Love and Loss

18. Reality

10:42 am
Los Angeles, CA
Cameron

"Here." I handed Deija a cold bottle of water as I sat down next to her in the slightly cushioned seat.

"Thanks." She said timidly, opening the water and taking a sip.

I stared at the side of her face for a moment, watching as she knawed on her lip nervously.

"You okay?"

She nodded, "I'm fine."

Before I could say anything, a loud voice rang through the fairly crowded ER.

"Deija Walker?" A short nurse, with brown hair and purple scrubs spoke from the front of the room. She held a brown clip board in her hand as she looked around the room.

I looked over at Deija who looked up at nurse, not moving from her seat an inch.

"Deija Walker!" The nurse called again.

"Deij." I nudged her arm softly, she looked over at me, a nervous expression across her face. "You don't have to do this."

She looked at me, her lip trembling just a little. It happened so quickly I wasn't sure if I was seeing correctly.

"Deija Walker!"

"Yes I do." She said, standing slowly from her chair. I stood up behind her, following as she began to slowly walk towards the nurse. When she stopped in front of the short woman, she looked up at her with a smile.

"Deija?"

"Yes."

"I'm Nurse Fox, you can follow me back to the examination room." She introduced, turning and walking through the double doors. "How are you today?"

"I'm okay, how are you?"

"Getting through the day." She chuckled. She opened the door to a room in the back, allowing us to walk through first. "Deija if you don't mind you can take a seat on the examination table please."

As the door shut behind the nurse, I took a seat on one of the small chairs as I watched Deija slowly climb onto the small table.

"Here are a few questions I would like you to feel out, just to answer some questions about how you are feeling, give me some contact information etc." She handed over a brown clip board to Deija. "And then after you finish that, I'll need you to undress top to bottom and put this gown on. I'll give you a little time to do so, before coming back, okay?"

Deija hesitantly grabbed the gown in her hand, nodding slightly.

"Okay, sweetheart." The nurse smiled timidly before walking out of the room, shutting the door behind her.

I watched closely, as Deija slowly but surely filled out the paperwork in front of her. Only a few minutes had passed when she put the clipboard and pen down beside her and looked over at me expectantly.

"Could you...?" She twirled her finger around, gesturing for me to turn as she dressed.

"Oh, yeah." I quickly turned in my seat, busying myself with my phone and she began to undress.