#MRI gown with sleeves

[damon25]

Can Your MRI Gown Make or Break Your Scan? Discover the MRI I.V. Patient Gowns

MRI I.V. patient gowns represent essential medical apparel that healthcare providers use for patients who need intravenous (I.V.) procedures during scans. MRI-safe I.V. gowns for hospitals support both patient comfort and safety protocols and enable better imaging results. The construction of MRI I.V. patient gowns includes MRI-safe non-metallic components that differ from standard hospital gowns. Metal elements found in zippers, snaps, and buttons create severe safety hazards during MRI procedures since they disrupt imaging results and endanger patient safety. The gowns feature fabric fasteners and ties, which provide total safety protection for MRI environments.

MRI-compatible hospital apparel requires easy accessibility, which is one of its essential characteristics. The medical staff can access I.V. lines through designed entry points in these gowns, which enable them to insert and manage the lines without removing the garment. The design plays an essential role for patients who need contrast-enhanced MRI scans since they receive bloodstream injections that enhance image quality. Another important aspect of these gowns is comfort. These patients wear garments that use hypoallergenic materials with breathable and soft fabrics to provide improved comfort throughout lengthy MRI procedure times. These gowns exist in multiple sizes and different styles, which allows them to fit patients of different body shapes appropriately. These patient gowns enable a trouble-free imaging process by protecting both patient safety and comfort needs. The product design enables quick medical operations without causing MRI-related problems that occur when using standard hospital gowns.

[torturedtypewritersdept]

blue eyes + bruises - part two

✯ pairing:

doctor!rafe cameron x fem!reader

✯ summary:

a tragic car accident looks like it'll be the end for you, but dr. cameron is here to make sure that doesn't happen.

✯ warnings:

mature themes, mentions of anxiety, nostalgia, and fear, car accident, death of a spouse (not rafe or y/n), major surgery, injuries, hurt/comfort, angst, fluff, etc.

✯ a/n:

nothing!! please don't engage if you have a hard time with any of these topics <3 this was origianlly posted on my old blog @/illicitfixations, @/lovelornanonymity back in 2021/2022 and i have rewritten + reshared it here :)

m.list

It only took minutes to get you into the operating room, Rafe had made sure of that – doctors on stand by as you were rolled quickly inside. He continued compressions as his colleagues worked around you, attaching a ventilator quickly to your lungs and cords and wires to your chest as your beautiful satin pale blue dress was cut away from your body and its arch nemesis cerulean blue surgical garb was draped over the different sections of your body that you were bleeding from. Rafe darted from the scene, rushing into the scrub room. He washed his hands quickly, but dutifully in his pursuit to get back to you. Jenni, his favorite nurse, helped him into his surgical clothes quickly, sliding his arms through the long blue sleeves and tying the back of it. It was funny, really, the way it resembled the structure of a hospital gown; one in the same with his patients in that way. As he made his way beside you, his gloved hand found its home against your hair and he leaned down to whisper in your ear. 

“You hold on for me, sweetheart, okay? I’m going to make it all better. I just need you to fight a little bit.” 

He said softly as he stood back upright and watched Jenni work the portable x-ray machine across you in search of any cracks amidst the shell of your body. 

“What are we looking at Cameron?” 

Dr. Richardson, Rafe’s long time friend and colleague asked as he looked over Jenni’s shoulders at the x-rays on the computer. 

“Extensive bone damage to the left side, specifically the femur, pelvis, and kneecap. She’ll need more than one surgery. I need to stabilize her leg for now. There’s possible soft tissue damage, she’ll need an MRI later to be sure.” 

He replied and Richardson nodded in his direction, understanding that Rafe meant you’d need more treatment if and when they could get you safely out of the woods. 

—

Some time later, Rafe stood over your body – cold, sterile, medical instruments in his hands as he dutifully worked to put your broken bones back together. He had watched on for hours as his colleagues repaired the internal bleeding in your abdomen and your brain. His body still remained canopied in seafoam colored scrubs underneath the blue surgical garb that he was required to wear in the operating room and his feet adorned in the best tennis shoes money could buy. He had a routine for surgery and over the last two years it had become a sort of safe haven for him – it was the only place that he didn’t think about her. The routine – simple in principle – his feet viciously traveling the white floors speckled with dots of gray as he rushed patient after patient in, the dressings, the blood, the practice of the procedures he performed – it all grounded him, down to the very essence of washing the remnants from his body when the performance was over. Wash, rinse, repeat, wash, rinse, repeat – he melodically spoke over himself after every discontinuation of the processes, whether the outcome was good or bad. He whispered reassurances to every person – the same ones he had whispered to you – though he never knew which way it would go. They went into the operating room, never knowing if they’d come out. The routine of it all had saved him, but all of that was washed away, like water under the bridge, as your blood trickled off of his hands. He closed his eyes for a moment and wondered if the outcome would be the same, if after all his efforts, would you end up just like she did. Would he be unable to save you, just like he couldn’t save her? 

“Paddles now! She’s crashing!” 

Dr. Richardson yelled, as he stood across from Rafe who was tending to the fractures you had sustained from the accident. 

“Charge to 350. Clear!” 

The shock sent electricity through your body, making your back arch off of the table, but still you continued to flatline. He did it again, your body responding in the same way – jerking off the table – yet, still, you flatlined and for Rafe it was visceral. The sound of the machine echoing that horrible constant beep, signaling that there was no life connected to it – it gutted him. 

“It may be time to call it, guys.” 

Dr. Richardson muttered in defeat to which Rafe found repulsive. 

“Absolutely not!” 

Rafe’s voice boomed across your body, as he took over. No one seemed to notice the crack in it as he did his best to keep his tears at bay. Dr. Richardson simply stepped aside, he knew your injuries were too bad, there was no way you were going to survive. But, he also knew that Rafe had to feel like he did everything he possibly could. He had to know that history didn’t repeat itself because of him this time. 

“Charge to 400! Clear!” 

Rafe was the one to send the electricity through your body this time and as he waited for your heart to start, the way that he knew it would, the seconds felt like hours and just when he was about to give up — the miniscule beat sent a series of beeps across the screen. 

“There you go, pretty girl. I knew you could do it.” 

He whispered above you, before getting back to his position and continuing his work on your bones, giving Dr. Richardson room to patch up the bleeding of your internal organs. 

-

Rafe stood outside of your hospital room, looking in on you every so often, he was pretending to do his nightly charting at the nurses station and every time he put his pen to the paper something stopped him. You were all he could think about, the way your eyes pleaded for his help in the emergency department, the way you said his name when you asked him if you were going to die, and where in the hell your family must be – didn’t they care? He finished off the chart he was doing and when he opened up the next file folder, your name appeared. Y/N Y/L/N. ‘Pretty name for a pretty girl,’ he thought. He wasn’t distracted as he listed your injuries, described the incident, and signed off on the surgery he had completed. He wasn’t distracted because this was about you. 

“How’s she doing?” 

Rafe looked up from your chart to the voice of his scrub nurse, Jennifer, who had helped operate on you. Everyone in the operating room knew that Rafe had grown attached to you, though, unsure why, he had never met you before, when he looked into your eyes, something was just different. Jenni knew if he didn’t save you he wouldn’t live with himself, he couldn’t live himself. So, she was really asking more for his sake than her own. 

“She’s doing okay, right now. Not out of the woods yet. We’ll know more when she wakes up. Did you find any family?” 

He questioned, never removing his eyes from the document held within the folder that he was writing on. 

“Mother in Georgia, but can’t come up because of ‘business obligations’. Real mom of the year type.”

Jenni said, rolling her eyes. 

“Her daughter could die and she’s worried about business obligations?” 

He asked incredulously. 

“You know the type well, Rafe.” 

He scoffed at the thought of his father doing the exact same thing if it were him who was in this situation. 

“I don’t know, Rafe. Nothing surprises me anymore. So, give me a run down.”

She replied. 

“Broken ribs, torn acl, whiplash, shattered kneecap, broken pelvis, concussion, broken femur, internal bleeding, brain bleed – you name it, she’s got it. We’ve got her in a medically induced coma to give her body some time to repair itself and if she wakes up, we’ll go back in and do more surgery. Truth be told – she’s a fighter, I don't know how she’s survived this long.” 

He said with an exasperated sigh, knowing the inevitable was coming, simply preparing himself for it. Your injuries – they were a lot to heal from and he knew that firsthand.  

“I believe she has Dr. Rafe Cameron to thank for that.” 

She gave him a soft smile and he returned it. 

“You’re a good friend, Jenni and you’re way too kind.” 

He reached out, placing his palm on her shoulder and gave her a pat on her back.

“I mean it, Rafe. They would’ve called time of death if you hadn’t spoken up. You should go in there and sit with her, it won’t hurt anything.” 

She nodded her head toward the door of your room and he shrugged. 

“It’s not really my place.” 

He spoke, but it came out barely audible, almost a whisper. She heard him and she knew what he meant. 

“Maybe not, but she has nobody coming for her and I know you feel connected to her. Don’t try to fight it to protect yourself. If she dies, it’ll hurt and it’ll be sad. But, if she doesn't, do you really want to live with the fact that you could’ve been holding her hand when she woke up? Do you really want her to wake up to no one being there? She’s not Molly, Rafe and I know you better than that.” 

Jenni left Rafe to think about what she had said while she tended to another patient. She came out of the room to find Rafe, evidently making a decision and she watched him from afar as he gingerly entered the threshold of your room, sitting down in the plastic chair next to you. She smiled to herself, knowing that he was in deep, deeper than even he was aware of. 

—

masterlist:

as always, if you'd like to be added to or removed from the taglist, please shoot me an ask or comment on this post so i can keep track <3

@maybankslover @inthelibrarybtw @luvrcndy @silkylovey @yagirlwrites @obxbabygirl @rafeecameronsbitch @klutzy-kay24 @roseczbalt @akobx @allsmilesreally7 @wtfdudesblog

[agere-fics]

Doctor Papa

dni: k!nk, anti-agere, agepl4y, or ddlg-esque blogs 🍄 this blog is a safe space for age regressors and age dreamers 🍄

pairing: caregiver!papa!bruce banner x regressor!little!reader

characters: uncle thor, bruce banner, reader, mentions of: steve, bucky, sam, and tony stark.

summary: you have to get MRIs done but you're nervous. thank goodness, papa knows how to cheer you up.

word count: 1,751

content warnings: MRIs, hospital gown, reader is written like they're a child's height, no mention of a particular chronic illness, please tell me if i'm missing anything

author's note: tadaa!! all done! this is the most i've written for a one shot! very proud of myself. also, this is inspired by me having to get MRIs done recently ajfhs

♡

Sometimes stuff we've done lots of times can still seem scary; which is annoying because who wants to feel anxious about the same exact thing over and over again?

You have to get these scans done by tomorrow. With every heart of your being, you wished that wasn't true but your previous scans were too old.

UGH!

Luckily, your papa had a trick up his sleeve.

He told you to stay here, in this gigantic, empty, white walled room. It was utterly boring, there were no paintings or statues or anything. Not even toys! Well, okay, you had your Mr. Rainy Day Bear but still... At least there were floor to ceiling windows- OH, and a skylight, too. Those were always nice.

While you waited for Bruce to come back, you watched what went on outside. There was Tony using his latest invention to attempt to lift Uncle Thor’s hammer. Tony still had no idea that it couldn't possibly work! How silly of him.

Bucky, Sam, and Steve stood in a far apart triangle. They were tossing around the Captain America shield like a Frisbee, guffawing, and yelling things that were joyously incomprehensible. It looked like lots of fun. Definitely more fun than MRIs. Maybe, they would let you join in later.

The double doors of the empty room swung open and papa’s humongous green form entered.

“Okayyy, love bug, I've grabbed all the cardboard pieces from recycling that weren't gross.” He grimaced thinking about the black, moldy gunk that spoiled some previously useful parts. He shrunk back down to Bruce Banner size after dumping the cardboard into a large pile. “We should have enough for our little art project.”

“Art project?” You looked at him expectantly. Your eyes were lit up with stars of joy this time, instead of meteor shower anxiety.

The idea was to make a cardboard MRI machine. Having an art project to focus on would comfort and reassure you about the process you would go through tomorrow. If he could make it fun, your anxiety wouldn't be so bad.

“I’ve seen the machine before, papa, I can make the bestest one yet!” You hopped on your toes, giddy with tight, flapping fists.

“I grabbed your sticker books and some paint, too-”

“OH YAY, THANK YOU PAPA, THIS IS SO EXCITING!!”

Mission accomplished. Anxiety gone, replaced with magical cure Art Project™. Bruce smirked to himself.

You laid down on a tall, square cardboard piece. Bruce traced your form with a sharpie as you giggled. Once you had the correct length, you both began cutting a rectangular piece and put that piece on a metal cart with wheels.

Then, you cut out half circle pieces and hot glued them all together until it made one large 4D sphere with a hole in the middle like a donut.

At one point, the glue burned you but Papa Bruce fixed it right up and stopped the booboo pain with a cure-all kiss.

Your cardboard MRI machine may look done to outsiders but it wasn't even close. It was missing the most important part of all: the stickers! There were heart stickers, stickers with dolphins, rainbow stickers, puppy stickers, stickers that had Mr. Hulk and Papa on them, too! There were even stickers of Stevey, Bucky, Iron Man, and Uncle Thor! Papa said for your birthday he'd make stickers with you on them, too.

You also painted squiggles, polka dots, lines, circles, triangles, kitty cats, and zig zags. All of them in your most favoritest color.

“There!” You stood proudly, hands on your hips. “Now, it's very, very pretty, papa.”

Papa gave you a minute and then asked, “Are you ready to practice?”

You blinked and sighed. Defeat warping your mood. “Yeah...”

Papa spun away, put a doctor's coat on, and then turned back, holding a clipboard. “Alright, are you the caregiver for Mr. Rainy Day Bear?”

“Yeah, papa.” You lightened up a little bit.

“Papa? No, I'm Doctor Doctor. Who's papa?”

“You're papaaa!” You pointed at him.

“Okay, okay I'm Doctor Papa.” He repeated, “Are you the caregiver of Mr. Rainy Day Bear?”

You tilted your chin up and did a faux British accent. “Why, yes, sir. He's feeling very, very bad and needs a scan.”

“Ah, yes, I see that on his chart, Caregiver.” He flipped through the scribbled pages on the clipboard. “Let's have. Mr. Bear lay down on the table with his head on the pillow.” Bruce gestured with his hand.

You laid your stuffie down on the pretend bed, placing Mr. Bear’s head gently on the pillow. You patted his hand for good measure.

Doctor Papa put ear plugs into the bear's ears and placed cushy pink headphones on him. The headphones had cat ears on them. Papa raised his voice a little, “Mr. Rainy Day Bear, what kind of music do you like to listen to?”

“Doctor Papa, Mr. Bear is nonverbal.” you said matter of factly. You raised your pointer finger to the sky. “I’ll answer for him. He likes The Wiggles, Papa- I mean Doctor Papa.”

“Alrighty then, The Wiggles album coming right up.” Bruce pulled out his phone, scrolling until he found the right music. “Wiggles rave?”

You nodded, then kissed the tippity top of Rainy Day’s head. “You'll be okay, Mr. Bear.”

Bruce began to push the cardboard bed into the donut sphere. You took a big, big deep breath in.

“BRRRR BEEEP AGHHHH RRRRR DNNNN-”

That breath was immediately released back into the atmosphere. “PAPAAA!” You clutched your chest, laughing so hard your legs felt weak.

Doctor Papa continued, “DRRRRR EEEEEE EHHHHHH MRRRRRR!”

You were rolling on the floor, tears leaving your eyes. How silly of your papa!

“BRRRRRrrrrrr….” Papa rolled the cardboard bed out of the donut. “How are you feeling Mr. Bear?”

“Papa, he can't hear you!”

Bruce laughed. “Oh, yeah, right.” He removed the headphones and then the earplugs. “How is the fantastic Mr. Bear?”

You lifted Mr. Bear’s paws and had him sign to Bruce, ‘I am okay.’

“Perfect! Let's take a look at your scans here…” Papa turned around and scribbled quickly on the paper. When he faced you again, he showed you the scan. It was a poorly constructed scribble of Mr. Rainy Day Bear with a big, biiiiiiiig, heart right in the middle. “I knew it, Lots-Of-Love-itis.”

You unburied the British accent. “Quite good, sir. Well done, Mr. Bear.” You placed a hulk sticker on his paw and hugged him tightly.

Papa kneeled down and asked, “Do you want to practice with you this time?”

You gave it a thought, looking this way and that. “Hmmm, will you make the funny noises again?”

“BEEEEP BRRR-”

“Not right now, Papa!” You shouted with a smile.

“Oh, during the practice?” He waited for you to finish rolling your eyes. “Yeah, I can do that.”

“Okay…” You breathed in, out, in, and out slowly. “Let's practice, Doctor Papa.”

♡

“Big day, lille venn.” Uncle Thor said as he helped tie the back of your hospital gown. He double knotted the strings behind your neck and then the ones by your hip. “There you are. All set.”

You frowned at that, looking at Thor with big, watery eyes. “Not all set.”

“It'll be okay.” His hands (placed on your shoulders) turned you to face him. “Remember your breathing?”

“Mhm.”

“Let's do it together.” He raised his left hand as you did the same. “Climb Yggdrasil, breathe in.”

You traced up your pointer finger.

“Let's sit at the very top, hold your breath.”

You paused at the tip of your finger.

“Slide down the Yggdrasil branches, breathe out.”

You traced down your pointer finger.

Uncle Thor had you repeat that four more times, until the tears dried and the anxiety flowed further away.

“Very good, great job. Let's go see Papa.” He held your hand as he walked you towards the scary room. Worse than the boring room from yesterday.

You turned the corner and there was Papa at the computer. “Hey there! The computer’s prepped and waiting for you, little one.”

You looked at Papa, then Uncle Thor, and then Papa again. “Okay… I'm ready.”

Papa led you to the metal bed. It was rectangular and thin. A sheet was laid out on it so you wouldn't get super cold. There was a thick pillow on the end that had your favorite kitty cat pillowcase on it, which made the corners of your lips turn upwards.

Papa pressed an arrow down bottom next to the donut sphere that brought the bed down to your level. He held your hand as you hopped on and then helped position you onto the center. He guided you through a big, deep breath so that your body was as comfortable on the table as can be instead of tense.

Next came pink headphones with cutesy kitty ears on them and plain boring ear plugs so that your hearing wasn't hurt from the loud noises. Papa already set up your favorite kind of music so when the headphones were placed on you, it was already playing. Bruce furrowed his brow in question, moving his thumb up and down. You replied with a thumbs up. You were ready.

Bruce handed you a panic button to hold just in case and laid a blanket over you to keep you warm. Papa kissed the top of your head and left the room.

You closed your eyes and took a deep breath in and out.

BBRRRRRRR

‘It's okay. I'm okay.’

