Sacred Serenity (Lotus House Book 2) (5 page)

I blew out a loud breath and dropped my yoga mat on the kitchen counter. My nana came into the room from the backyard, her gardening gloves still on her hands and a wide-brimmed, white thatch hat covering her head.

“Hey, poppet. How was assisting that yoga class? Was Vivvie there?”

“No, Nana. I’m helping out in a couples’ yoga class. The teacher is a friend of hers named Dash Alexander. Cool guy. Very nice.” The moment I felt my cheeks heat, I turned around, heading to the fridge for some water.

My grandmother laughed and started to heat the kettle on the stove. “Is this Dash a handsome man?” she asked with nonchalance.

Oh no. Nana was fishing, and she normally caught what she wanted.

“Sure, he’s nice looking. A few years older than me. He’s really gifted at yoga and has a way of connecting with his clients. I think I’ll learn a lot from his class.” I grabbed a glass from the cabinet and filled it to the top from the pitcher.

Nana hummed while preparing her afternoon tea. Teatime, a habit my grandparents picked up while living abroad. Even though the St. James clan came over from England long ago, my grandparents lived there while my grandfather served in the Air Force. During that time, Nana taught at the local church. To this day, she still taught Sunday school to the little ones at St. Joseph’s.

“Oh, speaking of class. You received a call from a Professor Liam O’Brien’s office. Well, technically it was his teacher’s aide. Someone named Landen. Anyhoo, they’re doing a meet and greet of the new program residents Thursday at the lecture hall at UCSF. The information is on the notepad over there, darling.”

“Thanks, Nana. This is so exciting. I can’t wait to meet the other fifteen students in the program.” I shook my head and shuffled my bare feet. My neon pink painted toes looked bright against my skin. “Do you think my mom would have been proud?”

Nana put her arm around my shoulders and hugged me to her side. “Poppet, she would have cried until her tear ducts dried out. You’re doing everything your mother wanted to do. You know she was premed too when she got pregnant. And even though pregnant and only twenty years old, she told me she was going to make sure you had everything the world could offer. Sadly, the good Lord took my sweet angel and left us with another gift. When the nurse put you into my Kate’s arms, she looked down, kissed every inch of your pink face and said, ‘You are a gift from God, Amber, and I’ll love you even beyond this world.’ And well, you know the rest.” Nana sniffed and kissed my temple several times.

I did know the rest. The placenta didn’t separate properly from the uterine wall and my mother hemorrhaged, losing more blood than the doctors could pump into her. She bled to death minutes after I was born, taking with her the secret of who my real father was.

“Thanks, Nana. I wish I could have known her.”

My grandmother pushed a lock of hair behind my ear and stared deeply into my eyes. “Just look in the mirror, poppet. I see her in you each and every day. In the way you walk, talk, and your beaming smile. The unbelievable intellect, your tenacity with your studies, and your humble faith in our Lord and Savior. Those are all gifts given to you by my Kate. She’s always with you, honey. I believe she’s your guardian angel, leading you through your life and watching over you. She’d be so very proud. As proud as your grandfather and I are.”

I nodded and pushed back my hair and dabbed at my eyes. I may have attempted to put on a front with Dash when it came to my parents and never having known them, but my grandmother made sure I knew as much about my mother as possible. Pictures of her were all over the house, including a large eight-by-ten of her pregnant with me. We did look a lot alike.

God, please tell my mother I love her and miss her. That I didn’t mean what I said to Dash before. He was right. You can miss something you’ve never had.

I cleared my throat and waved at my wet eyes, trying to dry them. “Nana, you always get to me!”

She chuckled sweetly as the back door opened and my grandfather entered.

“Hi, Papa, did you have good day?” I asked.

He came over to give me a hug, his rounded belly bumping me the same way Vivvie’s did, but his was all grandma’s cooking and too many late-night cookies. Nana always joked that he’d eat his weight in cookies if the stash was available. What she didn’t know was Papa bought his own stash and hid them. I found his hiding spot by accident one night when I was a kid. We’d made a promise that night that he’d always share with me if I didn’t tattle on him to grandma. I knew I’d struck gold, and ever since, we’d share cookies and milk in the wee hours of the morning—mostly when I was still up and studying for finals through college. During those times, he’d set a plate of cookies and a tall glass of milk on the table and pet my hair in passing on his way to his easy chair in his den.

“Hey, pumpkin. I did. A rowdy bunch of teens today. Woo boy. They can be a handful.”

Nana shook her head. “You need to retire, Harold. The house is paid off, the cars are paid, Amber’s school is on a full scholarship now. You’ve got your government and school pensions. Take a load off.”

Papa groaned. “Woman, would you stop pestering an old man? I’ll quit when I’m dead. You see, pumpkin, an old man like me can’t just retire. That’s when you die.”

