Chapter 9 #3
“Did you expect anything different? From what Scott and the security guard both said, in front of you and me, this was not the first incident that they have been made aware of involving some other transgression by you. I don’t even want to know what you did earlier.
I’m fixated on what you did to me just yesterday and all the days leading up to it.
And that’s enough for you to lose your job, in my opinion.
Regardless, I understand the hospital board will decide your fate. ”
She whined, “I just didn’t think that far ahead. This is the only job I’ve ever loved, and, as it turns out, the only job I’m really good at,” she shared. “But I can understand that, from your perspective, you don’t think I’m very good at it.”
“I wouldn’t know how well you do your job with others,” Chelsea snapped. “I definitely experienced all the crap you did to me, and thus I tried to avoid you as much as I could.”
She gave a bark of laughter. “I have that effect on a lot of people.”
“And is that really how you want to go through life, terrifying people, bullying people?”
“They shouldn’t be terrified of me, just aware that I’m watching their every move,” she clarified.
“We’ve had students in training steal from the pharmacy, smoke or drink in the back rooms, actually steal from patients, and, believe it or not, we even had one who thought she was in love with a patient and tried to have sex with him while he was in coma,” she frankly detailed.
“And that’s not for public knowledge,” she added.
“Wow. What’s wrong with these people? Those were not decent people. Those were criminals. They have no business being nurses. I’ve heard horror stories of people going into nursing solely to feed their addiction by stealing drugs from work. None of them should be allowed to work as a nurse.”
Gladys continued. “Exactly. While I get that, from your perspective, I’m probably being a hard-ass, yet, from my perspective, it’s my job to make sure that the nurses caring for these patients are actually decent people.
The last thing I want to do is unleash any of those godforsaken nightmares, who say they are all about providing quality patient care, but are doing the opposite. ”
“Yet you are not a decent person after what you did to me, so I wonder if you can even truly see decent people. After all, you didn’t see me clearly.”
“Yes,” Gladys muttered. “What’s wrong with people is correct,” she repeated. “Between your mother, these rogue students, my husband, and many other messed-up patients in this world, maybe it is time I retired.”
“I think it is time, and maybe, if you resigned, you might save some of your reputation. Now, I’m exhausted from all this, plus another busy shift on two busted knees. So time to end this call.”
“Of course. … You are doing an excellent job, by the way. My poor behavior was triggered in part because, every time I looked at you, I saw your mother,” she explained. “I was asked to give you a reference, and I gave you a good one.”
“And who did that go to?” Chelsea asked.
“Scott, the director, who asked about you,” she replied. “So you may well end up with a job offer.”
“He did tell me that he had a job offer for me,” she confirmed, “but I haven’t seen it yet.”
“Good,” she replied. “You’ll do just fine in the hospital.”
Chelsea snorted, wondering about that because of all the verbally abusive comments Gladys had made to her over the recent weeks. It raised her own doubts whether she was suited for or even wanted to work in a medical setting. Maybe now her original self-confidence would bounce back.
Gladys continued. “Patients in particular can be very difficult to deal with, simply because they’re at critical stages in their lives.
Yet I’ve seen you interacting with them, and you have a knack to settle them down, to take wonderful care of them, no matter their attitudes.
You are a good fit to be an excellent nurse.
I’ll let you go now.” And, with that, she disconnected.
Chelsea sat here for a long moment, wondering just how her world had shifted so quickly after these two disturbing conversations.
Sounded very much like Gladys had been yet another victim of her mother’s.
Not to mention Gladys’s husband too. Chelsea remembered the older gray-haired man who had been totally smitten, yet presumably didn’t have enough money for her mother.
Chelsea wondered if her mother had even realized he was married.
Probably. Yet she wouldn’t have cared. She was saddened to think how many people she hurt and didn’t give a damn about it.
Chelsea was sad to think the fallout she had been recently experiencing was from the devastation her mother had wrought.
If there was one thing that Chelsea absolutely hated to see, it was unnecessary destruction.
That’s what her mother always left in her wake, …
destruction that left someone in tears at every turn, not exactly a legacy Chelsea wanted to repeat.
And with that a lot of her own anger and pain slid away.
Feeling calmer, she phoned Timber.
“Have you told all this to Sterling and Joel yet?”
“Not yet. I want to get them together and save time by telling them all at once.”
“Sounds good. Just let me know when I can speak to them further about this. You are doing the right thing. I’m proud of you, Chelsea.”