by Candy Crum
After picking out my scrubs, I jumped in the shower and enjoyed the few moments of peaceful hot water as I tried to shake the icy feeling of the cold, unnatural rain that soaked me in my dream. I’d been awake for a while and it still chilled me. I hurried to finish the rest of my morning routine and grabbed my hoodie, keys, wallet, and iPhone before heading out to my car – a 2014 Chevy Sonic.
The drive was peaceful until I hit the Seymour morning traffic. Everyone was either trying to get to the large factory for the 6 a.m. shift, or headed to the hospital, like I was. I was in nursing school and graduation wouldn’t come for a few more months, so I worked as an ER Tech. It was a great job and Seymour Memorial was kind of a dream place to work. Great benefits. Great people. Amazing atmosphere. Most of all, it was okay to go above and beyond for patient care there. You could kind of be your own person instead of doing step one, two, then three and nothing else. It was okay to think outside the box to make sure people were happy and cared for.
When the large automatic doors to the ER opened, my head began to throb. I groaned with my irritation for the ailment and walked in anyway. I wondered if it was a late reaction to bashing my head against the headboard that morning.
Crossing the floor seemed the same as any other day, but my nerves were shot. My stomach was rolling over, and I knew it wasn’t going to be a very good day. Even worse, I couldn’t even tell where it came from. It was totally random.
“Good morning, Kailah,” a familiar masculine voice said.
“Good morning, Sam,” I said with a smile.
Sam Riley was a really great twenty-one-year-old male nurse that I worked with. I usually didn’t go for blondes, but he was absolutely adorable. A little taller than my five and a half feet tall frame, sandy blonde hair that was cut short and spiky, light brown eyes, and a good build.
“Has the new doc showed up yet?” I asked as I took a seat at one of the long, wall-mounted desks.
“Yeah, and she’s really cool. I think you’ll like her a lot,” he replied from his seat across from me.
Doctor Sydney Austin was to be our new ER physician, but she specialized in Pediatric medicine. The doctor that she was to replace had the same qualifications, though it hadn’t been a requirement for the position. We’d already been told all about her, but had yet to actually meet her. Well, I hadn’t anyway. Seemed Sam beat me to the punch.
Another sharp pain cut through my head as my heart began to race. It must have been anxiety. I always developed anxiety with pain. Something hurts? Freak out about it… That’s how I handled things. Unfortunately, it was affecting my stomach as well. It continued to roll.
“Hi!”
I jumped as a voice came from behind me. I turned and saw a woman standing there. She was about my height with short, shoulder-length, straight, jet-black hair with caramel highlights. It was parted to the side and swept across her delicate face. Her eyes were a bright hazel and complimented her porcelain skin. Her large smile lit up her features, and I couldn’t deny the pull that I felt.
“I’m Sydney Austin. Nice to meet you…”
“Kailah,” I replied with a smile. “I’m Kailah Clark. I’m your tech for the day.
Keeping my composure while simultaneously feeling like both my head and heart would explode and my stomach would come hurling out of my mouth was difficult, but I managed – for a few moments. The anxiety was killing me. My fingers had begun to feel cold, almost numb.
“Nice to meet you, Kailah,” Sydney said with a smile. “You and I will work closely together. The nursing assistants have just as much to tell me about a patient as the nurses do, sometimes more.”
She was right. Most doctors ignored the nursing assistants because they didn’t have a degree. Personally speaking, a lot of doctors and nurses treated aids as peons. I was happy to work where that wasn’t accepted, and where I was encouraged to learn more. Seemed like Sydney would fit right in.
Sydney extended her hand to shake mine. Never in my life had I been hesitant to take the hand of another person I’d just met. Sure, if they were dirty or something like that, but this certainly wasn’t the case. I just had a feeling like I shouldn’t. I’d begun to feel claustrophobic with her standing closer to me. Her hand that close to me only served to worsen it. I put my odd feelings behind me and reached out.