BEEEEEEPPP

‘Woohoo, I'm doing awesome!’

REEEEHHHHHH

‘This is boring, it's got to have been a bajillion minutes by now.’

After ten years (minutes), the machine stopped and Papa walked back into the room. He gave you a high five and bunches of praises that you only heard some of because of all the ear protectors. But you could tell by his facial expressions that he was so very proud of you.

He pressed the arrow down button again and the bed began moving to an easier height. You removed the headphones and earplugs yourself, you felt like such a big kid (in the best way)!

You stretched this way and that while making funny noises which made you abrupt into hearty giggles.

Bruce held your hand as you jumped down. Next thing you knew, he was hugging you tightly, picking you up, and spinning you around and around!

“I'm so very, very proud of you, bumble bee!”

You kissed his cheek. “Thank you, Papa!”

♡

[my-illness-and-me]

Warmth

Childhood is supposed to be warm. Soaked swimsuits against hot concrete, letting drips of water slide off our fingertips. Huddled under layers of blankets next to the soft glow of a night light. Sticky hands wrapped around popsicle sticks, scribbling on the sidewalk with chalk. Laying under forts made of kitchen table chairs and living room couch cushions. Hot blacktop and warm metal of monkey bars. Drops of ice cream stuck to red cheeks.

I longed for this warmth as a child. I reached out with small hands begging to touch it, and feel it. But I was sick, and being sick is cold. 

Cold rooms, sterile and white, with one sink, one spinning stool, and one computer. The doctors cold hands, just washed methodically under frigid water, touching my temples and neck and spine. Rolling up sleeves for blood pressure cuffs, pulling hair behind my ears for the thermometer. The smooth metal of the scale under my feet, chill creeping through my socks. Blue gloves feeling carefully for a vein. A wipe of an alcohol swab across the crook of my elbow followed by a needle. 

The saline drip being flushed into my blood, sending shivers through my body. The thin blanket brought by a nurse doing nothing to combat the violent air conditioning being pushed around the room.

I dreamt of sunshine on sidewalks while stuck in an open back gown. Imagining myself walking through grass at a park, not through a harshly lit hallway, dragging an IV pole behind me.

I closed my eyes tight so I could picture myself running around my backyard through sprinklers, because if I opened them I would see the inside of the MRI machine inches above my face. 

Cold is carefully checking my body for metal before getting a heavy protective vest placed over my shoulders, standing, shivering while being told to hold still so the x-ray would read right. 

The floor is cold, crouched down in the bathroom, sick in the middle of the night. White knuckles tucking away strands of hair as they fall into my face. A wet towel held to pulsing temples. Ice packs pressed to swollen joints. 

I missed the feeling of the sun on my skin so badly that I felt as though I was starving. I wanted to be warm like all of the other kids. But warmth was health, and I did not have that. 

I felt like they could tell that I was cold, that I was sick. I felt like I looked cold, crouched constantly with my arms wrapped around myself. And the other kids looked so warm, faces to the sky, flushed cheeks and freckled shoulders.

My dad calls me sunshine, like he knows how much I want to be warm like the rays of the sun. I would give anything to be warm, to be healthy.

I want to wrap up my childhood in light so that when I look back at it it shines. But instead it glistens like ice. 

So now I make new memories, ones so bright they distract me from my past. And I stay facing forward, reaching out towards the warmth and leaving the cold behind.

[thepoeticfox]

I'm kind of nervous for the MRI but not because I'm claustrophobic but bc I'm getting contrast dye, presumably directly in the joint, and I am worried that it'll hurt too much for me to lie still for the duration. It was 20 minutes for my wrist, I assume something similar for this. I'm going to take part of a tramadol before I go in, that's for sure. It won't be enough to handle all of whatever pain I'll be in, but it should help lessen it some.

Deep breaths and ambient music. Trying to decide what I'll request this time. Probably an ambient track. Probably "rainy cafe ambience" bc it tends to have rain, gentle clinking, and smooth jazz, a combo I find peaceful.

I wonder if I'll have to change into a paper gown. I really hope not. I'd prefer to just pull my pants down for the injection so I can pull them back up and not be as cold. Regardless, I'll be wearing tall socks and long sleeves, even if I have to wear a gown. They just need my hip.

Or maybe they'll inject it via IV. That would be super preferable. I've been told things that suggest it's directly into the hip though.

[helthcareheven]

From Concept to Cure: The Evolution of Medical Plastics

Overview of Medical Plastics

Medical plastics have become ubiquitous in healthcare applications over recent decades. A wide range of polymers are now used in everything from surgical tools and medical devices to implants, prosthetics, and diagnostic equipment. Some key advantages of plastics for medical applications include their lightweight nature, durability, biocompatibility, and flexibility in design and manufacturing. This article provides an overview of common medical plastics and their uses in modern patient care.

Thermoplastics in Surgical Tools and Medical Devices

Thermoplastics like polyvinyl chloride (PVC) and polyolefins are widely employed in disposable medical tools and devices. These plastics can be easily shaped, formed, and sealed through heating and cooling processes like injection molding and extrusion. Common thermoplastic applications include surgical drapes, gowns, gloves, face masks, catheters, tubing, syringes, and many other single-use items. Thermoplastics offer sterilizability, low cost, and convenience as they can be produced quickly and disposed of after a single use, reducing risks of cross-contamination compared to reusable materials.

Thermoplastics are also used to construct housings and components of more complex medical devices like dialysis machines, ventilators, ultrasound probes, endoscopes, and surgical tools. Their material properties allow intricate geometries to be replicated precisely while withstanding regular cleaning and sterilization cycles. Polycarbonate and acrylic thermoplastics often feature in medical device and equipment construction due to their transparency properties as well.

Engineering Plastics for Implants and Prosthetics

Engineering plastics with advanced material qualities have enabled new frontiers in medical implants and prosthetics. Ultra-high molecular weight polyethylene (UHMWPE) exhibits high strength and wear resistance essential for articulating joint replacements like knees, hips, and shoulders. Since its introduction, UHMWPE has vastly improved implant service lifetimes and mobility for millions worldwide.

Polyetheretherketone (PEEK) possesses radiolucency, making it well-suited for spinal and cranial implants. Its elastic modulus closely matches bone to minimize stress shielding while exhibiting biocompatibility and fatigue resistance. Titanium alloy and stainless steel bone screws, plates and rods are also widely employed in orthopedic and trauma surgery for strength and compatibility with scans.

Meanwhile, thermoplastic elastomers like polyurethanes facilitate lifelike prosthetics with soft tissue properties and resilience. Silicone formulations provide a barrier while transmitting sensory feedback in advanced prosthetic sockets and sleeves. Such optimized plastics enable unprecedented functionality and quality of life restoration for individuals with missing or non-functioning anatomy.

Diagnostic Equipment and Accessories

Diagnostic imaging modalities heavily rely on plastics to construct vital optical, electronic and mechanical systems. Liquid crystal polymers maintain precision tolerances in ultrasound transducer arrays and fiber optic cabling while withstanding stringent sterilization. Epoxy molding compounds encapsulate sensitive circuitry within CT and MRI scanners in protective housings.

Acrylic sheet forming finds use manufacturing view boxes and light boxes in radiology departments as the material effectively diffuses transmitted light for image analysis. Meanwhile polycarbonate excels as a housing material for portable ultrasound carts, endoscopy towers and lab equipment given its impact resistance, clarity and ease of disinfection. An assortment of commodity plastics from polypropylene to nylon further serve construction of trays, stands, handle grips and miscellaneous accessories throughout diagnostic settings.

Labware, Filtration and Storage

Plastics dominate the production of labware, filters and consumable storage products essential for diagnostic testing and biomedical research. Polypropylene and polyethylene provide an optimal combination of clarity, low bind-in, autoclavability and cost effectiveness for lab bottles, flasks, Petri dishes, microtubes, pipette tips and more. These widely inert plastics minimize risk of compound interactions.

Nylon and polycarbonate reinforce syringes and lab centrifuge containers against high speeds and mechanical stresses. PTFE and PVDF excel as biomaterial compatible membrane choices for important separations in areas like dialysis, blood filtration and cell culture. Meanwhile, plastics like PET and HDPE offer practical sterile storage and transportation solutions for reagents, blood products and clinical specimens with excellent barrier properties.

Future Outlook

Advancements in polymers and manufacturing technologies will undoubtedly yield further medical product innovations to come. Areas of active R&D include smart plastics possessing sensing, actuating and communication abilities for integrated diagnostics. 3D printed personalized implants fabricated from biodegradable polyesters address shortages while minimizing invasive surgery. Tissue engineering scaffolds may someday harness biopolymers ability to encourage natural regeneration. Always guided by principles of biocompatibility and sterility, medical plastics will remain at the forefront of patient care improvement for generations to come.

[ncssian]

A Favor: Part Six

Nessian Modern AU

Masterlist

a/n: nsfw sort of?? barely

***

Cassian is going to kill Nesta.

He’s never met a woman so stubborn that she would rather throw herself under a bus than accept help from others.

“What happened to your rants about universal healthcare and redistributing wealth?” He gestures furiously between the two of them while keeping one hand on the steering wheel. “I’m trying to redistribute the wealth!”

She scoffs from the passenger seat. “Nice try, comrade. I’m not letting you dangle your wallet over me while I live with you for free. It’s disgusting and manipulative.”

Cassian wants to grab her by the shoulders and shake her. “Why do you automatically assume I’m trying to manipulate you?” he says incredulously.

“You don’t get to pay for my things,” she snaps. “They’re mine.”

“I know you’re already broke from that MRI—”

“That’s none of your business.”

They pull up to one of the university buildings. “Oh, great argument.” Cassian brings the truck to a stop. “Are you gonna use that one in court?”

Nesta buttons her blue blazer and furiously grabs her things, not saying a word.

“What are you thinking now?” Cassian pokes, the hardness dissolved from his voice a little.

She shoves the passenger door open. “How much longer it’s going to take to get my car fucking fixed,” she bites, hopping out of the truck and slamming the door shut on Cassian’s face.

Clenching his jaw, he watches her walk sharply for the building, tension ratcheting her figure. Impossible woman.

She does look damn good in a pantsuit, though.

***

Nesta has to take deep breaths before she enters the mock courtroom, refusing to let Cassian get to her head right now.

It's not his offering to pay for her endometriosis treatment that pisses her off, but it's that he won't take no for an answer. She wishes he could just let her dig herself into a hole of debt and despair like millions of Americans already do every day. She wishes he wouldn't demand an explanation from her every time she screams and cries about getting her way.

Later. Her mind clears through an imaginary filter. You’ll deal with him later.

Now, she has a case to win.

Nesta strides into the courtroom with her file of documents and takes the speaker’s bench, her opponent already seated on the other side of the aisle. Emerie Nikolis is five feet nine inches of Mediterranean goddess, and the only student at Prythian Law who’s been able to challenge Nesta for her spot at the top of the class. Not that she’s succeeded.

Nesta’s never been up against another woman for a moot court, though, and it adds a buzz to her nerves. Men always come into the courtroom with too much confidence and not enough research, and from there Nesta can steadily dismantle their arguments until they’re left spluttering. From Emerie’s cutting hawk eyes, Nesta knows she doesn’t function like that.

As student judges file in and head for their seats, Nesta leans over and mutters to Emerie, “Good luck defending the side that represents everything morally corrupt with this country.”

Emerie brushes back her ponytail and smiles mockingly at Nesta. “You mean the side that powerful white men have chosen since the beginning of time? I won’t need luck.”

Nesta scowls at the panel of student judges. They are all white men.

“You’re lucky I enjoy a challenge,” she hisses, and sits back in her seat as they start calling oyez.

***

Cassian doesn’t mean to fall asleep.

He’s cleaning up around the house while Nesta is gone, and ends up finding a worn paperback trapped between the leather cushions of the couch. Pulling it out, he takes one look at the cover and nearly chokes. A half-undressed man graces the cover in regency-era clothes, his flowy shirt unbuttoned to reveal toned abs. A woman with golden curls clutches onto him passionately, only dressed in a corset and underskirt.

A slow smirk spreads over his face and he snickers. He didn't know people read these anymore. A glance at the back of the book proves his point: published in 1999, a true vintage piece.

Plopping onto the couch and laying back, he opens the paperback. If Nesta doesn't want him reading her books, she shouldn't leave them lying around the place.

Flipping to a random page, he frowns when it isn't a smut scene. Boring. He keeps flipping until he finds one, and props his feet onto the armrest to get comfortable. Now what exactly does Nesta Archeron get off to?

Over an hour and a hundred pages of surprisingly tender romance later, his aching eyes finally slip closed. The open book falls onto his face, and the scent of faded ink follows him into sleep.

Cassian is in a dim candle-lit room. Foiled wallpaper and overstuffed furniture decorates the space, and there, by the small window, she waits.

She turns her head to speak over her shoulder, “You came.”

“I did.” The line comes to him naturally.

Without turning around, her hands reach up for her hair. She starts removing pins from her updo, golden curls falling apart one by one. Once the last pin drops, she finally turns around.

Gleaming locks now frame her soft face and shoulders; her pale breasts rise and fall above the low curve of her thin nightgown. Under the candlelight, she looks freshly forged and porcelain-like at the same time.

“Could you help me?” Nesta says.

Cassian is stuck in his spot, unable to move. He's never seen Nesta like this: so heavenly, but so different.

“Cassian?” she asks again.

“Oh,” he stutters, “um— what do you need?”

She steps closer. “You.” His breathing stops. Nesta slips her slender hands up his arms, to his shoulders. She's holding him close. “I need you to tell me something.”

“Anything.”

Her breath fans over his face. “Do you want me?”

Cassian is very still.

“Do you want me like I want you, Cassian?” she repeats, pressing closer to him. He can feel her nipples through the wispy fabric of her gown.

“Yes,” he breathes shakily. He doesn't know which hurts more: wanting Nesta or being wanted by her.

“Have you been very lonely, Cassian?” She drags her hands back down his arms, finding his hands and placing them on her shoulders. “Is that why you like having me around so much, because you’ve been lonely?”

This Nesta knows him… a little too well. His breath hitches as his hands, directed by Nesta’s hands, slowly pushes down the sleeves of her nightgown. In a flash, the fabric has dropped to her waist, baring her unblemished chest and stomach. Before Cassian can even absorb what's happening, her arms are winding around his neck again, and now she's pressing entreating kisses into the crook of his neck.

“Tell me,” she mutters onto his skin. “Do I make you feel heard, or am I just a pretty face to you?”

“Nes—Nesta.” Cassian tries to swallow air.

She smells so good. She feels so good, and she's not even doing anything to him, just holding him.

“Heard,” he gasps when she goes for the buttons of his shirt, her mouth finding his chest. “You make me feel heard. I like it when we talk and you listen to me. Nobody listens to me.”

She pulls away from him, mouth shining. He just now realizes how jarring the gilded ringlets of her hair are.

“That’s so good,” Nesta purrs, reaching up to clasp his face. Her hands feel thin and rough, like paper. “You’re so good.” She reaches in, her lips chasing his, and—

Awareness seeps into the corners of Cassian’s reality, and his eyes peel open. He blinks between two different worlds until he finally realizes— it was a dream.

Of course it was a dream. Nesta doesn't have blonde hair or curls. And her skin isn't porcelain smooth, but dotted with freckles and moles. And yet, the arousal stirred in him is very much real, evident by the ache in his dick. Fuck.

A throat clears softly and Cassian jumps. The romance book is still on his face, he notices, and his world is darkened by the rough pages. Batting it away, confused, he fully awakens when he sees who’s in front of him.

She’s still in her pantsuit from this morning, but her hair is undone and her cheeks carry a rare flush. Her clothes are rumpled.

“Nesta.” He scrambles upright, painfully aware that he was just dreaming about her half-naked. He carefully arranges his elbows on his knees, his hands dangling between his legs. “You’re back,” he says casually. Taking notice of the blackness outside the windows, he becomes concerned. “You’ve been out this whole time? Oh God, I was supposed to pick you up—”

“No, no,” she says quickly. “Didn’t you see my texts? I went out with some people from moot court.”

Cassian widens his eyes. He’s never heard her mention any friends from school, much less leave the cabin to hang out with other people.

“I totally kicked this girl’s ass in the Title IX case I was telling you about,” Nesta goes on, “and she wanted to take me out for afternoon drinks, and some other guys ended up tagging along too…” She twists a piece of hair around her finger, the experience sounding as brand new to her as Cassian suspects it is. “And yeah, then she got me a cab.”

He raises a brow and leans back. “You willingly let someone else pay for you? Wow, you really are drunk.”

The smile blossoming on her mouth drops and the cold veneer returns. “So you go through my stuff while I’m gone?” she scolds. “How many times are we going to have the boundaries conversation?”

Cassian picks up the paperback still on the couch. “Oh, this? This was just a little light reading. You know, since I share my Netflix and Prime with you, I figured you could share your period-piece smut with me.” He fans through the pages, trying to find the spot he left off on. “I didn’t even know people read physical romance books anymore. That’s like me keeping VHS tapes of porn instead of using my phone.”

Nesta stomps over and snatches the book out of his hands. “It’s not like I enjoy owning books with ugly covers,” she hisses. “I get headaches reading e-books. And this is a classic.” She carefully wipes at the cover as if Cassian got dirt all over it.

Cassian tries to snatch it back. “I wasn’t done with it,” he grits. “Nesta, give it back.”

“I’m glad we brought up boundaries,” she says instead. “Because we need to talk about this morning.” Shoving the book into her pants waistband, she peels off her blazer and takes a seat on the coffee table in front of Cassian.

Cassian blinks, gripped by the authority in her movements. Nesta pokes a finger at his chest. “What you said bothered me all day. Nearly ruined my night. So I’m telling you now, I’m not taking your money for anything, ever. And if you bring up the topic again, I’m moving out.” She sounds dead serious.

He’s not afraid of her. “I’m bringing up the topic now,” he pushes back, his tone hard. “As someone who considers you a friend, I don’t like to see my friends struggling.”

Nesta blinks, and maybe finally accepts that she can’t fight her way out of this, because she drops her finger. “I can’t be financially dependent on a man, Cassian,” she admits, refusing to look away from him. “I’ve done it before, and it’s no way to live life. I don’t care how nice you are; I’m not taking your money. And you can’t make me.” She doesn’t shout or hiss that last part. It’s said with a quiet strength, and it makes Cassian want to concede everything. If this is about her ex-boyfriend, then he doesn’t want to be anything like him.

But it doesn’t change the fact that her health is still on the line. “What if you don’t take my money?” he says quickly. “What if I make you work for it?”

Law school doesn’t allow for part-time jobs on the side, and Nesta’s been scraping by with scholarships and leftover money from her father’s will. The suffering is worth it now, she told Cassian once, if she’s at a law firm the year after next with a starting salary of 100K.

Nesta purses her lips, skeptical. “What kind of work?”

“You can be a legal consultant for Night Court.”

