Please read the author's thoughts, thank you.
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Carefully folding the letter again, I slowly placed it on the nightstand beside the bed. I could feel my chest gradually tightening, excitement making it difficult to breathe. Or perhaps I was breathing so rapidly that my lungs couldn't keep up with the incoming air. I could feel my heart rate accelerating as a few involuntary tears escaped from my eyes.
With the money I'll earn from the bet and the connections I'm about to make, I will definitely achieve my goal in this life. I will become a great doctor.
Thinking about what my life would be like now that I'll be going to Harvard much earlier to work with a doctor on the verge of winning the Nobel Prize, I started to laugh. At first, it was silent, but with each passing moment, my laughter grew louder.
At one point, a groan from Gabe made me immediately fall silent. "Is it time to run?" Gabe asked wearily from his bed.
Quickly turning off the flashlight I still had on me, I calmly replied, "No, buddy, go back to sleep," receiving no response in return. Reality had hit me once again, and I no longer felt like laughing.
I was planning once again to leave my family to pursue my own dreams, even though the letter said I could work from here. How selfish could I be?
I had promised that if I had a second chance, I would use it to be happy, enjoy life, experience new things, make friends, and start a family. Now that it had come true, I couldn't simply forget my promise. I had friends, I experienced new things every day, my new family loved me, and I loved them back. I was genuinely happy, enjoying this life. I couldn't just leave.
With these thoughts continuously swirling in my head, debating internally whether I should go with Dr. Donnall to Harvard to continue the research and be directly involved or just stay in Texas, hundreds of miles away, after a few hours, exhaustion finally overcame my body, and I fell asleep.
In what seemed like three minutes of sleep, the sound of the alarm clock abruptly woke me up. Tired from what was undoubtedly a restless night of sleep, I took a few seconds to fully wake up enough to turn off the alarm.
Still lying in bed, staring at the ceiling of the room, the memories of my thoughts from the previous night came flooding back.
I had to make a decision, the best course of action was definitely to study directly under Dr. Donnall. It was even an opportunity to secure admission to Harvard without any issues.
Lost in my thoughts, I couldn't help but be surprised when a pillow hit me square in the face. Quickly removing it from my face and getting out of bed, I saw Gabe with a big smile.
"Revenge is sweet," Gabe said with a much more animated smile than I remembered seeing at this hour in the morning.
Throwing his pillow back at him, I laughed slightly, incredulous at his vengeful attitude. I put my thoughts aside and got up to start my morning routine.
Gabe, still energized by his accomplishment, got ready quickly, having much more energy than on other days, thanks to a good night's sleep, I guessed.
"Come on, let's go," Gabe said, bouncing up and down, urging me to leave the room once we were both ready.
As had become our routine, we began warming up in the front yard of our house. "PJ, Gabe, good morning," Mrs. Wilson said, as she did every morning, while taking a walk with her husband, Mr. Wilson.
"Good morning, Mrs. Wilson," I said with a smile to the kindly elderly lady, followed by Gabe repeating the greeting.
"Dennis told me yesterday that you played with him and a bunch of other kids," Mrs. Wilson commented with a sweet smile, making Mr. Wilson snort.
"I hope at least you can show him how to behave," Mr. Wilson said disdainfully.
"Oh, I didn't know that one of the kids from yesterday was your grandson," I deduced that the child was their relative, given how affectionately Mrs. Wilson spoke of him.
"No," Mr. Wilson immediately said, raising his voice and furrowing his brow even more, "that kid is not our grandson," he continued, lowering his voice after a nudge from Mrs. Wilson.
"He's not our grandson, PJ, he's just our neighbor, but he's a great kid," the woman said calmly. "I hope you get along well with him Gabe; it seems he had a lot of fun with you here," Mrs. Wilson finished with a friendly smile.
"Yes, ma'am," Gabe replied with a kind smile.
"I heard that today is the first game," Mr. Wilson said, still frowning after snorting again in annoyance.
"Yes, sir," I replied quickly but respectfully to the man, who only nodded, still with his ever-present frown.
"Well, we wish you luck, PJ," Mrs. Wilson said kindly, taking her husband's arm again. "We won't bother you kids anymore; continue with your exercises," the kind lady continued, gently dragging her husband away.
After bidding farewell to the elderly couple, we started our morning run. For some reason, Gabe seemed unusually excited today, running faster than his usual pace and even jumping a bit after a few steps.
Easily catching up with him and maintaining the same pace, I asked, "Why are you so excited today?" as we continued running.