“Oh pishposh! Such dramatics,” Nana tsk-tsked.

I shrugged. “I don’t know, Nana. I read a study recently that shows that blue-collar workers have a higher mortality rate. Basically, the study showed that for every year of early retirement, those people on average lost two months of life expectancy. I believe the end of the study gave some suggestions for retiring but still working in a smaller capacity.”

Papa hooked me around the waist and hauled me over to his side and kissed my cheek. “Thanks, pumpkin. See, Sandy, even the doctor said so!”

Nana sighed. “Amber, I really wish you wouldn’t back his neuroses with scientific studies.” She shook her head and placed her hands on her hips.

“Sorry, Nana, but it’s true. There are a lot of statistics about it…” I tried to continue, but Papa put a hand over my mouth.

“That’s enough. Let your nana pout in peace. Come on into the den and tell your grandpa about your day.”

I followed Papa into his den, one of my favorite places in the entire world. Almost every inch of it was filled from floor to ceiling with dark mahogany bookcases, all loaded with books. My grandfather was a voracious reader and passed down the trait to me. He liked it all. Fiction, nonfiction, biographies, historicals, periodicals. You name it. If it was in the written word, he’d read it. He always said to me, “Knowledge is power, pumpkin. Be smarter than you need to be to get by, and you’ll do well in life.” I took it to heart, and it’s been sound advice.

“So, I ran into Vivvie outside. She looked as pretty and as plump as can be.” He chuckled, sat in his recliner, and then propped the footrest up.

I sat down on the squishy chaise opposite his and curled up into a ball. “Don’t tell her she’s plump. She’ll end up crying for days.”

He nodded. “Pregnancy hormones. I remember those but would rather forget ’em, if you know what I mean.”

I grinned. “Got you.”

“Funny thing. She mentioned you’re helping the instructor for the Tantric yoga class. Gotta say, pumpkin, I was a bit surprised by that.” He furrowed his eyebrows, and two lines appeared between them, a sure sign of his tension regarding the subject.

If there was a way to beam myself up into my room and away from this conversation, I would have. “Papa, it’s not what you think.”

His hair had whitened long before he hit his late sixties but shone a startling white that looked distinguished on him. My grandmother, on the other hand, kept up her dark hair by way of bimonthly visits to Genevieve’s in-home salon.

He opened his eyes wide, adjusted his glasses on his face, and with a quickness I didn’t expect, hooked the footrest back down and propelled up and out of his chair like a man on a mission. He went over to one of the bookshelves and skimmed the titles with a finger. “Ah, there it is.” He pulled out a book and started flipping through it. “Whelp, pumpkin, if you’re going to assist in this class, you should probably read up on it. A man who claimed to be a healer gave me this book when I was doing a tour in Asia. It was so long ago I don’t remember all the ins and outs, but Tantra is a very sacred practice and largely based on uniting with your partner. As you know, that’s not what we’ve taught you in this house or in the eyes of the Church, but you know what I always say…”

“Knowledge is power…I know, I know. Don’t worry. I’m a big girl. I can handle myself.”

“Now that trait you got from me.”

T
he auditorium was
huge for such a small number of people. At least two hundred chairs were available, yet the sixteen students in the program huddled in the center seats. Eager minds with a thirst for knowledge. The room smelled of old parchment paper, like walking through the aisles of the county library—a tad musty, yet intriguing. I made my way down the steps to the middle section and sat next to a dark-haired guy furiously tapping on a tablet. Trying not to bother Mr. Tappy, I laid my backpack on the floor and dug out a notepad. The boy glanced over, down at his gadget, and then back to me.

“You’re going to take notes on that?” He grinned while looking at my standard issue yellow legal pad.

I glanced around the room and shifted in my chair. “Uh, yeah. What’s the problem?”

The guy sat up and held out his hand. “Landen, second year and the teacher’s aide. You are?”

I shook his hand. “Amber St. James. First year.”

“Top of your class, I assume?” He smirked and started tapping on his tablet again.

“Yeah, so what’s the problem with my notepad?”

His eyebrows rose as he smiled. “Nothing. Just a little old school.” He waved a hand around, indicating the other students. Some had laptops primed and ready on the long wooden beam that acted as the desks. Other students carried handheld devices, and here was little ol’ me with a notepad.

Blowing out a slow breath, I straightened my spine and set my perfectly sharpened pencil to rest above my pad. “Yeah, well, I like to do things the old-fashioned way. The act of writing something down helps me remember more information.”

“Kind of like the art of repetition.” He chuckled.

I jerked my head side to side and cracked my neck. “I guess. So, how’s the teacher?”

