Mending Broken Hearts

Prologue

Omar

Madison, Wisconsin in the Early Part of 2019

How the hell did I get here? 

I asked myself for the thousandth time while sitting alone in my one bedroom apartment, as the evening sun lowered itself over the horizon, giving way to a darkness that I had become all too familiar with. 

I had been the perfect son.

By every standard: my parents', society's and religion's, I was the stereotypical good Pakistani boy.

I studied hard, was the captain of my school's cricket team, got in to the best Medical College in Pakistan and then got accepted to a PhD program in the US.

I prayed, didn't drink alcohol, or do drugs, always fulfilled the wishes of my parents even when I didn't agree with them - except for going to medicine, then I did stand up against my dad's very strong wishes for me to follow his footsteps and go to business school. 

I never dated, or had girlfriends, there were no scandals about me. I kept all my interactions with females as professional and respectful as possible.

Even when I let myself have feelings for a woman, I made sure she was someone my parents would approve of. Someone who, like me, had no vices. Who was down-to-earth and led an ordinary life without any drama, and came from a well-respected Pakistani family.

Yet somehow here I was. Dumped 5 days before my wedding, by a woman who I had wanted to get married to for as long as I could remember.

"Omar, there is really no easy way to say this...", she had started as we sat across each other on the dining table in her Chicago apartment.

Part of me knew that moment would come sooner or later, I just didn't realize how much it would hurt. I thought I had loved her ever since we were teenagers. It nearly broke me when her parents refused to even entertain the idea of our marriage the first time around, but I had told myself that I had made a mistake at that time; she was barely 19 years old then, she had just started medical school and I was leaving the country. In my mind, her parents were just looking out for her then. 

"Omar!", she called out at our alumni event a few years later. 

Her soft voice had captured my soul even before my gaze met hers. When I did turn around it felt so surreal I almost pinched myself. To find out that the woman I had so desperately tried to purge from my heart, had never really left at all, was not something I was prepared for. 

"I can't believe you're here too. This is going to so much fun. Just like old times", she had excitedly said. 

I guess she wasn't wrong. It was like old times. When I was in love with her and she was oblivious to it all. We had grown up together and our conversations had always been easy. So we simply picked up where we had left off.

"I've always thought of you as an older brother/friend", she had said quietly when I met her again. In a coffee shop in Chicago, after my parents spoke to her parents about us for a second time. 

I had laughed that comment off. She had smiled in return, and we had a friendly dinner after that. But perhaps, that had been our problem all along. Our conversations were so easy, our past so comfortable, that she never felt the spark integral to a romantic relationship. 

"Did you...", a voice within me asked, "Feel the spark that burns without a single touch? Steal the moon and break away the stars to prove your love to her? Tamed your heart so it beat in sync with hers?"

"No", I mumbled to myself. I just walked away from her. Because, after a lifetime of holding back and conforming to norms, I was just a dull man in his late twenties, with nothing to offer her. Not like the 'complicated' man she had had chosen over me.

Just FIVE days before our wedding. 

She would never know how deeply her words had cut as she sat across me on her kitchen table. Or the depressive spiral I had found myself in the months after. Or the way if effected every aspect of my life, from my career to my legal status in the country. 

You'll never have to see her again, my despondent heart reminded itself. Nine months after I had walked out of her apartment, six months after I missed the deadline to apply to my dream surgery residency programs, three months after my PhD advisor convinced me to apply to every eligible internal medicine program instead so I had a job and wouldn't get kicked out of the US, I was still nursing my broken heart. 

"But at least I will never have to see her again", I said out loud this time into the dark empty void of my living room. The heavy silence hung, strangling me and my dreams, only to be interrupted by the pinging of my computer. 

I had received an email. I read it out loud, as if trying to defy the misery I was destined to suffer in silence. But the more I read, the quieter my voice got. Till it was barely a whisper. A whimpered protest against a destiny so convoluted that it could only be perceived as a punishment for sins I must have committed. 

"Dear Dr Omar Khan,

We are pleased to offer you a position in the Internal Medicine program at the University Hospital of Illinois in Chicago. As you know, this program has been consistently rated in the top 10 programs in the country for the past several years. Due to this prestige we have had many applications this year. In order to keep this process as streamlined as possible we ask that you reply with a confirmation or rejection by the end of the day today at 5pm.

Regards,

Allison Whitley (Graduate Medical Education office)"

I stared at the email in disbelief. Is this a joke?

For someone who did not know my past, it would have seemed that I was stunned because I had been accepted to one of the most prestigious Internal Medicine residency programs in the country. But if they did know me they would have realized that the reason I had frozen was because University Hospital of Illinois was the adult hospital connected to the same medical university as the Children's Hospital of Illinois - the hospital where Noor, my ex-fiancé, was currently doing her residency along with her husband.

Oh boy. 

*******

Eek. Talk about forced proximity with your ex!

Anyway, if you know anything about the residency match system in US you'll recognize that the above scenario is not really possible. Everyone applies for all the different residencies at the same time and gets matched to their residency program through a computer algorithm. But this is a work of fiction, so roll with me 😊

Hope you liked the prologue. Please vote and comment!