"Steady hands, Doc." A man compliments as he walks by, clapping him on the back.
"Thank you, Geno." Yoongi says, holding his arms out so that his assistant nurse take his gear off of him. She discards it into the bin and he thanks her before washing his hands up to his elbows and disinfecting his skin.
He goes into the private bathroom and relieves himself. Learning to hold his pee during long surgeries has become a skill for him. It's a very necessary skill working in the business that he does and he'll die on that hill.
Yoongi exhales as he flushes the toilet before washing his hands. Waving them in front of the paper towel dispenser, he waits for the towels to come out from the bottom. He rips two pieces and wipes his hands on them, effectively drying them off. Using those same two towels, he grabs the handle to the door and pulls it open before tossing the papers into the trash.
He steps out into the hall and smiles as a nurse passes him.
"How are you, Mrs. Vanguard?"
The woman returns his kind smile as she waddles by. She puts a hand on her pregnant belly and blows out a breath of air.
"Over it. I'm ready to go home. Kid's got his feet in my ribs."
Yoongi chuckles, showing all of his teeth with his laugh.
"I know it's a lot on you. Luckily, you go home tonight and won't have to come back for eight weeks."
"Woo hoo." She cheers out of breath as they walk into the break room. Mrs. Vanguard walks to the fridge to grab her lunch bag. "All that's left now is pushing out a six pound baby of a ten centimeter hole with medicine that doesn't even work in the birth canal. Yippee."
Yoongi laughs as he makes himself a cup of coffee. "Ah, the gift of motherhood. A few hours of a little trauma in exchange for eighteen years of a kid who may or may not even like you half the time."
Mrs. Vanguard laughs, putting her arms into her coat. "Nine months of growing a baby who's first word is gonna be 'dada'. A scam, I tell ya."
She shakes her head as they joke. She zips and buttons up her coat before waving to him. "Good night, Doc. I'll see you in a couple months."
"Good night and good luck." He calls to her. "Send me pictures of the little one when he's not swollen and angry looking."
The woman chuckles and holds her stomach. "Will do. I'll tell Gary about the surgery success as well. You know he'll ask."
"Oh, yes. Tell him to hold onto something stable while you're pushing, too. He's a surgeon. It'd be embarrassing for him to pass out in the delivery room."
Mrs. Vanguard snorts and laughs. "I'm sure you'll get a very embarrassing text about his state of unconsciousness. Have a good night!" She says as she gets into the elevator.
"You, too." He waves as the doors close. Yoongi turns back to the counter and adds his two creamers and three sugars into the cup. He stirs them in and tastes it, smacking his lips before nodding to himself. He discards his trash and walks with his cup of coffee into his office. Closing the door behind him, he takes out his phone and sits at his desk.
Yoongi checks the time before starting on his paperwork for the night. He takes a large gulp of his coffee, picks up his pen and starts his notes.
######
Fifteen minutes across the city, one exhausted mother tiredly rushes around her home. She's looking for one thing in particular. One specific pacifier. It's the only one that her son takes. It doesn't matter what brand it is, it doesn't matter if the shape is the same. It's this specific pacifier or nothing at all.
She's sure she had it earlier in the day. She gave it to him for his nap a few hours ago. It was in the living room, she's sure of it.
Harper shakes out the throw blanket groans when she doesn't see or hear it hit the wall of floor. She tosses the blanket to the floor and pulls out the couch cushions. It seems like a long shot but knowing her, it's not that far off. Her son's things get lost in places that she knows they never even were. She swears this apartment is haunted or something.
Her son screams at the top of his lungs from his crib and she sighs as she tears the living room apart.
"Oh, God. I'm coming, Onyx, I'm coming. I'm just trying to find," she gets on all fours to look under the couch. "..your pacifier."
Harper stands up and runs her hands through her hair, pulling at the roots as she tries to remember where the hell she put this pacifier. She takes deep breaths and becomes agitated that she can't remember.
With his incessant screaming and her own annoyance from losing the one thing that can keep him calm, she becomes frustrated with herself. Her eyes water as she stares at the ceiling.
"Why? Why me? What have I done?" She asks as her voice cracks. "What did I do?"
Onyx's cries become extremely loud, trailing off at the end as he screams using all of the air in his tiny lungs. Harper rushes to her bedroom and grabs him out of his crib. His face is red and stained with tears. His fists are balled up and clenching as he cries. His body trembles as he continues to scream.
Harper holds him, rocking him as she looks around the bedroom once again. She really can't find the damned thing and it's bothering her to the point of almost insanity. She isn't crazy, she knows where she saw it. So why can't she find it?
She looks down at her son and goes through the checklist again to find any other way to soothe him. She checks his diaper and he isn't wet. Feeling his forehead and neck, he is a little warm but she isn't sure if that's from his screaming or if he has a fever.
