The Ice Queen's Rebound

Chapter 25: Switch

Carmel Lucia

Here's the thing when you work at a hospital; if you wanna know something you ask the nurses. They're like the walls, they know and see everything but no one else will know but them unless you ask. They know if the patient in room twenty-six has a family with a shítty attitude, or if room fifty-five has a girlfriend but then there was a wife who was looking for the patient in the nurses' station, and sometimes, they even know which staff is hooking up with who.

They're better than the CCTVs and the top government agents, I swear. So, I tend to be really careful with how I look at B or how we interact in public.

"We were running a usual code on a patient who OD'd in meth, doktora. Ilang beses na siyang nag-run ng code pero eto 'yung unang beses na hindi lumingon si Doctor Bistalan sa monitor nang matagal. I guess, he was just so, so laser-focused in giving the compressions with the right beats per minute, but then that doesn't matter if there is no longer O2 in the monitor." Nurse Pauline explained habang nakatayo kami sa harap ng kanyang medication cart, she pulled it to the side so we weren't interfering with the people walking down this hallway.

After I asked around, I found out that she was the last nurse that he was with, so I tracked her down and found her here on the second floor doing her med pass.

"The patient will never wake up again." I said and she nodded again. It's all making sense now. "It's a medical error, yes, but unfortunately it's not as uncommon. I know many doctors, nurses, and technicians have done that at least once, in the name of saving a life."

She nodded again, "Yes, dra, pero mukhang nahihirapan po na tanggapin iyon ni Doctor Bistalan. He walked out after he talked with the family and I haven't seen him since."

"....you sure you haven't seen him anywhere?" Pinaningkitan ko ng mga mata si Nurse Pauline.

"Dra...hehehe..." Napakamot siya sa kanyang batok sandali.

Dahan-dahan akong napatango bago ko inabot ang laptop na naka-mount sa taas ng med cart niya at hinanap ang chart ng isa sa mga pasyente ko.

"Well, tapos ka na ba sa med pass mo?" I asked.

Tumango siya.

"Where are you going to be after this?"

She sighed heavily and said, "Triage."

I understand that sigh because being a Triage Nurse is not for the weak. Because when you're in Triage, you receive all the incomings through the emergency department door, and literally have five seconds to think where you will direct the patients based on what you see and what they tell you, and you also cannot make a mistake about where you will tell them to go, because that headache complaint from someone who just hit their head can be a brain bleed, that person that has a small bleed could be on blood thinners and has to be in urgent instead of the waiting room.

All the while you're standing there as a nurse, there are crying and angry family members asking you where is so-and-so, EMTs telling you what they had already done to another patient in a gurney, expecting you to remember all of it as if you don't have ten more admissions coming in and more visitors blaming you because they cannot see their loved ones who are currently in the trauma ward, which by the way, is not your fault.

As one can imagine, it's a sensory and mental nightmare.

So, with that in mind, I figured out a way to bribe her into giving the information that I want.

"Well....I've performed a laparoscopic fibroid removal on her," Tukoy ko sa pasyente. After I gathered the urine sample, I headed to the operating room for this procedure, trying not to think about my Beaux situation while I was cutting on this woman's flesh. I needed to focus, so I can get it over with and figure out 'my Beaux situation'.  "And she just got out of my O.R. All my floor nurses are busy, and I need someone to be one-to-one."