"You're covered under the hospital's work comp." She told me. "They'll cover the hospital bill but, unfortunately, since you don't make any salary, there's nothing to compensate you for time off work. You should've dragged yourself to your paid job and pretended you did it there."
"I'll do that next time." I said.
"Anyway," She continued. "Why don't you head up to the ER so they can stitch you up? I'll call your parents for permission to treat and send up the authorization. Then I'll start the reams of paperwork you've just dumped on me."
"Right." I said morosely, thinking about the ER. This was the busiest hospital in the Spokane metropolitan area. It's ER alone dealt with over eighty thousand patients every year. Great. When I'd come here with the stab wound to the abdomen they'd treated me right away of course. But this was not a life-threatening problem. I would not be high on their list of priorities. If I was lucky, they might get around to stitching me up before the ten-hour deadline for suturing a wound expired. The last thing I wanted to do was spend all day and part of the night sitting in the waiting room among the scrotes that this hospital attracted. It was too bad I couldn't go somewhere else to get my stitches. Any of the other hospitals could…
I stopped suddenly at that thought.
"Uh, Mindy?" I said.
"Yeah?" She asked, rummaging through her desk drawer now.
"Do I HAVE to get my stitches here?"
She gave me a puzzled look. "Why would you go somewhere else?" She asked.
I explained about the eighty thousand patients, and the wait, and the deadline. "I think if I went to another hospital, say Holy Family, I would get treated a lot quicker."
"Holy Family?" She asked. "That's clear out in North Spokane. How were you planning to get there?"
"My car." I said. "I can drive myself there."
"Is it a stick-shift?" She asked.
"Oh no." I lied. "Automatic, all the way."
She thought for a minute. "Comp will still cover it." She said. "But I don't know if your parents are gonna go for that. Since you're a minor we have to do whatever your parents say."
"Let me talk to them." I said.
She shrugged and spun her phone around, offering it to me. "Dial nine before the number." She said. "And let me talk to them when you're done."
I called Mom since she was the easiest to get hold of during the workday. I assured her I was all right but that I'd had a little accident at work that was going to require some stitches. After the obligatory mother interrogation as to my health and well being, I told her that, although I was located downtown in the trauma center, I wished to drive to North Spokane to get my stitches.
"Why Billy?" She asked. "What's wrong with getting them where you're at? After all, they treated you pretty good when you had, well, your little fight that time."
"Yeah Mom." I said. "But they're pretty busy here. I could end up waiting for hours."
"Okay." She said. "But why Holy Family? There are other hospitals that aren't so far away."
"Well Mom, I thought maybe it would be nice to go to, uh, well, the hospital where Nina works."
There was a long pause, almost long enough for me to think I'd been disconnected. Finally Mom said, "I think that's a fine idea Billy. Sometimes Fate works in mysterious ways."
"You ain't kidding." I told her.
"What was that?"
"Nothing." I said. "My supervisor wants to talk to you. I'll head over to Holy Family and hopefully I'll be home before dark."
I quickly realized why Mindy had been concerned about the layout of my transmission. I hadn't even made it to the freeway before the gauze on my hand began spouting flowers of red from the action of operating the gearshift. By the time I pulled into the parking lot of the suburban hospital my hand was throbbing and the gauze was stained with my blood.
I locked up my car and, authorization form in good hand, walked up to the emergency room entrance. The automatic doors led me into the emergency waiting area which, I was gratified to see, was not even a quarter full of people. I signed in somewhat clumsily since my right hand was my good hand and was shortly called up to a little room to be triaged. The nurse listened to my story impassively, took my blood pressure, pulse, temperature, and respiratory rate. She examined my wound and then re-wrapped it in fresh bandages. I was then sent me to the waiting room.
I sat down in one of the chairs and took a look at the magazines lying around. They were outdated even for this when. I ignored them and began to wait.
It was less than five minutes before the door that led from the emergency room to the waiting room creaked open. My heart quivered in my chest as I saw who poked their head out. It was Nina. She was dressed in a pair of surgical scrubs that hid all the curves of her body. Her hair was pulled into a tight ponytail. And she looked very pretty, very Nina as I looked at her. I knew then that I'd made the right decision by coming here. I only hoped Nina would too.
She had a chart in her hand. She glanced at it for a moment and then said to the room at large, "Matthew Miller?"
Across the waiting room from me a large blonde woman holding a crying baby with a runny nose stood up. The baby, who I figured was the Matthew Miller of whom she spoke, was tugging on his right ear obsessively. Matthew's mom carried him to where Nina stood and they all three disappeared, closing the door behind them. Nina had not seen me sitting there.
Twenty minutes passed. I sat there with my hand throbbing and my brain working on overdrive, trying to figure out what I should say to her, how I should say it, and how I could keep from saying the wrong thing. I passed a thousand scenarios through my mind, laying out a thousand scripts and rejecting them all. Finally I concluded that I would just have to take things as they came. That was one of my shining abilities.
When the door opened again Nina had a fresh chart in her hand. Her mouth opened to shout out a name as her eyes locked onto the paperwork before her, her lips beginning to form together to say the first name; William. Then she stopped. Recognition filled her face. Slowly her eyes left the chart and began to examine the waiting room. It was less than a second before they locked onto me sitting there.
I offered her a smile as she studied me, as she fought to compose herself. Finally, keeping her face neutral, her voice toneless, she said, "William, if you would follow me please?"
I stood up and walked over to her. She turned her back to me and led me into the emergency room.
The ER was almost exactly as I remembered it being on my many trips here as a paramedic. There were a few additions and coats of paint that they had yet to do, but otherwise I knew its layout fairly well. I even recognized a much younger version of one of the old biddy nurses that worked in there. Despite the relative emptiness of the waiting room, the treatment area, which only contained ten beds, was full. Several elderly people were being treated for breathing or cardiac type problems. Two children were waiting to be stitched up like I was, and of course there was Matthew Miller, who seemed to have an ear infection. Nina led me to an empty room, which was actually a hospital gurney surrounded by a yellow curtain.
"If you'll have a seat here." She said, waving me to the gurney. "The nurse will be in to see you shortly."
"Thank you Nina." I told her.
She looked at me for a moment. "Why did you come here?" She asked.
"Because YOU work here." I told her. "I wanted to see you, to talk to you."
"I don't have anything to say to you." She informed me. "And we won't be speaking any further. Sorry you wasted your time."
As she turned to go I said, "I'm not giving up that easily."
She gave me one more glance and then marched out of the room. She made a point of staying out of my line of sight. But, as I told her, I wasn't giving up that easily. This might be my only chance. Though it had been more than eighteen years, I had once been an ROP ER tech too and I knew well what their duties were.