Chapter 2
The shears were still open against my arm when he turned.
I hadn't heard the door move but I saw the light change. The white square of the frosted glass got darker at the bottom and then all the way up, like someone had stepped right up against it. The surgeon's gloved hand was holding the gauze down below my bruise, not touching the purple part, and I could feel his fingers tighten just a little when that shadow filled the door.
He didn't stand up fast. He breathed once, slow, and shifted his knee so his body was between me and the glass.
"We're not finished in here," he said. His voice was calm. Not loud. He was looking at the door when he said it, not at me. "I need you to wait in the hall for a few more minutes. We'll come get you when the exam's done."
For a second nothing happened. The shadow didn't move. The fluorescent light over my bed hummed and I could hear the air coming through the vent above the tile. Then a voice came through the glass, muffled and flat the way voices sound through that thick bathroom-type glass.
Something about being almost done and needing to go, needing to hurry home. I couldn't make out every word and he didn't open the door. It was short and it was already an excuse. The kind of voice that expects the door to open because it said so.
The surgeon didn't argue with it. He just nodded once, even though the figure probably couldn't see him clearly, and said, "I understand you want to get going. I need ten more minutes to finish the exam. There's a bench right down the hall by the nurses' station. Someone will update you there."
He said it the same calm way, like he said it every day. He didn't ask permission.
The shadow stayed for another breath. Then it shifted. The dark got a little lighter, like he'd taken one step back from the glass. He didn't leave. I could still see the broad shape behind the frosted square, just not pressed up against it anymore. The light came through again around his edges.
The surgeon turned back to me. He didn't look scared, but his eyes did a quick check over my face and then down to my arm. He eased the shears closed with a soft click and set them on the silver tray next to the bed. His gloves made a little sticky sound when he flexed his fingers.
He pulled the rolling stool a little closer and sat so we were at the same level. The stethoscope around his neck swung and tapped his chest.
"Hey, buddy," he said quietly. "You're doing okay. I'm going to keep that gauze off so I can see better, alright?"
I nodded. My mouth was dry. My other hand was still fisted up against my gray t-shirt, right over my heart, like if I pressed there I wouldn't have to breathe so hard.
He didn't touch the bruise. He held his hand underneath my arm, palm up, letting my arm rest there. The purple was dark, almost black at the edges of the finger marks. You could see four ovals where fingers had been and then the round part where a palm had pressed. My skin looked too white around it.
"Can you tell me how your arm got hurt?" he asked.
He asked it like he was asking what I'd had for lunch. Soft, not pushing. He was looking at my eyes, not the bruise.
I had practiced that answer in my head on the ride here. The words came out before I could think.
"I fell on the playground at school."
It was one sentence. My voice cracked on playground. I stared at the tile wall behind him so I wouldn't have to see if he believed me.
He didn't say I was lying. He didn't say anything right away. He just gave a small nod, like he'd heard me, and looked back down at my arm.
"Thank you for telling me," he said after a pause. His voice stayed even. "I appreciate it."
He reached with his other gloved hand and gently turned my arm just a fraction, so the light hit it better. I saw his eyes move slowly across each finger mark, then the palm, then the faint yellow-green at the edge where it was older than today. He was counting in his head. Measuring without a ruler. I watched his eyebrows pull together for half a second and then relax.
He pulled a little paper sheet from the pocket of his blue scrubs and wrote something with a pen, his hand shielding what he wrote from the door. He didn't show me. He just made three quick notes and slipped it back.
"I'm going to get a better light and take some pictures with the exam camera so we have a good record," he said, still quiet enough that the hallway couldn't hear. "And I'm going to have our nurse stay in here with us. That shadow out there stays in the hall until we're completely done. Okay?"
I nodded again. My chest was moving too fast. I tried to breathe like he was breathing, slow.
May you like
He stood and pressed a button on the wall. A soft chime went off somewhere outside. He didn't open the door. He waited, his back to the frosted glass, his body still between that broad shadow and my bed, until I heard shoes squeak in the hall outside.
The shadow behind the glass hadn't moved. It was still there, a dark shape waiting, but the door stayed closed.
