m sitting with her in a dark, abandoned closet crying over the miscarriage of a pregnancy I didn’t even know existed. People can be crazy, gossip can get out of hand, and my self-sustaining powerhouse best friend can get a stupid pregnancy.

They say middle school can be a jungle. Therefore, doctoring is a jungle, and with the size of this hospital, it more literally is. But you know what’s more of a jungle than either of those things? Gossip. Raging gossip can tangle you up in its branches and lead you in every which way, never knowing which way is the right direction. People can tell you things that then become other things that then become other things and next thing you know your friend is quote-unquote “dying of cancer”. I now understand why people call it “traveling through the grapevine”. But I would like to call it something else: traveling through the jungle vine. Even though gossip and rumors can be toxic, some, if uncovered, can be helpful in amazing ways. My concern for my friend led me straight to her side. Even if I was concerned for the wrong reasons, I was still able to help, and that’s what matters. I may not be the gossip type, but being a comforting friend is a very me thing to do.