“Do I look qualified to be a legal consultant?” She’s glaring now.

“Well, it’s either that or you get to be my personal assistant.” Nesta looks even more outraged at that, and Cassian holds up his hands. “I respect your need to stay independent,” he says, “but you can’t convince me that a handout or two is worse than going broke.” Cassian himself would be dead right now without all the handouts he got over the course of his life. “Please, Nesta,” he says quietly. “Think about it for me. And if you still hate it, I’ll never bother you about it again.” Even though it would kill him.

Nesta stares at him, the gears in her brain visibly turning. Finally— “Rhysand’s company does run on handouts anyway,” she mutters, glancing away. “What’s one more?”

Before Cassian can drop to his knees and thank her, she whips her head back to him. “But I want to do real work, Cassian. Not the pretense of work while I get a fat paycheck.”

He bursts into a grin and grabs her arms. “I’m gonna work you so hard.” He kisses her hard on the cheek.

Nesta makes a choking noise and starts coughing, and Cassian realizes how that sounded. “Did I say something wrong?” he plays innocent.

Nesta’s face is red for reasons other than alcohol now, but she covers it up by shoving Cassian hard enough to send him into the couch cushions. “Asshole.” She pulls her book out of her waistband and throws it at Cassian’s chest. “Have your romance back, I’m going to bed.”

“Hey— wait, it's six p.m. What about the puzzle?” he calls after her. She ignores him and keeps walking.

“Fine,” he says to her back, “but don't go to sleep with your contacts in again; you're gonna hurt yourself.”

As she reaches the stairs, he adds, “I’m proud of you for the moot court, by the way. I’m telling everybody you're the smartest person I know.”

Nesta pauses briefly at that, before saying, “Goodnight, Cassian,” and continuing up to her room.

Later that night, Cassian does want to tell everybody that Nesta is the smartest person he knows. She's the smartest, coolest, and wittiest person he knows, full stop, with killer looks and a criminally underrated personality. But something is holding him back from sharing his feelings with the rest of the world.

It's the same feeling that's had him avoiding Feyre these last few weeks. The unspoken knowledge that not everybody sees Nesta the way Cassian does, paired with the fierce desire to protect her from any sort of criticism.

He doesn't have any definitive proof to justify his feelings, but he knows he can't stop thinking about Nesta. He knows his friends will take notice of the change in his behavior eventually, so in a fit of restlessness, he reaches for his phone to test a theory.

Scrolling through his contacts, Cassian eventually settles on Mor. She's close to Feyre and Cassian both, has an inclination to gossip, and she’s never interacted with Nesta. Perfect.

Cassian: what do you think of Nesta?

He's straightforward with her the way he always is, the way she always is with him.

Mor answers quickly without question: didn’t she let feyre work her ass off at age 14 while she sat around and did nothing?

Mor: she sounds like a bitch and i have yet to see anything to the contrary.

Mor: she has very nice eyes though

Mor: if u know what i mean ( . )( . )

Cassian wishes he hadn’t even asked. He doesn’t even know how to reply to that, so he’s about to turn his phone off when another message from Mor comes in.

Mor: why do you ask? how are things going with you two?

Cassian sighs deeply, not in the mood to start a fight with one of his best friends. He never told Feyre about taking Nesta to the doctor, or the following MRI and diagnosis. The last time he had a real conversation with Feyre was the first night of Nesta’s period, when he was worried sick over how to take care of her.

“What should I do, Feyre? She's crying herself sick upstairs and all I have is this stupid hot towel.”

“You don't have to do that,” she sighed tiredly over the phone. “Nesta goes through this every month. She’ll survive. Don’t get yourself worked up over nothing.”

That was when he decided he was calling a doctor no matter what.

And now… He’s confused and upset and he doesn't know why. Instead of arguing with Mor, he texts back, it’s nothing. A second later, he adds, but she's not a bitch.

He wants to say more, but texting Mor an essay on why she’s wrong for judging Nesta without knowing her would make him look crazy, among other things. He doesn’t know why he has to clarify that Nesta isn’t a bitch in the first place.

Either way, Cassian’s theory was proven correct.

He decides not to mention Nesta to his friends anymore.

***

Nesta lays in bed, thinking about the absolute day she’s had.

If getting drunk with Emerie Nikolis and Eris Vanserra at two in the afternoon wasn’t enough, stumbling back home to find Cassian like that finished her off for good. Her cheek has been tingling for hours.

She remembers how this housing agreement between them first started: I need you to know you can enforce whatever rules and boundaries you want while you’re here.

Nesta huffs a laugh. Boundaries are for strangers. Cassian seems content to poke and tug at Nesta’s boundaries whenever he wants, and Nesta… is okay with this. A mere month ago, this would have been her worst nightmare— living with a man who pushes her on every decision, who never does what she wants but somehow always knows what she needs.

But now they're friends, and Nesta is slowly learning that the rules are different with friends. Not everything has to be spelled out, because Cassian will understand what she's trying to say anyway. Not everything that is unknown has to be scary, because Cassian is never scary.

He’s allowed to read her books because he won’t make fun of them. He's allowed to know about her personal health matters because he won’t tell anybody else. And apparently, he’s allowed to give her a job so she doesn’t go broke trying to afford endo treatment.

These are the new rules.

She’s ridiculously glad that she told Lorene she won’t be coming back to the apartment for a few weeks. She doesn't know what she'll do after then, but for now she is okay.

***

a/n: hello i love writing cassian pov and learning more about him so much :) also thinking about having cassian call nesta 'baby' when they get together more often than 'sweetheart' just bc i think it would be a good look on him. pls share ur opinion.

tagging: @ladywitchling @sjm-things @thewayshedreamed @drielecarla @sensitiveillyrian @superspiritfestival @aliveahaahahafuck @cupcakey00 @sayosdreams @rainbowcheetah512 @claralady @thebluemartini @nessiantho @missing-merlin @duskandstarlight @lucy617 @sleeping-and-books @everything-that-i-love @cassianscool @awesomelena555 @julemmaes @wickedqueenoffantasy @poisonous-bloom @observationanxioustheorist @gisellefigue08 @courtofjurdan @theoverlyenthusiasticwriter @wolfiixxx @cass-nes @seashade @royaltykxx @illyrianundercover @queenestarcheron @monstrousloves-explodinggalaxies

[doctorfiction]

Are there certain injuries that are more commonly seen in young women abused by their boyfriends?

You will notice that this posting consists of a single entry. I had already chosen 3 questions for this week’s posting when this appeared in my inbox. As you know, my answers are generally infused with a fair dose of whimsy.

I felt this question deserved a forum of its own undiluted by humor. Fear not, the 3 previously chosen questions will appear next week.

It is my fervent hope that the inspiration for this question is purely literary.

One of the most common misconceptions is to limit the concept of abuse to physical violence. Abuse springs from a desire to control. The perpetrator accomplishes this task through a combination of physical, emotional, social and financial gambits.

 I will answer the question with a most disheartening fictional  Emergency Room encounter.

As I am a writer, talking to other writers, I have exercised poetic license. The patient presented here is a fictitious amalgam of partner abuse injuries I have treated in the Emergency Department. My hope is that this will both answer the question and further raise awareness of this epidemic.

The post is quite long but please bear with me and read it all. I hope it will both educate and aid in the literary treatment of this epidemic issue.

Abbreviations: CC/chief complaint, HPI/ History of Present Illness, ROS/Review of Systems, PMHx/Past Medical History, CM/ current medications, PSHx/Past Surgical History, Imaging/ (X-ray, CT, MRI, Ultrasound), Dx: Diagnosis, and TX. If you are “getting all medical” in your story, the format shown below adds great credibility, allowing you to present information for discussion without appearing as an “info-dump.”

Physical examination was as follows: Pertinent POSITIVES are in bold

23 NOV 20XX

CC: L leg pain, headache and chest wall pain.

HPI: A 22-year-old female sits on the exam table. She is accompanied by her 25-year-old boyfriend. The boyfriend is bent over and whispering in her ear. She is nodding. They separate and he half smiles when I enter the room with a nurse.

The patient has swelling and yellow-brown bruising about the left eye. Although it is a hot summer evening, she is wearing a long-sleeve blouse, jeans, and socks. Her partner is wearing cut-offs, short-sleeve T-shirt and steel-toe work boots with gray socks.

She c/o Left lower leg pain, left upper arm pain, right rib pain made worse with deep breathing, abdominal pain without nausea and headache with blurred vision on left. She states that she sustained the injuries when she tripped over a rug and fell onto a “coffee table.” She denies LOC. (loss of consciousness) She also complains of left lower leg pain, worsened by weight-bearing. She c/o low abdominal pain associated with fall. Her partner interjects, stating that she can be clumsy and fell off the front porch 2 months prior sustaining arm, chest head injury. She denies ETOH (alcohol.) The nurse tells her she looks familiar. The patient responds that she was in the E.D. a couple of months ago after “falling off the front porch.” Her partner laughs and volunteers that she’s a bit clumsy. The patient is crying, appears deferential and stares at the floor during history.

 ROS: Positive for Head trauma with pain and swelling about R eye. Blurred vision R eye. A headache. Right side chest pain worse with deep breathing, and pain mid-portion L upper arm. Abdominal pain. Increased frequency of urination. Fatigue. Irregular infrequent menses. (LMP 4 months prior)

PMHx: Depression with Anxious Mood

            Second Trimester Abortion secondary to fall

            Abdominal Pain/chronic of unknown etiology

            Fracture Right Wrist after fall

 OB-GYN: G2/P0/Spontaneous AB2 (2 pregnancies, no births, 2 non-medically induced abortions)

CM: Prozac 20mg daily

PSHx:

D&C after traumatic abortion

Open Reduction and Internal Fixation Right Wrist Fracture

Social: Patient states she feels safe at home when queried.

Negative ETOH or illicit drug usage. 3 cigarettes per day

The nurse gives the patient a gown for the examination and asks the boyfriend and me to step out. He is reluctant but complies.

In the hall, the E.R. clerk hands me an EDie. report on the patient.

An EDie report is a computer-generated list of every emergency department visit to any E.R. for a given patient in a given time period.

The patient’s Edie reveals she has had nine visits in the past 12 months. Five visits have been for musculoskeletal “fall” trauma, two for abdominal pain, and one for anxiety. The clerk pulls me aside and states that the patient’s partner has had two E.D. visits in the past year, one for injuries sustained in a fight at work and another for evaluation after an arrest for driving while intoxicated.

When I question the partner regarding the patient’s repeated fall injuries, he states again that she falls a lot, becomes visibly agitated and says he has to go outside for a smoke.

Exam:

General: Patient alert and oriented x 3. No acute physical distress.

Head: Scaring of eardrums, L>R consistent with childhood ear infections vs healed traumatic rupture from blunt trauma. Questionable Left hemotympanum (blood behind the eardrum.) Obvious dental caries (tooth decay) in upper and lower molars. Chipped teeth: Right upper central incisor upper and Left lower canine.

Neck: Trachea midline, neck veins flat, Tenderness with Range of Motion. Generalized tenderness with palpation, no spinous tenderness. Blue-green fingertip bruising noted, one left, three right at the level of the trachea. (strangulation injury either “throttling or near strangulation to establish control)

Heart: Rate 102 and regular, without murmur.

Chest/Back: Lungs clear to auscultation without quiet areas. Black-blue fingertip bruising left breast. Multiple areas of bruising. Bright erythema (redness) with underlying edema noted of anterolateral aspect R ribs 5-7. Significant tenderness and crepitus (grating or crackling) over the affected area with inspiration. No tenderness or crepitus or step-off noted on spinal exam. Numerous bruises L/R chest and back. These cover the spectrum, ranging from Black-Blue-Green-Yellow and Brown.

Abdomen: Non-distended, non-tympanic with positive bowel sounds. The uterus is non -palpable. There is a large area of erythema noted in the suprapubic area with associated tenderness. A single circular 4mm burn with eschar is noted 7.5cmm inferior to the umbilicus.

Genital/Pelvic: Deferred at patient request (follow-up ob-gyn exam to be scheduled) Upper Extremities: No gross deformity. Warm and well perfused with good bilateral peripheral pulses. Fingertip erythema noted over mid-portion Left Humerus. Numerous areas of fingertip bruising. As with back and chest, these range from black to brown. Right extremity and balance of left extremity have a similar appearance. In addition, there are a total of 9 (4 right arm and 5 left arm) 5mm circular scars (cigarette burns) consistent with old healed 2nd-degree burn.

Lower Extremities: Warm and well perfused with good bilateral peripheral pulses. No gross deformity, no shortening or external rotation of leg when supine. SLR (Straight-Leg-Raise) negative left and right. Again, numerous bruises of various colors left and right over the Anterior Tibia. Abrasion and erythema with underlying edema (swelling) and tenderness left mid anterior tibia. No crepitus.

Neurological: Cranial and Spinal Nerves intact by exam. Gait not tested until post-X-ray due to painful weight-bearing.

Psyche: Cooperative, minimally conversational with direct query. Flat affect with overt signs of Depression with Anxious Mood

Labs:

1)Urine HCG (pregnancy test) negative

 2) Urinalysis 2+blood and numerous WBC (white blood cells), with numerous motile trichomonads (trichomoniasis)

3) CBC, CMP WNL (Within Normal Limits)

 Imaging:

1) Head CT w/o contrast: small 2 mm LEFT tempo-parietal subdural hematoma. No other acute pathology but there is scattered parenchymal (brain tissue) scarring consistent with old microbleeds. No facial/nasal/orbital fractures seen.

 2)Left Tibia/Fibula X-ray: No acute bony or soft tissue abnormality seen. Evidence of old, healed nondisplaced fracture anterior tibia.

 3)Left Humerus X-ray: spiral fracture mid humeral shaft with no angulation and good apposition.

 4)Chest X-ray with Right Rib detail: Acute nondisplaced fractures right ribs 3-5. Old rib fractures noted in various states of healing R ribs 3,5,6 and L ribs 4-7. No pneumothorax, no acute cardiopulmonary process.

 DX: 1) Traumatic Subdural Hematoma

       2)Abdominal Contusion

       3)Contusion Left Tibia

       4) Spiral Fracture

       5) Nondisplaced fractures R ribs 3-5

       6) Trichomoniasis

       7) Amenorrhea

       8) Acute on Chronic Depression

 *****Symptom Cluster suggestive of Domestic Abuse*****

 Consult: Social Services

              Hospital Administration on Call

              Hospital Security

 Additional History: Patient is presented with diagnosis and informed of concerns regarding potential abuse scenario. Patient denies abuse and asks to see her partner. Security is sent to the parking area to retrieve partner. When security approaches partner’s vehicle, he speeds from the parking lot.

 When the patient is informed of partner’s departure, she becomes tearful and agrees to update history.

 Patient and partner were introduced at a local bar and began dating three years prior. Both shared a common bond of having dropped out of high school. Her partner was a laborer at a local scrapyard. Patient clerked at a local department store while taking night courses to finish high school. She admits to social drinking while her partner was a moderate to heavy drinker given to occasional binging. They moved in together and shared rent until he told her he would leave unless she quit her job and high school completion courses. When the patient’s family complained, he forbid her to have personal or telephone contact with her family. Her partner was involved in a physical altercation at work and was taken to the E.R. for treatment of injuries. Employer mandated testing was positive for alcohol and cannabis, at which point he was discharged from his job. At this point, he increased his alcohol intake and began an escalating pattern of abuse. He forced her to sell her car to pay rent, utilities, and grocery expense but placed the proceeds in his checking account. At this point, the patient informed her partner that she was pregnant and he beat her violently for the first time. Punching her repeatedly in the abdomen until she passed out from pain. The patient subsequently miscarried. Patient packed clothes and was leaving with a friend. Partner blocked driveway and tearfully apologized. Over the protests of her friend, she agreed to remain with him. Partner encouraged her to take a cleaning job at a local business but confiscated her checks forcing her to bring peanut butter sandwiches to work for her lunch. He refuses to allow dental visits due to cost and forbids the use of oral contraceptives because it will encourage her to be promiscuous at work. When she returns home from work and finds him in bed with a female neighbor, he states that he did it to show her what would happen if she were unfaithful. Shortly thereafter, the patient developed a frothy malodorous vaginal discharge, itching and pain with intercourse.

 Emergency Department TX:

I.V. of normal saline @ 100ml/hr

Flagyl 500mg PO (by mouth) for Trichomonal Vaginitis

Splinting, sling left arm for Humeral Fracture

Consults: Presented patient history and physical to Hospitalist at a tertiary medical center. Documented acceptance of patient and arranged transport.

Disposition: Patient is transferred by ALS Ground (Advanced Life Support Ambulance) to tertiary care medical center where she was admitted to Neuro-Surgery for observation of her brain bleed with consults to Orthopedics, Ob-Gyn, and Social Services.

 Notification of local law enforcement regarding high index suspicion of domestic assault

The fictitious chart above is NOT an exaggeration:

 Physical Injuries:

 U.S. Department of Health and Human Services reports that domestic violence is the cause of more injuries in women ages 15 to 44 than all other injuries combined with more than 1 million women per year seeking care in the E.D. One fourth of these women will require admission, and greater than one in ten will require major medical treatment. Nearly 4 million women are beaten in their homes every year. ONE IN FOUR women will experience domestic violence in her lifetime.

 The above patient has evidence of significant physical abuse.

 Bruises: direct trauma to the skin appears first as a bright red area and over the course of a 10- day period the color of the injury progresses from black to brown as noted above. This allows the injury to be aged. Numerous bruises of different colors indicate a pattern of continuing abuse.

Fingertip bruises are a result of the very common grasp injuries used to control the abused woman.

 Burns: numerous 4mm circular injuries/scars in various states of healing indicate cigarette burns. These are commonly inflicted as punishment. Arm burns are common. Burns near the genitalia establish complete dominance and maximum humiliation.

 Head Trauma: You will recognize the epidural hematoma from a previous posting. The patient’s Head CT also showed evidence of scaring indicating a pattern of repeated blows to the head over time. The eardrum scars revealed blows forceful enough to cause rupture of the eardrum. The patient has several chipped teeth indicating repeated blows to the mouth over time.

 Fractures: The X-rays Physical exam revealed an old nasal bone and septal fracture. Multiple rib fractures both new and in various states of healing support ongoing abuse. The spiral fracture of the Humerus (upper arm bone) is a result of grasping and rotational stress and is a classic abuse fracture. The fingertip erythema (fresh injury) combined with this fracture is considered abuse until proven otherwise. The healing/healed fractures on the patient’s tibia (shin) suggest she has been struck repeatedly with a hard object (steel toe boots or a club of some kind.)

 Abdominal Injury: The blows to the abdomen represent the abuser’s attempt to terminate a perceived pregnancy due to the patient’s lack of menstrual cycle.

 Emotional Abuse:

 The effects of emotional abuse, while invisible, are no less devastating. Abused women have a markedly increased incidence of substance abuse including smoking. Low self-esteem and a feeling of hopelessness lead to loss of educational, relationship, and educational opportunities. Abused women have a fivefold increased risk of anxiety and depression.

