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There's a certain amount of wisdom and emotional maturity that comes with accepting the inevitability of aging.
Samira Mohan believed that she had a modicum of that acceptance.
Or at least she thought she did. Despite being generously blessed with a still full head of hair (all in good gratitude to her South Indian genetics) and flawless skin, the ye old curse of aging had still found its way to her.
It started with the prominent laugh lines.
As an educated woman with access to varying degrees of knowledge in the medical field, she chose not to indulge herself in the toxic mentality that instilled the fear of aging. She stayed true to her strict eating habits, skincare, and exercise regimes.
Then came the phantom joint pains. Easily manageable — she was no stranger to women's health being understudied and the various symptoms that presented themselves during her 30s.
But the grey hair. Oh, the greying hair.
At first, the grey presented itself bashfully in bits and pieces. Singular strands that easily went unnoticed. Nothing that a little brush of mascara or Kajal could not fix. Eventually, her grocery lists began to consist of curl creams, hair masks, and black hair dye.
She had a rigid process of purchasing hair dyes at every two-week interval. She had spent weeks and weeks perfecting a routine that would not reveal the blasphemous truth of her hair greying. Nobody would ever know.
She had told herself that she would eventually stop dyeing the evidence of her aging and tell everyone the truth. Throw a gender-reveal type party, even. Congrats! It's grey hair and eventual menopause! It's all uphill from here onwards!
Only, she had not planned on doing that today. This was far worse than she had envisioned.
Samira Mohan prided herself in being a relatively reasonable woman. She was an attending physician at one of Pittsburgh's most rigorous Emergency Centers, an environment both demanding and mentally taxing that she had managed to navigate, and that too as a woman of color when all the stakes were against her.
Unfortunately, all semblance of rationality was out the window at the moment. She had made a severe lapse in judgment and had forgotten to restock her usual brand of hair dye. All it took was a week off and no semblance of human contact for her to even fathom the need to dye her hair.
Samira frantically continued her baseless search for any remaining boxes of dye or any other product that even vaguely resembled black hair dye. Hell, she was even willing to dunk her head into a can of black paint. Head stuck inside the cabinet underneath the bathroom sink, she found herself wishing the thing would just swallow her whole.
A familiar furry sensation brushed up against her ankles. "I know, baby — I'll get to you in a minute. Mumma needs to find her stupid fucking hair dye," she enunciates the last few syllables out of frustration.
Her chubby tuxedo cat, Missy — a demanding thing she was — mewled in response.
Samira crawled out of the cabinet and sighed in defeat. It was 6:18 am, and she had less than an hour to clock in to her shift.
"It's over for me, isn't it?" She rubbed her palms against her face and looked over at her cat. "I mean, I can't possibly be greying before fucking Langdon," she huffs out. Missy clocked her head slightly.
"Who am I kidding — that man is definitely coloring his hair. I guess I'm going to face the fire first." She stood up with a sort of meek determination that she did not have before, bending down to scoop up a whiny Missy who eventually quieted down at the sight of the kitchen.
At exactly 6:34 am, Samira Mohan had miraculously managed to look ready and presentable, but the apparent elephant in the room was still proving to be a problem.
Scattered strands of silver hair were much more of a menial issue in comparison to the literal chunks of hair that were fading graciously into varying hues of grey. There was only so much her pinned-back hair could hide.
But damn it, she was going to put her big girl pants on and deal with it. Samira Mohan was going to embrace her grey hair (and find proof that Langdon was greying too).
She remembered overhearing a few interns whispering something along the lines of "Dr. Mohan is totally a MILF" — she had tried to ask one of her residents, Baran, about it, but she had simply blushed and told her not to worry about it.
She was going to wreak havoc in the ER for revealing her scandalous secret. Or it could just prove to be yet another uneventful day at the PTMC.
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"Dude, that is fucking disgusting." Jack Abbot tossed the apple core in his palm artfully into the trash can from across him. "The obvious answer is an armpit that dispenses sunscreen, duh."
The lanky brunette, Michael Robinavitch, who was standing near his desk, grimaced. "Why am I even surprised that you had a response locked and loaded. It's a wonder that you get anybody to sleep with your disgusting ass."
"Hey! I resent that statement. I'm quite the charmer," Jack drawled. "You asked, and I answered. I presume you have a less disgusting answer, Robby?"
"Not really, but I'm starting to regret even asking you that question. I should've just shut up and read a journal instead," Robby muttered.
Jack laughed and spun around in his chair before standing up. "Lighten up, dude. I'm going to get us some coffee from the breakroom. That oughta make you look less miserable."
Robby only rolled his eyes. "You are way too chipper for a first-year resident. That won't last too long, though. Enjoy it while you still can, Abbot."
Jack brushed him off wistfully and began to head towards the break room, only to be stopped almost immediately by their charge nurse, Dana. "Hey, kid! Where do you think you're going?" He stops in his tracks and turns around.