The instant that her hand touched mine a shock passed through us. It wasn’t the tiny jolt that one got from touching metal or brushing against someone when static was high. No… This was something different. The moment that we touched, the dream flashed through my head. I saw Khia again. I could even hear her voice as she said my name. It echoed through my mind so strongly that I could swear I heard it somewhere in the room around me.
Sydney was impossibly fast in pulling back her hand, her smile dropping as her eyes widened for a moment. Though she attempted to be casual, it was very obvious that the step backward was to space herself from me. Even with only a little more than a foot between us, not much at all in the grand scheme of things, I could feel my heart rate fall so quickly that I thought it might have stopped. There was no adjusting to a sensation like that. My stomach rolled over.
As I realized that I was about to lose what little my stomach held, my heart jumped again and made it all worse. The up and down, back and forth was too much. I began panicking as I looked for the best escape route to the bathroom. Everything in the ER began to tremble, the vibrations moved up from the floor and through my chair. The lights began to dim, and I felt an adrenaline rush in reaction to my current state of health as well as the intense change of environment.
Whatever fresh hell this was only added to the single worst anxiety attack of my life. And there it was…
I bolted across the hall to the bathroom, doing my best to not take anyone out on my way there, though I damn near wrecked into a mobile charting station. My entire body shook as I threw up. Over and over again, until my stomach was empty and there was nothing left. When I stopped, I took a seat back on the heels of my Nikes and noticed that the sharp pain in my head was gone. It was only a slightly throbbing headache. My heart rate was normal and my stomach felt great in comparison to how it had a moment before.
My entire body felt strange, like there was an energy crawled across my skin. The ER seemed to have calmed down. The clattering around stopped. Southern Indiana… It wasn’t completely unheard of to have a slight tremble of an earthquake, but it was certainly rare.
I stood and made my way over to the sink. As I stared at my reflection in the mirror, I saw that the dark skin that I’d inherited from my Native American side was pale, and my black-brown eyes were bloodshot. I grabbed a disposable toothbrush and toothpaste from my scrub pockets. I always carried them in case someone got sick in the ER and wanted to get that taste out of their mouth.
After brushing my teeth, I turned to the door to make my exit. As soon as I reached for the handle, I felt that tingle in my hand again. I shrugged it off. Two nurses were standing and chatting to the right of the door as I exited.
“Did you feel that?” one of them said. “We haven’t had a quake in a long time. I wonder if we’ll have another.”
I was beginning to wonder if I’d imagined it in the midst of my anxiety attack. I turned the opposite direction and jumped as I saw Sydney leaning on one shoulder against the wall, her arms folder across her chest and her legs crossed at the ankle. Her eyes stared into mine. My stomach rolled a bit, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as before.
“Are you feeling better, Kailah?” she asked.
I nodded. “A little. I’m really sorry about that. I don’t know what happened.”
Her eyes narrowed as she studied me. “What did it feel like?”
She moved away from the wall and moved to stand directly in front of me. Her movements were graceful. She pulled a penlight from her jacket. I wanted to move back, but knew I’d back into the other nurses that were still standing there chatting about the quake. Though I didn’t doubt that her inten
tions were noble, I couldn’t shake how nervous she made me. Something didn’t seem right. I’d always been pretty good at reading people, and something about Sydney wasn’t right.
“Please, Kailah,” she pleaded.
I sighed. “Okay.”
Sydney smiled and stepped forward, my body once again sensing her presence. Whatever the feeling was, it worsened every time she got closer.
“Does being close to me make it worse?” she asked.
“Uh…” I stared at her for a moment. “Yeah. Actually, I was just thinking that. Weird.”
Her smile faltered a bit before she recovered. “I suppose so. Um… What other symptoms?”
She continued with the penlight, moving it quickly as she measured my pupils and their function. I ran through everything I’d been feeling, trying not to think very much on the throwing up part.
“Are you pregnant?” she asked. I couldn’t stop myself from laughing. “What’s so funny.”
