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Part 2

“I should’ve known that it was coming to this, but I must have been blind…”

A week later I was back to work. One night the O.B. department was slow so I spent the second half of my shift down in the short handed E.R.  

I liked working there but at the same time I could hate it with a passion.

This particular night I was feeling pretty good. I had gotten back into the swing of things, I was balancing between delivering babies and being puked on, spit at, and bit.

“This is my last case of the evening. Gimme a good one.” I said to Carol, the E.R. charge nurse.

“Not much, just a simple suture removal.” She replied as she handed me the chart. 

I liked working the E.R. when it was short handed because I got to do things I normally didn’t get to do--like remove sutures. It made me feel important.

“Oh, thank god! Remove some sutures then I can get out of here.”

“Are you sure you didn’t come back too soon?” Carol asked looking concerned.

“I’m sure. I’ve just had some things on my mind lately.”

“Your friend? That was a really brave and stupid thing you did for him ya know.”

“You don’t have to tell me that. I still can’t believe I did it. I’m gonna go take care of this suture removal—this—“ I glanced down at the chart: Izzard, Eddie- Male, 39. I then looked up at Carol with an evil look. “You handed me this chart on purpose, didn’t you?” I accused.

With the best innocent face she could muster she sheepishly replied, “I have no idea what you’re talking about. Now go take care of him.”

And so I started what seemed like a long walk to the room where they put him.

I hadn’t seen him since that morning he took me home. I wondered how he was doing, how his bruises were—inside and out.  And the kiss, what did it mean? Was it just a friendly “thank you” between two grateful people or was it more?

Whatever the case I was about to find out. I took a deep breath and opened the door.

“Just can’t stay away from me, can you?” He joked as his eyes met mine.

“It seems I’m always coming to your rescue.” I shot back. “Now let’s see what we can do about your stitches. Can you believe they have to come out already?”

“No actually I thought I would have to live with them.” He chuckled.

As I sat down in front of him, my knee brushed against his.

“I’m sorry.” I said nervously.

“ It’s quite alright.” He smiled.

I got my implements of suture removal in order and put some gloves on.

“This may hurt a little.” I warned as I removed the bandage covering the stitches.

Then I situated the magnifying glass over the wound.

“You should feel some tugging as I remove them but it shouldn’t hurt too much.”

“Just to be safe I suppose I should ask, how many times have you done this?” He inquired.

“Once for every language in the European Union.” I laughed. I had remembered that part of “Dress to Kill”.

His bruises were almost gone and he had kept the makeup away from the bandage and kept the sutures clean as instructed.  I was relieved to see him healing but my heart was still going a mile a minute, I thought it would beat out of my chest.  “Say something, damn it!” I thought to myself over and over.

“You’re healing very well, how have you been feeling?” I asked, hiding behind the veil of my training.

“Very well, but something has been bothering me. ” He replied.

“Oh yeah? What’s that?” I stammered nervously.

“It’s been over a week and I haven’t shown you around London like I promised.”

“That’s true. But I couldn’t have gone last week. I was recovering myself.” Everything I said seemed to sound so mean.

“Don’t you think I know that?” He snapped and looked me straight in the eye.

“Don’t move your head!” I yelled. “You’ll have a nasty scar if you move.”

I put the scissors down and tried to calm myself. “Look, I didn’t mean it like that. I have never once blamed you for what happened to either of us, I never even thought it. It was my decision and they were the ones at fault. They were the ones who did this—not me, not you. “ I took up the scissors and resumed my work.

“Why did you get involved?” He asked a little more calmly, moving his head back into position.

“I don’t really know. Maybe because I saw his friends, maybe I was having a bad day and couldn’t take it anymore. I had been working here that day—the whole day—without a break. They need to hire more people but they don’t have the money so they take nurses from other wards and make them work the E.R.

They only hired me because I would work cheap. I wanted to see the world and the pay didn’t matter so much as it was London.  That day they had a barrage of stabbings, shootings, beatings, and people getting run over. Some of them lived, some of them didn’t. I wanted to go somewhere and just forget the whole day. I heard someone yelling, I turned around and saw you and this guy and I snapped. “

I looked into his eyes one last time put the magnifying glass away and started to finish the chart.

“So you took pity on me?” he asked in an ambivalent tone.

“No, I guess I couldn’t stand to see one more person end up dead for no good god damn reason whatsoever. I hate working down here and I’m going to ask them not to send me here anymore. “ The tears started to well up in my eyes.

“You shouldn’t have a scar or anything but if you have any problems come back and let us know.” I tried to regain my composure, looking down at the chart while I wrote my notes. “I’ll have to take your chart to a Doctor to—“

He put his hand under my chin, moving my face to his, and kissed me. This time it was a little more passionate than when I had kissed him the week before outside my apartment. I pulled back with my eyes closed. Slowly I opened them and stood up.

“I—I’ll be right back.” I said rather abruptly and ran out of the room with his chart.

I stood outside with my back to the door and put my fingers over my lips as tears were still clinging to my face. I wiped them away and walked off. 

I found the Doctor and got his signature. My next stop was to talk to Carol who was working the desk.

“I hate you! Why did you do that?” I snarled

“You needed to talk to him, right? I knew he was going to need his stitches out soon so I saved the chart for you. “ She tried to explain but I was on the warpath.

“I’m never speaking to you again! He kissed me!”

“I know he did last week, you told me.” She interrupted.

“No, I mean just now, he kissed me!”

“And then what happened?”

“I ran out.”

“You RAN OUT?” She managed to say before her jaw hit the floor in disbelief.

But that didn’t stop me from continuing my tirade.

“What am I supposed to be overjoyed he finds me attractive? Am I supposed to fall madly and passionately in love with him? I kissed him last week to thank him, in a way. I didn’t know he would think I had feelings for him. Just what the hell am I supposed to do now?“

“Go with it.” She said calmly. “Go back in there, let him sign his papers, tell him his free to go, and let him take you where he wants. You haven’t been this close to someone in a while.  It’ll be good for you. Besides, I wish I had someone that hot wanting to show me a good time. ”

“Shut up…” I said with a smirk on my face.

“Was it a good kiss?” She twisted the knife some more.

“Talk to you later, Carol.” I got the last word as I walked down the hallway.

After yet another deep breath I found myself back in the room. He looked up at me not knowing what to expect.

“I’m sorry, if I was out of line—“ He said with a concerned look.

“No, you weren’t. You just caught me off guard. I should be apologizing for running out like that. It was childish.” That seemed to make him feel better.

I sighed. “So, I have your papers, just sign and you’ll be on your way.”

I handed him the papers, he signed and I gave him a copy, which he put away in the pocket of his jeans. He was wearing makeup but had men’s clothes on-just a dark t-shirt and blue jeans.

I looked at him for a second, and then shook my head. “What am I gonna do with you?” I thought.  I thought about what Carol had said, what Eddie had done and what I was feeling.

“Oh, what the hell.” I said under my breath.

“Excuse me?” Damn, he had heard me.

“Do you still want to show me around?” I felt a little more comfortable with the idea.

“Of course…”

The End

*Quote at the Beginning of this part taken from “Left in the Dark.” Words and music by Jim Steinman