"Recovery..."

Chapter 1 - "An Almost Dull Shift..."

Chapter 1 - "An Almost Dull Shift..."

John stood on the locker room in his jeans and put on a clean shirt.

It's a good job he bought spare shirts and kept them in his locker at work - because he couldn't begin to count how many patients have vomited on him over the years.

He buttoned the last few, tucking it onto his skinny jeans and rolled up the sleeves, re buckling his belt.

He grabbed his stethoscope and wrapped it back around his neck, placing a pen and watch on the picket, and re pinned his name tag on his shirt, the attached his ID the the loop on his jeans.

'Evening John' Rory smirked stepping into the locker room and started swapping from normal clothes to his nursing scrubs.

'Rory' John challenged balling up the sick covered shirt and stuffed it in a plastic bag to be revisited later. 'Your supposed to not be here?'

'Change of plan. Amy's going to her Mothers and there's no way I was going. I can deal with only 1 angry Scottish woman at a time and when they're together it's a nightmare' he grimaced.

'Yeah. Come to mention it I've met Amy's Mother. Good plan' I smirked. 'Of course she likes me' John shrugged.

'Only because your a consultant and in a nurse'

'Head Nurse' I pointed out, admitting it makes no difference. Her Mother still wouldn't like him is he was a consultant.

'What are you doing in here?' Rory asked as John closed the locker door and locked it, grabbing his water and opening the door.

'Changing my shirt' he said making Rory laugh.

'Right what's to be fine here boss?' Rory mocked with a salute.

'Ask Martha' John said grabbing the iPad and headed to his last patient - the be conveniently that had up chucked on his shirt.

There's a reason John chooses not to wear nice shirts to work.

'Right. Ive got your X-Ray... Looks like a hair line fracture, so it won't need surgery. Just a plaster cast for six weeks' he smiled at the 8 year old boy on the bed.

'Oh thank goodness' his Mother sighed in relief. 'I've told you before about climbing trees Scott' she scolded.

'I would avoid tree climbing for about six weeks' John smirked. 'I'll grab someone to coma and cast that up. See you in six weeks buddy' John laughed high giving the boy as the Mother rolled her eyes. 'Martha can you go and cast that arm up. I think he requested a green one so he looks like the hulk'

'Sounds good. Umm there's still the old woman in cubicle 4 who needs discharging - and one hell of a projectile vomiter in cubicle 6'

'Great. I look forward to it' John sighed wanting very much to not have to change his shirt again.

- - -

'Where you going boss man?'

'To get a well needed cup of coffee. Want one? Then you can tell me all about the trip you should be on with your wife?'

'I'd rather not think about it if in honest' he shuddered as they left the ward.

John had been working at the hospital for 5 years now. Having started off on one of the wards but Emergency care was where it was at.

He was trained in other medical professions but he liked and enjoyed the thrill of emergency care - getting to save lives every day.

Getting to help people is what he thrived for.

He started off as the rookie five years previous when he was practically a kid and now bordering on 30, 6 months ago he finally got his promotion to consultant.

He's worked with Rory for years.

They met at Medical school with Rory training to be a nurse. Not too long after joining the hospital Rory married his long term girlfriend Amy and they had been pretty happy together ever since.

'So how's the house coming along?' John asked making polite conversation, as he picked at a blueberry muffin.

He found that eating at work wasn't always an easy task - mainly because when you deal with vomit on a day to day basis you start to find it hard to stomach your lunch.

'Fine. But I refuse to paint the living room yellow. It will just be too bright' he muttered. 'Your still coming for Christmas Dinner right?'

'Well I'm on the rota to work Rory'

'So? Your doing an early. Which means you can come to ours for dinner at 7. We don't mind waiting' Rory agreed. 'It'll be like every other year, we work and Amy cooks' he shrugged.

'Yeah okay. I just feel like I intrude every year'

It was true to say that John didn't really have any family. In fact 30 years old and he doesn't even have a girlfriend.

Of course he's previous divorce was pretty messy - one of the reasons he transferred to this hospital.

'That's not true John. Your our best mate - and you don't want to spend Christmas alone?' Rory pointed out.

'No. I guess not' he mumbled.

The last few years John has been married to his job, seeing as he has had nothing else to focus on.

It's not exactly easy for someone who doesn't have this kind of high maintenance job to understand - part of the reason the divorce ended so messily - resulting in John loosing half of his savings.

But it was worth it in the end to get away from the nut job he called a wife.

'Will the lounge be decorated by Christmas?' He asked with a grin.

'Are you kidding? Christmas is less than 12 days away. I don't think so'

'It's about 10 days away but whose counting?'

'Me. I got a cool Lego R2D2 in my advent calendar this morning' Rory said showing John the picture as Martha popped out of the lift.

'John. Just got a call from ambulance control - there's been an RTC on the motorway. They're about 40 minutes away and coming here' Martha said making John look up.

The shift was about to get interesting.