Financial Abuse:

 The abuser generally denies the woman access to finances which restricts access to dental/health care, work-appropriate clothing and personal care items necessary to secure quality employment.

Social Abuse:

 The abuser generally restricts access to family, friends, social outings and even media information to limit the possibility of abuse exposure.

General Health Abuse:

 Abusers generally engage in behavior which can have profound negative effects on the abused woman. A preponderance of abusers lack even a high school diploma and consider an educated or trained female a threat. Even the educated abuser fears the empowerment of a woman with a marketable skill. Generally speaking, domestic abusers are substance abusers exposing the woman to the hazards of their impaired driving, the violence of their drug suppliers, and the ramifications of their frequent brushes with law enforcement. The “risk-taking” behavior of the abuser will also frequently put the woman at risk for both minor and serious sexually transmitted disease.

Women at greatest risk for injury from domestic violence include those with male partners who abuse alcohol or use drugs, are unemployed or intermittently employed, have less than a high-school education, and are former husbands, estranged husbands, or former boyfriends of the women. 

Having said this, there are lawyers who beat their Ph.D. wives, physicians who manipulate their girlfriends, college professors who take advantage of their students, and politicians, actors and director/producers who use their power to exploit women.

 I hope this response will further heighten awareness of this epidemic and as a positive side effect provide some insight in depicting these characters in your writing.

 Thank you for your indulgence. I promise next week’s trio of postings will be a return to Doctor Fiction’s usual mixture of banter, brilliance, and bullshit.

The Doctor is In. Want to ask a question? Read the guidelines first.

[psychokangaroo]

Okay okay okay

So like I used to use rabbits for experiments

Like as in we put them to sleep, take mris, then wake them back up. (Not all labs are as benign but like we are trying. Mice and rats are sometimes just too small for imaging)

But like when I got trained to work with rabbits they tell you to be careful and watch the claws, and how the claws need to be trimmed very regularly. I learned pretty quickly why

When I was giving a rabbit an anesthetic the first time, the wee lass freaked out because I'm inexperienced, kicked me and tore a massive hole in my protective gown, jumped onto my coworker and shredded his gown in half, before the anesthetic kicked in and she just fell asleep on her carrier.

I told this to an animal tech from the lab next door about this story, and she proceeded to show me this foot-long scar on her forearm. Apparently, one of the rabbits didn't have their claws properly trimmed and kicked her on the forearm. The nails went through the protective gown and scratched her skin (she was wearing short sleeves).

(That was why she always wear long sleeves in lab now)

(This is also why I'm gonna stick to imaging humans for research now. I can get consent and they aren't likely to scratch me when stressed)

Hi Gallus, I'm curious what your thoughts might be on the following: Functionally, is there any difference between a "paw" and a "foot"? Are some paws feet, but not all feet are paws? Maybe the words can be interchangeable? If you don't know, maybe your followers do? I've been wondering about this for a long time.

Paws are specifically the feet of a mammal that has claws. Feet can have claws, hooves, scales, nails and more (or less!). So all Paws are Feet but not all Feet are Paws. Whether a Monkey's Paw is a Paw or a Hand (Hands are also Feet!) comes down to where that particular monkey falls on the claw-nail scale.

Notably, not all Paws have toebeans or 'Peets'. Rabbits don't have the naked toe soles associated with most paws (beans are the sign of a Killer- nearly every animal with toebeans is a carnivore), but they very definitely have claws!

Protip: Don't let a rabbit kick you.

[justme-noonebutme]

Coincidence - Part 1

Summary: An unexpected accident and a coincidence change my life when I meet someone who makes it all better...

Word count: 1.3k

A/n: Be gentle. This is my first fic and I hope you guys like it. After reading so many great ones on Tumblr I had to try it myself. Big thanks goes out to my beta @anticipate1003 for being awesome and pushing me to write my best and have so much fun while doing so. Thank you @torn-and-frayed for the beta shoutout, you saved me! And thanks to @joseyrw for the input, you have been great! 

Part 1

I had just left the hotel in a hurry knowing I would have to go back there eventually to get my stuff, but too scared to deal with all of it right now. My head was spinning with everything that had happened in the last hour as I was crossing Main Street when I heard a loud squealing noise. That's when my whole life changed.

Its funny how the mind works and it will never cease to amaze me. I remember how everything seemed to happen in slow motion. I was running into the street, only focused on my next steps, and when I looked to my left I saw it coming just a little bit too fast around the corner. I remember thinking to myself, ”Damn, that is a big ass beautiful car, that is going way too fast. It's definitely gonna stop because why wouldn‘t it?” And a second later everything went black.

I woke up in the ER at the hospital. The loud beeping noise recording my pulse seemed to be hammering in my brain with never ending persistence. My eyes fluttered open. It took me a second to adjust to the light, but when I did my eyes met the green ones of the strange man sitting next to my bed. They were filled with guilt and worry.

“How ya doin’, Kiddo?” he said with a crooked smile on his face, his elbows leaning on his knees as he folded his hands.

“Hi.” was all I managed before the sharp pain in my abdomen made me gasp for air.

“Woah there sweetheart. You took quite a nasty hit.”

I looked around the room scanning for anything familiar, still trying to figure out what had happened. He must have read the confusion on my face because he started to explain.

“So...I...uh.. might've…um...hit you with my car…” he stammered, running his fingers roughly through his short hair, “Dammit! I just didn't see you. I shoulda been payin’ more attention! I...I was in a hurry…I don‘t know why I didn‘t see you. You came out of nowhere, sweetheart. I was so sure the street was empty when...I called the ambulance...got here as fast as I could…” He looked down at the floor and stopped rambling, his focus landing on his shoes.

The Rolodex in my head was whirring, attempting to find some context for what he was trying to tell me. This man had an american accent. Am I in the US? Even though I had no issue in understanding him, I was certain that english might not be my first language. It was like switching on a light. As soon as I heard those first few words in English, my brain just clicked and was now functioning on that language setting.

“Uh, I'm gonna go get the doc. Tell ‘em you're awake.”

He stood up quickly and was out of the room like a shot. Even though I was pretty sure the two of us didn't know each other, I felt weirdly comfortable in his presence. I was still trying to wrap my head around the whole thing when an older, kind looking woman in a white lab coat walked in.

“Hello Miss. I’m Dr. Hall. Can I check your vitals?”

The light she shined in my eyes left me temporarily dazzled. She checked the bandage wrapped tightly around my head, which I had previously failed to notice. When she lifted my light pink hospital gown and tapped my stomach, which had turned a nasty blueish-green color her face lighted up. She didn't look too worried, which eased my fears a bit.

“Well, all things considered, you seem to be doing well.” She gave me a small smile. “There's no internal bleeding and your nervous system seems to be functioning fine. You haven't suffered any major external injuries except for the laceration on the right side of your head. The MRI we did has shown a small swelling in the frontal lobe which means you most probably have a - “

“ - a traumatic brain injury.” I concluded. The words escaped my mouth without me really noticing it.

“That is correct.” She smiled at me, her delicate features framed by her dark brown hair. “Could you tell me what day it is?” My mind was blank.

“It‘s alright.” She continued, “It is Saturday the 25th of August. Can you remember your full name?”

My uncertainty must have been visible on my face as the woman laid a hand on mine, trying her best to comfort me.

„This is absolutely normal. No reason to panic.” she said in a reassuring tone.

„I have retrograde amnesia due to the frontal swelling. Usually due to impaired episodic and declarative memory.”

“I get the feeling that you have not lost your knowledge of what seems to be a medical background.” She stroked my hand, sitting down on the edge of my bed.

My eyes started to fill with angry tears. How could I know all this and not my own name?

Just then a movement from the doorway caught my eye. I looked up and noticed the man who hit me with his car standing there, holding two paper cups in his hands. He had an unsure expression on his face. It seemed as though he didn‘t know if his presence was welcome. How long had he been standing there?

“You should rest for now.” Dr. Hall said gently, while getting of the bed, “Headaches and temporary memory loss are very common after an accident like this.”

I nodded my head slowly, as the pounding was still almost unbearable.

“I will check on you later. Try to sleep and get as much rest as you can. Should you experience any increase in pain don‘t hesitate to press the button to call the nurse’s station, they will be happy to help.”

I wiped my face with the sleeve of my gown and nodded, not facing her but, instead, focusing on my hands, scanning the light scratches from my accident. My eyes fell on my left ring-finger. It had a line as if a ring was missing from it. I traced the line with my thumb and index finger, trying to remember if I had ever owned a ring that I would wear regularly. A slight cough ripped me from my thoughts. I looked up at the green eyed man, unsure of why he had come back.

“Um, I brought you some coffee. Maybe that's not the best idea, though, since the doc said to get some rest. I dunno, I had to do something…” he mumbled.

“Who are you?” I said as I squinted up at him.

He walked cautiously into the room as if he wasn‘t sure if he really belonged there.

“My name is Dean. Dean Winchester. I ...I hit you, remember?”

I put my hands over my face massaging the bridge of my nose with the tips of my fingers. “Yeah, I remember.”

Dean sat in the chair next to my bed placing one cup on the bedside table and sipping from the other. He reached into the pocket of his worn green jacket and placed milk, sugar and sweetener packages beside the cup.

“I didn‘t know how you‘d like it.”

“Neither do I.”

I had no intention of crying in front of this stranger and I certainly did not expect that coffee could ever make me cry.

“Hey.. it‘s alright sweetheart. You're gonna be fine.”

His calloused hands took mine as he began drawing small circles with his thumbs. I looked up into his eyes and I believed him. Dean’s face was warm and even though his eyes looked tired I knew he would stay by my side until I got better.

Part 2

Next part will be out latest by next Friday :) I would love to hear what you guys think! 

Tags: If you want to be taken off, let me know ;) 

@anticipate1003​

@erin654​

@wheresthekillswitch

[words-writ-in-starlight]

things laid down

Hey y’all, for 600 followers here is some weird urban magic.

He blinked at the tiled ceiling, crossing into wakefulness from something…not.  There was a clamor of noise buffeting him, just outside the half-drawn curtain hiding him—a tiny besieged encampment against a hurricane in the hall.  The sheets crackled hard against his hands, more like paper than cloth, a sharp smell making the bone between his eyes ache, and it took a long moment before he could sort out the overload and look around. From where he sat, he could see two more beds, one in the room across the hall, curtain half-closed like his own, and one in his own room—a hospital, maybe.  He didn’t entirely recall what the word entailed.  Didn’t recall much of anything, now that he thought about it. He blinked away the concern and propped himself up on one hand to get a look around at the other residents. Kids, he noted.  Very young.  Younger than him?  He wasn’t sure.  

Across the hall was a boy, smooth-cheeked and round-eyed. He had one arm exposed to the shoulder, one sleeve cut away entirely, and halfway down his upper arm, the flesh turned abruptly into brass.  The metal threaded itself into the higher tissue, and the boy clutched his arm across his chest in numb shock.  The girl in the next bed over was sobbing, the blank sound of someone crying in an effort to soothe themselves, tears leaving glistening trails down the glossy porcelain of her cheeks.  Her eyes, when she blinked, were bright and lively, her black hair tumbling in thin dreadlocks around her face, but there was a chink as a bracelet knocked against porcelain—her hand, rubbing across her eyes.

He raised his fingers to touch his own face, but there was no metal or porcelain there, only the warm give of skin.  A touch of stubble on his jaw—older than these soft, scared children, then, but no lines, so still young enough—and chapped lips, but all living, perfectly human.  He looked down at his arms, sweeping fingers up from the thin skin at his wrists to the curve of his shoulders where they met the paper of a hospital gown.  He kicked away the sheet and performed a similar check, up the sinew-and-bone line of his legs, then tugged the hospital gown away from his neck and looked down.  All skin over muscle, blood racing at the crease of his elbow and the hollow of his throat.

Far from simply being entirely human, there didn’t seem to be a mark on him.  He wondered why he was here.  Hospitals were places for the terribly ill or grievously injured, that much he was sure of, and he didn’t seem to be either one.  If the noise outside was any indication, they hardly had the staff to spare for him.

He was still pushing his fingers through his hair—dark, curly, overlong, didn’t he ever cut it?—when the curtain was tucked back and a nurse, looking harried, strode into the room.  

She paused by the little girl, crouching down to wipe away the tears from the porcelain and murmur something reassuring.  Only when the little girl had hiccupped out a laugh, nodding, did the nurse turn away and cross the room to his side.

“Hey,” she said, a slow smile creasing her tired eyes.  She wore blue scrubs, fresh and clean in a way that suggested she had recently had to change, and her hair was scooped haphazardly away from her face into a bun, but her hands were quick and confident when she reached out to take his wrist.  “Sleeping Beauty wakes.”

“Have I been asleep?” he asked vaguely, watching the movement of her lips as she counted his pulse.  The machine beside him beeped in time, wires tugging gently at the electrodes on his chest.  “Doesn’t the machine do that?”

“Yeah, but I get a better feel for it if I do it by hand,” the nurse said, as if it was a common question.  “Can you tell me your name?”

“I, uh.”  He frowned. He was reasonably sure that he should be able to answer that question, firmly and without doubt, but there didn’t seem to be anything there.  His head was empty, ringing like a bell with each thought that passed through it. “No,” he said slowly.  “I can’t.”

“Okay,” she said, releasing his wrist.  Her eye-creasing smile was gone, now, lips thinner and turned down, and she picked up a chart from the end of his bed, flicking a look over the first page.  “How about your age?”

“Older than them,” he offered, halfway serious, “and younger than you.”

“Do you know where we are?”                                                                              

“A hospital?”

“Yeah,” she said, smiling at him again, but it didn’t make her eyes crinkle this time.  “Do you remember anything at all?”

“Never raise anything up that you can’t lay down again,” he said at once, as if the words had been hidden under his tongue, waiting for him to open his mouth and set them loose.  They were chalky on his tongue, sour—the taste of panic, he thought.  He didn’t remember what panic should feel like, save for a vague impression of tight muscles and smoke-thickness in his throat, but something deep in his chest knew the flavor, and laughed.

“Do you know what that means?”  He shook his head, the muscles protesting as if the admission took tremendous effort, and she nodded, still steady and professional.  “All right.  Can I leave you alone for a minute to bring back the doctor?”

“Yeah,” he murmured, and she left, hooking the chart over the foot of his bed as she passed.  It left him alone in the room, with the quiet sniffing of the porcelain-faced girl and the ringing terror of the inside of his own head.  He closed his eyes, trying to find some trace of information in his memory, and opened them almost at once, recoiling.  There was nothing, only darkness as complete as a sky without stars—or, more accurately, a sky past the edge of stars.  Cold and—hungry—empty, with shadow-on-shadow movement that he didn’t want to see.

It was a relief when the doctor walked in, escorted by the same nurse as before.  She offered him a small smile and left to check on the boy with the brass arm, and the doctor walked inside.

“My name is Doctor Hamada,” she said, looking almost as weary as the nurse had.  “How are you feeling?”

“I’m--” hungry “—fine.”  Nothing hurt, and he didn’t seem to have any strangeness like the boy with the brass arm or the girl with the porcelain face.  He was—hungry—just sort of hollow, as if something scooped out all the soft parts from his belly and chest and left his ribcage empty.  He couldn’t hear his heartbeat, but he could see the green line on the monitor as it kept track.  Spike-drop-pause, spike-drop-pause, steady and hypnotic, up and down.  Watching it, he found himself mouthing the sentence, the only words he could find in his echoing empty skull—it seemed to fit well with the beat of the heart on the screen.  Never raise anything up that you can’t lay down again.

“Melissa, the nurse you spoke to, she said that you don’t remember anything?” Doctor Hamada asked, leaning close and producing a penlight from her pocket.  “I’m just going to check your pupils,” she said, soothing, and he let her, shining the light into his eyes and leaving blue spots in his vision.  “Do you remember anything at all?”

“Never raise anything up that you can’t lay down again,” he said, and she nodded, picking up his chart.  “But I don’t know what it means.”

“We usually call it Faust’s Law of Magic—you know, never summon power you can’t control,” she said, frowning.  “Every kid learns it in school.  Is that all you know?”

“Yeah.”  He paused, swallowed, forced himself to open his mouth again.  “Do you know my name?  Why am I here?”

She sighed, setting the chart down, and rested a hand on the rail of the bed, looking at him.  “We know your first name—it’s Jake.  Jacob.  A little boy recognized you and told us.”

“Someone here knows me?” he asked, starting to push himself up, and she caught his shoulder—kill her.

“No,” she said.  “I’m sorry.”  She sounded sincere, her voice heavy and her eyes sad.  “He passed away—over eighty percent of his lung tissue was transmuted into asphalt.  He didn’t survive long after telling us.”

He dropped back onto the bed with a thud, something heavy settling in the hollow arch of his ribcage as he shut his eyes and felt tears catch on his lashes.  “What’s happening?”

He felt Doctor Hamada shift—the darkness behind his eyes stretched and muttered hungry, and he opened his eyes.

“There was an explosion,” she said, soft and serious. “Foreign magic.  We’ve never seen anything like it.  Everyone who was caught in the blast seems to have been transmuted by the shrapnel—we have a boy whose heart is made of steel, and a woman whose hands are made of glass, and a man whose skin is nothing but paper.  You were at the center, but at first we thought you were fine.”

“I’m not fine?”  He didn’t think he was hurt, he was just—hungry—hallucinating.  He gave his head a shake, hoping to clear the dark voice from the emptiness of his skull. It wasn’t a knife in the dark, it was worse, a knife in an empty room without doors, where there were no options besides the blade.  It was a black thought.

“You seemed to be, when the paramedics found you,” Doctor Hamada said, an encouraging note in her voice.  Then it faded and she was solemn again.  “But you didn’t seem to understand what anyone was saying to you. You were responsive, engaged with the world, someone would speak and you would look at them, someone would point and you could follow, but you didn’t seem to actually comprehend.  The paras assumed you had suffered a head injury, justified given the size of the explosion—it even destroyed your clothes.  It’s a near-miracle you’re even alive, a little brain damage wouldn’t have been a shock.”

“So I don’t have brain damage,” he said, skeptical.  “I just, what, set my memory down somewhere and walked away from it?”

That won him a small smile, a quick flash of teeth between thin lips, before she continued, quiet and serious.  “You suffered a massive seizure in the ambulance.  Five full minutes of convulsions, and you didn’t regain consciousness—nothing to sneeze at,” she added when he didn’t react. “We performed an MRI when you arrived. We expected to find a subdural bleed, which would have been manageable.”

The long pause made something in his chest seize up. Panic, maybe.  The dark voice grumbled, unsatisfied.  “But?”

“We didn’t find anything,” Doctor Hamada said.  “Your brain was lit up like a Christmas tree, don’t get me wrong, far more active than we usually see in unconscious patients, but there’s no damage.  We’ve kept you under observation until something changed, hoping we’d get answers when you improved or worsened, but you weren’t in any evident distress. You’ve been more or less comatose for the best part of an hour, and we’re not sure what the cause is.”

