If one listened to his father, he was wasting his life by not becoming a surgeon. But that was neither here nor there at this particular moment, and thinking about his father tended to sour his moods.

"Out, definitely out. Think I spent all night there," he had. He had been tapped to help with a difficult surgery, and had had the privilege of acting like a glorified nurse through a 12 hours surgery that had lasted well into the night. Right up to his shift start in the ER. Then someone finally took pity on him and told him to go.