He grinned and looked at me askance. His eyes burned a sparkling green and his corresponding smile, while pleasant, seemed almost too big for his face. He had a dimple in his right cheek that I could swear winked when he spoke. I found dimples an attractive feature on a man. This guy was no exception.

“He’s a piece of work for sure. I love him, though.” He shrugged and went back to multitasking on his device.

Love. Hmm. Not often you hear a guy toss out the term love so casually, especially when referring to a teacher.

“I’m excited about being here,” I said, chatting him up. The nervous bubbles in my belly popped and gurgled with anticipation of my first day.

He laughed that time. “The first-year med students always are. See that dude over there?” He pointed to an Asian man who looked about our age, typing furiously into a laptop. He kept pulling on his hair and finally banged his head down on the desk in front of him. “That’s Hai. He’s a fifth year about to get his MD. See how stressed out he is? I am not looking forward to that!”

I watched as Hai continued to pull at his hair, tug at his tie, and twist his fingers together. This program was unusual to say the least. Merging first years with fifth years for cross-training sounded like a great idea when I reviewed the course material. Seeing how wound up Hai was put an X in the con column for this untraditional format. When I chose it, I appreciated the severity in the differences between standard medical school and the joint program. The knowledge that students further along in their studies would be leading sections of the coursework alongside credentialed professionals, as well as the intense overlap in the training, would allow earlier advancement and more hands on support than the average program is what sold me on this course. Alas, seeing Hai, I no longer felt certain in my choice.

“Yikes. I hope I’m not like that,” I whispered, feeling really bad for Hai.

“Depends on what your specialty is. He’s going to be a brain surgeon. That comes with some serious emotional, mental, and physical pressure that a lot of us who just want to be GPs don’t have to suffer through.”

Brain surgeon. Yeah, that’s nowhere near where I want to go with my studies. “I’m focused primarily on pediatrics and gynecology. I figure I’ll determine which specialty I prefer once we start our residency.”

Landen nodded. “Makes sense. I think I’m shooting for the general practitioner route. Maybe emergency medicine. Haven’t decided yet. What you’ll find in this program, though, is there are usually only a couple in each year of the program, except the newbies. There are two fifth, fourth, third, second, and the remaining eight are first-year students like you. It’s good to partner with someone further along in the program. Maybe we can pair up.”

Landen set his hand on top of mine and squeezed. At first touch, I thought it was a simple gesture of solidarity, but the longer he held my hand and didn’t let it go, the more anxious I became. Was he interested in me? I smiled softly and tugged on my hand but not too hard. The last thing I wanted to do was upset him or put him off. I needed a partner, and Landen was not only a year ahead of me, but he was also the teacher’s assistant. That had to mean he was talented or the instructor wouldn’t have chosen him.

I faced him. “That would be great, Landen. Thank you.”

“Awesome. Ah, there’s the old man now.”

In the center of the front of the class was a wooden desk and beside that, a podium with a mic. Since the class was small and we hadn’t spread out too much, the teacher likely wouldn’t need the mic. Professor O’Brien shuffled to the desk and dropped his shoulder bag on the solid oak surface with a heavy thud. Whatever he had inside must have been heavy because the noise echoed off the walls of the mostly empty room.

My instructor was much younger than I expected. He couldn’t have been more than in his late forties, which was strange, since the information I’d found out on him stated he’d been teaching for over twenty years. Either he looked good for his age, or the timeline was off. He was very tall, easily a few inches over six feet, had a bit of weight around the middle but wore it well. His hair was curly, dark brown, shaggy around the sides in that cool, older gentleman way that attracted women of all ages. He had on a pair of silver-rimmed glasses that magnified his light eyes.

The professor walked around his desk and leaned on the front, his hands bracing on the edge as he crossed his legs. On his feet were a well-worn pair of burgundy Vans. I almost snickered. The man wore a white lab coat that spoke of his stature in the medical community, not to mention the UCSF Medical Center badge dangling from the coat pocket that demanded respect. Yet, he wore a shoe the local teen skaters would wear. I enjoyed unique oddities from others as I typically felt a little out of the norm myself.

Dr. O’Brien gripped the desk’s edge and glanced at each member of the team. When his gaze hit me, he jerked back, took off his glasses, wiped them with a handkerchief he’d pulled from his pocket, and put them back on. Again, his eyes met mine. He frowned, opened his mouth, and shook his head as if he were shaking off a memory or something he didn’t want to think about.

“Welcome to the Joint UC Berkeley-UC San Francisco Medical Program. You have been chosen because you are the best in your fields of study. This five-year program is intense. There will be many nights where you will find your ass sitting in the very chair you’re in now, only for a full twenty-four hours. Some days you will be helping at the hospital in an assistant capacity to the doctors. They may have you run to the supply room, take blood pressures, set up IVs, listen to heartbeats, check pulses, etc. Right now, most of you are peons. In five years, you will be doctors.”

