True Love

The man shuffled slowly to the door, dragging his right foot. Opening it, he invited us in.

As he cracked the door, I could the man. He man had on a white shirt, neatly pressed, as though it had been meant for a tie. His back was bowed forward, as though he carried an invisible weight.

"What's going..." I asked, pausing midsentence.

As the door opened further, an old woman came into view. She was lying on the floor, naked and listless. Her dark features stood out against a backdrop of pink bedsheets.

"What the hell happened?" asked Lisa, squinting as she turned her head to one side.

I grabbed the monitor and the drug bag, stepping past the man.

"She fell off the bed," he explained. "I think she hit her head."

"Uh hu..." I said, nodding quizically. "I see."

The woman lay on a faded tile floor, her body drenched in a pond of urine. Notebooks, old medicine bottles, and half-eaten bags of Dorritos littered the floor around her. She felt cold.

"HELLO?" I called out, rubbing my knuckles into her chest. She recoiled slightly, moving her arms.

"I'm going to go get a backboard," said Lisa, handing me an IV setup. "You gonna be okay?"

"Yeah. Sure," I said. "I'll be fine."

As Lisa walked out of the room, I turned to the man. "What sort of medical problems does she have?" I asked.

"Umm..." he stammered in a slow, drawn out sort of way. "I hope I the right thing. I hope...Diabetes. I think she has Diabetes...I wasn't sure if I should call you."

"You did the right thing, sir." I said, trying to reassure him as I searched the woman's arm for a vein. "How long has she been like this?"

"Ohh...umm..." he shuffled forward, bringing a white hand to his blanched lips. "I think twenty, maybe thirty minutes."

"I...I see," I said, sliding an IV catheder into the old woman's arm. "Why did you wait so long to call?"

"I wasn't...I wasn't sure," he stammered slowly, his face turning from white to red.

After securing the IV, I prepped an amp of Dextrose. Pushing it into the vein, I rubbed on the woman's chest again. "Carmen," I said, "Carmen! IT'S TIME TO WAKE UP! I've got lunch here for ya. It's a ham sandwich in IV form. C'mon now. Wake up!"

"She doesn't speak any English," the man offered, reaching out his right hand.

"Ohh...Okay." I muttered, my brow furrowing. "Do you speak any Spanish?"

"No," he shook his head. "I don't."

"Right." I proclaimed, nodding blankly.

Just then, Lisa walked in with the backboard.

"Is Carmen your girlfriend?" I asked the old man.

"Yes," he nodded.

"Right," I nodded again, looking back up at him. "Right. " The truth dawned on me.

Lisa and I placed Carmen on the backboard, affixing a hard collar to her neck. After the Dextrose--the ham sandwich, as it were--she started to come around.

"Estoy frio," she muttered, shivering violently.

We covered her with a blanket as we made our way out to the ambulance. The old man stayed at home.

Carmen--the old woman--was fully conscious by the time we arrived at the hospital.

As we wheeled her through the door, I whispered in her ear. "Esta hombre en tu casa es tu novio?"

"Si," she said, still trembling uncontrollably.

"What's the story?" asked the doc.

Lisa pointed at me.

"Well," I said, "you're never going to believe this, but she was having sex with..."

"Wha??" the doctor quieried.

"You know," I explained, making a crude gesture with my hand, "doing the nasty." As I explained the story, a crowd of young doctors gathered. When I finished, they stood in stunned silence.

"Anything else?" the doctor asked, still blinking his eyes.

"Oh yeah," I said, flashing a smile. "She doesn't speak any English and her boyfriend doesn't speak any Spanish."

Comments

[Russ]

Great blog! I have enjoyed reading your entries and will continue to do so in the future. Keep up the great writing!

Russ