Beautiful Scars on Critical Veins (kellic)

Chaptet Seven

"Hey, it's time for vitals. Sorry I woke you up!" A soft voice called me from my slumber, "This is my least favorite part about being a nurse here! I've got to wake up the patients who need vitals at six in the freaking morning!" Six? That means I got less then three hours of sleep! At least that's more then last night where I got none.

"Hey, your eyes flickered, I know you're awake." I opened my eyes and saw a small boy, oh shit he was a man, he's like four feet tall. "I'm Patrick, I'll be doing your vitals and getting your weight checked, okay? If you could come with me." I sat up and stumbled out the door because I forgot I was hooked up to the IV. I followed Patrick to wherever he was leading me.

I rubbed away the sleep in my eyes as we entered the room I'd gotten skin checked in yesterday. Skin check! Jack! I was wide awake now, "Glad you're awake! All ya need to do is get on that scale for me, turn around if you don't mind. Can't let you see your weight." I stepped blindly on the scale, "Okay, perfect! Now if you could just lie down on this bed thing." Patrick pulled out the leg rest and he took my vitals while I laid, sat, and stood.

"I'm taking your vitals in the orthostatic way, it's because with anorexia you might find yourself dizzy and lightheaded when you stand up since you don't eat enough." He explained, as though reading my curious mind.

"Since it's 6:05," he mused, "you could just set up for dinner- I mean breakfast! Silly me!" He laughed and led me to the rec room, "You okay with that?" I nodded, "You okay with being alone? I've got to finish room check and grab Jack and get his skin check." I felt bad for Jack, he was in for a hell of a lot of shit for that small screw he'd taken. Places like this probably don't take that lightly.

I nodded and Patrick left with a smile and hummed along out the door. "Adorable, am I right?" Said a voice from behind me, I spun around, "Oh, sorry, didn't meant to scare you." He said in a monotone voice, "I'm Pete, I'm a therapist here. Why are you up so early? Usually patients go back to bed for a hour if 6:00 is there vitals check." I shrugged.

"Oh, you're Kellin. You don't really talk. I'm just talking to a brick wall, huh?" He laughed, I gave a small smile. "Patrick, he's a nice guy. I really like him, ya know? He's never sworn at anything since the day I met him, two years ago. He's so young. As soon as he got out of college he came here, and he graduated a year early from both high school and college."

How old was he then if he was two years early? I calculated, twenty-three plus two more years here was only twenty-five and was working at a mental facility? Holy shit.

"Why am I telling you this? Sometimes I swear I need my own therapist, if only for my romantic struggles. Do you like gossip? The security guards sure do, Justin and Mike... the night shift don't really care though, they just do their job and that's it." He chuckled, "Anyways, I came in here to find Andy, he brought the coffee for the three patients Brendon promised coffee too."

I peeked up my ears, coffee? That's just what I needed, hopefully Brendon told Pete it was me who wanted it. Pete left to find my coffee. Coffee was amazing, it would keep me awake during the day and not in a sour mood. It was a good thing I'd drank coffee all night before I came here or I might've talked...by swearing every third word.

I set out all the napkins then decided I wanted my notebook. I went to my room and stumbled to find my folder in the dark while my roommate, Jack, was still sleeping. I knew his fate, he'd be woken up and taken to the skin check, I didn't know what would happen after that though.

I got back to the rec room and journaled what had happened so far. Also about my concerns for my roommate who, no doubt, was about to be waken up and very upset that he had to get a skin check on his would-be last day.