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Trinity’s apartment is on the third floor, usually not a bad thing, she enjoys the movement and the view is actually pretty nice for how shitty the rest of the building is. But tonight every single step feels like fire shooting up her legs. All she wants to do now is take off her shoes, bra, and crash in bed for the next 9 hours (give or take). But there’s a little bit of a problem. There’s a white guy with the saddest eyes she’s seen following her up the stairs.
“So, this one’s it”, she says, opening the door, “shoes off”.
She walks in straight to the kitchen, leaving Whittaker at the door. If she has to show him around, the least she could have is a beer.
“Um,” Dennis hesitates at the door of the kitchen- “thank you, again. For letting me in your home”. Jesus, that’s around the tenth time he’s thanked her, she’s starting to get annoyed.
“Ok Huckleberry, let’s get some things straight-” she grabs herself a beer, then, after a second, grabs another one. “If you’re gonna live here we’re setting rules”.
She walks up to the couch and drops down, leaving one can on the coffee table and opening the other one. She gestures at the empty seat beside her.
Whittaker sits down.
“Alright, no talking until I’m done,” she begins, “rule number one: stop fucking thanking me. Rule number two: do not eat any of my food-” She pauses,”Actually, until you can go to the grocery store you can eat mine, but always tell me first. Rule number three: you won’t pay rent, but you will make yourself useful, cleaning and fixing shit. Rule number four: you keep the noise down, ok?”.
Whittaker’s face is a little scrunched, like he’s taking mental notes on a patient. He hasn't opened his beer. “Yeah, got it.” He leans over and grabs the can on the table.
They stay silent for a few moments, both too tired to move any more.
“So, how was your first day?” she asks. She knows how it was, she was there. It was also her first day. Not great.
Whittaker looks back at her, he starts laughing. What else can she do but laugh too?
“To be honest,” he opens his beer- “as awful as it was, I feel like I learned a lot”. He takes a sip and winces “God, Santos, this is awful”.
“Sue me, I like the bitter stuff”.
Trinity sighs, she’s really tired but somehow her mind is wired, she doesn’t think she could sleep if she wanted to. She assumes he’s feeling the same.
“So, what did you learn today, Huckleberry? Aside from the medical stuff-” she turns towards him “Any personal revelations?”
He breathes in, out, in again. “Well, something weird happened with an attending, but i guess it also kinda happened to you too”
“Yeah, no more poking that bear,” she says, “I don't want to hear about hospital hierarchies until I walk back there tomorrow”.
“Yeah, me neither. What about you? Any personal revelations?”, he asked.
“Actually yes, I think I might have a competency kink” she answers.
Whittaker doesn’t hesitate to answer, “You’re a doctor, I think all of us have a little bit of that.”
At that, Trinity looks at him like he grew a second head.
Whittaker leaves his beer on the table “What? You thought I was some kind of blushing virgin?”
Trinity just shrugs. “I’m 26!” he protests.
“Well, I just assumed you were some good christian boy from the middle of nowhere, waiting until you married a good white girl with a weird name,” she explains.
“Yeah, that was the plan,” he says, “but, to my parent’s displeasure, a bunch of things got in the way of it”.
She puts her feet on top of the coffee table, besides Whittaker’s beer.
“Like which ones?”
Dennis crosses his legs on the couch, fiddles with the hem on his pants. “I guess the main one is that girls are not much of my thing,” he looks away.
Now that is a personal revelation.
“Holy shit Huckleberry, did you just come out to me?”
He hesitates, then looks at her- “Yeah, I guess so.”
And Oh no, he’s looking down again and I'm being a terrible person not saying anything just fucking answer Trinity.
“Me too!” she blurts out, too loud in the small living room. “I’m, uh, me too. Yeah, I’m a lesbian”. She tries giving him a supportive smile but it comes out as a grimace.
And then he laughs. Dennis Whittaker, the man she’s giving a room to for free, is laughing at her. After she came out to him. After he came out to her!
“Dude! Don't laugh! What the hell!?” She shoves him a little.
“Sorry! Sorry!” he answers, still giggling. “It’s just, your face was so intense! Also, I kind of already knew”.
Trinity stands up, slightly offended, and starts walking towards the hall, “Alright! To the right is your room, and the door in front of it is your bathroom. There's a small closet to the left of your door with some towels and linens and down the hall is my room, do not come in it.”
Whittaker scrambles off the couch to follow her.
Before she enters her room he speaks, “Good night! See you tomorrow”.
Yeah. Tomorrow. Getting up at the ass crack of dawn and trying to act like a normal person in front of her coworkers who probably know that it's her fault that one of them is not coming back during the foreseeable future. Yay.
“Good night, Huckleberry. If you’re not up in time tomorrow I’m leaving you here”, she goes into her room, without looking back at him.