Common Ground
Seth
The merger transition meeting was supposed to take forty minutes.
It hit the ninety-minute mark with Emily and me still standing on opposite sides of the same argument, neither of us willing to be the first to fold.
"Your protocol adds an extra eight hours to intake," she said, tapping the printout between us like it was a verdict rather than a proposal. "Eight hours, Seth. For patients who are already in crisis."
"My protocol exists because Gifted Hands' current system missed a drug interaction three months ago that nearly killed someone." I kept my voice level, though the accusation in her tone had already found its mark. "I'm not interested in speed if it costs us safety."
"And I'm not interested in bureaucracy dressed up as caution." She crossed her arms. "You
