Perilous (Harry Styles)

chapter 33

I entered the hospital and was immediately welcomed by the smell of disinfectants that somehow always lingered in every hallway. No matter where I went, the smell seemed to follow me.

Ignoring the woman at the counter, I walked right to the nursling track where someone was supposed to wait for me.

“You have to be Zoey,” a middle-aged woman cheered as soon as I rounded the corner.

I eyed her outfit from head to toe. She was wearing some kind of white jeans, white – God help me – Crocs and a dark blue shirt. Her name tag read Emily.

“Hi?” I replied, kind of unsure.

“I’m Emily,” she continued and motioned for me to follow her, “and these are your working clothes.”

I scanned the pile in front of me. All I saw was a mess of white things, and a pair of white shoes that you’d normally wear at home. It could definitely be worse.

Emily showed me where I could change and told me to meet her outside in five minutes. I politely thanked her and quickly stepped into the clothes she had offered.

The pants were a size to small and I felt like I couldn’t breathe properly in them, but after some jumping jacks and a few squats I at least could close them. The t-shirt fitted perfectly and wasn’t see-through and the slippers were genuinely my size.

I checked myself in the mirror and decided that white didn’t suit me.

Sighing, I tied my hair into a ponytail and spoke a few encouraging words to my reflection. I could do this, this would be fun.

After exactly five minutes, I had convinced myself and left the room, nearly running into Emily who was waiting in front of the door.

“Perfect. We’ll start with some easy tasks. You will learn most things at school, but this week I’ll just explain where you find all the things you need for work and what you have to do for now,” she explained, already walking out of the room.

I had a perfect view of her bum, that could definitely use some squats, and her long light brown hair that hadn’t seen a hairdresser in ages.

Pushing my dark thoughts aside, I put on a smile and simply followed her, for once keeping my mouth shut.

On the way to wherever we were going, we passed the psychiatry track where my former psychologist had her room. From past experiences, I knew that it was right next to the nursling station.

Maybe it really was supposed to calm people down, but I only could imagine that screaming babies would upset some people further.

“Okay, here is a list of all the babies. You’ll find their names and birth dates in their cases as well, but this list helps you to see how much weight they have gained. Here are the-“ and on and on she went.

The task was simple and boring. I only had to check the body temperatures every hour and calm down the babies when they were crying.

After three hours, I got bored and was told I could take my break.

“Just go back to the room where I took you first. It’s the nurses’ room and you can take your break there or at the cafeteria,” Emily introduced me.

“See you in thirty minutes,” I said, smiling.

Once I exited the room with the mostly sleeping babies. I took a few deep breaths. So far, so good.

Emily had told me that I would meet some of the other nurses soon, and that work would be more fun. The best part, according to her, was still to come.