“So you…you have no idea why I can’t remember,” he said, pressing his lips together and trying not to let his hands shake.  He took a deep breath, pressing down the—hunger—fear.  He needed to focus, he needed answers—he needed the dark voice to leave him alone. He was reasonably sure that the emptiness in his head would be less concerning if he was the only one there.

My body, my mind, the dark voice said, almost bemused, and he scowled.

“We don’t know yet,” Doctor Hamada was saying kindly when he returned to reality from the cold and starless black, leaving the voice to mutter in the darkest corners.  “We’re trying to find your family, but without a last name, that’s proving difficult in our current chaos.  With your consent, we’d like to run some more tests—a blood test, to see if we can find any medications or drugs in your system, and another MRI, to see if anything’s changed.”

“Sure,” he said.  “I don’t know what it’ll help, but whatever you want.”

“Jake,” she said, and reached out to take his hand in hers. The point of contact was warm, her palm dry and slightly powdery from exam gloves, and he closed his eyes as a brief war raged through his body.  Part of him—all of him, really—wanted to clutch her hand until his knuckles ached, and maybe cry, cling to the point of human contact like it was all that was holding him to earth.  But in the black of his mind, the dark voice coiled forward, hungry hungry hungry, kill her, scare her, feed us, and the hollowness in his chest ached like an open wound.

He pulled his hand back, and the black voice snarled.  On the wall, in the corner of his eye, his shadow splintered into a thing, all long arms and tentacle and writhing motion—when he looked straight on, it was solid, tame.

“Jake,” Doctor Hamada repeated, gentle, unoffended by his retreat. The girl with the porcelain face was watching them, her eyes wide, and they flickered nervously to the wall behind his shoulder.  He tried not to notice, tried to put it out of his mind—my mind.  “I know this must be terrifying for you.  I can’t imagine what you’re going through.  But we’re going to help you, and we’ll find someone who knows you. Okay?”

“Okay,” he said—barely a murmur.  He tugged his hands closer and balled them into fists, until pain sparkled up his nerves from where his nails bit into the skin.  It reminded him that his body was his own, even if he didn’t particularly remember it.  

It is not, the dark voice parried, calm and cold.  He was pretty sure it was a bad sign that the voice was becoming clearer, that the press of the starless black was becoming a headache as the hollowness in his chest dragged at his ribs and heart.  Mine, my body, my mind, hungry.

“This body is mine,” he snapped aloud.  Doctor Hamada didn’t bat an eye, merely arched an eyebrow as if asking if he was done. His cheeks burned—he must be an easy blusher, he thought dimly, filing the information away—and he stared down at his fists so that he didn’t have to look at her.  He hadn’t meant to answer the voice aloud, hadn’t meant to give it the satisfaction.  

Across the room, the girl’s face wasn’t very expressive—logical reasons humans weren’t meant to be made from porcelain, he supposed—but he could almost feel the fear coiling off her skin.  He could feel it, like something that clung to his fingers and cloyed on his tongue, sweet and bitter.  It eased the hollowness, drove back the blackness minutely, and the voice moaned—not enough.  In the corner of his eye, he could see his shadow.  Shatter, freeze, shatter, freeze, in time with the beeping of his heart rate.

“I’ll send Melissa, the nurse from before, to take some blood, all right?” Doctor Hamada asked, and he nodded.  He didn’t watch her leave the room, looking down at the tendons standing out on the backs of his hands and trying not to see his shadow or the little girl in his periphery.

Then she spoke, and he looked up automatically.  “Your shadow is moving, and you’re not,” she said, voice thin and faint.  It vibrated strangely between porcelain lips.  “What are you doing to it?”

He tried to find something reassuring to say, but all he could do was whisper back, “I don’t know.”  Shatter, freeze.  Spike-drop-pause.  “I’m not doing it.”

Hungry.

The nurse—Melissa, he reminded himself—returned almost at once, the same worn smile on her face as before.  She carried a small tray, arrayed with a syringe, a rubber tie, and a contained needle, and set it down beside his bed with businesslike efficiency.

“Hi, Jake,” she said.  “Normally we’d send you to the lab to get blood drawn, but given the givens, we thought it might be better to keep you here in the ICU until we know you won’t seize again.”

“Wouldn’t want to scare the lab techs,” he muttered, distracted, and eyed the needle, expecting to feel some trepidation at the look of it. There wasn’t a flicker of nerves, just a feeling of…condescension.  It was the voice, he thought, amused at the idea that a needle could be a genuine threat.

“Exactly,” Melissa said with a laugh, pulling on a fresh pair of gloves and tying the rubber strip around his arm a few inches above the elbow. That part was a little nervewracking, the foreign feeling of rubber on skin, of—how dare she restrain us—compression too tight for comfort.  “Can you make a fist for me a few times?”  He did, feeling the ache of trapped blood set in almost immediately as the vessels in his forearm stood out, and she nodded, approving.  

Never raise anything up that you can’t lay down again, he repeated to himself, reciting the rule like a mantra as the voice pressed forward.  Something to think about, that was what he needed, something that would let him focus and hold back the tide of starless black.

Never raise anything up that you can’t lay down again.

Spike-drop-pause.  Shatter, freeze.

Melissa carefully affixed the needle to the syringe and tore open a packet that smelled strongly of alcohol, astringent and sharp in his nose.

Never raise anything up that you can’t lay down again.

Spike-drop-pause.  Shatter, freeze.

The alcohol wipe was freezing against his skin, but nothing in comparison to the pressing, crushing weight of the cold presence behind his eyes.

Never raise anything up that you can’t lay down again.

Spike-drop-pause.  Shatter, freeze.

“This shouldn’t hurt much,” Melissa said quietly.  She smiled at him, trying to coax one out of him in return.  “I’m good at this part.”  He didn’t dare twitch, just in case the focus it would take to smile through the roar of the voice was the last straw.

Melissa touched the needle to his skin, a point of cold pressure.

His shadow fractured, exploding up the wall like splashing black paint, and took the whole world with it.

Never raise anything up—

The needle pressing at his skin—

Hungry, hungry, HUNGRY—

He blinked up at cloud-striped blue sky, and stood up without a thought, joints popping stiffly but not giving him any real trouble. There was a clatter, and he—Jake, his name was Jake—looked down for the source of the sound.  Bits of plaster rained down from his shoulders and hair, a fine white dust coating his hands and drifting around his feet like a miniature blizzard.

His chest wasn’t hollow anymore.  In fact, he felt…sparkling, like he’d drunk four espressos and was standing on a mountain top, energized and clear and fresh.

Jake looked around at the rubble surrounding him, bemused, and froze.

There she was.  The little girl from his room.  Half the ceiling had come down on her, and she hadn’t been nearly so fortunate as he was. Her porcelain face had a fault line cracking from the forehead all the way to the jaw, down through her eye and cheek, shards broken out of her lips and chin.  Blood seeped from the crack, deep enough to pass through to the tissue still left under the transmuted skin, blazing red against the smooth white. The eye within the crack stared, with no eyelid to cover it, and the other was closed.  What was left intact of her face was twisted into genuine terror, so blindingly obvious that even the inexpressive porcelain couldn’t hide it.

There was a precarious moment where Jake thought he might be sick on the spot.  His vision wavered, a desperate lurch of nausea as his stomach hurled itself at his ribs and tried to crawl up his throat.

He looked down to steady himself and saw, sprawled at his feet, Melissa.  She was mostly clear of rubble—impressive, he thought numbly, it looked like two stories of hospital and patients had been brought down wholesale—but she was broken, joints yanked apart until they had dislocated altogether.  She looked like she’d been put on the rack, or toyed with by something immensely strong and enormous.  The needle was jammed into the soft skin at the hollow of her throat, blood spilled across her skin, and the rubber tie had fluttered down to cover her dead eyes like a blindfold.

Whirling away, Jake retched, doubling over and coughing up thin, sour bile.  There was nothing in his system to be thrown up, but the convulsions left him with tears on his cheeks and shakes in his hands.  Or maybe that was the destroyed hospital.  Maybe it was everything.

In the corner of his eye as he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, Jake could see Doctor Hamada, killed by a falling steel beam. He hoped it had been quick.

His shadow, sprawled on the ground, was quiescent, his own shape rather than the tentacle-laden nightmare that had exploded across the wall.  His mind was still cold and dark, but the cold was distant, and the dark manageable. The voice was quiet, nearly purring with satisfaction—feast, what a feast, all their fear—and Jake was alone in the wreck of a hospital that had been destroyed by the monster that shared his body.

This was nothing a human could do, even the most deranged magic user.  There was something else in his mind, a demon—rude—or an old god—better—something that fed on terror and was under the impression that Jake shouldn’t be in his own head anymore.  That did explain a few things about the magical explosion, he supposed. Jake, or whoever he had been before, had bitten off more than he could chew and invited that…thing into his head. By mistake or design, it hardly mattered.

“Never raise anything up that you can’t lay down again,” he said aloud, his abused throat turning his voice raspy.

Lay me down, then, human, the voice said, almost chortled, ice touching Jake’s spine at the dare.  

“Go to hell.”  He didn’t get a response that time, only another cruel wave of sensation not unlike a dismissive sneer.

Jake stood there for another long moment, trying not to see the brass arm flung out from under a pile of debris, before a realization rose up through the fog filling his brain.  He couldn’t stand here forever.  More to the point, he was a danger to anyone who tried to take him in by force.  He didn’t know what the voice, the monster—old god—could do if pressed.  It had annihilated a hospital along with everyone inside just for a meal.  He was pretty sure the single most dangerous thing the police could do was try to imprison him, and that meant he needed to not be here when they arrived.

That meant he needed clothes.  Real clothes, not the tattered paper hospital gown.

Jake found what he could, jackets and scrubs without bloodstains, and tried not to be sick again at the idea of wearing the clothes of people he’d killed.  Once he was dressed—for a given value thereof—he tugged the hood of his stolen jacket up over his face and shoved both hands deep into his pockets, pretending that it would let him hide.

The sirens arrived just as Jake picked his way out of the last of the debris and slipped into the gathering crowd.

Good, the voice mused.  Find more people, more fear, more power.

Jake hunched his shoulders and walked faster, leaving the ruined hospital behind him.

[askthedespairkids]

*As Kyoji walks through the halls, he hears the announcement that Karma has been defeated*

Karma-San….it’s okay. We’ll get through this…and I promise I’ll help you.

—-

*The day after the party*

Kyoji is hard at work doing science

Karma: KYOJI!

Kyoji: GYSHI!

He nearly drops a vial before it hits the floor, but catches it in time. 

Karma, hey! Haven’t seen you in a while.

Karma: How is my good friend doing?

Kyoji: Well, current circumstances are….less than favorable. Although I did have a nice reprieve last night.

Karma: I dunno what that word means but good for you.

Kyoji: But a word of advice? Don’t ever mix alcohol, drugs, and candy. You will regret it the next day. Anyway, how goes things with you?

Karma: Well, I don’t seem to remember much of the party. I think Orochi and I had an interesting conversation of some sorts. And then I think Naomi and I… kissed?

Kyoji: Hehehe, really now? I don’t remember too much either. I think I was talking about Junko, then threw up. Or maybe it was the other way around.

Karma: I seem to remember you vomiting. And what was with that laugh?

Kyoji: Just kinda funny is all. I mean, you’ve been wrapped up in this love triangle with Junpei and Orochi for some time now. How’d Naomi get involved?

Karma: She just started making out with me and I went along with it!

Kyoji: Ooohhh, now I see. When did the higher-ups start letting you kids have booze?

Karma: People at the Agency actually considered me an alcoholic and put me in rehab. Same goes for marijuana.

Kyoji: I’d say something about that, but…I may have some oxycodone last night, so I’m not really in any position to judge.

Karma: Oxycodone?

Kyoji: Pain med. Seiko gave me some after I got my upgrades. I take it with a shot of morphine everyday so I can move without screaming in agony.

Karma: Hm.

Kyoji: You ever crush your finger in a door?

Karma: Duh.

Kyoji: Imagine that feeling all over your body. That’s how I’d feel on a regular basis without the stuff.

Karma: You’re an idiot for doing that shit to yourself.

Kyoji: I’m not gonna spend this event stuck in a lab. If I can go out on the front lines to help people, I’m going.

Karma: You can learn do front line things naturally. Hell, I spent 13 years trapped in a basement and I’m already in the top ranks.

Kyoji: ….*sighs* I don’t want to fight anyone.

Karma: …eh?

Kyoji: I just want help people. That’s all. But why is that so hard to accomplish? Why does every tragedy lead into another?

Karma: Because life is bullshit and is meant to torment us.

Kyoji: Pff. I wish that were the case. At least then things would make sense. But hey, no use being morose about it. Just gotta keep at it.

Karma: Life doesn’t have to be morbid to not make sense.

Kyoji: You don’t have to tell me twice. *He looks away* Innocent people go to death row, but I get to go free.

Karma: Dude that’s just how life works. I torture people for my own pleasure. Going so far as to fucking chew off people’s heads like a wild animal, and I get to work for the future foundation.

Kyoji: You ever heard of Operation Paperclip?

Karma: No

Kyoji: It was an operation conducted by the United States to recruit over 1,600 former Nazi scientists, technicians, and other specialists to help them against the Soviet Union. One of them provided the details on rocket technology, and that’s how they got the first men on the moon during the Apollo project.

Karma: Your point?

Kyoji: Life is weird like that. People who’ve done terrible things can end up contributing to society in some of the most meaningful ways.

Karma: Sure, sure. That’s not what I’m here to talk about though.

Kyoji: Sorry, I got really philosophical again, heh. What did you need?

Karma: …could you do the examination?

Kyoji: Huh? Oh! Right! Of course, of course!

Karma: Like… now?

Kyoji: Absolutely. If you’re comfortable with it.

Karma: Mhm.

Kyoji: Alright, please follow me. *He leads karma to another lab. One with a large table in the center and a large metallic ring on the ceiling*

Karma: Oh wow this brings back memories.

Kyoji: It’s a biometric scanner. Basically, it’s like a 3D MRI, but far more accurate.

Karma: Huh. So do I just lie down? Do I need to change?

Kyoji: A hospital gown would be preferable, yes. There’s a changing room right over there.

Karma: Oh. You’re actually giving me a changing room. They didn’t give me one last time. Made me change in front of them and shit.

Kyoji: Well, no need to worry about that here. Take your time. And no cameras in there, I promise.

Karma: I didn’t even think about cameras…*they head off to change*

He turns the machine on. It emits a low humming noise

Karma: *they come back in the gown, still wearing their hat*

Kyoji: Alright, all you gotta do is lay down and this shouldn’t take too long

Karma: You’re not gonna make me take my hat off? :DDD

Kyoji: nah, it’s fine

Karma: Thank goodness. It keeps my hair over my ey- Kyoji this won’t show you any burns or cuts right?

Kyoji: Only on one layer. This is designed to differentiate different body systems. But I promise I won’t look at it if it bothers you.

Karma: That’s still gonna show… I may as well say it myself instead of cowering. My right eye is severely burned, and I have… self harm scars on my thighs.

Kyoji: I have the names of all the friends we lost carved into my forearm.

Karma: What? Dude the most I have is a tattoo of the numbers 203 on my ankle what the fuck?

Kyoji: One of those people…was my creation. She’s the closest thing I had to a child. I can’t let myself forget that. Nor any of the others.

Karma: …can I see?

Kyoji pulls down his sleeve. The names are all there in prominent scar tissue

Karma: *they kiss their fingers and then run them along the carvings*

Kyoji: Um…personal space?

Karma: Er- sorry.

Kyoji: He laughs Its alright. The best thing we can do for all of them is to keep moving forward.

Karma: Y-yeah.

Kyoji: Now come on, let’s finally get the examination done.

Karma: *they hop up onto the table and lay down*

Kyoji: Alright, let’s get started.

He hits a few buttons and the table turns upward a bit. The ring, which is mount to a set of robot arms, comes down and encircles the portion of the table around Karma’s head. Blue lights on the interior light up. The ring moves down to the end, then back up before returning to the ceiling. On the other side of the room, a 3-D image of a human body appears on a computer screen

Karma: Well?

Kyoji: I’m taking a look and…what the….

Karma: Yeah it should be weird. Seeing someone have male and female sex organs isn’t supposed to be normal.

Kyoji: No, this goes beyond just that. I’m seeing sets of multiple digestive and endocrine organs as well.

Karma: Huh?

Kyoji: And there’s….a second heart as well…now it makes sense.

Karma: I have two hearts?

Kyoji: Yes. When you told me you have both male and female reproductive organs, I thought maybe this was the actual cause. You see…you’re not really intersex.

Karma: ….I’m not?

Kyoji: You’ve heard of conjoined twins, right? When a fertilized egg fails to full separate into two babies, the fetuses end up merged together. There’s a step down from that. Where one twin can end up subsumed by the other. A parasitic twin.

Karma: What are you saying?

Kyoji: *He sighs* When I tell you, I don’t want you to think too much about it, okay? It’s not something you had any control over. It was an involuntary biological function you had no conscious awareness of.

Karma: …..

Kyoji: Basically, you could’ve had a twin. Whether brother or sister, I can’t completely say. But the two of you ended up merging together in-utero. Those additional organs aren’t supernumerary congenital mutations. They’re from your sibling.

Karma: …I’m two people?

Kyoji: No. I don’t see a second brain anywhere, so it’s unlikely your twin would have survived even if they were born. You’re still you. You and your twin just ended up merged together.

Karma: I- I killed them.

Kyoji: No, you didn’t. I don’t see any traces of brain tissue outside your skull. It’s very unlikely your sibling would’ve survived even if this didn’t happen. It’s quite the contrary, actually. You’re keeping their organs alive.

Karma: You’re lying I killed them. Or- or maybe they killed me.

Kyoji: Why would I lie to you about this? Just listen. Sanju Bhagat was an Indian man who had a very prominent gut for 36 years. In 1999, he went in for surgery because doctors thought it was a tumor, but that that’s when they found he actually had a parasitic twin. It had fully-formed feet, hands, hair, and even fingernails that were several inches long. The twin survived in this state by feeding off the nutrients Bhagat consumed.

Karma: What is your point? Your lying because you don’t want me to freak out. Well that’s too late.

Kyoji: Listen to me for one second, okay! You asked me to provide you with an examination. I did. Now I’m giving you the results and telling you what they mean. You really think I’d lie to you about all this? I’m not.

He turns the screen toward Karma

Here it is, clear as day. These are the results. You have additional organs, including a secondary set of genitals. That’s the truth. But you didn’t kill your sibling. You were a non-sentient mass of cells that merged with another, less complete mass of cells.

Karma: The other doctors lied to me. You’re surely doing the same. This is why I refuse to speak to Miaya.

