"Oh!" The nurse exhaled deeply. "Oh no!"
She grabbed my upper arm with her cold, dry hands. She stood closer and closer with her toes until her face was only a few inches away from me.
"Open your eyes," she ordered.
I met her affectionate gaze staring at me. She stared into my eyes, searching. She drew the hair from my forehead to the back of her head. Her breath smelled like black licorice. She put her hand on my face, then took my hands up. She raised her palm and looked closely.
Finally, after feeling seemingly endless, she raised her head and said softly: "If you don't leave here, you will die today."
"what?"
"If you don't leave here, you will die today," she repeated, explaining the fact in the same tone.
"What are you talking about?" I said. "How to do it?"
"How did other people die? Your heart will stop beating," she shook her head. "However, it's too early. It's too fast for you."
"I thought I was just a brain shock, a broken hand, an injury, etc. etc. You said I was okay. Remember? I am a lucky girl. Today is my lucky rì?"
"Something is wrong. The machine ーー" She swept around the room with her hand, pointing at all the monitoring equipment, and possibly all the machines, "I can't see it, but I can see it."
But the doctor said ーー"I started.
"But the doctor said," she imitated my tone. "No matter what the doctor says, you will die today. When you die, he will scratch his head and say, but the machine says she is okay, everyone will pat his back and say, yes, the machine says she is okay and you—" She pressed her index finger to my painful breastbone to emphasize her point. "If you don't leave here, you will still die."
"Then how do I get out of here?"
"Run, run, and jump out of the window. The joke of opening the window. If I were you, I would stand up and go out without hesitation, but if you don't stand up right away, you will die. Here you are. Maybe because You are thirsty, you were lying in the hospital when I poured water for you, maybe because you were lying alone on the toilet when I was waiting for you outside the door. So maybe it’s coming soon. Something is coming. . I don't know what it is, but I can feel it. Maybe you should hurry up," she insisted.
"Are you really going to tell me this? What I heard from you is that if I don't escape the hospital, I will die?" I said.
"You have no problem with your ears. You heard it right," she said. "Soon. It's getting closer."
"Look," I said. "I think I'm going crazy. Seriously. I really think so, if I'm crazy, really crazy, I think I should stay here."
"Maybe you are crazy," she said, "but soon, you will be crazy and die."
I looked down at my hand, wondering what she saw, but all I saw was the hand. My hand is my hand. My legs are my legs. I looked at the hall downstairs. It was surprisingly quiet and empty. The peach and ash linoleum stretches to infinity. I looked at this persistent little nurse, at her serious black eyes and serious face. I am totally at a loss. I shook my head. No, I just want to lie down. I don't want to go anywhere. I just want to sleep.
"Now," she said the word slowly and clearly. "The doctor will come for rounds soon."
I shrugged. What does she want me to do
"I will help," she said. "Don't die before I come back."
She waited for me to confirm that I would not die when she was away. I have to say, "Well, I won't die until you come back."
Then she disappeared into the blur of the corridor. She runs very fast.
When she came back, she was wearing a pair of blue washing pants and a clean but very popular Harvard T-shirt. All nurses are wearing similar clothes, scrubbing pants, and t-shirts.
She found my plastic bag in the small closet next to the bathroom. The dress I wore at the wedding was stained with blood, but my flip-flops looked quite durable. My wallet is in it too.
With her help, I stood up and shuffled to the bathroom. She walked in with me and closed the door.
"Hurry up," she said. She wanted to help me take off the hospital gown. Her cold fingers moved violently on the tie behind the dressing gown. "wear clothes."
I put on scrub pants and a t-shirt. Harvard. She dragged the flip-flops on the floor, and I just had to slide my feet in. I wish I had a pair of socks. My feet are cold.
She combed my hair into a tight ponytail with her fingers, and soon I was dressed, and the wallet was in a front pocket of the washing pants.
I looked down. I look ridiculous. The sterile suit was short on my long legs and left at least six inches from the hem of my flip-flops. To change the angle, I looked in the mirror. Yes, I still look ridiculous. My nose is swollen, my eyes are black, and my face is as painful as it was blown by the wind. The airbag caused a lot of harm to me.
The nurse looked me up. She was not completely satisfied with the result, but she shook her head and said, "We can only do this. Let's go now. Have a purpose. Go. Go fast."
She opened the door.
"Come here. Are you from Portland? He's in Portland." She handed me a folded note card with an address, neatly handwritten and pinned. "He can help."
I picked up the note card and stuffed it into the pocket of my laundry pants. We left the bathroom together. She walked forward, looking down the corridor, walking one first, then the other. I waited behind her until she made me safe.
