Chapter 2
OXLEY
The pit in my stomach lessened when I heard him stirring. Relief flooded me, though I couldn’t explain why. This stranger… he’s nothing to me. But when I gave him the drugs to put him back to sleep and his heartbeat spiked all over again, the pit opened once more.
“I’m sorry,” I murmur as I watch him fall under the drug’s hold.
Mark told me that too much stress, making his heart beat too erratically, would keep the wound bleeding freely. I don’t have any blood bags here, and I was not trained for blood transfusions. He needs to relax until Mark gets here.
I managed to stop the bleeding, but I was so afraid of putting something over an open wound of this size, causing an infection, that the only thing I could wrap my head around doing was getting him out of there. Off the street. Away from dirt and disease, and the bacteria.
Getting home was a fucking nightmare, as I think I stared at him in my backseat via the rearview mirror more than I did at the road.
I’m not entirely sure why I brought him home and not to a hospital.
He needs a hospital. But bringing him there would mean he was out of my sight, and for reasons I couldn’t explain, that wasn’t acceptable.
On the way, I called Mark and explained what I had seen and what I was seeing now. Once I rejected his suggestion of bringing him to the hospital, Mark said he’d meet me at my apartment in an hour. I refused to bring him to a hospital. The dread of never seeing him again was far too great.
I tried to get Mark to get here faster, but he was an hour away. Even speeding.
There’s nothing I can do but wait it out. He should be here any minute now.
“Just a little longer,” I say quietly to the man in my bed as my gaze travels down to the gaping hole in his leg.
I’m a bit obsessive about, well… a lot of things.
Sterility is one of them, so I have plenty of first aid supplies to get him this far.
What I don’t have is knowledge or training about where to go from here.
I bandaged him as best I could and applied pressure above the wound to staunch the blood flow while trying not to make it too tight and risk killing his entire limb.
I don’t think he’d forgive me if I were the reason he became an amputee. That thought also makes the pit in my stomach sour.
My fingers trail above him, just barely not touching his hand. I can feel his warmth. His life. He has to live.
Gently, I move a lock of hair from his forehead, careful not to touch his skin. But then I pull my hand back. I don’t have permission to touch him. Not even that.
Taking a step back so I’m less tempted (ha!), I stare at him. My ears trained specifically to the monitor, listening to its rhythmic beeps.
I hear the front door open on the other side of the apartment and turn expectantly. Mark steps into the bedroom a minute later. He gives me a smile, and then his attention is on the patient.
We don’t talk. Mark pulls my desk chair over and unwraps my patching.
His only comment is, “Nice job, Oxley.” While his compliment might resonate deeper at any other time, I barely hear it now.
The way my heart flutters in my chest suggests maybe I also need to have a heart monitor.
It feels like it’s ready to punch its way right out of my chest!
The minutes drag. On and on and on. I’m getting fidgety as I wait for Mark to get through his task. While I don’t get queasy easily, that’s a big wound, so I keep Mark’s body blocking my view and focus my gaze on the man’s face.
He’s young. Twenties, I think. If he’s in his thirties, he’s aging very, very well. His hair is dusty blond. There’s a unique shade to it in the sun, like he’s got charcoal mixed into the light strands. I haven’t gotten a good look at his eyes, though.
I had to cut off his pants, which felt invasive and awkward, but Mark insisted I needed to see the damage clearly.
Dirt and bacteria would cling to his jeans and might infect him, so I didn’t have a choice.
As much as I wanted to wait until Mark got here, fear of him dying from infection spurred me on.
For the record, I covered him quickly. Boundaries are a big deal for me.
As is invading someone’s personal space.
I’ve been told I’m weird my entire life, which is fine with me.
Everyone should learn about boundaries and consent.
There are a lot of things lacking in the world, but those two are a couple of the biggest areas, in my opinion.
It’s entirely too long before Mark stands. “We need to change the bedding,” he says, and I nod.
Tearing my eyes from the man’s face, I step into the bathroom and pull clean linens from the closet. I stare at the comforter that goes with these. My fingers itch with the compulsion to change it, too.
Knowing that it’ll never stop itching in my head if I don’t, I pull the comforter out as well. Mark already has the man on my couch and is in the process of stripping my bed. He’s also separated the towels and mat I’d laid out before bringing the injured stranger into my space.
In silence, Mark helps me make the bed. New sheets. New comforter. New pillowcases, though the urge to change out the pillows completely is there, too. No, the comforter was most important. The pillows can wait.
But as I’m stuffing a pillow into the case, I decide that no, it cannot, in fact, wait. Sighing, I head back to the linen closet and pull down the four pillows that go with this bedding set.
Mark doesn’t question me. He pulls the pillowcase off the pillow he’d been dressing and accepts the new pillows instead.
“You have more sterile pads?” Mark asks.
I nod and leave him to finish the pillows. Two entire shelves of my linen closet are dedicated to medical supplies. Don’t ask me why. It’s an obsessive compulsion. I bring another pad in, along with a towel. The towels are softer than these scratchy pads.