Kyoji: Really? After I’ve tried to help you, turned you away from Maverick, granted you a power to help protect you, wanted to make sure you got out of Hope’s Peak safe, helped you back at the mansion, and offered to help you understand something about yourself, you really think I would lie now of all times?

Karma: I’d lie to me.

Kyoji: Well I wouldn’t. If I wanted to lie to you, I would’ve just said you had supernumerary organs. That’s a lie. But this isn’t some big dramatic reveal on how you’ve been a killer since before birth. That’s a load of bullshit. This is just a thing that happened. You had no conscious control over any of it.

Karma: You’re lying. You’re not my friend. You never were my friend. You want to hurt me. You want to make sure I’m never happy. You hate me. You’re trying to use me for some purpose. You want to take me back to the Agency and make me work there again. You’re here to hurt me and I can’t believe I didn’t realize this!

Kyoji stands up, walks over, and hugs her

Karma: Let go of me! You want to hurt me!

Kyoji: No, I dont. I just want to hug.

Karma: You’re going to stab me. You’re going to stab me with your weird body horror shit!

Kyoji: I could’ve done that at any time. But I’m not going to.

Karma: Why are you hugging me? You want to hurt me.

Kyoji: No I don’t. I wanted to hug you because I thought you needed a hug.

Karma: I don’t- Kyoji I’m fine. I just- I don’t-

Kyoji: Please. Just let me hug you, okay?

Karma: *they simply start to cry*

Kyoji: It’s okay. It’s okay. Just let it all out, alright?

Karma: I- I’m sorry. It’s my- It- It’s my- My Disorder- I- I can’t-

Kyoji: I understand. You’re talking to a medical expert, after all.

Karma: I hate it. I hate everything. I hate myself.

Kyoji: I feel that way sometimes. But it’s okay. You just need a little help is all.

Karma: Please don’t leave me alone.

Kyoji: *hugs her tigher* I promise I won’t.

Karma: I’m supposed to be a fucking adult in Canada and here I’m crying like a small child…

Kyoji: You’re allowed to cry regardless of your age

Karma: That’s the first time I’ve been told that.

Kyoji: Well it’s true. Especially here.

Karma: *they take some deep breaths* You sure I didn’t kill them?

Kyoji: Of course. It was a non-conscious biological occurrence. If anything, you’re keeping the last vestiges of them alive.

Karma: What am I?

Kyoji: You’re Karma Graves. You’re a human being.

Karma: I don’t even know what gender I’m supposed to be. Humans have genders right?

Kyoji: Yes. But it’s not a 50/50 split. You can be whoever or whatever you want to be.

Karma: I don’t know who I am or what I am.

Kyoji: It’s okay. I can help you figure out.

Karma: You’d do that?

Kyoji: Absolutely!

Karma: ….thank you.

Kyoji: You’re welcome. Miaya would be more than willing to help you as well, you know.

Karma: yeah…

Kyoji: She’s helped me a lot. She can help you too.

Karma: I may see her. I’m not sure yet.

Kyoji: I can go with you if you want

Karma: …that would actually help a lot.

Kyoji: Good. You wanna go now or later? 

Karma: …later.

Kyoji: Alrighty. So…what do you wanna do now?

Karma: Fuck if I know.

Kyoji: Hmmm….you wanna go watch a movie or something?

Karma: Uh- sure. Why not?

Kyoji: Then let us be off! We shall watch Government Witches from Outer Space!

—-

*Present time* We’ll figure things out, one way or another.

[mafiabosstsuna]

this is sent in by the lovely @xmoonlightjasminex

Just like a summary of the entire drabble. I got this from kill the cliche here on Tumblr and it has been stuck in my head and I just wanted to write it. 

“My wife has amnesia?” Tsuna asked the doctor.

Said man gave him a pitying look.  “I’m afraid so, the impact on her head lead to severe loss of memory. I am afraid that she will never be able to remember.” 

Good. 

Hell if he did. He was tricked by his then soon to be father in law. The stinking bastard had tried to scam the familia after racking up a debt once he gambled everything he owned. He offered his own daughter as a leeway. But once she stepped one foot in the Vongola mansion he high tailed out of Italy on the night they were supposed to have their honeymoon. 

Needless to say the honeymoon was replaced by a intense investigation on his ‘bride’  who had denied helping her father escape only to be stunned with tears leaking from her eyes as she held the stinging cheek. 

A few days later he showed her her father’s decapitated head, his expression forever frozen in fear. Seeing the same fear take over her features he left and ordered the head be thrown in the most disgraceful place a dead body could be thrown without being found. 

Needless to say the marriage went downhill after that. He was to angry to touch her and she was to scared. They slept in different rooms in the mansion, she never showed up at the meals he was present for in the dining room and he took his dinner in his office. The only time they were anywhere close to one another was during social functions when she was quietly standing by his side,  or when he stumbled back after a night of finding another woman for his bed, the bed his wife refused to enter. 

He would come in, reeking like sex and perfume sometimes mistake her room with his, sometimes he did that just to spite her. They would start an argument that would usually end either with him slamming the door as he left to his study or her on the ground with a red cheek and unshed tears pooling in her eyes as he left for his office. 

Tonight, tonight though it ended differently. After the rare slap, she didn’t collapse on the ground from the hit. Instead she just turned her head to look back at him with eyes so full of hatred and anger. She was the one to storm out of the room this time, slamming the door. Not long after he entered his office he was informed that one of the cars had left the garage. He payed it no mind where would she go. Her father was dead, the house she had lived in was repossessed after her father lost it. 

And here he  was now, trying to drink himself to sleep. As he looked at the ring he remembered her in the simple wedding dress she had worn. After he had agreed to marry her due to her family having great reputation and connections well before her father. He had refused a large ceremony like the mongrell had wanted but had caved in once Tsuna turned his cold eyes on him. 

A simple white gown with the skirt reaching to the middle of her calves. Half sleeves long enough to cover her elbows and a short veil held by a headband. 

As they filled out the book register and left for the mansion (since there was no reception) he had thought to himself maybe this could work. But all hope of it working out went with finding out her father (who was absent at the signing of the register) had taken money from the familia and left. Everything was hell after that.

Suddenly frantic steps could be heard becoming louder and louder as they neared his office doors. Who was it now? 

“Judaime! There has been an accident!” Gokudera yelled out, slamming the door open. 

“What happened?"his speech was only slightly slurred, his flames purging away the effects of alcohol. 

"The Donna! The car she was driving crashed.” He could see his storm Guardian was shook, the car crash reminding him of his mother’s death. 

“Was she drunk?” Tsuna asked, she didn’t look like one who would drive under intoxication. 

”No, the breaks were cut. “Gokudera said grimly making Tsuna straighten in his seat. 

”What? “

”After the hospital called I had several members go check. They confirmed that the breaks were sabotaged. That was the car we were suppose to use to go to the Ventana familia in three days for the collaboration between the two territories.

“She’s in hospital?” Tsuna asked after he got the required information about the sabotage. 

“Yes in Santa Maria General. I’m sorry Juudaime they didn’t tell me more about her. Are you going to see her? ” He asked, getting only a nod before Tsuna left the room. 

When he reached the hospital and got the information in which room she was Tsuna slowly walked the corridors until he found the designated number. 

The had to take a double take when he looked at her seemingly asleep on the bed. Despite a few scratches and cuts on her face and limbs the only noticeable injuries were the sling on her left arm and the bandages around her head. Her hair which was shoulder blade length was shorn off to properly treat the head wound the only serious injury she had. 

“Are you her husband?"he heard a voice ask and turned to look at an elderly woman in blue scrubs. She smiled warmly when he only nodded. “She is a very lucky young lady. Not many come out of such a car crash with so few injuries. The only notable injuries are her sprained shoulder and head trauma. She is still in a medicated sleep but should awake in a few hours.”

Not saying anything, just entering the room he took a seat next to the bed. 

Seeing her asleep now with hair a different length made her seem like another person. But when she awoke he would be met with hate in those eyes. 

He must have dozed off at some point, one moment it was the middle of the night, now mid morning. And her condition hadn’t changed. Still asleep on the bed, face slack as if sleeping. 

Rubbing the sleep out of his eyes he glanced back at her only to see her hand twitch. Slowly the twitching grew stronger and her eyes started to flutter. Calling the doctor and drawing the attention of those two unfocused eyes to him he awaited the hate and loathing to arrive but blinked in surprise when the only feeling there was confusion. 

“Who are you?” the words leaving her mouth made the doctor and nurse entering break into a flurry of movement and questions. After half an hour of asking questions and several other filled with  MRI scans Tsuna was pulled away from his wife by an older doctor. 

“My wife has amnesia?” Tsuna asked the doctor. Said man gave him a pitying look. “I’m afraid so. While she hasn’t sustained injuries anywhere else, the impact on her head lead to severe loss of memory. I am afraid that she will never be able to remember.”                

Thinking about the doe eyed female who drank in every word he said once he had calmed her down whilst waiting for an MRI scan. 

He had rambled on complete lies like how nice her body felt when he held her when they slept. How she cooked breakfast for the two of them and brought him lunch and dinner to his office when he couldn’t make it. How they went to bed every night whispering sweet dreams to each other. 

Really whatwas he supposed to say? That the two of them were forced to marry one another and he had traumatized her by showing her father’s head to her? 

No he’d rather take the clean slate. If what the doctor said was true it should be easily accomplished. 

But just to make sure he will ask Shamal as well.  And if the whole new newly wedded life story is to be believable he needed to fill out the plot holes in their story. 

He had phone calls to make. 

Her (former)  room was searched through by himself in order to see if he could find what he was looking for. Her diary. The next thing that had information about her than she used to.

A few days ago Shamal had called to confirm what the doctor had said. 

“It’s like her brain was a hard drive and the crash deleted everything except basic information such as her own name, the ability to read and write. Even her school lessons remain but she can’t remember the people or events that took place outside of that. ”

Reading the written memoirs only steeled his resolve in his idea. She was nothing like her father. Raised by a sickly mother who got worse as her father squandered the family’s savings and property so that they couldn’t afford medicine. Leaving for a scholarship as soon as she turned 18 and succeeding, becoming valedictorian of her graduating class. Fighting to find a job, apartment. Then her father calls her begging for help at the cost of his life. Finding out about the engagement, the marriage. The first horrid horrid day and how she couldn’t look at her wedding dress any more, hence it being buried deep in the closet. 

He memorized every important detail in the little book and used both truth (her life up before her father called her) and lies (from said point till today in 'improved’ version). 

He made sure not to leave any detail.So as the story went the two of them met by complete accident when they bumped into one another and he helped her gather the papers she dropped.  They later laughed at the sheer cliche when she bought him coffee for helping her. Exchanging phone number in hopes of friendship and they saw that friendship quickly bloom into love. Not long after confessing their feelings to each other Tsuna asked her to marry him. On her insistence the wedding was a small quiet affair with just them, the priest an witnesses. A small dinner between the two of them was the reception. Unfortunately before they could have the honeymoon he was called to an urgent business involving the company he ran and has been run ragged ever since. Boy was he a romantic. 

All of the staff was warned not to mention anything of the past that had been unless it wasn’t like the story.  Even the Guardians, all of them had agreed to play along. 

The last thing to dowas burn any evidence of the old relationship between them, and he had already replaced the seldom pictures they had with top of the art photoshop. Now as he watched the journal burn to pieces (he had already made a copy with her handwriting courtesy of a forgery expert who was clever enough to suggest he add a few 'romantic’ entries to solid the belief.) Tomorrow his wife would be coming home as he went to pick her up with a huge bouquet of flowers. 

As he woke up with the faint floral scent of her shampoo and short strands of hair tickling his cheeks he marveled how peacefully she slept in his arms. Taking a deep breath before nuzzling his nose in her hair while tightening his grip just the slightest bit as he started to drift into dreamland. 

A knock on his office door sounded before it opened and her head peeked through. 

“I brought you dinner. For you and me. And once you’ve finished eating you are going to bed. No arguing.”

Smiling indulgently at her he chuckled as he sat  down next to her to eat. 

“Of course Dear ”

After the nice dinner they walked to their bedroom, took off their shoes before slipping into bed with their clothes still on. As Tsuna pulled the covers over them she whispered. 

“Goodnight Tsuna.”

He smiled as he gently,pressed a kiss to her temple. 

As he lays there falling deeper and deeper into Morpheus’ sleep he can’t help but think one tiny traitorous though . 

‘I am so happy she has irreversible amnesia. ‘

[xmoonlightjasminex]

The fic I posted on TYL! Mafia! Vongola/You

Just like a summary of the entire drabble. I got this from kill the cliche here on Tumblr and it has been stuck in my head and I just wanted to write it. §§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§ "My wife has amnesia?" Tsuna asked the doctor. Said man gave him a pitying look. "I'm afraid so, the impact on her head lead to severe loss of memory. I am afraid that she will never be able to remember." Good. §§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§ Tsuna POV. Hell if he did. He was tricked by his then soon to be father in law. The stinking bastard had tried to scam the familia after racking up a dept once he gambled everything he owned. He offered his own daughter as a leeway. But once she stepped one foot in the Vongola mansion he high tailed out of Italy on the night they were supposed to have their honeymoon. Needless to say the honeymoon was replaced by a intense investigation on his 'bride' who had denied helping her father escape only to be stunned with tears leaking from her eyes as she held the stinging cheek. A few days later he showed her her father's decapitated head, his expression forever frozen in fear. Seeing the same fear take over her features he left and ordered the head be thrown in the most disgraceful place a dead body could be thrown without being found. Needless to say the marriage went downhill after that. He was to angry to touch her and she was to scared. They slept in different rooms in the mansion, she never showed up at the meals he was present for in the dining room and he took his dinner in his office. The only time they were anywhere close to one another was during social functions when she was quietly standing by his side, or when he stumbled back after a night of finding another woman for his bed, the bed his wife refused to enter. He would come in, reeking like sex and perfume sometimes mistake her room with his, sometimes he did that just to spite her. They would start an argument that would usually end either with him slamming the door as he left to his study or her on the ground with a red cheek and unshed tears pooling in her eyes as he left for his office. Tonight, tonight though it ended differently. After the rare slap, she didn't collapse on the ground from the hit. Instead she just turned her head to look back at him with eyes so full of hatred and anger. She was the one to storm out of the room this time, slamming the door. Not long after he entered his office he was informed that one of the cars had left the garage. He payed it no mind where would she go. Her father was dead, the house she had lived in was repossessed after her father lost it. And here he was now, trying to drink himself to sleep. As he looked at the ring he remembered her in the simple wedding dress she had worn. After he had agreed to marry her due to her family having great reputation and connections well before her father. He had refused a large ceremony like the mongrell had wanted but had caved in once Tsuna turned his cold eyes on him. A simple white gown with the skirt reaching to the middle of her calves. Half sleeves long enough to cover her elbows and a short veil held by a headband. As they filled out the book register and left for the mansion (since there was no reception) he had thought to himself maybe this could work. But all hope of it working out went with finding out her father (who was absent at the signing of the register) had taken money from the familia and left. Everything was hell after that. Suddenly frantic steps could be heard becoming louder and louder as they neared his office doors. Who was it now? "Judaime! There has been an accident!" Gokudera yelled out, slamming the door open. "What happened?"his speech was only slightly slurred, his flames purging away the effects of alcohol. "The Donna! The car she was driving crashed." He could see his storm Guardian was shoocken, the car crash reminding him of his mother's death. Was she drunk? " Tsuna asked, she didn't look like one who would drive under intoxication. " No, the breaks were cut. "Gokudera said grimly making Tsuna straighten in his seat. " What? " " After the hospital called I had several members go check. They confirmed that the breaks were sabotaged. That was the car we were suppose to use to go to the Ventana familia in three days for the collaboration between the two territories. "She's in hospital?" Tsuna asked after he got the required information about the sabotage. "Yes in Santa Maria General. I'm sorry Judaime they didn't tell me more about her. Are you going to see her? " He asked, getting only a nod before Tsuna left the room. §§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§ When he reached the hospital and got the information in which room she was Tsuna slowly walked the corridors until he found the designated number. The had to take a double take when he looked at her seemingly asleep on the bed. Despite a few scratches and cuts on her face and limbs the only noticeable injuries were the sling on her left arm and the bandages around her head. Her hair which was shoulder blade length was shorn off to properly treat the head wound the only serious injury she had. "Are you her husband?"he heard a voice ask and turned to look at an elderly woman in blue scrubs. She asmiled warmly when he only nodded. She is a very lucky young lady. Not many come out of such a car crash with so few injuries. The only notable injuries are her sprained shoulder and head trauma. She is still in a medicated sleep but should awake in a few hours." Not saying anything, just entering the room he took a seat next to the bed. Seeing her asleep now with hair a different length made her seem like another person. But when she awoke he would be met with hate in those eyes. He must have dozed off at some point, one moment it was the middle of the night, now mid morning. And her condition hadn't changed. Still asleep on the bed, face slack as if sleeping. Rubbing the sleep out of his eyes he glanced back at her only to see her hand twitch. Slowly the twitching grew stronger and her eyes started to flutter. Calling the doctor and drawing the attention of those two unfocused eyes to him he awaited the hate and loathing to arrive but blinked in surprise when the only feeling there was confusion. "Who are you?" the words leaving her mouth made the doctor and nurse entering break into a flurry of movement and questions. After half an hour of asking questions and several other filled with MRI scans Tsuna was pulled away from his wife by an older doctor. "My wife has amnesia?" Tsuna asked the doctor. Said man gave him a pitying look. "I'm afraid so. While she hasn't sustained injuries anywhere else, the impact on her head lead to severe loss of memory. I am afraid that she will never be able to remember." Thinking about the doe eyed female who drank in every word he said once he had calmed her down whilst waiting for an MRI scan. He had rambled on complete lies like how nice her body felt when he held her when they slept. How she cooked breakfast for the two of them and brought him lunch and dinner to his office when he couldn't make it. How they went to bed every night whispering sweet dreams to each other. Really whatwas he supposed to say? That the two of them were forced to marry one another and he had traumatized her by showing her father's head to her? No he'd rather take the clean slate. If what the doctor said was true it should be easily accomplished. But just to make sure he will ask Shamal as well. And if the whole new newly wedded life story is to be believable he needed to fill out the plot holes in their story. He had phone calls to make. §§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§ Her (former) room was searched through by himself in order to see if he could find what he was looking for. Her diary. The next thing that had information about her than she used to. A few days ago Shamal had called to confirm what the doctor had said. "It's like her brain was a hard drive and the crash deleted everything except basic information such as her own name, the ability to read and write. Even her school lessons remain but she can't remember the people or events that took place outside of that. " Reading the written memoirs only steeled his resolve in his idea. She was nothing like her father. Raised by a sickly mother who got worse as her father squandered the family's savings and property so that they couldn't afford medicine. Leaving for a scholarship as soon as she turned 18 and succeeding, becoming valedictorian of her graduating class. Fighting to find a job, apartment. Then her father calls her begging for help at the cost of his life. Finding out about the engagement, the marriage. The first horrid horrid day and how she couldn't look at her wedding dress any more, hence it being buried deep in the closet. He memorized every important detail in the little book and used both truth (her life up before her father called her) and lies (from said point till today in 'improved' version). He made sure not to leave any detail.So as the story went the two of them met by complete accident when they bumped into one another and he helped her gather the papers she dropped. They later laughed at the sheer cliche when she bought him coffee for helping her. Exchanging phone number in hopes of friendship and they saw that friendship quickly bloom into love. Not long after confessing their feelings to each other Tsuna asked her to marry him. On her insistence the wedding was a small quiet affair with just them, the priest an witnesses. A small dinner between the two of them was the reception. Unfortunately before they could have the honeymoon he was called to an urgent business involving the company he ran and has been run ragged ever since. Boy was he a romantic. All of the staff was warned not to mention anything of the past that had been unless it wasn't like the story. Even the Guardians, all of them had agreed to play along. The last thing to dowas burn any evidence of the old relationship between them, and he had already replaced the seldom pictures they had with top of the art photoshop. Now as he watched the journal burn to pieces (he had already made a copy with her handwriting courtesy of a forgery expert who was clever enough to suggest he add a few 'romantic' entries to solid the belief.) Tomorrow his wife would be coming home as he went to pick her up with a huge bouquet of flowers. §§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§ As he woke up with the faint floral scent of her shampoo and short strands of hair ticking his cheeks he marvled how peacefully she slept in his arms. Taking a deep breath before nuzzling his nose in her hair while tightwnong his grip just the slightest bit as he started to drift into dreamland. §§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§ A knock on his office door sounded before it opened and her head peeked through. "I brought you dinner. For you and me. And once you've finished eating you are going to bed. No arguing." Smiling indulgingly at her he chuckled as he sat down next to her to eat. "Of course Dear " After the nice dinner they walked to their bedroom, took off their shoes before slipping into bed with their clothes still on. As Tsuna pulled the covers over them she whispered. " Goodnight Tsuna." He smiled as he gently,pressed a kiss to her temple. As he lays there falling deeper and deeper into Morpheus' sleep he can't help but think one tiny traitorous though . "I am so happy she has irreversible amnesia. "

[finefigure]

Unbreakable

Under the bludgeonings of chance,

My head is bloody, but unbowed.

