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five.

delilahs pov.

"Look, you can't tell no one. Ramone will start war and I just come off parole."

"...Not even-."

"None of them, I'll do it myself. I just need to think." He eyes my dangling lanyard. I feel like grabbing his shoulders like 'Think about what? You've just been stabbed.' But I don't. Qamari was just that guy with the most concerning nonchalance about everything. Whereas Ramone was his polar opposite. A surprising bond to many.

"...Never knew you was a nurse."

"Trainee."

He nods.

The gash was long, sitting above his collar bone underneath about seven or eight stitches. Next to it, a tattoo stretches up his neck to stop at the back of his ear in cursive. It looked like somebody's name. "...Who was it?" I ask him, soaking a cotton pad in cleansing solution.

"Couldn't see." He croaks, staring into space almost like the events were resequencing right there on the table. I take a breath, press the cotton pad to the wound and swab very gently. Which to my surprise he isn't even flinching. "Too fucking dark." He kisses his teeth, snapping out his daze.

   "It's crazy that you made it here without..." I stop to measure exactly how long the gash is, and I come to find it's nearly twice my finger. "Bleeding to death."

Scratching his beard, Qamari let's out a chuckle, a mere sound from deep down his chest. "Yeah."

The quiet is deafening. Just the sound of me swabbing wet cotton on his skin.

"So they took everything?" I say, binning the moist cotton.

"Phone, squares, weed, my license." He chuckles out the last part. "What them weirdos gonna do with my license man?" He shakes his head.
"Fucking hell, that's why I try keep my Lizzie's down here." He leans forward to tap the ankle of his sock that I'd come to notice looked bulged with a wad of 20s, but not at all obvious.

"Smart." I say.

"Well not smart enough otherwise I wouldn't be sitting here with..." He yawns and slowly, goes to swing his long legs off the bed on to the floor. "seven, what's it eight stitches?" He stands, glancing down at his shoulder. "Im sorry...they got me drinking all this rehydration shit I'm pissing every two minutes." He mumbles.

I watch his bare back as he disappears in to the tiny toilet and shuts the door, subsequently the silence is followed by the sound of him pissing. The most awkward 30 seconds of my life. Then I hear the toilet flush, the running of a faucet and eventually the door opens again.

"You ready now?" I ask, reaching for the gauze.

"Yeah yeah." He rubs his eye and sits back down on the bed.

Soon enough he's watching me snip through gauze in the loudest silence ever. It's torture, so I speak.

"...You want me to write it down at least?" I ask him.

"Write what?"

"It's part of my job to..." I pause a little, to make sure I've secured his shoulder right like Charlene taught me. "Write down any serious concerns and give it to my supervisor."

Qamari blinks.

"Protocol, for safeguarding when it sounds like you're at any extraneous or criminal risk." I recite Charlene word for word as she'd sing that shit down our ears everyday.

He laughs a little. "Like police report?"

"I'm giving you the choice."

"Oh well...I'm sure we both know I don't need jakes in my face right now."