After a sprint and now a bit out of breath, Gabe slowed down, taking a moment to respond, "It's the first game I'm going to watch in person," he said with great excitement, "and you're going to play in it," he continued, even more excited, blushing after a moment of thinking about what he had said and looking away.
"Aw, you're excited because you're going to watch your big brother play," I told Gabe, playfully nudging him on the shoulder.
"No, I just want to see how they tackle you" he said, raising his voice, dodging my arm as it sought to gently nudge him again to continue the joke. Now even more embarrassed, he sprinted again.
Amused, I accelerated as well to catch up with him and continue teasing him, causing Gabe to constantly change his running pace to avoid me.
Quickly, Gabe, who didn't maintain a steady pace and didn't have the physical condition for that kind of race, got tired, slowing down to a light jog. I accompanied him back home, where I let him enter the house to get ready for school.
Watching Gabe enter the house and close the door, I continued with my own run. Since I had constantly been changing my running speed, I could feel the physical effort in my legs. Therefore, I decided to continue with the slow pace we had at the end, allowing me to once again immerse myself in my thoughts about Dr. Donnall's proposal.
With my head still filled with pros and cons, several minutes later, I returned home, where I took the glass of water that was already prepared for me, greeted everyone present, and took a quick shower to wash off the sweat.
Already in Bob's terrible truck, still worried about what I would have to do with the offer, on the way to school, listening to the music that Bob claimed was the best in existence, he suddenly said, "I know you might be nervous," possibly noticing something in my demeanor as one song ended and another began. "I used to get nervous before the first game of the season," he continued with a big smile, still looking at the road.
Partly grateful to Bob for his intention to cheer me up, I simply nodded and didn't say anything, causing the truck to fall back into a conversation-less silence. A moment later, a new song started, making Bob tap his fingers on the steering wheel to the beat of the music.
When we arrived at school, and Bob slowed down, seriously he turned to face me. "What I wanted to say is, it's okay to feel nervous, uncertain, and even scared; it's natural," he said calmly, once again pulling me out of my thoughts. "But it's important to know that you shouldn't let those feelings overwhelm you; rationality is your best friend," he continued with a faint smile. "No matter what you do out there, I want you to know that your mom and I support you," he said, placing his hand on my shoulder.
Perhaps Bob didn't realize it, but his words had truly helped me. I still had a debate in mind about whether to go with Dr. Donnall or not, but Bob was right; I couldn't let fear pressure me.
"That doesn't mean I don't want to see you win; quite the opposite actually, give it your all," Bob said, losing all seriousness with a big smile, pushing me out of the terrible truck. "Break a leg!" he shouted before closing the truck's door and driving away from the school grounds.
Shaking my head again, amused by Bob's childish attitude, I began to walk toward the school. If yesterday some people were excited, today was definitely the majority of the school. "Win the game, Duncan!" an older teenager said as he passed by, friendly patting my shoulder.
"Good luck, PJ," a bunch of girls said, smiling kindly in the main hallway, openly laughing when I nodded, grateful for their encouragement.
And so, with many more people in the main hallway, I now understood the problem that Sheldon faced every day in these same hallways. With difficulty, I continued to advance, being stopped every now and then by someone cheering me on as they passed and attempting to engage in a brief conversation, which I obviously reciprocated.
In one of the many occasions when I had to stop and chat briefly with a classmate a few steps away from me, I heard, "Come on, Kat, you have to tell him," from the voice of a girl.
"Kat?" I turned intrigued. What a coincidence it would be to meet Bianca's sister, Teddy's friend, the day after I promised the girl I would thank her sister.
Behind me, a group of three girls stood together, looking at me in surprise. "Katherine Stratford?" I asked the group of frozen girls who were staring at me for some reason.
One of the girls pushed the central girl a few steps forward, causing her to stumble over her own feet and lose her balance slightly. Quickly taking a step forward, I caught her by the arm, being careful not to squeeze too hard to avoid hurting her. "Careful," I said as I helped her regain her balance.
"Thank you," the girl said immediately, snatching her arm back with a forced smile and then turning annoyed toward her friend, who pretended not to know anything and walked away with the other girl several steps.
"See you later," said the guy I was talking to a moment ago. "Go, Wolfs!" he shouted as he walked away, being cheered on by other equally excited people.
Waving goodbye to the excited boy who was walking away, I turned my attention back to the teenage girl in front of me.
