Island of Men

Chapter 2- An impromptu first aid lesson

Emma wished she felt like crap.  But those glorious days were gone.  Now she just felt like someone had decided to run over her a few times with a 15 passenger van, then threw her off a plane.  Basically, she felt like if crap took a crap.   

She opened her eyes slowly.  Please let the last hour be a dream.  Please.  Please. 

The first thing she saw was a lot of hair.  And something cold on her stomach.  Something cold and strong.  Ohhh.  Those are hands.  Someone is touching my stomach.  Wait one second...

"AAAGGghhh!  What are you doing?"  Emma tried sitting up, but the hands forced her to lay back down.  Well, that and the pain too.

"Emma, stop being an idiot and just sit still.  I'm trying to figure out what you broke," said Luke.  Well, there goes the chance of it all being a dream.  Stink.  She fidgeted a bit, as he put his cold hands on her stomach once again. 

"Stop moving Emma! You could make it worse!"  David always had a slightly snarky look on his face, resulting in him always looking just the littlest bit constipated.  But when he said this, he looked truly concerned, but also a bit constipated.   Emma stopped moving as much as possible but managed to sneak a look at her stomach. 

All the way from her right hip bone to way past up her ribs  was covered in the gnarliest bruise she had ever seen.  The colors were almost beautiful; blue and a light purple, though she knew that would become a nasty split-pea soup color in  a few days.  Well, she would have appreciated the beauty of it a bit more if it didn't hurt like hell.   

Luke removed his hands and began to investigate the cause of most of her pain, her right shoulder.

"Can you lift your arm?"  asked Miles.  He took two beats too long on the word lift, till it sounded more like: lifffftttt.  Miles liked to over enunciate random words.  

Emma tried for a second,  but a streak of pain ran up her shoulder to her neck.

"No.  Not at all."

"What do you think it is Emma?  You do have more medical knowledge than I do?"  Just this sentence would have been surprising enough in real life, if Emma wasn't already stuck on a random island with three of her classmates.  Luke was the sort of guy who never admitted that he was outwitted. To be fair, he was incredibly smart, and could lead a group like no other, just with a few pride issues. He had that convincing look to him, as if he thought hard enough, he could solve all the world's problems. 

"I think I dislocated it.  In that case, I need you to fix it."  David looked constipated. Miles looked embarrassed.  Luke looked resigned.  That was basically how it always was.  

"What? Now? But he has no idea how to do it!"  said David, as he stood up and started pacing in the sand.  It would be a good time to recap on the point that David was a rather lean built guy, so he honestly looked a bit comical sloughing back and forth.  

"We can figure it out.  In the meantime, she's going to need a sling.  Do you think you could find something to make one, David?"  Emma would never verbally acknowledge it, but, Luke was once again right.  David nodded and walked off into the tree line, with a mission in mind. 

"How can I help, Luke?"  Miles was always the helpful one, which would definitely come in handy in this situation. You get that sort of servant attitude being the middle brother of five, when nothing will get done if you don't do it.  

"I need you to help Emma sit up, and then brace her left side so I can relocate it.  Emma, you're going to have to walk me through how to do this."  They both slowly lifted Emma up, as she tried to hide any pain she was feeling from the boys.  In all honesty, Emma was a terrible faker, and ended up looking constipated as well.