Borealis 2015-2016

Rule of Rib Dirt and pollution loose in the outside world fear the whitewashed walls of the waiting room that are sterile with bleach and scarlet shadow puppets. A graveyard voice reads out obituaries of patients, even the ones who harbored hopeful eyes but greying skin. Soiled on the walls were images of apathy, sluggish blood of collapsed cases, and dents in the plaster by white knuckles. The pungent taste of medicine caked on patients’ tongues and striped out in a white goo, but inhaling through the nose deemed much worse for the lungs. “Athena Monty,” a voice of static resonated from a door frame. “Room 93. Dr. Kane will see you now.” “Thank you,” Athena echoed, bowing her head to the receptionist in efforts to refuse her glower. Her tan fingers crawled up her body as she rose to her feet with a blonde tress around her in- dex, swinging from strand to strand during her journey. The plaque of ROOM 93 flicked in front of her, beckoning other eery thoughts to corrode over the current ones. Her body dragged in a breath when her trembling hand coiled around the door handle, and her lungs hid the tightness for a mo- ment. “Athena! You move quick, very quick,” a fidgety figure addressed upon her entrance. “I barely had time to clean up from my last patient.” “Well, if you weren’t ready for me, then why did you tell the nurse that you were ready, Dirk?” Athena scowled with a grimace, flexing her palm at him in opposition to his protests. “Doesn’t matter. Can you at least clean up now?” Her hand fluttered to the bloodied wrap. “You know, you’ve really become the doctor that I always feared you’d be.” “A professional one? Ena, you have to understand what dealing with death and sickness twenty four seven will do to you. A women died in my care today, and it was the first time I didn’t cry.” His voice wasn’t flooded with empathy. Athena narrowed her jaded jade eyes, her breath clotted between her teeth, “That’s wonder- ful. And maybe when my time comes to die, you’ll be standing over me, cackling until your face turns blue.” “That won’t happen, Ena. We haven’t concluded whether or not the baby is strong enough to break your ribs,” darted from his lips, tone biting. “That’s why you’re here today.” “I would be happy to get started if you would wipe down the damn bed and get a new wrap for it for god’s sake!” she met his tone with heightened pitch. Her hands curled in tension release, one around her stomach and the other looming over the red splotched patient bed. “I was getting to it. I would never let you settle for this” Dirk cooed in his pursuit. His gloved hands tore off the crimson soaked plastic, discarding the crumbled up remains in a makeshift pile in the corner. A tub of bleach, slicked on a white cloth, polished the bed clean. White. White. Ev- erything was white. If it wasn’t white, it was red. A stupid gradient of colors to have to see every day. Dirk covered the wet cleanliness with a new sheet of paper wrap. “All set for you, Athena.” Her footing dragged to the bed, gliding her further back against the sound of amateur fire- crackers. Up to the ceiling, her eyes trained. “Just do it. Get it over with so I can leave.” His mouth clouded with imaginary cotton balls. “Anything for you.” The ache of pressure orbited around her swollen belly, and the screen beside her head flick-

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