“And you didn’t harass Ava to follow in her father’s footsteps?”
“Never,” Ava said, “but I was clear about how it was for her to try to benefit from the tragedy.”
“Why didn’t you tell me about this identity change earlier in our relationship, as intimate as we’d become?” Noah asked.
“I don’t know,” Ava said. “What might surprise you is that I don’t think about it that often. I’ve adjusted to my new reality, and I much prefer it to the old one. I might have told you eventually, but then I might not have. I don’t see it as important. And thinking about what is important leads me to another more serious issue I want to bring up with you.”
Ava moved even closer to Noah by pulling the ottoman she was sitting on against his chair so she could lower her voice even more. “Before I say what I plan to say, I want you to know that I like you, Noah Rothauser. I really like you and respect you, which is why we have gotten along as well as we have, and I hope our relationship can continue and hopefully even blossom. I think we were made for each other, but whether or not it happens is going to depend on your cooperation.”
“Cooperation on what?” Noah asked hesitantly.
“That you join the team,” Ava said “My team! Above and beyond my personal interest, I think you could be a big help to the NSC. You and I together. Understand that I have lobbied for you strenuously, which is ironic, me lobbying a lobbying organization! My success at this particularly lobbying effort is why you are sitting here at this moment rather than having disappeared to God knows where, which would have been easy as no one knew you had gone to Lubbock or why.”
A chill descended Noah’s spine, making him tense.
“I’ve had to make a huge pitch to have you brought back to Boston to have this talk,” Ava said. “I even essentially ransomed several planned trips to Washington to make it happen, threatening not to go. Now, I want to remind you of the metaphor you used the first evening you visited my home to plan for the initial M&M Conference, and that was when you described us as ‘two peas in a pod.’ Do you remember?”
“Of course I remember,” Noah said. “It was when I learned how similar we were in our total commitments to medicine and our specialties.”
“Unfortunately, it seems that the metaphor is not as apropos as I was counting on,” Ava said.
“What does that mean?” Noah said. He knew intuitively that something was coming that he was not going to like.
“Believing that you felt as committed to surgery as I feel toward anesthesia, I was sure that if you were suspended from your super chief resident position that you would be so totally consumed by getting yourself reinstated that you wouldn’t have time or energy to cause trouble for anyone else — namely, me.”
A sudden feeling of anger and betrayal surged through Noah’s brain. He regarded Ava with disbelief. “Are you telling me that you were responsible for my suspension?”
“Only indirectly,” Ava said. “All I did was tell my babysitters, Keyon and George, that you had somehow fudged or fabricated data on your Ph.D. thesis. I also told them that Dr. Mason was eager to have you fired. With that little bit of information and their considerable resources, they were able to accomplish getting you temporarily furloughed.”
Noah could feel his face redden. It was almost too much to believe that he had been jilted by someone he’d felt so very close to and trusted.
“I can see you are upset,” Ava continued in the same even tone she’d been maintaining. “But before you allow yourself a paroxysm of righteous indignation, I want to tell you that I wasn’t completely confident you would stop causing me potential trouble with your supposed misgivings about my competence even after your suspension. Accordingly, for backup, I encouraged Keyon and George to use the full investigative power of ABC Security to delve into your background. It is fascinating what they have come up with. It seems that you, Dr. Noah Rothauser, like most people, have a few secrets that seem at odds with the persona you present, which might be more like a Facebook sockpuppet than you would have us believe. Who is the real Noah Rothauser?”
The color of Noah’s face that had so recently appeared now drained away. It took him a minute to organize his thoughts. “Let me ask you a question,” he said in a halting voice.
“Please do,” Ava said.
“Why are you and the NSC so against my checking into your training? Initially, I was just interested to know how many and what kind of cases you did as a resident, which is all I was trying to do when I used your computer.”
“The NSC doesn’t want my training questioned because I told them emphatically I did not want it questioned,” Ava said. “It is as simple as that.”
“Does the NSC know why you feel that way?”
“No, they don’t,” Ava said. “My turn for a question. Why are you concerned about my training when I have passed my anesthesia boards both written and oral with honors, and as you have reminded me I’ve handled upwards of three thousand cases at BMH without a problem.”
“It’s mostly those niggling questions about the three deaths that I felt ethically obligated to check out. I told them to you.”
“And I explained fully that your concerns were without basis in all three instances,” Ava said. “What else? Let’s clear the slate.”
“Okay, I’ve also wondered about your syntax in your anesthesia notes,” Noah said. He felt embarrassed to bring up such an insignificant issue, but it had been bothering him like a pebble in a shoe. “You use fewer acronyms and more superlatives than other doctors.”
“That’s an absurd notion,” Ava said. “If anything, it’s mainstream medical snobbery. I write my notes the way notes are written in Brazos University Medical Center in Lubbock, Texas. What else?”
“It surprises me that you have no real friends at the hospital,” Noah said. “You keep everyone at arm’s length and apparently prefer social media to face-to-face interaction. Why? It seems so strange to me because I know you as warmly personable. It makes no sense, especially with your ability to read people so well.”
“Isn’t this a little like the pot calling the kettle black?” Ava said. “When it comes down to it, you are the same. Remember: ‘two peas in a pod.’ Maybe you go more out of your way to be superficially friendly with everyone than I, but you’re not close friends with anyone except an alleged girlfriend who no one ever met and who decided she needed more of a relationship, which you weren’t supplying. As for social media, I think you don’t indulge in it because you don’t have the time, at least not until you finish your residency. When you do, the ‘gamer’ in you is going to reassert itself, and currently there is no better online game than social media.
“Here’s the reality. We are both products of the new digital age, where truth and intimacy are becoming less and less important. Thanks to the ubiquity of social media in all its forms, we’re all becoming narcissists, maybe not as overt as our friend Wild Bill Mason, but we all thrive on continuous reaffirmation, which is why you work so damn hard and I love anesthesia. Everyone is becoming an elaborate fusion of the real and the virtual, including you and I.”
Noah stared back at Ava. Earlier he had had a foreboding about where their strange, digressive conversation was going, but now he was sure, and a deep-seated atavistic fear spread through him. It disturbed him to recognize she was in control and not him. She knew all her own secrets and apparently some of his.
“The growing popularity of Facebook and other social-media sites is a harbinger of the future,” Ava said after a pause to see if Noah would speak. When he didn’t, she continued: “People can be what they want to be by managing technology, and those who do it the best, like you and I, will thrive despite our pasts.”