notes from above ground

xiv

Another day, another dollar short. Get it? It’s a joke about how I’m not getting paid for my labor.

Am I an entitled brat for asking my supervisor to let me go to a wedding on a Saturday? I don’t think I am, but that’s how she makes me feel. It’s annoying that something as simple as asking for a day off has to turn into a whole reckoning with the system. I don’t want it to be that serious. Especially when I’m, ahem, not getting paid.

Now I have to be extra good or they’ll shoot me or something. When I see her tomorrow, I'll just say, “I’m so sorry for asking for a day off on a Saturday in June! How stupid of me to even think of something like that! You can go harder on me this week, I can take it!”

Or should I just double down on the “problem child” narrative? I could go full Joker mode. Unprofessional all week. Wear my headphones during rounds. Take three-hour lunch breaks. Piss in a supply closet. They have to talk to my dean. My dean has to talk to me. He says, “This is completely unexpected and—I’m sure you realize—unacceptable. Are you okay? This isn’t like you. I’m worried. I’d already been considering failing you because of how stupid, lazy, inconsiderate, and stupid you are. Thinking you can have a life outside of the above ground is proof of your entitlement. A wedding? Are you insane? It’s a slap in the face to all of us doctors. Goddammit! We’re entrusting you with the world and this is how you repay us!” And then spits on my face.

Last night I had a dream my classmate said it was manipulative of me to push back a meeting because of my birthday. I told her to “get the fuck out.” She left, and then I started sobbing. I followed her out and screamed “I hate you!” over and over. She didn’t respond. I kept screaming at her until I got the impression that she’d called the police. I threatened to kill myself out of spite, and I was about to do it when the dream ended.

I had another one where my friend Mari ordered a drink of fentanyl mixed with orange Crush served with fire on top. My other friend Skylar was like, “Holy shit, I know a person who overdosed on fent after trying it for the first time in a situation like this.” We tried to stop Mari from drinking the fentanyl-Crush, which caused her to stand up on the bar and give a speech about how it’s her life and she’ll do what she wants with it.

Then there was one about a church that I controlled with a Wizard of Oz-like machine behind a curtain in a back room with doors and windows that opened up to the church itself. I controlled the sounds and gave the sermons, projecting my voice without being seen. In the middle of a sermon, one of the doors opened, revealing the back room to the churchgoers. A voice told me to keep going, but then I noticed somebody lifting up the curtain that separated me from them. I tried to stop him, but he was really persistent. I was caught, and they’d all soon know the whole thing was a fraud. It was going to be really bad. They were going to storm the room and destroy the church or something. Then it ended.