Tis The Damn Season

Chapter 1

I pull into the parking lot of the hospital, trying to shake off the argument that Michael and I had before I left for work. Always the same thing, I'm never doing enough at home or I'm always sleeping too much. He is always going out or wanting people over. He doesn't trust me, and in turn, I'm struggling to love him. I won't leave though, and every time he does, he comes back. We've been together for over four years, we're a family. I take a deep breath and prepare to walk in, not ready to face what promises to be another shit show in the ER.  I finally drag myself out of the car and into the doors to check the dreaded assignment sheet. I breath a sigh of relief when I notice I'm running our immediate care zone, so basically a treat and discharge assignment. I clock in and walk into the back, glad to find I'm the only one back here.

Around two in the morning, I have finally cleared out my assignment. I pull my phone out from my bag and check the cameras for the house, trying to figure out who all I'll be going home to in the morning. As I check the camera, I see three of Michael's friends entering the house, and none of them leaving. So, I'll get to go home to four drunk guys. It's not that I hate his friends, but I definitely don't like them. I take my ring out of my bag, he'd given it to me for my birthday a week ago. But it wasn't an engagement ring, it wasn't even a promise ring. It was a ring to promise to work on things. At least that's what Michael said as he had slipped it onto my finger. I slide it back on and twirl it around.

"Things not going well?"

Nathan walks up beside me and sits in the chair next to me. Nathan is one of our nursing assistants, and the one that we always called when we needed help. He's got the typical country guy with rough edges look. His dirty blonde hair slicked back and a beard that's barely starting to show. He must have worked out at some point; his bicep muscles are rather obvious and look like they could break the arms of his scrub top out. He has a crooked smile and warm laugh that the old me would've been attracted to. He has tattoos too, although only one is visible when he's working, but he says he has more. He's nice enough I guess, I just started talking to him recently on more than surface level and work-related topics, and not by choice. But when someone walks out into the ambulance bay when you're sitting against a wall with your head in your hands sobbing and asks what's going on, you tell them. He understood though and he's become a friend I can vent to when I need it, after all, who's he going to tell?

"I guess you could say that. I only have a house of four drunk guys to go home to in the morning." I roll my eyes as I slide the ring back off my finger and return it to the pocket in my bag. "He just has to have friends over all the time. But it's fine. Hopefully I'll get a little bit of sleep before I have to come back tonight."

"That's bullshit. You don't need to go to a house full of drunk guys, especially being the only girl. That just sounds like a bad plan."

"Where else am I going to go?"

"I have a cabin about an hour up the road, it's not much but I could give you the key and let you crash there." This offer sounds tempting, still I shake my head and decline the offer.

"Thank you. I think I'll just go home though."

"If you change your mind, let me know," he shrugs, "You deserve better, you know that right?"

"Yeah, well he's the best guy I've been with and the only other people I even socialize with are the ones that work here, so my options for meeting people are kind of limited."

"You've got a point. I've made it a rule not to shit where I eat," I laugh as he says this, "But I could probably make an exception."

"Oh could you?"

I laugh as I tease him, this is something we've done more frequently recently. He always finds a way to make me laugh and chooses to spend most of any downtime with me. We just get each other in a way no one else does and it's nice to have a friend like him here. I have Mark too, but he'd called off tonight. He's also friends with Nathan. Truthfully, the three of us have become a team. Mark is around Nathan's age, but he is defiantly the male version of myself. Only he bats for the other team.