Beneath the Red Sand

4 || Chapter Four

"This may sting a bit," the nurse, Emilia, says, patting my arm in a gesture meant to reassure me. She doesn't need to. I can take the stitches she's about to sew into my forehead. I've been expecting them. "But, hey, at least you're concussion-free."

"I'll be fine. I'm ready." I take a deep breath to steel myself and clench my hands together in my lap. It helps me tune out the sounds of chatter from other nurses and patients in this large, open examination room. The antiseptic scent of the room fills my nostrils, clean and strong. I wrinkle my nose to dispel its sharpness.

Emilia swabs some kind of gel over my wound, and it cools the skin there. In a minute, the area around it tingles, and then I start to lose sensation. She arches an eyebrow at me. "A brave one. I like that."

I can't help but chuckle. "Thanks. I've had worse injuries from dance."

"Just a slight pinch, five stitches, and I'll have you fixed right up. It'll heal into a pretty scar — and make you look tough, too. Perfect for a field researcher. So, tell me, what interested you in this sort of work?"

I like how she rolls her Rs and the lyrical trill she gives some of her words for emphasis. Her skin, a rich caramel, stands in stark contrast to her white lab coat. Her thick brow furrows in concentration as she works. With deft hands, she pinches my skin together and pierces it with her needle. The dissolvable thread she uses tugs the folds closed. Instead of the sharp sting I expected, a dull ache spreads from one side of the gash to the other.

All the adversity I've overcome so far fuels my determination, and I find myself locking gazes with Emilia. "I'm going to be the first to discover something amazing out there."

In dance, I've always competed to be the best. Why shouldn't I strive to reach the highest goals here, too?

Her jaw drops, but she doesn't stop sewing my gash shut. "Brave and ambitious. With your attitude, you might be the first one to make a great find." She pulls the thread through my skin again and tugs the stitches into tight, neat laces. I wince.

To distract myself from what she's doing, I study my surroundings. The whitewashed-and-metal infirmary, lined with industrial shelves and cabinets on the walls and fluorescent lighting overhead, is a spacious wing. This room holds about twenty examination tables, most of which are full. Nurses tend to people needing casts, stitches, or minor wounds cleaned. It's pretty noisy. All around me are groans and muffled sobs, conversations about the crash,  doctors shouting orders, and the clink of medical instruments being set onto metal trays. In the adjoining ward, the critical patients — the ones who will take time and intensive care to heal from surgery or devastating burns — stay in partitioned, makeshift rooms.

She smiles at me. "Almost done. You're doing great."  After two more stitches, she ties off the thread.

I force a smile. "That wasn't so bad."

"All set." She tosses the remains of the sterile stitching thread into the trash and surveys her handiwork. My head no longer aches, thanks to a numbing cream and a dose of pain medicine. With a smile of approval, she hands me a care package of antibiotic salve and painkillers. Her deep brown eyes crinkle. "I want to see you back here in a few days to make sure you haven't gotten an infection."

"All right. Thank you," I say, and wander over to my mother, who is sitting on an examination table in the far corner of the room with her left arm outstretched. A doctor is plastering a cast onto it, and I remember she'd injured it in the crash. So she did break it.

When Mom sees me, she smiles. "Your forehead looks so much better, sweetheart. I'm glad the gash wasn't as bad as we thought." She brushes a stray black curl from my face and tucks it behind my ear.