She walks to her dresser and opens his baby bin, taking out the thermometer. She sits on the bed and struggles with him to put the tip of it under his armpit. She holds it there, waiting for it to beep. As he continues to cry, she begins to cry as well.
Her bottom lip trembles and she bites down on it, peeling some of the skin off. As the thermometer beeps, her hands begin to shake. It reads 98.7. Normal.
"Okay, what else?" She picks him up with her trembling hands and walks to the kitchen. She's already tried to feed him. She's tried twice since he started screaming two and half hours ago. How he even has the lung capacity for this, she has no idea.
She makes him a bottle while blinking quickly to keep the tears from eyes. They fall down her face but wiping is the least of her concerns. Filling the bottle with four ounces of water, she puts in two scoops of formula and shakes it up.
Looking at the time on the drive, her panic increases. It's almost three in the morning.
"Here, baby. You gotta eat. It's been like five hours. You're scaring me, Onyx."
She cries as she tries to feed to the baby, once again. She teases some milk on his lips, letting it roll onto his tongue so that he tastes it. His tongue sucks against the roof of his mouth and Harper cries in relief as she puts the nipple into his mouth. His crying bushes to whining hums as he hungrily drinks his milk.
She sways side to side, standing up as her son eats. She doesn't even want to risk sitting down and upsetting him again. So she stands and paces her floor as she feeds him.
Onyx drinks all of his bottle and quickly becomes tired. Harper burps him and he spits up a bit. She wipes his face and rocks him to sleep. He whines as he dozes off but stays asleep. She tries to put him in his crib and he slowly starts crying again. Picking him up before it can escalate, she watches him fall right back to sleep.
"How am I supposed to clean like this, Onyx?" She whines in distress. She looks around her apartment and groans. Her hands are still shaky and she feels ready to drop. But she has to clean her house.
Holding her son in one hand, she begins putting her living room back together as best she can. Her left arm grows tired so she switches Onyx to her right. This slows down her cleaning process being that she's right-handed.
She cleans and puts the dishes away with her left hand. She folds the blanket using both hands but slowly so she doesn't wake her baby. Wiping the counters down is the easiest part of her cleaning.
When she's finished with the kitchen and living room, she walks back to her room. She picks up all the clothes and throws them into the hamper. She doesn't check to see if they're actually dirty or not. At this point, she doesn't even care. They're all getting washed together.
By the time she's done cleaning the rooms, she's sweating and fatigued. She wants to take a shower but with Onyx in her arms, it's going to be impossible. She'll just wait until tomorrow.
When he goes down for his first nap, she'll take that time to herself to shower and brush her teeth. Maybe she'll even have time to shave or wash her hair.
Harper scoffs humorlessly at the thought.
As if.
As her exhaustion takes over, she sits in her bed, propped up with pillows. She places some on either side of her as well. If she lays all the way down, Onyx isn't going to sleep for as long.
Harper shuts her eyes as she cradles her son and gets some sleep for however he'll allow her to this time.
Next door in his own apartment, Yoongi lays on his back, staring at the clock. He hasn't gotten a lick of sleep since he's been home. He showered and got right into bed. Despite his burning eyes and aching body, sleep is a luxury that some nights, he cannot afford.
He rolls onto his stomach as the crying of his neighbor's baby seems to finally stopped. They've been next door to him for two and half months and it's been this way for almost all of that time.
Some night, the infant's crying is only a few hours like tonight. Some nights, it's all night and he has to put in earbuds to get good sleep in.
Yoongi doesn't blame the woman for her crying child. Well, some nights he does if he's being honest. But that's only when his exhaustion mixes with his frustration and makes him judgmental for a moment. He snaps out it quickly, trying to be understanding.
The only people that he ever sees go in and out of that apartment are the woman and the car seat she carries her baby in. This lets him know that she only has one child. It also makes him certain, that she's a single mother. He's sure that she's taking care of her young baby on her own. What present father would allow her to go through this on her own?
Finding his stomach to be a much more comfortable position to lay in, Yoongi's blinking slows at the clock strikes three a.m.. He has four hours of sleep that he can get in.
Four hours before his next eight hour shift. Maybe he can sneak in some sleep on his lunch. He can recline the seat in his car and get some extra time in.
That'll help him out a bunch.
A|N
#Welcome to one of my favorite books that has ever been produced by my brain. I'm literally so excited for this. I have SO many cute things and big moments planned for this. I hope you're ready to feel every emotion there is to have :)
#Also, I tried to find exactly what happens with surgeons after they're done with a surgery for the beginning of this and I couldn't. It annoyed the hell out of me so I just assumed they did everything in reverse with the nurse taking the stuff off the way she'd help him put it on :)