"The break room?" The older woman stared at him, glasses perched low on the bridge of her nose and chewing her nicotine gum. "Nuh-uh, no can do — Dr. Langdon and Dr. Mohan just paged in. Debriefing starts in two."
Jack groaned and reluctantly grabbed his tablet. Robby only patted his shoulder in slight sympathy.
Minutes later, their attending physician, Dr. Frank Langdon, walked into the hallway with his usual confident stride. Jack, Robby, and the other residents and interns gathered around him. He ran a hand through his hair, exhaustion sitting under his eyes in the form of prominent dark circles.
Noticing her absence, Jack tried to crane his neck subtly in search of a certain other attending.
And that's when she walked in.
Jack felt the air being physically knocked out of his lungs at the sight of Dr. Mohan.
"Good morning, everyone," she greeted the group. Her eyes scanned the group, taking a mental note of everyone present. Dr. Langdon began the usual rundown, which should have prompted Jack to pay attention, but all he could look at was Dr. Mohan's hair.
Her usual tight bun had been replaced with a loosely tied semi-updo, curly tendrils framing her face and giving her a softer edge. Dr. Mohan had been away for a week and was now back, sporting luscious silver locks that gleamed under the fluorescent lights of the ER.
Jack was having a very hard time breathing.
What had initially started as a puppy crush on a senior attending had harbored itself into a massive, full-blown infatuation over the course of four years. Samira Mohan maintained a staunch belief in empathy and efficiency over speed and numbers. She ran the PTMC in a way that demanded respect, but not so much that her employees would cower in her presence.
She was the same doctor who had taken a chance on him and his unconventional methods from the time he had joined the PTMC as a scraggly twenty-three-year-old amputee who had been made to believe that he was nothing more than his disability.
"—the status on that patient, Dr. Abbot?"
He blinked himself back to the present.
"I'm sorry, what patient?" Dr. Langdon visibly sighed and tapped at his screen impatiently.
"Did Dr. Shen not brief you during handoffs earlier?"
He was absolutely positive that he was briefed about a patient who had been admitted for a subcutaneous hematoma.
"Uh. Yes, the hepatoma— That. That was the case. For me." His brain was forming sentences, but he couldn’t seem to remember how his vocal chords functioned.
Dr. Mohan looked up at him. "Did you mean hematoma?" He nodded, heat creeping up his neck.
Thankfully, she only smiled. "Alright, enough standing around— we have an ER to run, so let's get moving!" she ushers everyone out of the circle.
Despite Jack having tuned out the debriefing, he hadn't missed the way Dr. Mohan had been obsessively adjusting her hair and running her fingers through the curls. He was by no means a mind-reader, but he was a man desperate for his attending to notice him in a way that was definitely not reflective of the various crushes he had harbored for the female authoritarian figures in his life.
So, he did what any smart, observant person would do.
"Dr. Mohan!" The older woman turned around, eyes landing on Jack as he caught up with her.
"Jack," she smiled. "What can I do for you?"
He swallowed at the sight of her dimpled smile. "Are we... still on? To go over my research? For my dissertation."
Dr. Mohan nodded. "Of course. But that's for Thursday, isn't it? Could have sworn I marked it down last week."
Jack nodded furiously at her confusion. "No, yes, absolutely. I just, you know, had to make sure this was still happening." Jack Abbot— resident physician, ER cowboy, former army medic, grown man nearing his 30s— was gut-wrenchingly nervous about meeting his much older attending for a coffee with no strings attached.
He was not inexperienced by any means whatsoever. He dated, flirted, fucked around. But in the presence of Samira Mohan, Jack Abbot was reduced to a bumbling mess of syllables and the demeanor of a nervous virgin.
The older laughed lightly, a faint indentation of crows feet in the corners of her eyes. "A little eager, aren't we?" she teased. Which probably meant nothing. Jack was going to pass out.
"Well, I can't say I don't look forward to our meetings. It means I get the chance to see you." She raised her eyebrows questioningly, and Jack quickly realized the implication of his words.
"The chance to see you give me your absolutely valuable insight," he added, albeit a little too loudly. Jesus. Fuck. He nervously shoved his sweaty palms in his scrub pant pockets.
"I'm glad that my insight has proven useful to your research," she replied warmly. "And that you enjoy our meetings. I too enjoy our meetings— I get to learn something new from one of my most promising residents, after all."
Jack preened like a peacock in an open enclosure. "Thank you, Doctor. I appreciate it."
"I'll let you get back, then. See to it that Shen's patients are given the necessary tests." She waved him off.
He turned around, only to spin back on his heels in a clumsy, rapid motion. "Oh, and Dr. Mohan!" he called out. He ignored Dana's pointed look from his peripheral.
She turned around, hair swishing in a gentle motion.
"I think you should keep the hair. It looks great on you. Gives you an edge," he said, winking after. He winced almost immediately and scurried away with an unbearable amount of heat forming on his cheeks.
A sarcastic "real smooth" is uttered from Robby and Jack stuck a finger up at him without turning back.
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Later that evening, Samira deleted the hair dye from her online cart.