Chapter 2 Stan
STAN
We were slammed at work. It was funny how that happened, and not funny ha-ha. The ER being busy always meant people were hurting, and there was nothing humorous about that.
There were days when the weather was horrible, and I expected to have a ton of people come in for slip-and-falls or car accidents.
There were times when the Norovirus was going around, so you knew it was going to be a hotbed of grossness.
And then there were days like today, where it was a normal weekday, gorgeous outside, no surges in any particular illness going around, and yet we were bursting at the seams.
One after another after another, people came in by car and by ambulance. We had an elderly patient who fell down the stairs, two heart attacks, a case of pneumonia, and a kid who ran into a wall in gym class, and on and on it went.
My job was never boring, not any day. Being an ER nurse wasn’t a sea of tranquility; even on days when it was slow, there was always something that needed doing and people who needed care. But today? Today was off the charts… well, on the charts… because nursing humor made the days brighter.
“Stan, we have a patient who needs a room. Is there anyone being discharged in the next 20 minutes?” James, a fellow nurse, asked.
He was frazzled, being new to the ER. He was a great nurse but had come from a much calmer floor and moved over to get the pay differential because his husband was expecting, and they were hoping to save enough that his omega could stay home with their little one for a few months before going back to work.
“No.” We ran out of those a half-hour earlier. “We already have three in the hallway, and there’s a wait on the cardiac floor for a room, and a wait on… well, all the floors. I can try and move someone to the hallway so you can give the patient some privacy, but that’s the best I can do.”
I always felt guilty lining patients up in the hall, but shifts like today’s gave us no choice.
They were usually done receiving their emergency care and waiting for a room upstairs, and sadly, that meant we needed their room here for new patients.
What this city needed was a second hospital, but that wasn’t even in the talks yet.
All we could do was put a smile on our faces, treat them the best we could, and keep on going.
“You’re in a pretty good mood, considering the chaos in here today.” James grabbed a new set of gloves out of the box sitting on the nursing station counter.
“Well, James, that’s because I have tickets to tonight’s hockey game.” Which he knew. Everyone knew. I’d been going on and on about them for a month.
“I didn’t know you were into hockey.” He stuck out his tongue. There were days I worried that the pressure of this department would be too much for James, and then he did something like this and I knew he’d be fine. Having a playful spirit in this environment went a long way.
I rolled my eyes. “Har-har.” I talked about hockey non-stop, and it wasn’t even about the team that played, not really. It was the person on the team… Axel.
Axel and I had been roommates for a while in college, and to call him a roommate was dismissive at best. I fell in love with him right away and wanted us to have a future, but fate had other plans. Unlike me, Axel was a wolf shifter and they scented their mates, and he never scented me as his.
That’s why I made sure never to shift with him.
It had been selfish, but I didn’t want the proof that he wasn’t mine that came from my fox not recognizing his wolf as ours.
Once my fox scented him, there was no turning back.
If my fox thought of him as only a playmate, then that was all he’d ever be.
I couldn’t love my way into being a true mate.
That wasn’t how it worked. It was better to live in a world where he could possibly be mine instead of a world where I knew he never could be.
Gods, I was stupid in my youth. It wasn’t as if everyone had true mates.
Falling in love was a way to mating too.
Right? Only for many shifters, it wasn’t.
You could be mated for love for years and then boom, your beast scents your true mate and your world comes crumbling down.
And as selfish as I was, asking Axel to be with me in the hopes that he’d never find his true mate wasn’t something I’d been willing to do.
He deserved all the happiness he could find.
But the university cut our time together short when people in the athletic department decided to do all the things illegal in their recruiting process.
Axel was born to play hockey. He was mesmerizing on the ice. There was a gracefulness to him, even amid the checking and the aggression that came with the game. I didn’t want him to leave. I didn’t think he wanted to leave. But looking back, it was exactly what had to happen.
He was recruited to play at one of the best universities, and his five-year plan was no longer squashed. It was exactly what he needed, and I showed my support as enthusiastically as possible, despite it breaking my heart into a million pieces.
Axel was now one of the top players in the game, and I never missed one of his matches, whether it be on TV or on the rare occasion that they were within driving distance. I was his number one fan, and unlike many of his fans, would continue to be whether he scored again or not.
In person, I was a chicken. I never went to see him, not up close, and always got seats where he wouldn’t be able to see me. It was sad that after all these years, I held on to my crush, while at the same time being too unwilling to do anything about it.
But today, that was going to change. His last on-air interview, hearing his voice made me feel like I was back in college, and I had to see him.
No good was going to come of it, but a growing feeling inside me said I’d never forgive myself if I didn’t.
Today, I was going to be there to see him, to meet him, and to make sure that I didn’t bow out…
I got VIP tickets. They cost a week’s salary and were going to be worth it.
I got box seats with a meet-and-greet, and nothing was going to keep me away from that.
“Anyone going to the match with you tonight? A hot date, perhaps?” James was so in love with his husband that he wanted the same for everyone else. It was adorably sweet.
As much as he knew I liked talking about hockey and was Axel’s biggest fan, he didn’t know our connection. It wasn’t a secret. Why would it be? But I felt like it was something I didn’t want to share with a coworker. I wanted to keep it to myself.
“You mean the hockey game?” I wasn’t sure if he said match to get me riled up or if he thought everything used the same terms as his beloved tennis.
“No, the tickets cost too much to bring a friend. It’s just me.
Let me go do that changeover for you. I’ll give you a heads-up when it’s clean enough.
At least they called an extra cleaning crew today. ”
I did have to give my hospital credit, they did the best they could with the facility and staffing they had.
The rest of my shift went by at the speed of lightning. That was what happened when you were busy. But as I was getting ready to complete the shift-change paperwork, we got a call saying there were not one but six ambulances coming due to a major crash on the highway.
As much as I wanted to go to that hockey game, it wasn’t even a thought in my mind not to volunteer to stay and help. Because at the end of the day, I went into nursing to help people and took a job at the ER to help them when they needed it, not just during office hours.
Tonight, that meant sacrificing a hockey game. I’d have another chance to gather my courage again, but these people couldn’t wait.