“That’s impossible,” I said, still smiling. “I haven’t actually had sex.”
“Wow, that’s pretty impressive. You’re what? Twenty years old?” I nodded at her question. “You certainly are a rare one. Any dizziness or visions?”
“I’m sorry?”
Visions? That was an odd question. My dream came back again.
“Sorry. I meant hallucinations. Have you seen anything that isn’t there? Or maybe had some kind of a dream while awake?”
“No. I’m feeling much better, really. I should probably get back to work.”
It wasn’t a lie. That dream happened while I was asleep, so it didn’t count. Besides, I doubt that she analyzed dreams.
“If you start feeling weird or sick again, let me know,” she said. “Sometimes anxiety can spring on at moments when you’d normally feel comfortable. That may be why it’s stronger when you’re close to me. The more you’re around me, the easier it’ll get. You just need to get used to me is all. If it worsens, or if you have any other symptoms that I mentioned, you need to let me know immediately.” She smiled and walked away.
I sighed in relief. She seemed so nice, but I couldn’t wait to be away from her.
~ ~ ~
Something slammed down on the desk next to me, and I jolted awake. I’d only laid my head down for what I thought was a minute, but I’d fallen into a deeper sleep than I’d realized.
“Kailah,” Sydney said.
I was surprised that I wasn’t overcome with anxiety with her proximity, though I still felt a small thrum of energy crawling across my skin. It seemed like she was right, that I was getting used to her.
“Sorry,” I said. “I fell asleep.”
Sydney waved it off, shaking her head. “I told you to sit and rest. Remember?”
Hours later and my day hadn’t gotten any better. In fact, it had gotten much worse. Earlier, a small boy came in presenting with a cough and high fever. It took a while for me to get in there to do more than just a simple introduction, but once I was able, I checked him out head to toe. After getting his vitals and making him comfortable, I checked his chart and saw that he was a leukemia patient and had a list of problems. Because of that, he’d easily developed pneumonia.
Of course, I immediately told Sydney, who somehow had no idea what was in his chart. She had no idea that his labs were crazy, that his chest x-ray was terrible, and that he had leukemia. I was annoyed that I knew that before she did, but as it turned out, there was a reason. Turned out there was a damn good reason for it.
There was no chart.
None… Nothing charted on that patient. At… all.
I immediately went to show her proof of what I’d read, and there was nothing inside. It was empty. Sydney furthered that point by telling me that it was impossible to have seen labs, x-rays, or leukemia because she’d never ordered a chest x-ray, blood work, or anything else, and the mother said he’d never been treated for anything that serious. Even worse, Sydney hadn’t had a chance to order any of those things because she hadn’t been in there to see him. Only I’d seen him, and I had no power to order anything.
Sydney said that I’d been hallucinating what I saw and that I should rest. She wanted me to lie down in one of the beds, but I refused. I simply sat down at the nurses’ station and rested my head on my arm on the desk. Apparently, I’d fallen heavily asleep.
“Yeah, I remember. Unfortunately,” I said.
“Never mind all that,” she said, a broad smile on her face. “I have news.”
“Okay?” I said. I wasn’t exactly sure how I felt about her, but I knew that I wasn’t in the mood for riddles.
“Sorry to wake you, but I needed to talk to you. Out of morbid curiosity, and also because I needed to anyway, I ordered the non-existent labs that you reported to me. I just got the results.”
“How long have I been asleep?” I asked. “Those things take hours.”
She shrugged. “You’ve been out for two hours. I told everyone to leave you be.” She waved her hand again. “It doesn’t matter. Listen. You were right. The hallucination that you had was completely right. His kidneys are failing. His potassium was high, 6.1 actually, the exact number that you gave me, his white blood cells were very elevated, and with other problems that we found in the labs and things that his mother told us, we are talking to an oncologist about the possibility that he has leukemia. It certainly looks like it. The chest scan was also positive for pneumonia. You were right about everything.”
