I followed Dr. Okafor into his office. He gestured to the chair across from his desk.

  "Sit."

  I sat down. He settled into his chair and pulled the stack of files toward him. Started reviewing them one by one, making notes, signing some, setting others aside. I sat there with my hands on my knees like an idiot, waiting for him to say something. Explain why he'd called me in. Give me some profound surgical wisdom after that hallway confrontation.

  But nothing. Five minutes passed. Then ten. The clock on his wall ticked loudly. I could hear voices in the hallway, nurses and residents going about their afternoon. Dr. Okafor turned another page and made another note with his pen.

  I shifted in my chair, cleared my throat quietly to get his attention. Nothing. I stared at him. What the hell.

  My leg started bouncing. I forced it to stop. Clasped my hands together instead and stared at a spot on the wall behind his head. A framed certificate from some surgical conference in 2019. Another one from the Royal College of Surgeons. A photograph of him shaking hands with someone important-looking.

  Fifteen minutes. I was starting to wonder if he'd forgotten I existed. Maybe he'd called me in for something specific and then got distracted by those papers. Maybe this was some kind of test. Maybe he was waiting for me to say something profound.

  But I had nothing profound. Finally, I couldn't take it anymore. "Sir?"

  He looked up and blinked at me like he was surprised to see me there. "Yes?"

  "You... you asked me to come in?"

  He looked at me for a long moment. Then nodded slowly. "Yes. You can go."

  I stared at him. "Go?"

  "That's what I said."

  My brain scrambled to catch up. "Sir, did you... is there something you wanted to discuss?"

  "No." He went back to his papers. "You can go."

  I sat there for another five seconds, trying to process what had just happened. He'd called me into his office, made me sit in silence for fifteen minutes, and then dismissed me without explanation. Was this some kind of lesson? A test of patience? A power move? Was it punishment for contaminating the field? Some bizarre teaching method I didn't understand?

  I stood up. "Thank you, sir."

  He didn't look up. I let myself out. In the hallway, I stood there for a moment, completely baffled. "What was that for?" I muttered to no one. A nurse walked past and gave me a weird look. I shrugged and started walking.

  Whatever. I didn't have time to analyze Okafor's teaching methods. Murin had texted me an hour ago about a group assessment tonight. Some kind of clinical skills review that we were supposed to prep for together. I needed to get back to the hostel.

  The sun was starting to set, casting long shadows across the hospital grounds. I walked fast, cutting through the courtyard toward the main gate. My phone buzzed. Murin again. I texted and pocketed the phone and kept walking. The gate was just ahead.

  "Ashru!"

  I stopped and turned. Two figures were jogging toward me from the direction of the medical education building. I recognized them immediately. Tonny and Bonny. The twins.

  Oh shit. This was the last thing I needed.

  They reached me, both slightly out of breath. Tonny was slightly taller, Bonny had a small scar above his left eyebrow from some childhood accident, but otherwise they were identical. Same messy hair and oversized backpacks.

  "Ashru, man, we need to talk," Tonny said.

  "We really need your help," Bonny added.

  I held up my hands. "Sorry. I'm kind of busy right now. Group assessment tonight. I really can't." I tried to step around them. Tonny moved left. Bonny moved right. They'd done this before.

  "It'll just take a minute," Tonny said.

  "Five minutes max," Bonny agreed.

  "Guys, I really—"

  "Two minutes."

  "—can't—"

  "One minute."

  I looked at the wall of identical desperation in front of me. "What do you want?"

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  They exchanged a glance that meant they'd rehearsed this and were about to launch into a speech. "We need you to come to our room," Tonny said.

  "For what?"

  "Just for a little while."

  "To do what?"

  Bonny grabbed my arm. "Just come with us."

  "No. Absolutely not. Whatever this is, I'm not interested."

  But they'd already flanked me, each taking an arm, and they were surprisingly strong for guys who spent most of their time avoiding anything resembling physical exertion. They walked me toward the residential blocks like I was a prisoner being escorted.

  "Guys! This is kidnapping!"

  "It's not kidnapping," Tonny said. "It's... forceful persuasion."

  "That's literally kidnapping!"

  "We'll let you go after," Bonny promised. "Just help us first."

  I kept protesting as they marched me across campus. A few people glanced our way but nobody intervened. Probably assumed we were friends messing around. I was definitely not friends with the twins.

  They pushed me into their room and closed the door. The room was exactly what I expected, looked like a natural disaster had targeted it specifically. Clothes everywhere, empty food containers stacked on the desk. A basketball in the corner next to a violin case that looked like it hadn't been opened in months. Two beds, both unmade. The smell of stale instant noodles.

  "So now show us," they said in unison.

