My Sweet Cupcake- A Nightvale Fanfiction

Chapter 27

Carlos awoke with a start. He was lying in a blindingly white hospital bed under a blindingly white blanket. He was quiet for a few seconds, but then his memory flooded back to him. He sat up quickly, but was stopped by a stabbing pain in his arm.

"AH! What is this?" Carlos lifted the sleeve on his shirt. There was a big, purple bruise that covered the entirety of his shoulder and some of his arm. His body ached all over and he had a major headache. Carlos winced at the brightness of the room. He gritted his teeth and swung his legs over the side of the bed, testing to see whether his body would hold his weight or not. He gently pushed himself up off of the bedside and bent his knees a few times. He wiggled his right leg, then his left, then danced around the room a little. Carlos stretched his arms above his head. They were both working. He yawned. He had barely gotten any sleep since he first brought Cecil to the hospital, and that seemed like ages ago. His shoes reflected months of working in the lab and collected memories wherever they went. Now, all they reminded him of was when he dragged Cecil into the hospital and cried in the bathroom when his boyfriend was diagnosed with Cancer. His jeans were wrinkled from days of use and wear. Carlos walked to a mirror on the wall and peered in. He saw a man with alarming bags on his eyes, a half-shaven face, and eyes that were red from crying. He also had a bruise on his jawline. Carlos mussed his hair and sighed, his breath fogging on the mirror. He pondered his reflection, then turned to walk out of the room, at the same time someone swung open the door. The nurse he had seen when he first arrived--the man with the blue eyes and blonde hair. Carlos' eyes glanced down at his arms, which were sculpted with muscles accented with his white scrubs.

"You are...Carlos?" The man asked.

Uh, yes." Carlos responded. The man stepped in and closed the door behind him. He had a clipboard in hand. Carlos gulped. 

"There is something we need to talk about." His eyes grew hard and serious. "The hospital cannot excuse how Mr. Palmer acted, whether it was accidental or intentional. This is not the first time this has happened and we cannot allow it to happen again."

"I'm very sorry, he keeps saying he's having a reaction to the medicine.." Carlos rubbed his sleepy eyes.

"Actually..the doctors have looked into the prescriptions and how they affect his blood level. The problem is, they don't affect him at all. In fact, nothing has. Everything we have given him has no effect on him at all." He stopped. "Well, except for the chemo." The nurse eyed Carlos suspiciously. "The hospital staff cannot put up with this any longer. We're sorry, but we have no choice but to relieve Mr. Palmer of the medicine and discharge him."

Carlos's stomach dropped. "No, NO!" Carlos held his head in his hands. "What about..Cecil has CANCER!"

"That's the thing. Mr. Palmer doesn't have any kind of strain of cancer in him. We're not sure what he has, but the scientists here have never seen it before. Overall, the chemo and medicine was useless to use, and there isn't anything more we can do for him besides send him off with an over the counter painkiller." The nurse looked up from his clipboard. "I'm sorry. He will be released this afternoon." And the nurse nodded at Carlos and walked out the door, leaving Carlos alone. He grabbed his stomach, which was being gnawed away by nervousness. A shiny pearl glistened in Carlos's eye. He shook his head. 

"NO!" Carlos reached over and punched the wall. It didn't give. Carlos swung the mirror against the spot where his fist was, shattering glass all over the floor. He broke the frame against his knees and threw the splintered wood into the bathroom. Carlos stood in the middle of the hospital room, breathing heavily and staring at his shoes. He pressed his palms against his eyes, preventing tears from leaking out. The room was silent, minus Carlos's heavy breathing. Carlos took his hands away from his pulsing eyes and glanced on the clock, securely fastened to the wall above the bed. It read 9:24. Carlos took a heavy breath, his stomach overturning with nervousness about the afternoon to come.