#I HAVE EVERY SINGLE PAY STUB FROM THOSE FIVE MONTHS EXCEPT FOR THE ONE.

[morp]

Insurance is stupid

[dragonsateyourtoast]

Special thanks to @skylarklanding for a donation to the Emergency Release Fund!

By the way, head on over to that blog to get a taste of some of Skylark’s art; similar to what I’m doing, you can show a donation and receive a custom art as thank-you!

Original post of mine

Prompt, courtesy of @writing-prompt-s: “It is impossible to erase a curse, but it is possible to trade it with someone else. You’ve been wandering for years, searching for someone willing to trade curses with you, but never suspected it would happen like this.” 

-

Not many people are unlucky enough to get hit with a real curse. A true curse, a curse that writes itself into your bones and blood, not some surface-level scuff on your soul. Those happen all the time; little things like a higher likelihood to stub your toe, or a few extra minutes of searching when you’ve lost your keys.

To be cursed with a true curse is different. It’s something that you feel in your lungs when it hits you, which screams like static in your mind when it activates. It lies dormant like a disease, letting you forget it exists occasionally, until the time comes for it to rear its ugly head and it spits venom into your life once again.

You can’t get rid of a real curse. The little ones? You can polish them away, or pay a witch to get rid of them, or whatever. But the real ones... those are powered by something greater than just a little bit of malice. Those ones aren’t just throwaway statements of “I hope you always forget about your tea” or little sigils drawn on paper and burned to ash. These ones are borne of blood.

I used to sing at a church. I’ve long since abandoned the church, after they told me I was evil for a good number of things, including my curse. I didn’t even think it was that bad, at first.

When I speak, things come to me. Animals, mostly. Sometimes it’s plants. Insects and spiders and stuff are the biggest problem. Birds are the next worst. No matter what I do, if I utter a single syllable, I am swarmed in an instant with everything alive around me except other people. I laughed on a lakeshore once - the fish died when we were trying to shove them back into the water. I sighed too loudly once, on a wet night; I’d never seen so many worms.

There are online boards for people who want to swap curses. I know you can do it - curses don’t like to be destroyed, but they love to hop around. They’re kind of sentient; they like to see new things. Sometimes, if you don’t give them what they want, they’ll evolve, force you to carry them harder. Mine is pretty dormant; I never speak, but it doesn’t cause problems. It can feel my misery.

I’m not going to get into what got me cursed in the first place. It was an accident, and it wasn’t even my fault, and I’m marked forever in more ways than one.

July, 2014. I sat in my room, reading a book. I don’t remember what it was. One of my friends messaged me, asking about a movie that was coming out, and while I was checking movie times I saw someone had pinged me in the curse boards.

Curious, I visited. I’ve had this curse for twelve years, mind you, and never been able to find anyone willing to switch me. It’s just too inconvenient.

But, there in the board, was a message in a five year old thread I’d made. It read:

“Hi! I saw your notice. I’m a wildlife biologist in Arkansas. I’m cursed too, and I think that you would be the perfect person to switch curses with, if you’re willing. It seems like you’re an active member of the forums, but it’s been a while; do you still have the same curse you did before? I’d really like to swap you for it, if that’s still possible.”

What? I stared at it, uncomprehending, until I finally messaged her directly through the site. “Thanks for your interest,” I told her. “What curse do you have, so I can know what I might be getting into?”

“Nothing too terrible,” she wrote back. “When I speak, whatever I say comes out in a different language. I never know which language it’s going to be, either, and if I stop speaking or take a breath, well, it switches. It’s really a nuisance if I’m trying to communicate with people! Yours seems to be that you can’t make any sound at all; being able to laugh or speak without consequences would be an improvement for you, right?”

“It would,” I wrote back. “And it would mean you have a lot less freedom in what you can say. Why do you want my curse?”

“I can’t explain it,” she said, “I guess I’ll have to tell you if it works.”

