Chapter 5

Oh, Jeeze. Now I was going to get it.

It was Saturday morning. I was lying in the extra bed that had been brought into Anthony's room. I woke up to see his doctor, my best friend Jeff, leaning over me, shaking my shoulder to awaken me.

My best friend. It hit me how unusual that was. And how true. This man, twice may age, in charge of most of the areas in the hospital I was involved with as a candy striper and recently married to a woman who was almost ready to deliver her fourth child, was my best friend. While not the only person in the world who thought I was worth something, he was definitely the first.

I swiped my hand across my mouth to wipe off any semen that may be laying there. Somehow, I thought a big puddle of the stuff might have gathered during the night as I drooled. It felt like I should have a big flashing sign on my forehead, warning and informing all who came near that I did disgusting things with drugged up patients.

"Good morning, Sunshine. How did you sleep?"

"Pretty good."

"Did you take good care of our patient?"

I glanced at him. He seemed to want a serious answer.

"He was pretty far out of it from that shot. I put some ice on it and tied him down, but he fell asleep pretty fast. I think he probably slept straight through."

"That's good. Why don't you go in the bathroom and clean up, then we'll check him out."

I went into the bathroom and used the toilet. I came out a few minutes later, worried I might have taken too long. My body is used to doing its thing when I got up.

"Ah, there you are. Well, one thing we don't have to worry about is paralysis."

I was all set to ask why he said such a thing when all Anthony had wrong was a broken collarbone. Paralysis is usually the result of spinal injury. Then I saw what Jeff was looking at. The blanket was tented just below my patient's waist.

I think I turned red.

"Nancy, it's perfectly natural. You do know how to take care of it, don't you?"

I know I turned red.

He lifted up the blanket.

"Come here, Sunshine."

I just knew he saw some lipstick on him, even though I didn't wear any. Or maybe a hickey. Can a guy get a hickey on his prick from oral sex?

"Look at that, right there, just below his scrotum. That's salt, Nancy. The poor guy probably sweat up a storm out on the football field and he never got a shower. You're going to have to bathe him as best you can. Do you need some help?"

It took a couple of seconds for me to realize he'd asked a question, play it back so I could figure out what it was, then answer. My attention was on the stalk that was sticking out above the scrotum, not any salt on the leg below it.

"Uh, no. I should be able to manage."

He looked a little concerned.

"Are you OK?"

"Yeah, I'm fine. I'm probably not awake yet."

"Ahh. Maybe we should go down to the cafeteria and get some food in you. Some good old caffeine to jump start your brain."

"That would be nice."

"OK. It doesn't look like Bubba here is going anywhere. Let's go get some breakfast and plan out our strategy."

He dropped the sheet and took my arm, leading me out of the room.

Dr. Bradley is one of the funniest men I've ever met. You'd swear he thought the cafeteria staff was the most inept group of people in the world the way he carried on every time he got in line. This was old, these were leftovers from the mission down on skid row, this slop had been rejected by pigs.

The help loved him. And it was nothing for them to leave the cash register and get him a fresh cup of coffee. When one of the gals brought out a new tray of food, they'd pile some on a plate and take it over to his table.

He always went through the charade of reaching for his wallet. I never saw a cashier accept money from him. They'd just laugh and tell him to go eat.

He played his games, complaining about the food while piling it on his plate. He sure ate a lot for someone who thought they were trying to poison him. And he pushed food on me when I tried to get by with just half a grapefruit.

"Come on, Nancy. You have to take care of a football player. You need some protein or he'll wear you out."

My immediate thought was of something I'd heard about semen being high in protein. Thank God I kept my mouth shut.

We ate and talked and I got to try some scrambled eggs with chopped up green peppers in them when one of the gals brought some over to the table. She looked as though she was ready to come when Jeff told her how pretty she looked. I could remember feeling the same way the day he asked me to meet with him to figure out how to make the hospital run better. That was in this same cafeteria. And he'd been sitting with the future Mrs. Bradley at the time.

We figured out our plan for the day. Basically, give Bubba a bath as best I could, while taking care not to disturb the injury to his collarbone. And let him sleep. If needed, I could put some ice on it. Oh, and convince him to take a pill if it looked like he needed one. Not much of a plan. The best part was staying with him all day.

We went back to Bubba's room. There was a nurse who was just taking a blood pressure cuff off his arm as we walked in.

"Is he still alive?"

She grinned back. "I think he'll live, doctor."

I noticed he no longer had the tent in front of him. For a split second I had a flash of jealousy when I thought that maybe the nurse had taken care of it for him. But I didn't notice any telltale signs. Her buttons were all buttoned and there wasn't anything seeping out of her mouth.

"OK. I'm going to spend Saturday with my family. Nancy's in charge. He's got a prescription for some dope if he needs it but he doesn't really want it. Let Nancy make any decision about that. You both know how to reach me if you need me."

With that, he gave me a kiss on the cheek and was out the door, whistling "Pop Goes the Weasel." I thought about weasels popping and some of the things Jeff had said and wondered just how much he knew or suspected. And realized that however much it was, his reaction would be to be happy for me.

The nurse wrote her information on his chart and started to roll the cart out.

"What's this about you being in charge? How do you rate?"

"I've just worked with Dr. Bradley a lot and he trusts me. I'm not really in charge."

"Well, what about the pills? It's pretty standard to deliver a prescription if there's any pain."

"Anthony doesn't want to take any pills if he can get away with it. Dr. Bradley just wants to make sure we don't make him if it isn't absolutely necessary."

"Well, it still seems a bit unusual."

"You can call him at home and talk to him about it if you disagree with anything."

"I'll just see what happens."

She exited the room. By the book, cover your ass. Any fears that she'd taken care of Anthony went out the window as she went out the door.

Speaking of Anthony, he started to stir for the first time today.

"How are you, Anthony?" No answer. "Bubba?"

"Oh, Nancy. I'm sorry. Nobody calls me Anthony. I didn't realize you were talking to me."

"Would you rather be called Bubba?"

"No. It feels good when you call me Anthony. But I'd rather make it Bubba when there are other people around."

"That's fine. But you know your chart doesn't say Bubba. I think you're going to have to get used to Anthony while you're here."

"I can live with that."

"So, how are you doing this morning?"

"I'm OK. There's kind of a dull ache up here." He reached up to his neck and frowned a bit.

"Careful. Don't move too fast. Are you ready for something to eat?"

"In a bit. I need to use the bathroom, first."

I reached into the drawer of the nightstand next to his bed and pulled out a bedpan.

"Here you go."

"No, you don't understand. I have to use the bathroom."

"You don't understand, my dear Anthony. Until I hear otherwise, you are staying in this bed. And this is your bathroom."

"But..."

"But nothing. Come on, Bubba. You aren't going to do anything I haven't encountered before."

"It's still embarrassing."

"If you think that's embarrassing, wait till I give you your bath."

"You wouldn't."

"If you really don't want it, I can get a couple of male nurses in here. But they might get carried away and shave you."

He got a resigned look on his face and held out his hand for the bedpan.

"Can I at least have some privacy?"

I handed him the bedpan.

"I'll be outside. Call me when you're ready. If I don't hear anything for five minutes I'm coming back in."

"All right." He didn't look real happy but I think he realized you can't fight City Hall. Or hospital regs.

I went outside and wandered down the hall aimlessly. My favorite duty nurse came up to me.

"Why aren't you in with him?"

"He's using the bedpan."

"Oh, you can't leave him in there alone." She started to head for his room and I grabbed her arm.

"He'll be fine."

"But we're responsible." She tried to pull away but I just held on tight.