  I stared at them. "Have you two lost it?" I gestured at the room. "Oh wait. My bad. You two don't have any to begin with." I crossed my arms. "So which one you want to see?"

  Tonny grabbed a crumpled piece of paper from his desk and shoved it at me. It was their medicine rotation evaluation form. Completely blank. Not a single signature. Not one comment from Dr. Bennett.

  I looked at it. "Shit," I said. "What the hell is this?"

  "It's our evaluation form," Bonny said helpfully.

  "I can see that. Where are the signatures?"

  They exchanged another glance. "That's... that's why we need your help."

  "You need my help because you have a blank form? You need my help because you didn't attend a single day of your medicine rotation?" I waved the paper at them. "Even the people who skip constantly manage to get at least one signature. You two didn't manage a single one!"

  They started talking at the same time.

  "It's not our fault—"

  "—we went to him today—"

  "—he was being unreasonable—"

  "—wouldn't listen—"

  "Stop!" I held up my hand. "One at a time."

  They looked at each other. "We went to Dr. Bennett today," Bonny said. "To get our signatures."

  "And?"

  "He asked us what we learned and we said... you know... Everything."

  I closed my eyes. "You said everything."

  "Yeah. We said we learned a lot from him. Thanked him for being such a great teacher."

  "Please tell me you didn't actually say that."

  "Word for word," Tonny confirmed. "It seemed like the right thing to say!"

  "To a man who's been a doctor for forty years and can spot bullshit from three rooms away."

  Tonny winced. "Yeah. That became clear pretty quickly."

  "He asked us to be more specific," Bonny continued. "And we couldn't really... remember anything specific."

  "You couldn't remember anything from a two-week rotation?"

  "It went by really fast!"

  "So he took us to a patient," Tonny said. "Guy with ascites. Told us to examine him."

  "And?"

  They both went silent.

  "You didn't know how to examine someone with ascites." I said.

  "We were nervous!"

  "You've been in here for three years. You should know basic abdominal exam by now."

  "We know it! We just... forgot. In the moment."

  I looked at the blank form again. "Let me guess. He gave you a lecture."

  "A really long one," Bonny confirmed.

  "And then he gave you two days to learn every basic examination for every system. And if you fail, you get a pending."

  Their faces confirmed everything. "A pending," I repeated. "You know what that means, right? You'll have to repeat this rotation. Over and over until you pass. Even if you're supposed to be somewhere else. Even if you're in your final year. You'll be stuck in Medicine until Dr. Bennett decides you've learned something."

  "We know."

  "And you have two days, and you want me to teach you everything."

  They nodded in perfect unison.

  I laughed. You shameless bastards. "That's impossible. You can't learn a year's worth of clinical examination in two days. It's literally impossible."

  "We're not asking for a year's worth," Tonny said. "Just the basics. The stuff he might ask."

  "The stuff he might ask could be anything! Respiratory, cardiac, abdominal, neurological, musculoskeletal—he could pick any system, any exam, and expect you to do it correctly."

  "We'll study hard."

  "You don't study at all! That's literally your whole problem!"

  Bonny grabbed my arm. "Please, Ashru. We're desperate. If we get a pending, our father will—" He stopped.

  Tonny looked away. "You know what our father's like. He's already disappointed we're not as good as our cousin. If we fail a rotation, if we get held back..." He didn't finish.

  I knew about their father. Actually everyone did. The man had wanted doctors, got twins who wanted anything else. He'd made their lives hell for years. Forced them into this program they never wanted, and made them feel like failures every single day.

  It didn't excuse their laziness or three years of skipping classes and mooching off everyone else's notes. But I understood, a little, why they'd rather hide in their room than face a rotation they never chose.

  "That's not my problem," I said.

  "I know." Bonny's voice was quiet. "But we don't have anyone else to ask."

  I looked at their desperate faces and at the room that screamed two people who'd given up on trying. At the basketball and the violin, symbols of lives they weren't allowed to live.

  "Fine," I said. "But not here. We need somewhere quiet, with space to practice."

  Their faces lit up. "Really?"

  "Really. But you're going to do exactly what I say, when I say it. No complaining, no giving up, no sneaking off to play basketball or whatever. Two days of actual work. And if you slack off, I walk. Understood?"

  They nodded frantically.

  "Good. Get your stuff. We're going to the empty anatomy lab."

  "The anatomy lab?" Tonny's face paled.

  "It's the only place open this late with exam tables. Don't worry, the cadavers are locked up. You'll be practicing on each other."

  They looked at each other, then looked at me. "On each other?"

  "You're going to learn physical exam by doing physical exam. I'll demonstrate, you'll practice. And you'll do it until you get it right."

  Bonny grabbed his bag. Tonny grabbed his. They followed me out the door like lost puppies. This was going to be a long night.