The Flame (A Norman Reedus Story)

Chapter 4--The Hospital

Chapter 4—The Hospital

I spent some time in the ER until they could send me to X-ray.  The ER doctor reported that they didn’t find any initial breaks but they wanted to do an MRI.  Since it would be a while before they could do the MRI they were putting me in a room.  Great, I guess I’ll be here for a few hours.  It’s 5pm and I’m getting hungry.

The nurse comes into my room and says there is a gentleman here to see me and he has my bag.  I tell her to send him in.  The door to my room opens and I expect to see the cop walk through the doorway, nope it’s Norman.  Whoa, I wasn’t expecting him to bring my purse.  He saunters in and approaches my bed.  As he gets up to me he smiles and says, “Hi, Jenna right?”  I nod.  “I brought your bag, oh and I’m Norman by the way.”  I smile, “Thanks and I know who you are.”  He chuckles, “I thought you might.  So how are you feeling?”  I motion to him to sit down in the chair next to the bed, “OK I guess, I’m stuck here until they can do an MRI.  Hopefully it won’t be long, I’m getting hungry.”  He laughs and sits down. I grab my purse from the edge of the bed where Norman placed it.  “I really appreciate you taking the time to bring this to me.  I imagine you’re really busy.” He takes off his Raybans and looks at me, “Not a problem, Sweetheart, I wanted to. You did an awesome thing today, saving that girl.”  I blushed and looked down at my hands, “I just did what anyone would do, I didn’t really think about it. I have kids and I just can’t imagine them getting hurt like that.”  He looks at me, “You have kids?”  “Yup, 3 actually”, I smile at him.  He gives me a curious look, “So you’re married?”  I reply, “Nope, I’ve been divorced for a year.”  He actually looked relieved, why?

Norman clears his throat, “So tell me about your children.” I look over at him, he’s leaning back in the chair looking relaxed and actually interested.  “Cira is my oldest, she’s 17.  She is finishing her Junior year of High School, she’s taking mostly advanced and Honor Art courses.  She’s planning on going to Art School once she graduates.  Melanie is 13 and is finishing 7th grade.  She’s a good kid with a very warped sense of humor.  Travis is 10 and just completed 5th grade.  He’s all boy, constantly running around and getting dirty.  They are all into outdoor stuff and they are big gamers. They are still in Jersey with their Dad, but they will be coming down here for the summer once school is finished in June.  I miss them so much” I finish my rambling half expecting him to look bored but he’s still looking at me intently.

He smiles at me as he speaks, “They sound great.  I can tell you care a lot about them.  My son is almost 16 and he’s still up in New York with his Mom.  He’ll be down here once he finishes school too.  Maybe we can get them all together this summer.”  “That would be nice.  They don’t know anyone down here, hell I don’t know anyone here either,” I reply.  “Well you know me” He states.  I was about to say something when the nurse walks into the room.  She is carrying crutches and an ice pack.

“The doctor on duty will be in to see you shortly.  He’ll answer any questions you have.” She says in that smooth Georgia drawl.  She looks over at Norman and smiles.  Jeez that man has fans everywhere.  She turns back to me, “The ice pack may ease the pain and swelling in your leg.”  She reaches into her pocket and hands me a pill “This painkiller will help too.”  “Thank You” I reply.  She leaves the crutches leaning against the wall and tells me to use those if I need to go to the bathroom.  She then turns to Norman smiles and walks out of the room.  Norman looks over at me and I just raise an eyebrow and smirk at him.  He just chuckles.

“I really just want to get out of here,” I whine flopping my head back into the pillow.  “I think it’s best if you wait and see what the doctor says,” Norman whines back.  I look at him and just start laughing.  Once I start I can’t stop, Norman starts laughing too.  Soon we are just giggling like idiots.  This guy is a goofball and I love it.

The doctor comes in soon after our giggle fit.  He explains that the MRI is down and that I will have to wait until tomorrow for the scan.  They are going to admit me because they don’t want me wandering around in case my hip joint is damaged.  The Doctor wants to look at my leg so he pulls back the bed sheet.  He glances at Norman and I tell him it’s fine he can stay.  I managed to keep my dress on in the ER though I had to battle a bit with the staff.  The doctor slides the hem of my dress up toward the top of my hip.  “Careful there Doc, I may have managed to keep the dress in the ER but they insisted on cutting my panties off” I snickered.  Norman just smirked and looked down at the floor.  “I won’t pull it up that far, I’m a professional” The doctor remarked.  Well there it was, my badly bruised leg and hip.  Dark purple almost black bruises covering my leg from my upper ankle to the top of my hip, you couldn’t even tell I have a tattoo on my upper ankle.  You could actually see the grill imprint from the car on my hip.  Yeah, that’s gonna leave a mark.  I glance over at Norman and he looks shocked.  The doctor tells me to get some rest, he will see me in the morning and leaves my room.

The room is very quiet.  I look over at Norman and he still looks upset.  Before I can ask him what is wrong, Norman looks me in the eye and quietly says, “I’m so sorry.”   “For what Norman?” I ask.  “This is all my fault, that girl was running into the street because of me” he mutters.  I scoot over to the edge of the bed and reach my hand out and touch his cheek, “This is NOT your fault, not in the least.  What happened was no one’s fault.  The girl made a mistake just like kids do all the time.  My injury is because of a conscious choice I made, not anything you think you did.  Accidents happen all the time, and this was just an accident.”  Norman reaches up and grasps my hand, turning his face into my open palm, I feel him kiss my palm, “Thank you.”  My palm is tingling from the feel of the kiss, good lord someone help me.  We spend the next few minutes in silence, staring at each other, Norman still holding my hand.

As much as I want to spend eternity like this, I really needed to pee.  Yeah, not sexy but hey when you gotta go.  “Umm, Norm can you hand me those crutches?  I need to get up.”  He looks at me, “Where do you think you’re going?”  “The bathroom.  Why ya wanna come along?” I ask.  Norman chuckles, “I’ll help you up, but pass on accompanying you.”  He hands me the crutches and helps me to my feet.  I hobble to the bathroom.  “I’ll let you know if I fall on my ass and need any help,” I quip as I shut the restroom door.

Once I finished and hobble back out into the room to Norman, I grab for my purse, rummaging around inside for my phone and cigarettes.  “What are you up to?” Norman asks.  I show him my cigarettes and state “I’m making a break for it Jesse James, ya wanna tag along?”  Norman smiles, “Well I think I can help you that, I need one myself.”  I hop out to the nurse’s station with Norman hot on my heels.  Norman looks at the nurse from earlier, “hey darling is there a place where we can have a smoke?”  The nurse smiles and points to a door at the end of the corridor, “That exit door has the alarm disconnected, since we are on the ground floor, all the smokers here use it.  Just don’t tell any patients.”  Norman thanked her and headed to the exit.  He waited for me to hobble down there before opening the door, “Ladies first.”  “Yup and don’t you forget it Mister,” I growl.  “Whoa such a tude from such a beautiful girl” He says.  I laugh, “Sorry I haven’t had a cig in hours and I’m getting a little cranky.”  He just smirks at me and lights his cigarette.  I do the same.