We agreed to meet up about six hours from where I lived, at the halfway point between our houses. I wasn’t working at the time - it’s difficult to hold a job when you can’t speak or your building suddenly reveals how many rats are in it - so I gathered what I needed and left the next morning.

Six hours. I had six hours while driving to wonder why she would choose to make her life worse, by preventing herself from even laughing. I couldn’t fathom why. Did she want every living thing to swarm her at all times? I say swarm - I mean it. Just because the curse brought the animals to me didn’t make them friendly. I’d been bitten, stung, pecked, and scratched more times than I could count.

Whatever. It probably wasn’t my place to ask. I hadn’t asked her how she had gotten cursed, she hadn’t asked me, and I wasn’t going to ask her what she wanted it for if she wasn’t willing to tell me.

I pulled into the designated place - a restaurant on a tiny little highway exit in the middle of nowhere. I stood next to my car and waited.

About fifteen minutes after I’d arrived, a car pulled into the parking lot a few spaces away from mine and shut off. A woman got out - probably about thirty, with dark brown hair and brown skin, warm green eyes shining out from her face. She glanced over, saw me, and her face lit up. “Zdravo!” she called, and I knew it was her - that wasn’t a language I recognized. I nodded in response.

She pulled out her phone as she came over, and opened up a notes app. I opened mine too, watching, and she wrote down. “Songbird, right?”

“That’s me,” I wrote back, showing my screen to her. “Got everything we need?”

“Yeah, I visited a witch before I left home; that’s what I did with the rest of yesterday.” She set down a bag that had been slung over her shoulder and pulled out a shiny green box. She opened it, pulling out a length of white silk, and held out a hand. I held out mine, and she grasped my forearm; I took hold of hers.

Together, we wound the white silk around our hands and arms, binding us together, and tied it on the bottom, which is a lot harder than you’d expect. Then she looked me in the eye, still brimming with excitement. “Bist du so weit?” she asked, and then sighed and rolled her eyes. “Är du färdig?”

That still didn’t make sense, but I got the sense she was asking me if I was ready. I nodded sharply.

She began to speak. I didn’t understand it, of course. The language must’ve changed at least four times as she was trying to talk, and I couldn’t get a word of it, though I kind of understood some of what sounded like maybe French. I did catch her name, though: Maria Coombs. She finished, and looked up to me, expectantly.

My turn. This was going to be rough. I opened my mouth, swallowing; I really, really didn’t talk often. “My name’s Sage Lawson. I willingly take on to myself the burden this stranger bears, so that they might carry mine in turn.”

Above, I saw a flock of starlings divert swiftly in its path; a fly bounced off my face. “I give to this person the magic that has plagued me. I take upon myself the magic that has plagued her. Together, we give to each other.”

Nothing seemed to happen, but the starlings fluttered into a nearby tree and began to squawk at each other, ignoring me. I looked warily up at them.

“Is that it, then?” Maria said, and gasped, her eyes going wide. She clamped a hand over her mouth. The birds overhead hopped downwards into the branches surrounding us, eyes black and wary.

I hastily unbound our hands. I was still too nervous to talk. Maria picked up her phone. “Say something!” she tapped out, and showed it to me, grinning.

I rubbed my hands together. “Antoka,” I said, still feeling my voice rasp in my throat, and paused. I’d meant to say “sure,” but my mouth had just... said something else. The feeling was uncomfortable, to say the least. “... أعتقد أنه نجح.”

Maria clapped her hands together. She was beaming, brighter than I’d ever seen anybody smile. I ran my hand over my mouth, shaking my head. I could speak... though I wouldn’t make any sense. Whatever. I could work with this. I could work with this!

“Thank you,” Maria typed back, still beaming. “Thank you so much. You have no idea how much this means to me.”

I didn’t, really, but she was so happy, I couldn’t help but smile and even give a little breath of a laugh. That was more than I could’ve done before.

I handed Maria the silk back. She took it, replacing it in the box, and put it back in her bag. Already, she was humming.