Mark arranges both, and I watch intently as he picks up the man and settles him back into the bed. He covers the man up entirely, and I feel much better about that.
“He’ll be fine,” Mark tells me. “The nature of the wound means it’ll take longer to heal, but he’s fortunate that it didn’t hit anything important. Not even bone. While it’s a big, ugly wound, it’s basically a flesh wound. He should count his lucky stars and maybe play the lottery.”
Mark grins when I don’t find his humor funny. I don’t find most ‘funny’ things amusing. Call it a quirk, I guess.
He goes on to tell me about the pain medication and how to administer a dose through the saline drip. He leaves a couple more for me to change out when needed. I listen raptly as he gives me care instructions.
Once he’s packed up, Mark looks at me. “You sure you don’t want me to take him to the hospital, Oxley?”
“No,” I say quickly, and while I’d love to give him a reason… there just isn’t one. So I don’t elaborate.
Mark nods. “All right. Call if you have any concerns. I’ll want a video of the wound tomorrow. We can re-evaluate his condition then.”
“Thank you,” I say and follow him to the door, locking it behind him.
I gather all the soiled laundry and dump it in the laundry room, starting the sheets before leaving.
He’s still asleep when I return to the room, so I sit back at the desk and continue going over the police scanner reports and maps. It would be more efficient to do this digitally, but I don’t want the light to disturb him. So I’m left pretending I’m in the nineties.
Hours pass before he stirs again, and I turn in my chair to watch him. His eyes flicker open. He rubs them and looks around. The monitor catches his attention, and he sighs. But then the monitor tells me he’s stressed when the pattern changes to something a little concerning.
He picks his head up and looks at me.
The light in the room is very dim now since the sun’s gone down, and there’s no daylight trying to break through the curtains or spilling in through the hallway door.
I get up and move to the side of the bed so he can lie his head down again and still see me.
“Who are you?” he asks.
“Oxley,” I answer again. Maybe he was too stressed to remember that he’s already asked me that. “Are you in pain? Are you hungry? Do you need anything?”
He stares at me. I think his eyes are black, but that’s probably the lighting. Would he be bothered if I turned on the bedside lamp so I could see them more clearly? Or would he think that’s weird?
Interesting that I care at all whether he thinks I’m weird. Others’ opinions don’t generally bother me.
“I’m a little hungry,” he says, but I hear the wariness in his voice. “Are you going to drug me again, Ox?”
“Oxley,” I correct. “No. Never again. I’m sorry. I was afraid that you’d bleed out from your accelerated pulse.”
Alarm spreads across his face, and while I know his wound is properly sealed shut, panic rises in me, too. “You won’t,” I add quickly. “You’ve been properly sewn up now. So you won’t bleed out.”
He takes a deliberate deep inhale and nods. His heartbeat slowly relaxes, though mine takes a bit longer than his.
“I’ll go make you some food,” I say. “Doctor’s orders are that you don’t get up for now. Okay?”
He nods.
I have a very strong urge to wheel this bed out of the bedroom and into the kitchen somehow so I can watch him. What if he needs me and I’m not here?
That’s not possible, though. The king-size bed won’t fit through the three-foot door opening. They just don’t make apartments like that. I’ve looked.
Once in the kitchen, I open the refrigerator door and then pause. What am I supposed to feed him? Does he have any dietary restrictions? Are there foods that help you heal and those that hinder it? Will something upset his stomach with the pain meds?
Pulling out my phone, I dial Mark. When he answers, I ask, “What do I feed him?”
He chuckles. “He’s not a dog, Oxley. You feed him food.”
“Mark.”
I can still hear his amusement when he answers seriously this time. “Bland foods for a few days until his pain subsides and we’re able to reduce the input of pain meds.”
“Bland foods,” I repeat, not entirely sure what that means. Any food without seasoning is arguably bland.
“Yes. Rice, chicken, plain crackers, toast, pumpkin, sweet potato, bananas, applesauce, soft white pasta, fish… eggs.”
I nod. I don’t think I have most items on that list. “Okay. Thanks.”
“He’s awake?” Mark asks.
“Yes. I might have nearly made him panic, but I also calmed him down.”
Mark chuckles. “Definitely avoid making him panic, but be yourself, too.”
Weird thing to say. “Yeah. Thanks?”
He laughs again. “Call me if you need anything else, Oxley.”
“I will. Bye.” I don’t wait for his response before I hang up in case he wants to tell me to be someone else instead. That was a strange thing to say.
After searching my pantry and fridge, I place a grocery order for delivery. A search for ‘bland food’ in the market search bar isn’t helpful. I’m pretty certain a chocolate cake isn’t bland, and that was the first item on the list.
I settle on the things I have and go about preparing them while peeking in on my patient periodically. He seems peaceful enough. His heart monitor is steady, anyway. That’s a relief.