July 2019
Madiha
Beep...beep...beep
My pager went off.
'I have a patient with intense abdominal pain, may be diverticulitis. Please call for possible inpatient admission - Omar Khan'
"Omar Khan. Which one is he?", Kylie my co-resident peered over my shoulder then looked at the new resident face sheet that had been put up on the main notice board.
"No idea", I grumbled. A new desi sounding intern was the least of my worries when I was still debating on how to respond to the text message on my phone from my fiancé of six months who lived, worked and studied in New York.
"Oh Omar is cute", I heard Kylie say while I typed out a message and ignored her.
Me: I am on service today.
Jawad: But I am your fiancé who is in town for literally 48 hours. Don't tell me you can't even take out an hour to have coffee with me.
Jawad: Come on babe, I miss you.
Me: I didn't know you were coming. If you had told me in advance I could have changed my call day or something. There is nothing I can do right now.
Jawad: Is this how you're going to behave when we get married?
I closed my eyes and sighed deeply. Do it for your parents, I told myself just like I had so many times before. They deserved to be happy knowing that both their daughters would be getting married into respectable families. Which really translated to well-to-do families.
My story was not exactly one of rags to riches, but it came pretty close.
My parents had come to the US from Pakistan after winning a visa lottery in the early 1990s. Dad had been enrolled in a college back home, and mom had just finished high school when the two had gotten married. It was a typical arranged marriage of that time, where they hadn't even seen each other till the day of the wedding. Yet, according to them, they had fallen in love at first sight.
But despite the loving atmosphere we grew up in, there were always subtle reminders of how tough our financial situation was. My father worked as a cab (taxi) driver for many years while my mother had started a home catering business. Abu eventually received a diploma on automotive engineering, and a decent job fixing high end luxury cars.
God helps those who help themselves - was the mantra we lived by.
"You get what you want, not what you wish for", were my father's words that were entrenched in me.
Right now, though, all I wanted to do was live the life I knew I was destined to live. As a physician who led from the front in ever aspect of her career. And, make my family proud of me. Unfortunately, where I came from pride was linked to conforming with social norms and not being the rebellious, high-strung daughter I had grown up to become.
"Why are you scowling at your phone?", Kylie asked, her hand worriedly placed on my shoulder. She was a good friend. Non-judgmental and always willing to listen, she and another desi friend were the only ones who had kept me sane through the last couple of years.
"My fiancé is here for a friend's wedding. Last minute plan he says. But somehow I am supposed to drop everything and go have coffee with him now", I complained.
She raised an eyebrow, I braced for the question she had already asked me a dozen times before, "Remind me again, why are you marrying that douchebag?"
What choice do I have? I wanted to say.
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