For some reason, she seemed nervous, shifting on her two feet still firmly planted on the ground, swaying back and forth while playing with her hair behind her ear.
"Sorry," I said when I noticed I hadn't said anything, which was probably why she felt uncomfortable. "Are you Katherine Stratford?" I asked immediately after.
Raising her head, she nodded, intrigued. "How do you know?" she asked strangely, with a small smile.
"Your sister is a friend of my sister; I met her at my house yesterday," I replied to the girl with a big smile, trying to be friendly.
"Oh," she said, surprised, losing her smile and widening her eyes.
"Yeah, what a coincidence, our sisters are friends," I said, trying to joke with the teenager. "Well, she said some nice things about me that you had told her, so I wanted to thank you," I continued, making the girl's eyes widen even more comically for some reason.
"What?" she asked, raising her voice in disbelief after a small coughing fit.
"Yes, your sister said you think I'm the best student of the year. Thanks for that," I explained, causing the girl's expression to change drastically. "Oh, that, yes, everyone knows you're the best in our year, even though I'm in different classes," she quickly clarified, nervously playing with the hem of her clothes.
"Well, thank you very much for that," I said, flattered. "Although there's Sheldon," I continued, trying to play it off.
"The kid?" she asked, this time more calmly.
"Yes, I'm definitely not smarter than him," I explained calmly. Sheldon's intelligence didn't bother me; I've always known that there are people much smarter than me. You can't be the best at everything; it's impossible.
"Everyone knows the kid is a genius," the girl said, trying to downplay the topic. "But you're intelligent, kind, funny, and outgoing. They say you help anyone who asks, and no one has ever seen you be pretentious or rude to anyone, not even a teacher," she quickly explained, staring at her hands as if something very interesting was happening with them. "Despite being one of the most popular people in school, you're open to having a conversation with anyone, and it's easy to get along with you," she continued quickly, not pausing to take a breath and avoiding my gaze.
"Well, at least that's what everyone says," she said after a moment of catching her breath.
Now, embarrassed by all the compliments, I didn't know what to say. I was simply kind to other people, and I didn't realize they thought so highly of me. Looking at the people around me, I began to notice that indeed many of them greeted me cheerfully when our eyes met. I thought all these interactions were normal, but it seems it was a false idea of mine.
"Than—" I was saying when someone pulled my arm. "PJ!" Regina shouted excitedly as she hugged my arm. "It's today, the first game," she said, still excited, bouncing slightly while clinging to my arm. "Aren't you excited?" she asked, squeezing my arm tightly, filling me with her strawberry scent.
"Yes," I replied as calmly as possible, once again thinking about mathematics, trying to get the excited girl to relax a bit, and therefore, me too. "Hello, Regina, good morning," I continued after a moment, remembering my manners.
"Good morning, PJ," Regina said, calming down and slightly smiling as she clung even closer to me. "Regina, meet Katherine Stratford," I said quickly, recalling the other girl I had rudely ignored.
"Ah, hi," Regina said with a strange smile, quickly ignoring Katherine, who had a hand up with a similarly strange smile on her face.
"Let's go, PJ, I'll walk you to your locker," Regina said again, changing her expression and playing with a few strands of hair as she tugged at my arm, urging me to move forward.
Being dragged along by the girl, I smiled at the other teenager with silent apologies for my unresponsive behavior. "See you later, Katherine," I said, waving with my free hand without looking at where Regina was pulling me.
"Just Kat," Kat replied, smiling slightly, also waving with one hand in the air.
"Goodbye, Kat," I replied as I was pulled away by Regina.
"Who's this 'Kat'?" Regina suddenly asked, strangely serious as we walked through the school hallways.
"What?" I asked, surprised by the sudden question.
"Yeah, who is she?" Regina asked, squeezing my arm between hers.
"She's the sister of a friend of my sister," I replied quickly, not really knowing why I needed to explain.
"Ah, okay, then it's fine," Regina said, quickly changing her serious expression and smiling at people passing by and cheerfully greeting those who approached to give encouragement for the upcoming game.
Every now and then, for some reason, Regina would press closer to me to greet other girls by name as they passed by, who simply walked faster, making Regina smile even more.
Arriving at my locker, Regina squeezed my arm one last time. "See you at the game, PJ," she said sweetly before heading to her locker with her friends.
"Right now, I'm so jealous of you," Brock said, approaching from the same spot where Regina and I had arrived moments ago.
"What? Why?" I asked, genuinely surprised, as I fist-bumped my friend.
