Changing Seasons

Thirty-Nine

****

"We had to give him ten units of blood," the PACU nurse quietly told Atira, "He's doing well those." She patted Krist on the foot, giving him a warm smile. "You have one tough guy over here."

Atira bent down to hug him, her cheeks glistened with tears. "Oh my gosh." She wept into his neck.

He did his best to hug her back with an IV in both his right hand and the crook of his arm and, a blood pressure cuff on his left arm. "I'm fine baby." He assured her.

Atira seated herself in the plastic chair next to his hospital bed, wiping her tears. "I've never been so scared. When Jeordie called me, he didn't know if you were even all right. He just knew that you had lost a lot of blood."

Krist fought back his own tears, "I'm ok, I'm gonna be fine."

She took his hands in hers, "I had such a bad feeling about you working tonight. Your mom told me she did too."

He winced, "Does she know what happened?"

"Yes, I was over there when Jeordie called. She's worried sick." Atira studied his face, "Fortunately Rocco was asleep."

"Thank God. I don't want him to know." Krist fell silent as he stared up at the ceiling.

Although he was grateful Atira was there, he wished he was alone to process everything that had happened. His spleen had been lacerated to the point it was not repairable and had to be removed. The staff had explained to him that the particular wound was what had caused his large amount of blood loss. They'd had to take it out through a large incision that ran the lower part of his rib cage to just below his navel. The other torso wound, although ugly, was superficial, as was the one to his scalp.

"Good thing I just got my hair cut the other day, can't do anything with this bullshit in my head." Krist joked, referring to the staples in the back of his head.

Atira gave him a wry smile and squeezed his hand. "I'm so glad you're here. We all are."

Krist didn't reply, blinking back the tears that were forming in his eyes. He felt tremendous guilt over the fact that he should be grateful to be alive and mostly fine but it had hit him hard that he could have died leaving Rocco without a parent.

How the fuck was he supposed to earn an income recovering from surgery? He knew he could stay at the club but what if those dudes came back? What if they brought guns next time? If he quit, he'd look like he was scared, a coward. Was his pride worth his life?

He knew could not be doing any lifting with a foot-long incision in his belly so that ruled out grocery delivery. Krist supposed he could do food delivery instead, he'd done it a few times and was sure he could make decent money beforehand.

His thoughts were interrupted by the blood pressure cuff tightening on his arm. Holding his breath, he waited for it to fully inflate and deflate.

An alert beeped, and his blood pressure was low. 110/54. The nurse reentered, turning the alert off.

"Still low." She murmured to herself, turning her gaze to Krist. "Do you need anything?" He shook his head. She diverted her attention to Atira, "How about you, honey? Do you need anything?"

"No thank you," Atira replied, her face full of concern. "Is it normal to have low blood pressure after what happened?"

"It can happen, we are going to continue monitoring it but the doctor doesn't seem too concerned.
"Do you know when he can go home?"

"I'm not quite sure, I would imagine Monday at the latest." The nurse replied, as she quickly typed a few notes. "Are you sure either of you don't need anything from me?"

"No thank you," Krist answered.

She handed Krist a remote, pointing to a button. "If you can think of anything, the call light is right here."

****

"Monday," Atira remarked, "That's not too bad."

Krist shrugged, not replying. It wasn't necessarily the length of stay that bothered him, it was the amount of idle time. Krist had trouble dealing with free time, it meant he was overthinking, dwelling, and generally anxious. He was also concerned that if he had too much time to himself, he'd be tempted to relapse-not that he had any intention to but the worry was always there.
He wasn't sure how to put into words his fears to Atira, especially without causing her to worry about him or scare her off.

****

It must have been around six in the morning when his PACU nurse came in with another nurse to have him moved from the PACU to a general hospital room.

"You don't have to stay here, you can go back to the apartment and rest if you want," Krist told Atira after he'd been settled in.

"I don't mind being here." She replied, kissing his hand. "I was thinking about going back to get a few things and showering though."

"I'll give you my keys and the access code to get in the building."
"Should I go now?"

Krist shrugged, "It's up to you."

Atira ultimately decided to go. Krist asked her to bring him a few hygiene things, a phone charger, clean sweats, underwear, and socks because he felt gross in the gown. Not to mention, he hated being dirty.

He tried to sleep with Atira gone but found it near impossible with the doctors doing their rounds and his nurse checking his vitals. A bland breakfast had been brought in. Two small pancakes, a small bran muffin, two slices of turkey bacon, soupy oatmeal, and cranberry juice. He picked at the bacon and drank his juice but did not have an appetite.

His stomach was hard and bloated, almost painful. One of the nurses had explained it was due to the extra gas during surgery and to "anticipate some juicy farts". Those had been her exact words, Krist had chuckled over her warning.

She wasn't wrong, however. With Atira back at his apartment, he forced himself to expel the gas. How he'd wished Rocco was there at that moment, he would have been in stitches over the farts. "Bubblers" they'd called that specific type of fart.

Krist found himself holding back his laughter, forcing more farts to escape with each chuckle. He hadn't laughed that hard over farts since he was probably ten but the laughter felt good and getting the gas out felt even better.

Once he'd felt adequately emptied of gas, he turned on the television set, flipping through channels until he came to the local news. The first story he saw was about him being stabbed.

They were asking for tips on the suspects' whereabouts, fortunately, his name was not given just that he was security for the club and that he was hospitalized with serious but not life-threatening injuries.A wave of relief swept over him, he hated being fearful of other dudes but he was grateful his name hadn't been given. With Rocco to worry about, he didn't want to spend his life looking over his shoulder if the dude got picked up for the stabbing.