Diary of a Girl from Seattle

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Dear Diary,

Today was my first day of med school! It was exhilarating, overwhelming, and nothing like what I was expecting. This term I'm taking Anatomy and Physiology, Intro to Clinical Medicine, and Biostatistics and Epidemiology. The courses all seem really interesting and I'm both excited and terrified for cadaver lab. I thought that acclimating to a new school and a whole new level of challenge would be the hardest part of the day, but life had other plans.

As fate would have it, my first day of medical school was also the day that news of the Harper Avery sexual assault scandal broke. It really took the medical community by storm and the entire campus was buzzing. It was all anyone could talk about and on top of it my phone kept blowing up from my friends at Grey Sloan. I made it through half the day without anyone actually talking to me about it, for which I was grateful. After Anatomy, we had a 20 minute break before Biostats and the girl sitting next to me asked me and the guy at our table if we wanted to get a cup of coffee. We stopped at a coffee cart on campus and went off to find the next building together as we chatted. I learned that the girl's name is Grace, she grew up outside of Denver, went to UCLA and actually had a class with Connor! The guy's name is Jamie and he's from Philadelphia. He went to Temple University which he said was only 30 minutes from his house and he had never been to the west coast before moving here for med school. We all hit it off pretty well and agreed to get lunch together after biostat.

Biostatistics and epidemiology felt as long as its name sounds and was definitely the most boring class of the day. It has potential to get more interesting and I really hope it improves cause I swear I could've fallen asleep. But after class we had 40 minutes for lunch before intro to clinical so Grace, Jamie, and I stopped at a korean food truck for lunch. Just as I took my first bite of bibimbap, Grace brought up the Harper Avery scandal. They were talking about how awful it is and how it's totally going to ruin Grey Sloan. I tried to keep quiet at first but Jamie finally noticed I hadn't said a word and asked what I thought about it. I told them that I hope it doesn't ruin the hospital's reputation or mess with any of the doctors there. Of course Jo texted me right then to tell me that Meredith brought her awards in to give back, with a picture of her and her mother's awards. My phone was sitting on the table and even though I tried to hide it quickly, Grace saw the picture and grabbed the phone to see.

"Who's sending you pictures of Harper Averys? Wait... it says Meredith. Are they talking about Meredith Grey?!" Grace practically shouted as Mattie snatched her phone back.

"Shh... um yeah. I guess she's returning her awards. Weird right?" Mattie tried to play it off; she didn't need everyone at school knowing her history with Grey Sloan. She figured that if people knew they'd think she had everything handed to her and that she had an unfair advantage.

"How does anyone know that tho? And that doesn't look like a professional shot." Grace was not giving up.

"Oh um a friend of mine works at Grey Sloan. No biggie she must have heard through the grapevine. I've always heard hospitals can be pretty gossipy" Mattie responded. "Anyway, it's getting late, we should probably get to class." With that she packed up and led her little crew to class.

Grace didn't ask me any more questions about the Harper Avery stuff after lunch and I was so relieved. But it seems like keeping my ties with Grey Sloan a secret is going to be a lot harder than I expected.

My last class ended around three so I still had a good part of my day free. I thought about going to the hospital to check in on everything but as I drove up I saw at least 7 news trucks and thought it might be better to steer clear for a day or two. As I left I remembered that Jack and Andy had gone through "the incinerator" which is basically an intense live simulation test for captain, so I headed to the firehouse to see if I could get an update on how it went.

Andy and Jack were still out when I got to the station so I just hung out for a while and waited with everyone. We ordered in Chinese food and were bantering over dinner when Vic dropped a bomb on us. She confessed that she's been scared of fire since being trapped by the tanker a few weeks ago. Which, as I'm sure you can imagine, is not great for a firefighter. I can't say I'm entirely surprised, she seemed freaked by the BnB fire a few days ago and has been sticking by the aid car as much as possible lately. The six of us agreed that we would all keep it a secret and help Vic get over her fear. If Jack or Andy knew they'd have to report it but none of us have that obligation. Conversation got more normal after that but Andy and Jack never came back to the station; I guess their test went pretty late. I'll check in with her tomorrow morning to see how it went but for now I'm off for my nightly call with Connor and some much needed sleep before school tomorrow.

-Mattie