Nodding, the doctor placed his iPad on the bed, and looked like he was going to make himself comfortable. Shit.
“Yeah, he’s been doing it a while, and we keep saying to the girl that’s in with him to stop, but she isn’t listening. Bets they’re listening now,” he snorted.
When it looked like they were going to continue talking, I shifted in my seat to stand up. Unfortunately, the rubber feet on the bottom of it shifting over the floor made a small farting noise getting everyone’s attention – including the kid’s again.
Blushing as both men looked at me in surprise, I tried to think up a solid excuse. When I couldn’t think of any past the obvious one, I just sighed and said it. “It wasn’t me, it was the chair.”
Surprisingly enough, it wasn’t the men who answered. “Yeah, right!” The little snot next door yelled. “Just like it wasn’t me who did it when we got donuts yesterday.”
Glaring at the curtain, I missed the moment when the doctor walked closer to me. In fact, it was fair to say that when I heard his voice right next to me, I almost reenacted the chair fart with a real one.
“So, your x-rays show no breakages, but it’s very bruised and swollen, so it looks like a sprain. The nurse is going to come in and put a brace on it, and I want you to follow the instructions on this sheet for a couple of days,” he placed a printout of directions on the bed in front of me. “Ice it like it says and make sure you do the exercises there. Do you need a prescription for these painkillers or do you have them?”
Looking at the Acetaminophen and Ibuprofen instructions, I leaned down and picked up my purse, pulling bottles of both out of it. I was a female and my periods were not my friends. “Got ‘em.”
“Excellent. I’ll get you an appointment for a checkup in three weeks because of the amount of swelling and bruising you’ve got…”
“How did you actually hurt yourself?” the sheriff who’d been quiet until that moment interrupted.
“The baby’s head,” I replied distractedly as I tried to put the bottles back in my purse without upending the whole bag. Why was it so easy to get them out one handed, but not back in again?
A hand plucked the bag away from me, followed by both bottles, as he asked, “The baby’s head? How?”
Watching as he easily plonked the bottles inside – not even fumbling once, the smug bastard – I mumbled, “It was big and Jose squeezed my hand,” I trailed off as he pulled out a pair of panties (clean ones) that I kept in there for emergencies. Seriously, my period wasn’t my friend, it was my worst enemy, and I hated it. Some months I didn’t even have any warning, it just turned up screaming obscenities at me, so it paid to be prepared. Not that I could say that to this guy, or the doctor. I don’t care that men knew women got it, they didn’t have to know the finer details of mine.
I only just stopped myself from saying something to the sheriff about overstepping the boundaries, and honestly, the only thing stopping me was the kid next to us and the doctor who was laughing quietly beside me. Otherwise I totally would have let him have it, officer of the law or not.
Wanting to get back to Jose, I asked, “Am I done? Can I get back upstairs now?”
Still snickering, he nodded and waved toward the gap in the curtain. “You may once the nurse puts your new accessory on your hand. But don’t forget you have to follow the instructions. See you in a couple of weeks, Ms. Newton.”
Thanking the man, I turned back to see that the Sheriff had put my bag down and was now frowning down at my injured hand. “You right handed?”
“Yeah, it’s gonna make finishing the unpacking a bitch. And when school goes back in two weeks and if it’s not better by then, that’ll also be a bitch. Eating will be a bitch…”
“Wiping your butt will too,” the annoying kid piped up.
Shit it all, he was right!
Ignoring that comment completely, and acting like my face wasn’t thirty shades of scarlet red, I continued, “I can sometimes paint and draw with my left hand though, so that should be ok for class.” I really should’ve stopped there, but for some reason I continued on and divulged something very personal to me. “Just before Mom died of cancer, she woke up one morning feeling like she wanted to draw. She thought of a peacock feather and drew the most beautiful picture of it. The detail in it is absolutely perfect, and it almost looks real. Sometimes I get like that with my left hand, it can do pieces of work my right one can’t.”