Instructions for a second-hand heart (Slow Updates)

Chapter-5

Lavanya hated blood. She always felt strangely nauseated around blood. So, it didn't surprise her that she couldn't sleep for days after her first practical lesson. Cutting dead bodies, watching deformed dead bodies wasn't so her cup of tea.

She wasn't made of that stuff. The morgue gave her creeps and the skeleton called Mr. Bones just wouldn't let her sleep. She wasn't doctor material. She never wanted to be a doctor. She never wanted to saunter around in a white coat and spend her life around the ailing and critically ill. She hated blood. She hated death. She was too emotional to not get emotionally attached to the patients.

Yet she had no other options.

She had too.

For her parents said so.

The daughter of renowned, world-famous doctors and owners of the international Heartis hospital chain. Just can not — not be a doctor. It was a sin to think about being anything but a doctor.

She wasn't given a choice. They didn't care she hated watching the blood. She couldn't even deal with dead pigeons. Yeah, a dead pigeon had fallen in her house after breaking its neck somehow and she was scared of hurting a dead pigeon. She had buried that pigeon under her favorite mango tree. How'll she dead with critically injured humans?

They didn't care.

They said; she had too. So she did. She became a doctor. She was happy being a general physician but no, it wasn't acceptable enough for them. It wasn't worth bragging enough. So, she was told to become a cardiothoracic surgeon. She did that too.

She worked so hard. She worked herself to death. She wasn't a genius after all yet she needed to be one. So, she practiced day and night.

And she hated her parents for they never noticed how hard she worked? They never saw the efforts she put in. They only saw that she stood in seventh place. They hated she didn't make in in the top five or topped the college. They told her she could do better than that all she wanted to hear was single; "Beta, I'm proud of you. You worked really hard for this, "

But that never came. They wanted her to be more when she couldn't. She wasn't a genius medical prodigy. She was an average girl who worked herself to death to literally win in the race of a medical seat. She won a seat in one of the best medical colleges in India for which about fifteen lakh more students were competing for. But they never cared about the efforts she put it. She didn't mind the expectations but a little "I'm proud of you, " didn't kill anyone, did it? Yet those words never came from her parents.

She was just a puppet for them. An underperforming puppet.

She hated it and wished to flee away not once but many times. She wished to take her savings and enroll herself in a course she loved. Live a life she enjoyed. But every time, the thought of her shaggy-haired best friend stopped her from fleeing. Who'll help him if she ran away? Who'll look after him if she isn't around?

Following her parent's wish had only a single benefit for her. They didn't mind the amount of money she took. They didn't ask how or in what way she spent it all? She was free to spend more than several lakhs in a month. They never asked and just because of that she stayed the ideal puppet.

She might not have needed all the money, the almost surplus expenditure rights. Her bestie did. And she was more than happy to spend it on him. For he cared more about her efforts and intentions that the whole world combined. He was her home. Di was her home. They didn't mind that she wasn't genius enough. They didn't mind she wasn't perfect enough. They didn't care she didn't top the college. They didn't mind that she wasn't barbie reborn. They were more than happy to celebrate her small victories.