Post 191: Come with Me

Food poisoning? Virus? Migraine variant? The possibilities, the differential diagnoses had already gone through my mind, but I really had no idea what was wrong with me. All I knew was that I was kneeled over a toilet in an empty patient room on the Pulmonary Care ward of Northville Community Hospital, waiting for this horrible feeling to pass. It had started as nausea, retching, in waves. That was still with me, but I now also had a constant headache and my vision was swimming, to boot.

Ugh. Here it comes again.

Dry heaving, retching. I didn’t have anything left.

Ugh ugh ugh.

The staff here at the hospital had called my office and supposedly Vida, my APRN, was on her way to relieve me, to finish seeing my patients here. Maybe she was on the floors already. I felt terrible about it, pathetic, like I was failing my patients, and had argued with the nurses when they suggested they call her. I had insisted I’d be fine…but I wasn’t fine. I really had no choice, and my patients needed care. I knew the staff here was worried about me the minute I walked in the door, looking pale and weak, swimming in my too-big jacket and slacks. They were concerned I shouldn’t be here in the first place. And now here I am barfing over a toilet.

Another wave, I felt it approaching.

Deep breath, deep breath…here it comes.

I heard the door to the outside room open, someone had entered. I’d been given the private little lavatory of an empty patient room to use in my sickness.

Deep breath, deep breath…hey.

Oh, ahhh….that smell.

The feeling was passing.

“Oh, sweetie,” came her voice, from behind me, cutting through my nausea, clearing it away like a cool breeze through miasmic fog, “you poor thing!”

Melissa.

I turned my head, from my seat on the ground next to the little toilet of white porcelain, and looked up. She had stepped from the outside room into the bathroom doorway. I blinked, my vision clearing as my world came into focus, centered on her.

Melissa.

“Vida told me you needed some help,” she said, immediately leaning down in concern, hands on knees. Her face was a mix of sympathy, worry, and something else. But it was her plump, tan cleavage that first captured my eyes, drawing them like a magnet. Dark, soft hair fell around her shoulders and her perfume settled over me like a warm, gentle embrace. “I heard you weren’t feeling well, I came right away,” she said, voice gentle and warm but betraying a hint of excitement, “I thought that you might need…me.“

She smiled, allowed me some time to drag my gaze up to her throat, past her chin and jaw to her face. Her eyes watched me, were fixed on me, seemed intrigued. My sickness was crippling, making me miserable and pathetic, but it was passing, quickly, right in front of her eyes. She was seeing how, miraculously, I was beginning to-

“Feel better?” she asked, fighting back a wider smile. She then reached down her left hand to me, her right still on her knee. In a tight, dark-gray skirt, matching fitted jacket with a blue tank underneath, she appeared like an angel, a halo of light coming from the doorway behind. I gulped, and for a good long moment could do nothing but look at her. Even just the sight of her was making me feel better, less sick, more normal. I drank in her smile, her air of maternal care, and my eyes flitted to her cleavage again. Below her ribbed, blue tank she wore a black bra of some type; I could see the straps. Her bulges of soft, womanly flesh, her overdeveloped breasts filled my vision and held my gaze for a breath too long. She giggled, and my eyes shot back to hers.

“Take my hand, sweetie,” she said, and as I reached up for it, felt her take my clammy hand into her warm, soft one, her voice was full of promise:

“Let’s get you home...”

==========================================