Dissolving

Chapter 32 - Overwhelmed

I hate hospitals.

It's not like I have a lot of experience with them, to be fair, and neither are they exceptionally bad ones, but these places nevertheless give me the creeps. Whenever the sliding doors that lead to the entrance open, I almost jump out of my skin. I am literally expecting the worst as people rush in and out.

Josh has explained to me that normally, patients come in through a separate entrance that leads directly to the emergency rooms. But it is the term "normally" that stuck with me the most out of everything he told me. Because this means that it is still a possibility that really badly injured people could enter through the main doors. And I have no desire whatsoever to see anyone bathed in blood or being carried inside unconscious or, I don't know, maybe missing pieces of themselves, like limbs and stuff.

I guess it is quite simple: I am not a hospital person and the last thing on my mind is to ever work in one. It is a mystery to me how someone could voluntarily choose a career that involves working here. Gracie has talked about wanting to become a nurse, or a doctor even – although she thinks that going to university for years to become one sounds really daunting – and I cannot for the life of me understand why she would want to voluntarily be exposed to messed up body parts or intestines or whatever else it is that a doctor has to deal with on an everyday basis.

Just seeing blood, wounds or, even worse, stitches, makes me feel incredibly queasy. I barely managed to have a look at my own knee after surgery and I was very relieved that Sam and Jordan were so at ease with it all and took care of it for me. Although, any kind of injury that I have myself – and there have been a few over the years since I am a bit accident prone, as my brothers like to point out at every given opportunity – is only half as bad as seeing other people wounded and in pain.

Unfortunately, that is something that the twins figured out really quickly. Now they take great pleasure in shoving whatever kind of injuries they have right into my face, just to see me squirm. Because they are just as bad as I am when it comes to hurting themselves, this is a regular occurrence and it is really annoying when they tease me with that kind of gross stuff.

All in all, I prefer to steer clear of hospitals altogether and so far I have been quite successful with that tactic. My brothers do have the odd sports injury or get sick every now and then, like normal people do, but usually that does not require for them to go to or stay in a hospital. I only remember one time when I was around six or seven that Ben was here because he had appendicitis and we went to visit him after his surgery. It is not my fondest memory.

I don't even know why I am so bad with this. Apart from potentially seeing gross and disturbing injuries, it might be the smell of the disinfectant that makes me feel sick as soon as it enters my nostrils.

Maybe it is the negatively charged energy that seems to envelop this place, combined with the subdued mood of the people gathered in the waiting area.

The stoic expressions of those waiting to hear news about their loved ones.

The silent tears slipping down pale cheeks that are sheepishly wiped away as soon as the person crying notices that they have been found out.

The anguished screams of family members when they receive bad news.

Or maybe it is simply the fact that we are currently part of this nervous group of fellow sufferers that have involuntarily been thrown together in this vast but at the same time incredibly suffocating waiting area.

"Don't forget to breathe every now and then, sugar, okay?" Josh's voice filters through my jumbled thoughts.

I am kind of awkwardly lying sideways on a hard plastic chair with my legs curled up underneath me, my arms tightly wrapped around to hold them against my upper body. My knee is throbbing painfully because it is not used to being balled up anymore, although this has always been my preferred comfort position prior to my accident. But I don't care about any physical pain right now, so I don't move, no matter how uncomfortable I am.