"Alex, my darling, the answer to that question, as you very well know, is no." Liz grinned. "There's absolutely nothing wrong with being a red-blooded, American girl who enjoys sex, so don't judge me."
"I wouldn't dare," I smiled before turning the conversation to a more serious matter. Sometimes Liz's reckless behavior scared me. She took chances that I knew I'd never be brave enough to take, and most of the time her gamble worked out just fine, but the few times when it hadn't, well, it had spelled disaster. I looked over at her stuffing fries in her mouth and said, "I'm just worried that I won't be able to manage all the coursework on top of working at the hospital. I can't afford to lose my scholarship, Liz."
"I know, kiddo," she said, patting my hand. "You're going to be just fine. We're going to kick ass and take names so that when we walk across that graduation stage, we'll be super stars!"
"I hope you're right," I sighed as I finished the rest of my salad. "I really hope you're right."
#
Later that afternoon, Liz and I walked into our classroom and found our professor setting up an anatomy lesson covering the skin. Liz muttered a few choice curse words under her breath while I took note of what the professor had written on the board.
"It's not going to be that bad, Liz," I whispered as we took our seats in the middle of the classroom. "It's just basic anatomy. Stuff we've been studying forever."
"Well, that would be helpful if I'd been studying it," Liz said mournfully.
"Liz! Why didn't you tell me you needed help?" I whispered. "I would have shared my flashcards with you or helped you study."
"I know, I know," she said. "Well, now's as good a time as ever to turn it all around!"
Twenty minutes later, Professor Jackson began the lecture, and I found myself lost in the intricacies of human anatomy as it related to the skin. I loved learning about the way the body was not only designed to be an efficient machine, but also how easily that machine could be disrupted by even the smallest abnormality. It wasn't that I wanted people to get sick, it was just that I loved learning how we, as medical professionals, could learn how to ident
ify the problems and contribute to the process of fixing them.
"So, you can see how important healthy skin is to the overall function of the body," Professor Jackson said as she tied together the main points of the lecture. "Any time the skin is compromised, you have to keep an eye out for infection. A breach in skin layers can be as small as a paper cut or as large as a third-degree burn, and cause major problems either way. This is why good hygiene is so vitally important when you are dealing with the skin. Now, any questions?"
"Is this going to be on the exam?" Violet Metzler asked in a bored voice as she looked down at her nails. "And if it's not, could you be so kind as to give us an idea of what will be on the exam?"
"Ms. Metzler, it would be safe to assume that everything I lecture about will be part of an exam," Professor Jackson replied. "After all, this knowledge is what you will need in order to function as a nurse."
"Yeah, but see, I'm planning to be an administrator," Violet replied in the same bored tone as she flipped her hair over her shoulder and said, "I don't intend to have to actually deal with patients, so I don't want to waste my time memorizing things that aren't going to be useful in my administrative capacity."
"Ms. Metzler, administrators normally work their way up through the ranks, so you're going to need to actually practice nursing before you are allowed to supervise other nurses," Professor Jackson said, raising her eyebrow.
"Yeah, no. My daddy is going to put me in charge of the nurses at his hospital as soon as I graduate, so I don't need to worry about all that stuff," Violet said, waving her hand impatiently.
"And I wish you, and him, the best of luck with that," Professor Jackson said, turning back toward the board. "Are there any other questions?"
"How can you quickly recognize skin infections, Professor Jackson?" I asked without raising my hand. "I mean, how do you know the difference between an irritation and an actual infection?"
"Good question, Ms. Pierce," she said. "Let's talk about the differences!"
For the next half hour, Professor Jackson laid out the various ways in which we could differentiate between irritations and actual infections as I scribbled notes as fast as I could. She covered bacterial, viral, and fungal skin infections in detail explaining that when in doubt, we should always ask for a second opinion from someone who is outside of the case. She explained that sometimes the caretakers working on a case were too close to see things clearly, so it was always good to get a second set of eyes on the problem.
"In closing, I'd recommend that you also remember that while it is tempting to go for the most complex diagnosis," she said looking around the room, "often the right answer is the simplest answer. Now, I want to remind you that we have exams coming up at the end of the term, and you'll need to score 90% or higher in order to move on to the next level of your training. This means you need to hit the books, ladies and gentlemen."
"Why is she looking at me?" Liz grumbled as we packed up our things, pulled on our coats and gloves, and got ready to head to our next class.
"Maybe she can sense that you are a lost soul who needs saving?" I teased as we walked across campus toward the hall where our psychology class was held. It was freezing outside, but the sun was shining and it reflected off of the fresh snow, making the campus look like a winter wonderland. Chicago could be brutally cold in the winter, but days like this, the ones just before we turned the corner and headed toward spring, were the ones I loved best.
"Maybe she needs to focus on straightening out the attitude of little Miss Rich Girl," Liz said, flipping her ponytail. "I'm not the problem, she is."
"Maybe Professor Jackson has given up trying to teach Violet anything because Violet doesn't see the value in learning," I suggested, pulling my scarf more tightly around my neck as the wind picked up. "She's right about the fact that she's not going to have to work in the field like the rest of us will, so why expend energy trying to make her see things differently?"
"Good point," Liz muttered as she reached around and dug into her backpack with one hand, pulling out a tube of lipstick and then proceeding to freshen the color as we walked.
"I cannot for the life of me understand how you do that," I said admiringly. "I'd have it all over my face if I tried that."
"Eh, it's not so difficult once you get the hang of it," Liz said as she started to instruct me in the art of walking and applying lipstick.