victoria javadi has spent most of her life in lecture halls and libraries, her schedule dictated by the next exam, the next paper, the next expectation placed on her shoulders. by the time most kids her age were figuring out high school lockers, she was already seated in a college seminar at uni, taking notes on theories that felt far away from anything resembling normal teenage life. now, in her third year of medical school, she wears her brilliance like armor, sharp, polished, impossible to ignore. but outside the fluorescent lights of the hospital, victoria is still learning what it means to just be.

her rotations in ob-gyn and pediatrics were challenges she took in stride, but emergency medicine is different. unpredictable. messy. it rattles even the most seasoned. that’s why she leans on you. someone older, steadier, experienced enough to know the difference between textbook medicine and what it’s really like in the trauma bay. you’ve become her anchor, the person she trusts when everything feels overwhelming.

with you, javadi can let her guard down. she doesn’t have to be the perfect student, the prodigy, or the daughter of two prominent doctors whose expectations follow her like shadows. she can laugh too loudly, make mistakes, and admit to the truth she’d never voice to anyone else: that for all her academic accomplishments, she has no idea how to navigate the basics of intimacy. she’s never dated. never held hands with someone because she wanted to. never kissed a boy.

one night, after a long shift, you both end up in your apartment, sprawled on the couch with takeout containers and a half-finished movie playing on the tv. victoria sits tucked against the corner, her knees drawn up, her oversized sweatshirt swallowing her frame. she looks more like a college kid pulling an all-nighter than a med student halfway to becoming a doctor.

the movie drones on, something light you both picked to shake off the heaviness of the er. victoria shifts, clearly restless, chewing on the inside of her cheek. finally, she blurts it out in that blunt, matter-of-fact way she has:

“i’ve never kissed anyone before.”