I walked along the corridor, as fast as I could, but I couldn't fool anyone. Thankfully, the corridor is empty. I walked towards the exit sign. Just as I was going through the two doors, I looked back. The old nurse stood at the nurse's post, looking down at the writing board. She closed the metal clipboard with a snap, barely looking in my direction, she briskly walked across the hall and walked to the other side.
I opened the double doors, walked through the other two corridors, and moved the "exit" sign to the "exit" sign, just like connecting these points. No one noticed me. I can't help but think that people really should pay more attention.
Outside the hospital, I encountered a cool mist. We are not very close to the sea, so I can smell it, but I imagine I can. I wish I had a jacket or something. I embraced myself with my arms to protect against the cold, and walked slowly, painfully, step by step, pulling the distance between me and the hospital as quickly as possible. The nurse is right. Something is coming. Getting closer. I can feel it too.
I found a four-hour pharmacy a few blocks from the hospital. They have rows of beach supplies. You may forget to bring or not realize that you need these things-shovel, bucket, sunscreen, sun hat, marshmallow, marshmallow baking fork, kite, beach ball, rain boots.
I bought a sweatshirt, a pair of $10 canvas sneakers, some stockings, ibuprofen, water, a pint of ice cream, and a spoon.
The woman at the cash register looked at me up and down with knowing eyes.
"Oh, dear," she said. "Boy friend?"
"No," I smiled sadly. "Car accident"
"Oh, sorry, dear." She put the things I bought into the bag, and kept muttering how people drive like crazy people, thinking that the road belongs only to them, why can't people slow down? "You go home, huddled up in sex, sleep, and sleep until you feel better."
"I'm planning to do this," I lied. "Can you call a taxi for me?"
"Of course. Take care." A 99-cent lipstick smile on her face.
I was waiting for a taxi at the door. The car was warm and I was eating ice cream. The cashier went back to the magazine she had been reading before I walked into the store. I can hear her tapping her bubble gum from time to time, but other than that, everything is quiet.
As soon as I finished the ice cream, the taxi stopped.
"Goodbye," the cashier shouted. "Take care, dear!"
After I climbed into the car, the taxi driver put one arm across the top of the bench, looked back at me, and asked, "Where to go?" Then "I rely on!" when he saw my face.
"Yes," I agreed. "Please come to the candy shop for coffee."
The taxi took me to the Candy House Cafe. It's still early, but I think someone might be there. No one knows better than me that running a breakfast shop is an early job.
The front of the restaurant is quiet and there is no sign of activity. I went around behind. I moved like Frankenstein's monster, staggering in pain. The secret operation is not on my side.
I came here by taxi to do some deep reflection. Can a soul be searched in thirteen minutes? Yes, if you have enough time.
In fact, I allow myself to have a ten-minute sympathy gathering. I am really pitiful. I sat in the back seat and cried bitterly, my belly was stuffed with chocolate ice cream, my self-destructive thoughts were oh-sad-me, my boyfriend-need to be angry-manage bruised and beaten faces.
I almost called a stop in the ninth minute. I just want to give up. I'm mad. I feel that I have lost control. For a while, for a while, I am willing to let my story end in the back seat. Ask the taxi driver to shovel me out of the car with a shovel, and then decide what to do with my poor self.
The tenth minute was my brightest moment. It was a mess last night, the man who came out of the hospital this morning is incurable, but my Nana always tells me to believe in myself. Like a frog in a boiling pot, if I live too well, the world will boil me to death. I need to trust my instincts. My instincts tell me that I am not crazy. Some things do happen to me. I am the only one who can stand up and walk out of the kitchen. It's time for me to jump down. If I wander outside and get burned alive, I will be cursed.
On the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth minutes, I made a plan to find Mr. Silas Nelson first, and then what
Before I had time to figure out the next step of the plan, the taxi had taken me to the Candy House Cafe. The next step of my plan has not been decided yet. Obviously, I could have spent fourteen minutes.
The taxi driver, not a man of knighthood, said nothing. I cried in his back seat for ten minutes, and my eyes were swollen. Before the taxi came to a complete stop in the candy store parking lot, he reached out to pay. My cash supply is pitifully small and almost exhausted. He took my money and rushed out of the parking lot, leaving me behind him without exaggeration.
I dragged my road crunchingly through the gravel parking lot and came to the back of a small restaurant that was born in a shiny soda shop.
"Hello?" I shouted loudly.
The back door was open and the lights were on.
"Hello, is anyone around?"
nothing.
"Hello?" I yelled hoarsely. My head trembled with the effort, and I cringed.
A giant, I mean giant, opened the door, holding a garbage bag in one hand and a half-eaten doughnut in the other. (To be continued) (End of this chapter)