Always, Lily

▫️ Sixteen

LILITH

Monday came faster than I'd anticipated.

I had taken work off my mind for the last three days but now that monday was here, I reached for my phone and un-muted the hospital group chat.

Not hearing every incoming notification made me feel like I could rest but now my long weekend was over.

My shift began this afternoon so I wanted to familiarize myself with what had happened in those past days.

I furrowed my eyes at the screen when the total messages amounted to 3k. Surely it had just been three days.

I opened the chat with reluctance, knowing that some of the chats were probably about someone confessing their love.

It was a common occurrence but clearly that didn't explain the very many messages.

I skipped through the first fifty because they were just memes and a few stickers.

Then I came across a very puzzling piece of information. I had to scroll up to the previous chats so as to follow the discussion.

I read through the entire conversation and my heart sank. What was this? How had it happened?

Over the weekend alone, we had lost about fifteen patients. From the information I was now getting, it was said that all the patients had seizures before their death.

My index finger twitched as I scrolled down, my thoughts already racing.

That was a very large number of patients. It was troubling and as I tried to understand all this, the recent events crossed my mind.

That mix-up that had happened before. I knew it wasn't a usual one. No doctor would have overlooked that, I could attest that.

I tried to find a connection between these two occurrences, still wondering how such a thing could happen.

From the messages, most of the doctors were saying that since all patients showed similar symptoms before their demise, it could mean that they were under a drug of some sort.

No one had a clue what type of drug it was. There were no suggestions but this theory wasn't a confirmed one.

As I pondered over all this, my eyes caught Lorenzo's name in the discussion and I almost scrolled past.

Dr Davis lost three of his patients in one day.

He has been at the hospital since.

Chances of his medical license being revoked are very high.

The higher ups can't overlook this.

I blinked for more than ten seconds, not believing what I was now seeing.

I quickly skimmed through the rest of the messages just as my mom brought me my morning coffee.

"You're busy?" My mom looked at the phone I was holding in a tight grasp.

"No, just checking my emails." I reached for the coffee and took a sip but I didn't feel the taste of it on my tongue.

Mom watched me as she tidied up the bread crumbs Lucas had left around. She was observant, I knew she could tell I was preoccupied with something.

I looked at my phone screen and wondered, how was Lorenzo doing? Surely not well.

I dialled his number when mom left the room but no one picked up. I tried again after a few minutes but still, no response came.