"Regina," he said as if it were obvious, looking at me incredulously, "she's completely into you," he continued, but after studying my face for a moment, Brock's eyes widened in surprise. "You really don't know?" he continued with a big smile, starting to laugh, increasingly puzzled.
"I don't know what?" I asked, amused by my friend's attitude.
"Come on, SuperStar, you've got to know," he yelled, throwing his hands up in frustration.
"What does he have to know?" Alan suddenly asked, also having arrived from the same direction as us a few moments earlier. "Everyone's very excited," he said as he fist-bumped us.
"Yeah, I know" Brock said excited seeing the other people at school, "but SuperStar claims not to know what Regina's up to," Brock explained with an incredulous expression, pointing at me with his hand while shaking his head.
"Oh, yeah, he definitely doesn't know," Alan said as he stored and retrieved things from his locker.
"I don't know what?" I asked, this time more desperate.
"What are you talking about?" David also asked, joining the group.
"About Regina and SuperStar," Brock explained as if it were a recurring topic.
"Oh, yeah, she's intimidating," David laughed as he also started storing and retrieving things from his locker.
"You're popular, mate," Brock explained as he gave me a shoulder hug.
"Yeah, someone made it clear today," I said, agreeing with my friend's statement.
"Well, why do you think girls don't talk to you besides the ones in our class?" Brock continued with a sinister smile.
"Girls do talk to me," I said, feeling offended for some reason. "Look," I said as I nodded at a group of girls passing by us.
"Hi, PJ," they said in unison before laughing and continuing on their way.
"See?" I smiled proudly.
"Yeah, they greet you," Brock said, adopting a strange pose of wisdom, "but they don't talk to you beyond that," David added, joining Brock in fist-bumping our bigger friend, imitating the pose.
"But what does Regina have to do with all this?" I asked, amused by my friends' antics.
"I noticed it," Alan said calmly, closing his locker. "There are no other girls from different groups or years who talk to you," he said calmly, "only Regina and Regina's friends," he continued, giving his explanation as if it were a presentation. "Yesterday, there was an approach with another girl in front of Regina, and she somehow distanced her from you," Alan said, receiving affirmations from the other two teenagers.
"So, with this evidence, I concluded that Regina was doing something to keep other girls from getting close to you," he said, crossing his arms, accompanied by our other two friends that were making noises that were intended to be creepy with fun.
Watching my three friends having fun, I couldn't help but shake my head amused by their crude conclusions. It couldn't be true that Regina was keeping people away from me; she's a kind girl.
Although, with Kat, she literally pulled me away from there, it couldn't be true, right?
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Author Thoughts:
As always, I am not American, and certainly not a doctor.
This marks the end of this week's chapter. I know I mentioned the possibility of a mid-week chapter last week, but I didn't really have the time to sit down and write. I feel that for now, I won't be changing the update schedule, so we'll have to stick with one chapter per week, or maybe not. I don't know.
Things I would like to clarify:
1. The MC is a human, and I try to make his personality as human as possible. Humans are made up of feelings and thoughts. If you want to read about a completely desensitized, flawless protagonist who's far from human, go ahead and read another novel. The synopsis has a warning for a reason, so he'll be calling Bob by his name until he deals with his human issues.
2. His 'Beta' attitude (I find it very disgusting to categorize people as Alpha, Beta, or Sigma; It's just the stupidity of a teenager who wants to be like Christian Bale in American Psycho. Just teenagers thinking that hating the world is 'cool.') will continue until he changes it. I'm not going to immediately change his attitude; it's called character development, and my character will undergo it as the story progresses.
3. I've been having some trouble researching tax and stock market-related things for this novel, so with or without your permission, I'll make up nonsense to keep the story going. I won't suddenly make the protagonist the richest person on the planet; how boring would that be?
4. The title may be misleading. Even though this novel will have elements from various TV series, characters, plots, interactions, etc., it remains fundamentally a medical drama. That's the purpose, and it will continue to be. The main plot of the story is to be a doctor, as I've explained at some point. In my notes, the story is divided into three volumes: the current one, 'adolescence' getting used to the world and his persona; the second volume, medical school, where the character is more developed, and there are many other planned events; and finally, the third volume, being a doctor, where the story will end (there's still a long way to go for that).
If you've read these points, please leave a comment or just a message to let me know that I didn't write these clarifications in vain.
I think that's it. As always, if you find any errors, please let me know, and I'll correct them immediately.
Thanks for reading! :D
PS: 20 Chapters, What? How Cool it's that? :D