B+A

Aizlynn Thursday

I open the bathroom door and step inside. Honestly. Brice always leaves all his stuff out. I stuff his things back into his Reebok duffle bag. 

Brice calls my name from a far off land, and I answer with nothing. It can wait.

A little later... "Azzy!"

"What?!"

"C'mere!"

"Where are you?!" I head down the stairs.

I hear him again. "You coming?"

"Yes. Where are you?" In the basement, maybe?

"I'm in the basement." I reach the basement stairs. "C'mon. I need your- damn it- I need your help for a sec. Just come down; I have a flashlight. You'll see it."

I blindly start down the stairs with my hand on the wall. "Where's the switch?"

"It's... It's still under construction. They do have one. They have windows, but it doesn't much help at night."

"Oh, I see it now. I'm- a- comin'." I reach him after dodging way too much construction equipment. Then I stop in cold blood. Well, I stop and stare at blood.

He grins at his accomplishment.

"Brice! What did you do!" I smack him across the back of his head.

He flinches. "Ow!" Then he glares at me. "Maybe not with a knife stuck in my hand, please. Or ever."

"Sorry. How did you do it? Let me get a towel."

"Aizlynn." He holds my chin with his free hand, since his other is sorta stuck to the table. "Listen, I'm fine. Shush. I need-"

"A towel."

"Oh, that's true. I guess you're right," he mumbles. "There's one over there."

I snatch the towel. "What?! We can't just bring the whole table! We have to take the knife off! We'll let the doctors take the knife out of your hand, though, right?" Hopefully.

"Well, as much as my truck is big, and I would love to ride in the back and have the table come crashing on to my head, you're too weak to lift it. So, no. Also, as badass as this looks, We have to pull the knife out. So, you get the easy job of applying pressure to my hand, and having blood spurt out on to your hand."

"Ew."

"Not really. One time-"

"I don't need to know. Here, come on." I set my hands around his cut and turn my head so I don't see the blood spurting on to my hand.

I hear him take a breath and all the sudden, I feel something wet on my hands. I throw my arms up in the air and spin around.

"Azzy, it's just blood," he laughs.

I gag a little. I don't know how he's so calm throughout this, but it's probably 'cause he has ten brothers, or something similar to that. Then I turn back around with my eyes closed, and he take his bloody hand to position mine again. I think I might just throw up. And I'm not the one with a knife through my hand.

His hand flings up off the table, with the knife still in it, might I add. Oh my God. I can't. Don't look. Next thing I know, I see a flash, and I turn around to see him taking a picture of his hand.

"What are you doing?!" I grab his phone from his hand.

"Wait! You have blood on your hands!"

"So do you!"

"I wiped it off on my pants! Aizlynn!" He goes to cover his face with his hands, and last second, he draws his hand back from his face. "Maybe shouldn't do that," he whispers in aggravation.

I hand his phone back to him as he's rubbing the dripping blood on his shorts.

"Thank. You." He turns it off and sticks it in his pocket. "Dude." He pauses and groans. "I still have to pull this out."

"Let the doctors do it. You can feel the rest of the pain later."

"Azzy, they would freeze it... And you know I'm scared of needles..." His face looks like a bruh.

"Right."

He grabs the knife, and it scares the hell out of me how he just rips it out of his hand. I don't know how, but I rush over to him with the towel. He spins around a couple times and curses under his breath way too much.

"Brice!"

He looks up at me with pain written all over his face then thrusts out his hand. I wrap the towel around it to slow down the blood pooling on the floor.

"Let's go!" I urge and snatch the flashlight. "C'mon! We're leaving!" I lead him up the stairs and I grab a few more towels. We head outside and get in to his truck. Then he scooches his butt forewords in his seat and motions to his pocket with his chin.

I reach in it to get his keys.

"Wait!"

"What now, Brice?"

He hands me a towel. Oh my God. Now is not the time.

I wipe my hands on it and resume. I back up onto the road, and we're off. And, of course, you can never second guess that Brice is gonna take more pictures.

When we reach the hospital, we go into ER. 

Brice heads to the desk and I grab his phone out of his pocket.

"Hey!"

"Shh. And I didn't get mine because somebody was bleeding to death." I head to the waiting room to find a couple seats.

A couple minutes later he comes back and sits beside me. I'm scrolling through his Instagram.

"Why are you following Aleesha?"

"I dunno. I got Instagram when I was, like, ten." He runs his free hand through his hair and holds his other one again. "I probably just liked her, or something. I dunno."

Then a nurse walks over to us, breaking the awkward silence. "Hello. Mr. Daniels?"

Brice clears his throat. "Uh, yeah."

"Pleasure to meet you. I'm Nurse Clancy. Please come right this way."

He motion for me to follow him into the room.

The nurse leads us and says when he sits on the bed, "The doctor should be right in."

When she heads out, she bumps in to Dr. Clint, whom I know from Brice's previous injuries. He walks in with a big smile, Brice grins back at him.

"Hello, Mr. Daniels. How are you, today?"

"Well, besides almost bleeding to death, pretty good."

"That's good. How did this happen?" Dr. Clint sets down his clipboard and leans foreword.

"Well... You see... Aizlynn, here," he points to me. "Was upstairs when it happened. So, I was all like, Oh, I'm gonna find something to do in my uncle's basement. And he's gone, so he was letting us stay at his house. And his basement isn't finished, yet, because him and his wife are on vacation and just moved there. So, I went to go search for something to do. And then I found a random knife. So then I decided to play the knife game. Y'know where you stab the knife between your fingers and try not to stab your actual body. Yeah, well, obviously it didn't go according to plan. Because I'm here."

Dr. Clint nods and basically the rest is gruesome and disgusting for my poor eyes, so I'm not paying attention.