                                 –William Ernest Henley, “Invictus”

It was the paragraph loop that did it.

We were the only ones on the ice. I was grappling with my biggest challenge that year: right forward inside loops. Nancy Blackwell-Grieder was working on RFO paragraph loops for the 2017 WFC.

I came around my loop just in time to see her rock onto her heel and overbalance. 

I saw it in slow motion, too far away to catch her when she fell.

After she screamed, the first thing she said was, “No, no, no, no, no…”

I don’t know what people normally say immediately after sustaining a major injury. However, I’m pretty sure you have to be a seriously focused athlete to have your overriding thought be, “This can’t happen so close to the competition.” But I knew that was what the “no”s were about.

That was around the second week of July.

On the last day of September, Nancy became the new World Figure Champion.

This recollection is not strictly in order. Trauma and excitement do that: they chop things up, bringing some into sharp focus and smearing or obliterating others.

And it is only a memory. It’s my experience of what happened, and therefore not remotely the whole story. For that, you’d have to ask her.

She didn’t want me to call 911.

“Let me see if I can get up first,” she said.

So we waited for a while. She called her husband, Tony. (I later had to call him back and explain what she’d been talking about.)

When she started shivering and still couldn’t stand, I yelled up to two boys playing in the stands above. Told them to tell the front desk there was someone injured on the ice.

In a minute, other people arrived to help. I went to gather her things and tell my student, Brendan, who had just gotten off the ice, what had happened. I barked information over my shoulder to the person on the phone with emergency services as I passed by and heard him say, “I don’t know.”

Between brief errands, I kept running back to where she was still lying on the ice. An EMT was removing her skates, and I was furious at how clumsy and rough he was being. I snatched them from him, to take them away and dry them. To do something useful. To try to blot out how hard she was shivering, every shake jolting pain through her injured body. I remember wanting to get down on the ice to hug her, try to keep her warm at least. But I couldn’t help at all.

Brendan and I followed the ambulance to the hospital in Nancy’s car. Her brother-in-law met us in the lobby and told us that she was in radiology. At some point, Brendan and I went and had lunch. I remember we lugged my skates and his and Nancy’s into every air-conditioned building we visited: it was a scorching-hot day, and we didn’t want to break down our heat-moldable skates by leaving them in the car. At some other point, Tony came out to the waiting room and sat with us while Nancy was in CT.

At a third point, I was in her hospital room with her, holding one of her hands while Tony held the other. She’d been given heavy painkillers and was kind of adorably loopy for a few minutes until a nurse came in and told us that the scans had shown that she had no broken bones. I couldn’t believe it, but I was so relieved.

The nurse said to Nancy, “Do you want to try standing up?”

The loopiness gone, Nancy put a hand to her face and took a couple of deep breaths.

“Sure,” she gritted.

I looked across her at Tony and said quietly, “That was really a no.”

He nodded. But the nurse was there, cheerfully, briskly insistent.

I left to give her some privacy. Nothing like having an audience for your most painful moments, particularly when you’re in a hospital gown.

The standing up did not go well.

They discharged her anyway, for some reason extremely reluctant to provide her with a wheelchair to get to the car, and telling her that no, they didn’t have any crutches, and anyway, she should try to just walk.

A later MRI revealed what the CT and x-rays had missed: two fractures to the pelvis and a torn right labrum. (Incidentally, had she tried to walk as advised by the emergency department personnel, she might have displaced the fracture and had to have surgery.)

No Worlds for her this year, I thought sadly.

It’s the afternoon of September 29, Day 1 of the championships. Nancy and I are in the same flight of competitors for this first set of figures. Everyone in the flight is standing by the door to the ice, waiting for the chief referee, Alicia, to give us our patch letters and instructions.

Nancy bends over, breathing hard, nauseous from nerves. I go over to try to comfort her, rub her back, and she leans against me. I can feel her heart pounding. It calms me down to have someone else to focus on. Something to do. A way to be useful.

Alicia arrives. We stand up straight and listen.

A week after the accident, Nancy was back coaching from the hockey box. For patch class, she had an on-ice assistant coach. Also, I scribed circles in front of where she was standing with her crutches, and she called people over to her one by one so she could see their tracings while she taught them. World Figure Sport’s Figure It Out Workshop was at the end of the month, and some of her students were testing and competing. I was one of them. It was my first competition ever, and some other people’s too. She didn’t want to let us down.

At the workshop, we pushed Nancy around the ice on a chair so she could help teach the workshop skaters. She acted as the chief referee for the exams and competition. Afterward, she drove Karen Courtland Kelly to the airport and then drove another hour back home.

A week or two after that, she told me she was getting back on the ice: she had a student who learned best by being moved around physically. The inside of my head started screaming a little. I asked her if she wanted me to be there. I could even move the student for her. She said she’d be fine, that I shouldn’t bother to come.

I said OK, but then found that I couldn’t sleep the night before that lesson. And I thought, Everything will probably be fine. But will you be able to live with yourself if it’s not?

I was lacing up my skates the next morning when Nancy walked in the door. She stopped dead and gave me the eye.

“You are so silly,” she informed me.

I shrugged. Whether I was silly or not, I had to make sure she was all right.

Everything was fine that day. The kid had a good lesson, and nobody fell over.

About a week after that, Nancy started practicing again. Face drawn, lips white, body shaking.

She’d catch me looking at her and say, “It’s only pain.”

Yeah.

“How is she doing that?” Richard Swenning whispers in my ear. We’re in the stands of Dobson Ice Arena in Vail, watching Nancy compete the double three. She’s on her third tracing, and it looks like close to one line where she comes nearest to us.

“I don’t know,” I mutter back, “but that’s her bad leg.”

Four tracings. Right on.

Five.

“How is she doing that?!”

I just shake my head.

Six.

We let our breaths out.

A funny thing: if you ask her how she was doing that, how she made it through any of it, she’ll say she has no idea.

Well, that makes all of us.

Once Nancy got back to preparing for the competition, I only saw her really discouraged once, and then just for a few minutes. We were practicing a couple of weeks before the WFC. I was in the hockey box retying my skate, and she abandoned her tracings and came to the boards where I was.

“I can’t feel it,” she said. “I can’t feel any of it anymore.”

I made some joke welcoming her to my world, but she wasn’t in a laughing mood.

“Yes, but no one expects you to feel it,” she rejoined, on the verge of tears. “I should be able to.”

I grabbed her gently by the sleeve.

“Hey. You’ve got this,” I told her.

“No. I don’t have this!” She named a couple of our competitors. “I know they can feel everything!”

“You’re not them. They’re not coming from where you’re coming from. You can only do what you can do. Right now. And even if you can’t feel it, your body knows what it’s supposed to do.”

She stood there for a moment, staring out at her tracings. Then she took a deep breath, nodded to herself, and skated back to them.

That was all.

The score sheet for the second-to-last flight of the competition – my flight – has just been posted. I do some quick math, smile, and make my way into the stands, joining two of Nancy’s young students on the floor by the boards at her patch.

My grin fades. It’s time for the paragraph loop.

In one hand, I’m holding one of Nancy’s pre-Worlds gifts to me: a little plush snowy owl. The fingers of my other hand are at my throat, touching the pendant of the necklace that was her other present. Two good-luck charms. I hope.

The whistle blows.

I’m barely aware that I’m stream-of-consciousness coaching her in a whisper. Bend, hold it, hold it, easy. That’s one. Great, right there, you’re fine, you’ve got this, come on, hold on. Two. Good. I don’t think I’m breathing. There’s more tension in me now than when I was on the ice less than an hour ago skating my own figures.

An agonizing two minutes later, she finishes the figure and skates off to prepare for the next one. I relax a little. She isn’t quite out of the woods yet, but she’s conquered the nemesis. I start smiling again.

Unable to keep the reason to myself, I lean over and say quietly to the nine-year-old next to me, “Do you know what happens now?”

She looks my way, shaking her head.

“If Nancy doesn’t fall, or touch down more than twice on the next three figures, she wins.”

The girl’s eyes go wide. I nod and show her my crossed fingers. She returns her attention to the ice, leaning forward on the boards. I slide over and say the same thing to the twelve-year-old, a more reserved child, who regards me solemnly for a moment and then nods once before shifting her eyes back to the action. (“So you’re who got them all worked up!” exclaims the older girl’s mother later. “They said they’d never been so nervous in their lives!”)

 Swiss S.

 Done.

 Maltese Cross.

 Done.

 Creative figure…

  Done.

 The two kids turn to me for a second, their eyes wild and shining, as we all applaud.

Later, Nancy will have a suspicion confirmed: she has severe osteoporosis throughout her body, to the point where some of her bones are difficult to see in x-rays. It would be dangerous for her to keep competing. Even so, it will take her a long time to bring herself to announce her retirement.

Nancy quit skating the first time after she passed her gold figure test in her late teens. When you quit skating as a teenager, you do it knowing that you’re giving up a high-level skating career for good. Maybe you’re sorry, or maybe you’re glad, but you know it’s permanent.

But then what if, through a set of completely unforeseen circumstances, that turns out not to be true? What if suddenly, one day when you’re in your early 50s, this crazy chance appears for you to skate again?

You grab it and run with it, because nobody gets a chance like that.

Imagine that. And then fast forward just three years and imagine being told that no, actually, you really shouldn’t do it anymore after all. No, now that you’re hooked on it all again, now that you love it again, more than you did the first time, now that you’re really good and getting some recognition for it—you need to stop.

Don’t get me wrong: I think it’s a good decision. It’s just that I can see that it might take a while to reconcile oneself to making it.

When she finally does that in the spring of 2018, she will throw herself wholeheartedly into being a coach and a WFS official. She’ll be the special guest judge at a workshop, standing in for Janet Lynn. Her patch class will become so popular that she will have to consider putting a cap on attendance. She’ll have retired from competing only to jump into another, bigger set of roles. It won’t be the same, but I suspect that it will grow into something even better.

But right now…

The competitors are lining up on the ice against the boards as the finishing touches are made to the awards podium. Dorothy Hamill is over there on the other side of the rink, getting ready to place the gold medal around the neck of the 2017 Ladies’ World Figure Champion. Olympians, world champions, and skating show stars are milling around casually in the background.

Standing here next to me on this magic black ice, Nancy murmurs, “Doesn’t this feel surreal?”

“No,” I tell her. “It feels exactly right.”

World Figure Sport has recently set up a scholarship fund in honor of Nancy. If you were moved by Nancy’s championship win, I know she would love it if you would donate to that fund, which will help introduce more skaters to the world of figures. You can make a donation by clicking here:

 https://squareup.com/store/world-figure-sport/item/wfs-s-nancy-blackwell-grieder-scholarship

Thank you for reading!

[cloudcorpus-blog]

Memento Mori- Nathan Nolan

Your wife always used to say you'd be late for your own funeral. Remember that? Her little joke because you were such a slob--always late, always forgetting stuff, even before the incident.

Right about now you're probably wondering if you were late for hers.

You were there, you can be sure of that. That's what the picture's for--the one tacked to the wall by the door. It's not customary to take pictures at a funeral, but somebody, your doctors, I guess, knew you wouldn't remember. They had it blown up nice and big and stuck it right there, next to the door, so you couldn't help but see it every time you got up to find out where she was.

The guy in the picture, the one with the flowers? That's you. And what are you doing? You're reading the headstone, trying to figure out who's funeral you're at, same as you're reading it now, trying to figure why someone stuck that picture next to your door. But why bother reading something that you won't remember?

She's gone, gone for good, and you must be hurting right now, hearing the news. Believe me, I know how you feel. You're probably a wreck. But give it five minutes, maybe ten. Maybe you can even go a whole half hour before you forget.

But you will forget--I guarantee it. A few more minutes and you'll be heading for the door, looking for her all over again, breaking down when you find the picture. How many times do you have to hear the news before some other part of your body, other than that busted brain of yours, starts to remember?

Never-ending grief, never-ending anger. Useless without direction. Maybe you can't understand what's happened. Can't say I really understand, either. Backwards amnesia. That's what the sign says. CRS disease. Your guess is as good as mine.

Maybe you can't understand what happened to you. But you do remember what happened to HER, don't you? The doctors don't want to talk about it. They won't answer my questions. They don't think it's right for a man in your condition to hear about those things. But you remember enough, don't you? You remember his face.

This is why I'm writing to you. Futile, maybe. I don't know how many times you'll have to read this before you listen to me. I don't even know how long you've been locked up in this room already. Neither do you. But your advantage in forgetting is that you'll forget to write yourself off as a lost cause.

Sooner or later you'll want to do something about it. And when you do, you'll just have to trust me, because I'm the only one who can help you.

EARL OPENS ONE EYE after another to a stretch of white ceiling tiles interrupted by a hand-printed sign taped right above his head, large enough for him to read from the bed. An alarm clock is ringing somewhere. He reads the sign, blinks, reads it again, then takes a look at the room.

It's a white room, overwhelmingly white, from the walls and the curtains to the institutional furniture and the bedspread.

The alarm clock is ringing from the white desk under the window with the white curtains. At this point Earl probably notices that he is lying on top of his white comforter. He is already wearing a dressing gown and slippers.

He lies back and reads the sign taped to the ceiling again. It says, in crude block capitals, THIS IS YOUR ROOM. THIS IS A ROOM IN A HOSPITAL. THIS IS WHERE YOU LIVE NOW.

Earl rises and takes a look around. The room is large for a hospital--empty linoleum stretches out from the bed in three directions. Two doors and a window. The view isn't very helpful, either--a close of trees in the center of a carefully manicured piece of turf that terminates in a sliver of two-lane blacktop. The trees, except for the evergreens, are bare--early spring or late fall, one or the other.

Every inch of the desk is covered with Post-it notes, legal pads, neatly printed lists, psychological textbooks, framed pictures. On top of the mess is a half-completed crossword puzzle. The alarm clock is riding a pile of folded newspapers. Earl slaps the snooze button and takes a cigarette from the pack taped to the sleeve of his dressing gown. He pats the empty pockets of his pajamas for a light. He rifles the papers on the desk, looks quickly through the drawers. Eventually he finds a box of kitchen matches taped to the wall next to the window. Another sign is taped just above the box. It says in loud yellow letters, CIGARETTE? CHECK FOR LIT ONES FIRST, STUPID.

Earl laughs at the sign, lights his cigarette, and takes a long draw. Taped to the window in front of him is another piece of looseleaf paper headed YOUR SCHEDULE.

It charts off the hours, every hour, in blocks: 10:00 P.M. to 8:00 A.M. is labeled GO BACK TO SLEEP. Earl consults the alarm clock: 8:15. Given the light outside, it must be morning. He checks his watch: 10:30. He presses the watch to his ear and listens. He gives the watch a wind or two and sets it to match the alarm clock.

According to the schedule, the entire block from 8:00 to 8:30 has been labeled BRUSH YOUR TEETH. Earl laughs again and walks over to the bathroom.

The bathroom window is open. As he flaps his arms to keep warm, he notices the ashtray on the windowsill. A cigarette is perched on the ashtray, burning steadily through a long finger of ash. He frowns, extinguishes the old butt, and replaces it with the new one.

The toothbrush has already been treated to a smudge of white paste. The tap is of the push-button variety--a dose of water with each nudge. Earl pushes the brush into his cheek and fiddles it back and forth while he opens the medicine cabinet. The shelves are stocked with single-serving packages of vitamins, aspirin, antidiuretics. The mouthwash is also single-serving, about a shot-glass-worth of blue liquid in a sealed plastic bottle. Only the toothpaste is regular-sized. Earl spits the paste out of his mouth and replaces it with the mouthwash. As he lays the toothbrush next to the toothpaste, he notices a tiny wedge of paper pinched between the glass shelf and the steel backing of the medicine cabinet. He spits the frothy blue fluid into the sink and nudges for some more water to rinse it down. He closes the medicine cabinet and smiles at his reflection in the mirror.

"Who needs half an hour to brush their teeth?"

The paper has been folded down to a minuscule size with all the precision of a sixth-grader's love note. Earl unfolds it and smooths it against the mirror. It reads--

IF YOU CAN STILL READ THIS, THEN YOU'RE A FUCKING COWARD.

Earl stares blankly at the paper, then reads it again. He turns it over. On the back it reads--

P.S.: AFTER YOU'VE READ THIS, HIDE IT AGAIN.

Earl reads both sides again, then folds the note back down to its original size and tucks it underneath the toothpaste.

Maybe then he notices the scar. It begins just beneath the ear, jagged and thick, and disappears abruptly into his hairline. Earl turns his head and stares out of the corner of his eye to follow the scar's progress. He traces it with a fingertip, then looks back down at the cigarette burning in the ashtray. A thought seizes him and he spins out of the bathroom.