I stared at her, hearing her words, but not really processing. At that point, all I wanted was to shut down. Go home, go to bed, and sleep for days. But would I be chased in my sleep like I had been for months? The dream from the night before was certainly the worst, but they’d been getting progressively worse since day one.
“I wish I knew what to say.” I finally spoke. True to my word, I had no idea what to say. I had no idea how or what to do about anything at that point.
“I think it’s amazing,” Sydney said. “You saved his life. You should be proud of that. Do you do that often? Have premonitions?”
I shook my head. It wasn’t like me. It has never been me. It was always my mom, my paternal grandfather, and sometimes my sister, Amanda, but never me.
My eyes wandered as I stared off. There was a glare in the glass that surrounded the nurses’ station and it caught my attention. I focused on it and saw it move. Looking harder, I began to see a clear outline of a feminine face. Goosebumps rose on my arms as I made out the very vibrant crystalline blue eyes and long white hair of the woman staring back at me. A grin crossed her face as her eyes narrowed.
I jumped out of my seat, the chair falling behind me.
“Kailah?” Sydney said. “Are you alright?”
My jaw was open, my breaths coming quickly. I looked to Sydney, fighting with how to respond. What was I supposed to say? How did I not sound like a crazy person? I was seeing things. There was no way out of that one. Giving up, I quickly looked back to the glass. The image was gone. My imagination was running wild.
I gave up. “Yes. I’m fine. Thank you for–” At that moment, I was interrupted by frantic shrieking in the unit as the sprinkler system began raining down on us and the deafening alarms screamed through the halls.
Chapter Three
A soaking wet patient tapped on the glass, breaking all of us from the commotion and back to reality. Regardless of my mental breakdown, I had a job to do. A duty to the people in my charge, and I wasn’t about to let anyone get hurt because I couldn’t think straight.
Sydney and I worked together as we wrapped everyone in their blankets and rounded them up in an attempt to get them to safety. On the way out, I grabbed the backpack that I always left under the desk with my nursing books and school supplies, so they wouldn’t get even wetter than they already were.
As I stood, I saw the reflection in the glass again. There she was, plain as day, staring at me. Her smile grew, the coldness in it chilling me to the bone. I began having flashbacks to th
e dream. Her face. The rain. It was too familiar. I needed to get out of there. It was supposed to be warm and sunny all day, and it was when I came in. I needed to get outside into the sun to shake off what I was feeling.
The woman’s mouth moved, and I somehow heard the words, Hello, Kailah, in my mind. I opened my mouth to scream, but I felt hands on me. I turned to see Sydney standing there, worry on her face.
“Get out of here. Now. Run,” she said.
Run? There was no fire. It was only some stupid kid, or maybe a dementia patient that didn’t know any better that pulled the alarm. They did this. Why would I run?
“Kailah,” Sydney said, spinning me to face her completely. “You have to. Run. Get out of the building right now.”
Chills ran through me. All I could do was nod. Backpack in hand, I took off running, careful not to slip on my way out. As I exited the doors, excited for the warmth of the sun’s rays to shine on my face, I was met with gray, cloudy skies. The forecast had been clear, but the weather certainly didn’t get the memo. We’d been lucky not to have any critical patients, and they were all on the edge of the parking lot in the grass.
The wind began to pick up as I stood with our patients. Everyone began clutching their blankets close, even with them being wet from inside. I saw Sydney approach from my right. She didn’t look happy. The wind whipped through her hair as she came to stand in front of me. She reached for my hand, that shock passing through us again. She didn’t seem to care as she pulled me away out of earshot of the other people standing there.
“I thought I told you to run,” she said.
“I did. I ran out of there, just like you said.”
Sydney slowly shook her head, her brows furrowing in what appeared to be worry. “No. I meant run. You need to get away from here.”
Chills ran through me. I looked around and back up to the sky before returning my gaze to Sydney.
“I…” I had no idea what to say. “Why would you say that?”