You could hum, I remembered. You just couldn’t open your mouth and speak, or laugh, or sigh too loudly. Humming was the only thing that had saved me from despair after I’d been cursed.

“Maria,” I called, as she walked back over to her car with a bounce in her step, and she turned, eyebrows raised.

“Hmm?” she said, without opening her mouth.

“Ευχαριστούμε,” I said, with a smile.

Maria may not have known the language, but she understood a thank you when she heard one. She beamed at me, waved, and got back into her car.

Three months later, I got a message from Maria, the wildlife biologist living in Arkansas. It was an email that she’d sent after getting my email address from my account on the curse forums, where I’d been busy figuring out how to work with my new curse.

“Thanks,” it read, “for all the help. You have no idea what this means to me.”

Attached were two pictures. One was of her on a canoe, floating through some kind of forested swampy area, and the other was a photograph - in full color and perfect clarity - of an ivory-billed woodpecker.

[jenthehenrn]

STEAK

This is a work of fiction.

I'm a registered nurse who works at the Critical Care Unit of a busy level II trauma hospital in the Southwest. My typical shift starts at 1900 in the evening to 0700 in the morning and my typical "customers" are a motley sort:  "Homie" drop-offs (wounded gang members dumped right at the ER curb by their "friends") with gunshot wounds fixed with chest tubes and vacuums draining their lungs. Nursing home elderlies, neglected and festering deep in sores and feces. Frothy overdoses, mangled motor vehicle accidents, cardiac arrests, alcohol withdrawals, schizophrenic wig-outs, customer service complaints…you get it.

A bruised and nervous woman staggered into the ER. This wasn't the first time she showed up in the odd hours of the night. She would check with complaints of various sorts. A head bump. A twisted arm. A broken tooth. A stubbed toe. And on cue, her sobered husband would show up hours later demanding to see her. And once he was by her side he would hover on her every word. Coddle her. Taunt the staff. Raid the patient food fridge. Then he would demand they leave for home....only for her to return a few evenings later.

It was a pitiful cycle of spousal abuse and we did everything we could to get her to press charges. We left post it notes as she went to the bathroom, dropped cues in our conversations with her, arranged numerous social services consults, and even tried to isolate her from the husband. But she denied the signs, brushed off the police, and clung to her husband like a prince. And the more she kept coming back, the more pissed off we became. Our hands were tied.

I was on shift when she came in with a chief complaint of a sore throat this time. Wide red bruises wrapped around her neck; the telltale signs of manual strangulation. Unlike her previous visits, Dr. O'Neill (a young female resident) decided to admit her in the hospital for a day or two.

The husband exploded. "The fuck she's not staying in here!"

"Strangulation to the neck causes throat swelling and an increased risk for suffocation. We'll b treating her with steroids and monitoring her should the swelling get worse."

"She's stupid and clumsy, yo! She fell and hit the counter. That's what she did!"

"That doesn't match the injuries to her neck."

"Bullshit, she's fine!"

Dr. Stevens, lead doctor of the ER, approached the couple and tapped Dr. O’Neill by the shoulder. "There's an old lady with a head lac in gurney five. I'll take over."

Dr. O’Neill sighed, shaken but relieved. She took the chart from his hands and marched to the next exam room. But not before shooting a sarcastic gaze: good luck with this one.

The lead doctor smiled at the couple and introduced himself with a chirpy voice. "I'm Dr. Stevens, I'll be taking over your wife's case." Dr. Stevens had recognized the wife numerous times but never treated her. Until now.

"Finally! A real doctor,” the husband scoffed.

Dr. Stevens held out a cup of water and some Tylenol. "First of all, you're cranky and I'm hearing you're having a headache. I want you to take this and get that taken care of."

The husband snatched them with a swig and a gulp.

"Now that I've introduced myself, can you tell me what's going on?"