He is caught at the door to his room, one hand on the knob. Two pictures are taped to the wall by the door. Earl's attention is caught first by the MRI, a shiny black frame for four windows into someone's skull. In marker, the picture is labeled YOUR BRAIN. Earl stares at it. Concentric circles in different colors. He can make out the big orbs of his eyes and, behind these, the twin lobes of his brain. Smooth wrinkles, circles, semicircles. But right there in the middle of his head, circled in marker, tunneled in from the back of his neck like a maggot into an apricot, is something different. Deformed, broken, but unmistakable. A dark smudge, the shape of a flower, right there in the middle of his brain.

He bends to look at the other picture. It is a photograph of a man holding flowers, standing over a fresh grave. The man is bent over, reading the headstone. For a moment this looks like a hall of mirrors or the beginnings of a sketch of infinity: the one man bent over, looking at the smaller man, bent over, reading the headstone. Earl looks at the picture for a long time. Maybe he begins to cry. Maybe he just stares silently at the picture. Eventually, he makes his way back to the bed, flops down, seals his eyes shut, tries to sleep.

The cigarette burns steadily away in the bathroom. A circuit in the alarm clock counts down from ten, and it starts ringing again.

Earl opens one eye after another to a stretch of white ceiling tiles, interrupted by a hand-printed sign taped right above his head, large enough for him to read from the bed.

You can't have a normal life anymore. You must know that. How can you have a girlfriend if you can't remember her name? Can't have kids, not unless you want them to grow up with a dad who doesn't recognize them. Sure as hell can't hold down a job. Not too many professions out there that value forgetfulness. Prostitution, maybe. Politics, of course.

No. Your life is over. You're a dead man. The only thing the doctors are hoping to do is teach you to be less of a burden to the orderlies. And they'll probably never let you go home, wherever that would be.

So the question is not "to be or not to be," because you aren't. The question is whether you want to do something about it. Whether revenge matters to you.

It does to most people. For a few weeks, they plot, they scheme, they take measures to get even. But the passage of time is all it takes to erode that initial impulse. Time is theft, isn't that what they say? And time eventually convinces most of us that forgiveness is a virtue. Conveniently, cowardice and forgiveness look identical at a certain distance. Time steals your nerve.

If time and fear aren't enough to dissuade people from their revenge, then there's always authority, softly shaking its head and saying, We understand, but you're the better man for letting it go. For rising above it. For not sinking to their level. And besides, says authority, if you try anything stupid, we'll lock you up in a little room.

But they already put you in a little room, didn't they? Only they don't really lock it or even guard it too carefully because you're a cripple. A corpse. A vegetable who probably wouldn't remember to eat or take a shit if someone wasn't there to remind you.

And as for the passage of time, well, that doesn't really apply to you anymore, does it? Just the same ten minutes, over and over again. So how can you forgive if you can't remember to forget?

You probably were the type to let it go, weren't you? Before. But you're not the man you used to be. Not even half. You're a fraction; you're the ten-minute man.

Of course, weakness is strong. It's the primary impulse. You'd probably prefer to sit in your little room and cry. Live in your finite collection of memories, carefully polishing each one. Half a life set behind glass and pinned to cardboard like a collection of exotic insects. You'd like to live behind that glass, wouldn't you? Preserved in aspic.

You'd like to but you can't, can you? You can't because of the last addition to your collection. The last thing you remember. His face. His face and your wife, looking to you for help.

And maybe this is where you can retire to when it's over. Your little collection. They can lock you back up in another little room and you can live the rest of your life in the past. But only if you've got a little piece of paper in your hand that says you got him.

You know I'm right. You know there's a lot of work to do. It may seem impossible, but I'm sure if we all do our part, we'll figure something out. But you don't have much time. You've only got about ten minutes, in fact. Then it starts all over again. So do something with the time you've got.

EARL OPENS HIS EYES and blinks into the darkness. The alarm clock is ringing. It says 3:20, and the moonlight streaming through the window means it must be the early morning. Earl fumbles for the lamp, almost knocking it over in the process. Incandescent light fills the room, painting the metal furniture yellow, the walls yellow, the bedspread, too. He lies back and looks up at the stretch of yellow ceiling tiles above him, interrupted by a handwritten sign taped to the ceiling. He reads the sign two, maybe three times, then blinks at the room around him.

It is a bare room. Institutional, maybe. There is a desk over by the window. The desk is bare except for the blaring alarm clock. Earl probably notices, at this point, that he is fully clothed. He even has his shoes on under the sheets. He extracts himself from the bed and crosses to the desk. Nothing in the room would suggest that anyone lived there, or ever had, except for the odd scrap of tape stuck here and there to the wall. No pictures, no books, nothing. Through the window, he can see a full moon shining on carefully manicured grass.

Earl slaps the snooze button on the alarm clock and stares a moment at the two keys taped to the back of his hand. He picks at the tape while he searches through the empty drawers. In the left pocket of his jacket, he finds a roll of hundred-dollar bills and a letter sealed in an envelope. He checks the rest of the main room and the bathroom. Bits of tape, cigarette butts. Nothing else.

Earl absentmindedly plays with the lump of scar tissue on his neck and moves back toward the bed. He lies back down and stares up at the ceiling and the sign taped to it. The sign reads, GET UP, GET OUT RIGHT NOW. THESE PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO KILL YOU.

Earl closes his eyes.

They tried to teach you to make lists in grade school, remember? Back when your day planner was the back of your hand. And if your assignments came off in the shower, well, then they didn't get done. No direction, they said. No discipline. So they tried to get you to write it all down somewhere more permanent.

Of course, your grade-school teachers would be laughing their pants wet if they could see you now. Because you've become the exact product of their organizational lessons. Because you can't even take a piss without consulting one of your lists.

They were right. Lists are the only way out of this mess.

Here's the truth: People, even regular people, are never just any one person with one set of attributes. It's not that simple. We're all at the mercy of the limbic system, clouds of electricity drifting through the brain. Every man is broken into twenty-four-hour fractions, and then again within those twenty-four hours. It's a daily pantomime, one man yielding control to the next: a backstage crowded with old hacks clamoring for their turn in the spotlight. Every week, every day. The angry man hands the baton over to the sulking man, and in turn to the sex addict, the introvert, the conversationalist. Every man is a mob, a chain gang of idiots.

This is the tragedy of life. Because for a few minutes of every day, every man becomes a genius. Moments of clarity, insight, whatever you want to call them. The clouds part, the planets get in a neat little line, and everything becomes obvious. I should quit smoking, maybe, or here's how I could make a fast million, or such and such is the key to eternal happiness. That's the miserable truth. For a few moments, the secrets of the universe are opened to us. Life is a cheap parlor trick.

But then the genius, the savant, has to hand over the controls to the next guy down the pike, most likely the guy who just wants to eat potato chips, and insight and brilliance and salvation are all entrusted to a moron or a hedonist or a narcoleptic.

The only way out of this mess, of course, is to take steps to ensure that you control the idiots that you become. To take your chain gang, hand in hand, and lead them. The best way to do this is with a list.

It's like a letter you write to yourself. A master plan, drafted by the guy who can see the light, made with steps simple enough for the rest of the idiots to understand. Follow steps one through one hundred. Repeat as necessary.

Your problem is a little more acute, maybe, but fundamentally the same thing.

It's like that computer thing, the Chinese room. You remember that? One guy sits in a little room, laying down cards with letters written on them in a language he doesn't understand, laying them down one letter at a time in a sequence according to someone else's instructions. The cards are supposed to spell out a joke in Chinese. The guy doesn't speak Chinese, of course. He just follows his instructions.

There are some obvious differences in your situation, of course: You broke out of the room they had you in, so the whole enterprise has to be portable. And the guy giving the instructions--that's you, too, just an earlier version of you. And the joke you're telling, well, it's got a punch line. I just don't think anyone's going to find it very funny.

So that's the idea. All you have to do is follow your instructions. Like climbing a ladder or descending a staircase. One step at a time. Right down the list. Simple.

And the secret, of course, to any list is to keep it in a place where you're bound to see it.

HE CAN HEAR THE BUZZING through his eyelids. Insistent. He reaches out for the alarm clock, but he can't move his arm.

Earl opens his eyes to see a large man bent double over him. The man looks up at him, annoyed, then resumes his work. Earl looks around him. Too dark for a doctor's office.

Then the pain floods his brain, blocking out the other questions. He squirms again, trying to yank his forearm away, the one that feels like it's burning. The arm doesn't move, but the man shoots him another scowl. Earl adjusts himself in the chair to see over the top of the man's head.

The noise and the pain are both coming from a gun in the man's hand--a gun with a needle where the barrel should be. The needle is digging into the fleshy underside of Earl's forearm, leaving a trail of puffy letters behind it.

Earl tries to rearrange himself to get a better view, to read the letters on his arm, but he can't. He lies back and stares at the ceiling.

Eventually the tattoo artist turns off the noise, wipes Earl's forearm with a piece of gauze, and wanders over to the back to dig up a pamphlet describing how to deal with a possible infection. Maybe later he'll tell his wife about this guy and his little note. Maybe his wife will convince him to call the police.

Earl looks down at the arm. The letters are rising up from the skin, weeping a little. They run from just behind the strap of Earl's watch all the way to the inside of his elbow. Earl blinks at the message and reads it again. It says, in careful little capitals, I RAPED AND KILLED YOUR WIFE.

It's your birthday today, so I got you a little present. I would have just bought you a beer, but who knows where that would have ended?

So instead, I got you a bell. I think I may have had to pawn your watch to buy it, but what the hell did you need a watch for, anyway?

You're probably asking yourself, Why a bell? In fact, I'm guessing you're going to be asking yourself that question every time you find it in your pocket. Too many of these letters now. Too many for you to dig back into every time you want to know the answer to some little question.

It's a joke, actually. A practical joke. But think of it this way: I'm not really laughing at you so much as with you.

I'd like to think that every time you take it out of your pocket and wonder, Why do I have this bell? a little part of you, a little piece of your broken brain, will remember and laugh, like I'm laughing now.

Besides, you do know the answer. It was something you learned before. So if you think about it, you'll know.

Back in the old days, people were obsessed with the fear of being buried alive. You remember now? Medical science not being quite what it is today, it wasn't uncommon for people to suddenly wake up in a casket. So rich folks had their coffins outfitted with breathing tubes. Little tubes running up to the mud above so that if someone woke up when they weren't supposed to, they wouldn't run out of oxygen. Now, they must have tested this out and realized that you could shout yourself hoarse through the tube, but it was too narrow to carry much noise. Not enough to attract attention, at least. So a string was run up the tube to a little bell attached to the headstone. If a dead person came back to life, all he had to do was ring his little bell till someone came and dug him up again.

I'm laughing now, picturing you on a bus or maybe in a fast-food restaurant, reaching into your pocket and finding your little bell and wondering to yourself where it came from, why you have it. Maybe you'll even ring it.

Happy birthday, buddy.

I don't know who figured out the solution to our mutual problem, so I don't know whether to congratulate you or me. A bit of a lifestyle change, admittedly, but an elegant solution, nonetheless.

Look to yourself for the answer.

That sounds like something out of a Hallmark card. I don't know when you thought it up, but my hat's off to you. Not that you know what the hell I'm talking about. But, honestly, a real brainstorm. After all, everybody else needs mirrors to remind themselves who they are. You're no different.

THE LITTLE MECHANICAL VOICE PAUSES, then repeats itself. It says, "The time is 8:00 A.M. This is a courtesy call." Earl opens his eyes and replaces the receiver. The phone is perched on a cheap veneer headboard that stretches behind the bed, curves to meet the corner, and ends at the minibar. The TV is still on, blobs of flesh color nattering away at each other. Earl lies back down and is surprised to see himself, older now, tanned, the hair pulling away from his head like solar flares. The mirror on the ceiling is cracked, the silver fading in creases. Earl continues to stare at himself, astonished by what he sees. He is fully dressed, but the clothes are old, threadbare in places.

Earl feels the familiar spot on his left wrist for his watch, but it's gone. He looks down from the mirror to his arm. It is bare and the skin has changed to an even tan, as if he never owned a watch in the first place. The skin is even in color except for the solid black arrow on the inside of Earl's wrist, pointing up his shirtsleeve. He stares at the arrow for a moment. Perhaps he doesn't try to rub it off anymore. He rolls up his sleeve.

The arrow points to a sentence tattooed along Earl's inner arm. Earl reads the sentence once, maybe twice. Another arrow picks up at the beginning of the sentence, points farther up Earl's arm, disappearing under the rolled-up shirtsleeve. He unbuttons his shirt.

Looking down on his chest, he can make out the shapes but cannot bring them into focus, so he looks up at the mirror above him.

The arrow leads up Earl's arm, crosses at the shoulder, and descends onto his upper torso, terminating at a picture of a man's face that occupies most of his chest. The face is that of a large man, balding, with a mustache and a goatee. It is a particular face, but like a police sketch it has a certain unreal quality.

The rest of his upper torso is covered in words, phrases, bits of information, and instructions, all of them written backward on Earl, forward in the mirror.

Eventually Earl sits up, buttons his shirt, and crosses to the desk. He takes out a pen and a piece of notepaper from the desk drawer, sits, and begins to write.

I don't know where you'll be when you read this. I'm not even sure if you'll bother to read this. I guess you don't need to.

It's a shame, really, that you and I will never meet. But, like the song says, "By the time you read this note, I'll be gone."

We're so close now. That's the way it feels. So many pieces put together, spelled out. I guess it's just a matter of time until you find him.

Who knows what we've done to get here? Must be a hell of a story, if only you could remember any of it. I guess it's better that you can't.

I had a thought just now. Maybe you'll find it useful.

Everybody is waiting for the end to come, but what if it already passed us by? What if the final joke of Judgment Day was that it had already come and gone and we were none the wiser? Apocalypse arrives quietly; the chosen are herded off to heaven, and the rest of us, the ones who failed the test, just keep on going, oblivious. Dead already, wandering around long after the gods have stopped keeping score, still optimistic about the future.

I guess if that's true, then it doesn't matter what you do. No expectations. If you can't find him, then it doesn't matter, because nothing matters. And if you do find him, then you can kill him without worrying about the consequences. Because there are no consequences.

That's what I'm thinking about right now, in this scrappy little room. Framed pictures of ships on the wall. I don't know, obviously, but if I had to guess, I'd say we're somewhere up the coast. If you're wondering why your left arm is five shades browner than your right, I don't know what to tell you. I guess we must have been driving for a while. And, no, I don't know what happened to your watch.

And all these keys: I have no idea. Not a one that I recognize. Car keys and house keys and the little fiddly keys for padlocks. What have we been up to?

I wonder if he'll feel stupid when you find him. Tracked down by the ten-minute man. Assassinated by a vegetable.

I'll be gone in a moment. I'll put down the pen, close my eyes, and then you can read this through if you want.

I just wanted you to know that I'm proud of you. No one who matters is left to say it. No one left is going to want to.

EARL'S EYES ARE WIDE OPEN, staring through the window of the car. Smiling eyes. Smiling through the window at the crowd gathering across the street. The crowd gathering around the body in the doorway. The body emptying slowly across the sidewalk and into the storm drain.

A stocky guy, facedown, eyes open. Balding head, goatee. In death, as in police sketches, faces tend to look the same. This is definitely somebody in particular. But really, it could be anybody.

Earl is still smiling at the body as the car pulls away from the curb. The car? Who's to say? Maybe it's a police cruiser. Maybe it's just a taxi.

As the car is swallowed into traffic, Earl's eyes continue to shine out into the night, watching the body until it disappears into a circle of concerned pedestrians. He chuckles to himself as the car continues to make distance between him and the growing crowd.

Earl's smile fades a little. Something has occurred to him. He begins to pat down his pockets; leisurely at first, like a man looking for his keys, then a little more desperately. Maybe his progress is impeded by a set of handcuffs. He begins to empty the contents of his pockets out onto the seat next to him. Some money. A bunch of keys. Scraps of paper.

A round metal lump rolls out of his pocket and slides across the vinyl seat. Earl is frantic now. He hammers at the plastic divider between him and the driver, begging the man for a pen. Perhaps the cabbie doesn't speak much English. Perhaps the cop isn't in the habit of talking to suspects. Either way, the divider between the man in front and the man behind remains closed. A pen is not forthcoming.

The car hits a pothole, and Earl blinks at his reflection in the rearview mirror. He is calm now. The driver makes another corner, and the metal lump slides back over to rest against Earl's leg with a little jingle. He picks it up and looks at it, curious now. It is a little bell. A little metal bell. Inscribed on it are his name and a set of dates. He recognizes the first one: the year in which he was born. But the second date means nothing to him. Nothing at all.

As he turns the bell over in his hands, he notices the empty space on his wrist where his watch used to sit. There is a little arrow there, pointing up his arm. Earl looks at the arrow, then begins to roll up his sleeve.

"You'd be late for your own funeral," she'd say. Remember? The more I think about it, the more trite that seems. What kind of idiot, after all, is in any kind of rush to get to the end of his own story?

And how would I know if I were late, anyway? I don't have a watch anymore. I don't know what we did with it.

What the hell do you need a watch for, anyway? It was an antique. Deadweight tugging at your wrist. Symbol of the old you. The you that believed in time.

No. Scratch that. It's not so much that you've lost your faith in time as that time has lost its faith in you. And who needs it, anyway? Who wants to be one of those saps living in the safety of the future, in the safety of the moment after the moment in which they felt something powerful? Living in the next moment, in which they feel nothing. Crawling down the hands of the clock, away from the people who did unspeakable things to them. Believing the lie that time will heal all wounds--which is just a nice way of saying that time deadens us.

But you're different. You're more perfect. Time is three things for most people, but for you, for us, just one. A singularity. One moment. This moment. Like you're the center of the clock, the axis on which the hands turn. Time moves about you but never moves you. It has lost its ability to affect you. What is it they say? That time is theft? But not for you. Close your eyes and you can start all over again. Conjure up that necessary emotion, fresh as roses.

Time is an absurdity. An abstraction. The only thing that matters is this moment. This moment a million times over. You have to trust me. If this moment is repeated enough, if you keep trying--and you have to keep trying--eventually you will come across the next item on your list.

You can't have a normal life anymore. You must know that. How can you have a girlfriend if you can't remember her name? Can't have kids, not unless you want them to grow up with a dad who doesn't recognize them. Sure as hell can't hold down a job. Not too many professions out there that value forgetfulness. Prostitution, maybe. Politics, of course.

This is the tragedy of life. Because for a few minutes of every day, every man becomes a genius. Moments of clarity, insight, whatever you want to call them. The clouds part, the planets get in a neat little line, and everything becomes obvious. I should quit smoking, maybe, or here's how I could make a fast million, or such and such is the key to eternal happiness.That's the miserable truth. For a few moments, the secrets of the universe are opened to us. Life is a cheap parlor trick