Shape of the Sun

A welcome for the new doctor

None of the nurses on duty dared to make any mistakes, each doing their hardest to show the new doctor how efficient they were in their work. He had just resumed this morning and managed to get the supervisor to write up six of their coworkers.

It was obvious who the hospital management thought was more important. How could a nurse hold the same weight as such a well-established sub-specialty physician like Dr. Rajkumar Reddy? All they wanted was to ensure that he enjoyed the year-long exchange program, enough for him to request another return. He could write up ten more nurses if that was what it took.

Rajkumar didn't care enough about their thoughts. Usually, he worked with the same nurses for the longest, and it took two or more repeat offenses in his book to get a write-up to their supervisor from him. It was just that today, he was a walking embodiment of 'under the weather.' As he couldn't neglect his new duties in India, especially as he was a representative of the Royal Hospital in the exchange program, he arrived at work still smarting from the incident with Manmeet in the morning. She was not out when he left for work and upon checking her room, realized that she had set out for her office without letting him know. And the temper that he had tried to soothe flared up again.

In retrospect, he didn't have to react as strongly as this. The thing was, Rajkumar wasn't used to dealing with opposition of any sort, and whether Manmeet realized this or not, her feelings for him were getting in the way of him having things where he wanted, and it was more frustrating because it was her, and not any other woman. And while Rajkumar realized that he needed some sort of self-reflection for this new normal, that nothing may happen exactly as he planned, he was having a hard time not letting it affect his demeanor, hence his irritation at things he would have let go of, and the subsequent firing of the nurses.

Still, he had a measure. Whatever moods he had stopped at the patient's door. Rajkumar recognized that his work and its beneficiaries were sensitive, so there was a need for extra care when in the same space. The patient that he had to attend to now wasn't actually his at first but had her file brought up to his desk because the other personnel had encountered an issue with standard procedure. Apparently, it was a normal case that was escalating. Rajkumar handed the file in his hand over to the nurse beside him. He was ready.

He knocked on the door. There was nothing like too much caution when dealing with a patient of the opposite sex.

It was a policewoman who came to open the door and allowed him to step in, the nurses in tow. Rajkumar steadily took in his surroundings, and the unopened rape kit on the cabinet was too conspicuous for him to ignore. The busy, full ward that reeked of unclean also ticked him off. He turned to ask the nurse.

"Aren't there any empty, single rooms in the hospital? This place is highly inappropriate." The high population density may be contributing to her resistance. Rajkumar looked over at the patient who lay, motionless in bed, like there was no one around her, and frowned, upset at the hospital staff. There was nothing normal about what he was seeing, but he needed more time to understand exactly what it was.

The nurse he'd asked whispered to him, like she was anxious that anyone might hear her reply, which caused him to raise an eyebrow.

"Doctor, all the rooms are occupied."

"All of them?" He swore that the hospital was only at half-capacity when he checked this morning before his rounds. Was everybody in Mumbai having an accident by the second now? Some kind of new TikTok challenge?

"No, doctor. It's just that," her voice lowered even more so that he had to strain to hear her, "the SP's son was admitted and so no one is allowed on the top floor."

Rajkumar almost cursed shit at the blatant corruption, but he still understood that it was the pot calling the kettle black. Hell, he and Choti had full hospital wings and shopping malls shut down when they were younger. He reached for his phone, making everyone in the ward that managed to overhear them, curious as to what this doctor wanted to do. The nurse he'd asked was also included.