"Yeah," the husband interjected. "She fell on the floor and her sweater got wrapped up in her neck. That bitch doctor wants to keep her here. I ain't paying bills for that."

The doctor stroked his beard for a moment. Then he turned to the silent wife. Her head was bowed under her hoodie.

"Is this true?"

She feebly nodded. Or tried to.

"I can't hear you."

"Yes," she said hoarsely.

"Oh good. You can talk."

"Yeah, cause she won't shut up," the husband berated her. "Next time, you listen exactly what I say, babe. Or this shit happens again."

"Why! You're exactly right!" Dr. Stevens chimed in. Then he sternly turned to the wife. "Listen closely. All of this can be avoided if you serve your husband what he wants. Just imagine the trouble you're putting your husband in! A good wife should stay put, keep the house tidy, and get him a whiskey and some nice juicy steak after a long day's work. Every single night. No exceptions."

"Ha! That's fucking right. You hear that? Babe. Every night," he boasted. "We can go, right?"

"Certainly. We can't legally hold you against your will. One of the nurses will hand your wife an AMA form. Have her sign and you'll be on your way. Here's your script for a steroid and throat spray you can take to any pharmacy."

"Awesome," he sneered.

On cue, I printed up the AMA form and script and headed to their gurney, only to find the husband exit the ER with his wife in tow and her medication scripts in the trash. I marched up to Dr. Stevens at his desk, fuming.

"Ornery?" he calmly noted the anger across my face.  

"'A good wife should stay put'. What the hell was that about?"

"She's been here seven times. Patients like her, you give them what they want. Not what they need to hear."

"You just gave her a death sentence! He'll kill her."

"We'll see," he shrugged, grabbing the next chart.

Weeks passed. Months passed. The wife never returned. I started to worry but the endless flood of patients each night kept me distracted. In time I forgot about her.

Then I saw her, back in the ER. But she was different this time. I didn't recognize her at first. She had an upright posture. She had blush and lipstick on. She was colorfully dressed. Not a single scratch or bruise was on her. She sat next to a gurney where an unconcious unruly man was covered in tubes and machines.

I overheard a conversation between his nurse and Dr. Stevens:

"32 year old male alcoholic found unconscious and not breathing at home by his wife. Unknown down time. CPR was initiated on the field. ROSC achieved in 30 minutes. GCS 3. Hasn't moved at all."

"Any reflexes?" Dr. Steven’s asked.

"Absent. Brain CT's crap. Ammonia level's 280. Liver is toasted. His wife is over there. Says he's been taking Tylenol for headaches."

Holy shit, it was the husband! I stared at the bloated guy on the gurney. His face puffed, his skin yellowed, and he had a rounded protruding belly. He didn't look anything like her husband except those women tattoos I remembered on his arm.

Dr. Stevens made his way to the gurney. "Ma'am, I'm Dr. Stevens. We've met before."

"I know," she shook his hand.

"There's no easy way to say this, but your husband has alcoholic hepatic encephalopathy and anoxic brain injury. We've placed him on life support to keep him alive but the damage to his brain is done. I'm sorry."

"Will he ever wake up?"

"I'm afraid not."

She tearfully shook her head. "Every dinner, I cook him steak and whiskey. He was so happy, he'd sleep it off. So I cooked more."

"Every night?"

She nodded. She would go on to say how less angry he became. He was able to sleep more. There were less arguments, less beatings.  She had more freedom to clean the house, dress herself, go shopping, handle the bills, and cook meals. All while unknowingly poisoning her husband. With Tylenol and steak and whiskey.

There was a long moment of silence between the two. Dr. Stevens patted her gently on the shoulder then walked away.

The wife later took him off life support and he died the next day. I never saw her again. Rumor has it she went through an epiphany. She sold the house. Went to college. Found a job. And married a better man.

To this day, she still cooks. Mostly dishes of lean chicken and a glass of fine wine. But steak and whiskey is her specialty, and she saves them for those special occasions.

- OrneryJen RN, CCRN