He scanned the crowd again looking at every student one at a time. By the time he got to me, his eyes were hard, cold, and sharp. I shivered trying to shake the sense of unease.

“This program is going to set you up for the rest of your career. Consider it medical boot camp because, some days and nights, that’s how it’s going to feel. If you cannot keep up or handle the level of commitment this program entails”—he lifted his hand and pointed at the double doors with the shining red “EXIT” sign glowing above it—“there’s the door. Use it. You have five minutes to make your decision.”

I’d never heard a room so quiet. A raindrop landing on the roof would have sounded like an atomic blast. Not a single person spoke, shifted, or made a sound. I’m pretty sure I spent five straight minutes holding my breath with only a scant, shallow intake of air when absolutely necessary.

“All right then, let’s get started. We’re going to connect as a team, introduce ourselves one at a time, and give your anticipated field of study.” His eyes came back to mine when he finished his statement. “At the end of this evening, we’re going to pair you off and set you each up with white lab coats. I expect your lab coat to be clean and pressed for every class. The first thing every patient looks at when you enter a room is your coat. Show them, and me, that you have respect and put your best self forward.” The professor pointed at Hai. “Introduce yourself.”

Hai stood up and fisted his hands. “Hello, I’m Hai Cheng. This is my last year in the program. I’m going to be a neurosurgeon. My father died of a brain tumor when I was a boy, and I want to help save the lives of people suffering from neurological conditions. Thank you.” He offered a curt chin dip and then sat back down abruptly.

Lord, please bless Hai and his family and help him achieve his dreams. In you I trust. Amen.

Each person stood up and delivered their information. I said a silent prayer for each member of the team as they finished their introduction. So far, there wasn’t another person who wanted to go into pediatrics. The one running theme was that each student had chosen their field of medicine for a deeply personal reason.

Finally, the instructor came to Landen. “Hello, I’m Landen O’Brien, and the professor is my father.” Dead silence met his admission. He glanced around at his peers. “And no, he does not give special treatment. I promise he’s harder on me than he will ever be on you.” The entire class laughed, breaking the ice once more.

I stared in shock and shook my head. What a phony. He totally played me in the beginning of class acting like a regular Joe, making it sound as though he didn’t know the instructor so personally. Well, I’d have to think of a way to get him back. At least the love comment now made a whole lot of sense. Landen looked down and winked at me. I felt that wink zip through my heart, but it wasn’t the same as when Dash winked at me. Those winks went straight between my legs and sucked all ability to speak from my throat. In this case, there definitely wouldn’t be a love connection with Landen, though he looked the part and had a bright future.

“I’m probably the most boring of the entire crew here. I just want to be a doctor. An everyday man who goes to work and helps those from all walks of life, the young to the old and everything in between, much to my father’s disappointment.”

I shifted my gaze to the head of the class. He huffed and scowled.

“After I get my MD, I plan to set up a practice, marry a beautiful woman…” This time Landen’s eyes were laser-focused on me as he smiled huge.

Oh dear Lord, I think he likes me.

“…and come home to my family. I guess you could say I’m shooting for the American dream.”

“That’s quite enough, Landen.” Professor O’Brien took a deep breath and lifted a glass water bottle to his lips, the kind environmentally crazed people bought. “Next?” He tipped his head toward me before taking a sip.

I looked around and realized I was the last person to answer. Slowly, I eased out of my chair and stood. My five feet ten inches seemed overly large when standing on an elevated platform. “My name is Amber St. James. I graduated from UC Berkeley right where I was born and raised by my grandparents.”

A deafening crash pierced the air. The instructor cursed and crouched down to where he’d dropped the glass bottle to the concrete floor.

“Jesus!” he said as he scrambled to toss the big chunks into the waste bin near his desk. I cringed at the outburst.

The professor stood up and walked closer to me, the mess forgotten after he’d trashed the bigger pieces. “I apologize, Ms. St. James. Please continue. You stated you live in Berkeley with your grandparents. Are your parents not from around here?”

He caught me off guard with his question. He hadn’t asked anyone else a direct personal question. “My mother’s dead. Anyway, I want to practice pediatrics or gynecology.” I moved to sit down, but his quick response stopped me.

“Any particular reason why pediatrics or gynecology?” He took off his glasses, and his expression softened. His curt speech and cool demeanor when he entered the class were now gone. In its place, a kinder tone, one that spoke of hugs and pats on the head. It was probably the tone he used to connect to his patients. I’d heard that a lot of doctors did that. Lower the voice, get on the patient’s level, and look them in the eye. All of it was part of earning the patient’s trust and respect so they’d feel confident in their doctor’s care and diagnosis.