Second Sight

The Woman in Hospital Room 39

The directions to the Causeway Hospital from the visitor's center employees and the EMTs sent the quartet of ladies on a short and silent car ride. Ava drove with more caution to the hospital than she had on their way to the adventure gone awry, much to the pleasure of her three companions. Just as the hospital broke their view of the horizon, Hannah chimed in.

"How on earth did you manage to get that close to the cliff sides? I thought there were regulations to prevent crazy stupid deaths like the one you almost had, Ava."

Hannah's ringing voice shocked Ava out of deep, meditative thought. Her shoulders shrugged up and down in silence, clearing away the fog settling around her mind. "I thought they had, too." Another beat, seconds passed before she took a breath of courage. "Can I say something crazy?"

The silence was shocking. With her lack of a filter, Ava was surprised that Kayla hadn't blurted out something like why, since you haven't already said anything crazy? But there was no response, which Ava took as a go-ahead.

"I don't even remember going to the cliff side," Ava confessed in one breath, pulling their rental into the small car park out front of the hospital. "I remember being by the seaside, not at the top of the cliffs."

"Maybe there was something going on in your brain with hypo..." Aubrey trailed off, trying to remember which word she wanted to use. "Hypo... hyper... well," she waved away the imaginary scratch paper from in front of her, "whichever one is getting too cold."

"Hypothermia," Kayla added.

"I didn't think that hypothermia could make you hallucinate," Ava mused as they all piled out of the small car and headed towards the emergency room entrance. All three of the girls shrugged in response.

Ava was surprised at how easily the hospital visit went. She simply flashed her UK student visa, explained what happened at the Causeway, and was immediately sent into a room that looked more like a doctor's office than an emergency room. They did the basics—a pulse-oximeter on her finger, a small blood sample, a check that her heart was indeed beating and that her lungs were indeed filling with air...

"Well," a young woman came in, her shoulders donning a white lab coat embroidered with "Theresa Fleming," and an additional "M.D." afterwards. "You are quite the special case," she commented as she sat on the stool next to the examination table. "It says here that you had to be resuscitated by a team of our best EMTs, and yet you were able to stand up, walk, and drive yourself to the hospital all on your own. Is this all true?"

Ava's head nodded up and down solemnly, avoiding eye contact with the doctor all together. She knew that her case was odd, but she certainly was not a fan of being fawned over by complete strangers. At least none of the other girls were in here, since that was a regulation that the UK seemed to have down.

"Love, it's okay," Dr. Fleming continued, "I don't want to make you a research subject. I just want to make sure I've gotten all the facts correct."

The kind reassurance from the doctor convinced Ava that she could look up. Once her eyes locked with her, the doctor smiled. The pleasant grin sent Ava's way knocked nearly all the air out of her lungs.

For the most part, Dr. Fleming looked perfectly normal. Average height, maybe a little taller than Ava (honestly, that was not a difficult standard to meet). But as Ava gazed at the doctor overseeing her care, it was her eyes that caught Ava's attention. And it was her teeth. Two small points extended from her canines in such a subtle fashion that Ava was shocked she had even caught them. In this one moment, Ava was beyond relieved to remember that her companions were asked to stay in the waiting room, because she was sure they would continue to think she was crazy.

Ava figured that her line of sight was obvious; for the most part, when people locked eyes with a doctor giving them treatment, they locked eyes with them. So when Ava finally raised her eyes from Dr. Fleming's fangs up to her eyes, it was clear that the doctor noticed. She ran her tongue along her teeth and winked one of her deep maroon eyes at Ava. The other eye, the one that hadn't flashed a wink at the dumbfounded patient, was concealed by long, reddish brown hair that cascaded down Dr. Fleming's back and shoulders. She looked less like she belonged in a white lab coat and more like she belonged at the top of mount Olympus... she was perfect.

"Now it makes sense," her melodic Irish accent rang in the room like a bell, a chill running down Ava's spine. "You are no ordinary human."

Hearing the word "human" to describe Ava by a doctor felt surreal to say the least. She assumed that, in a hospital setting, being a human was an assumed obvious. Everyone that walked through the automatic doors of the emergency room was human. Humans get sick, humans get injured. It took Ava a moment to realize that she had just heard a doctor, someone with the specific letters "M.D." embroidered on their coat, to describe her as human.

Ava tried as best she could to act casual after Dr. Fleming's observation. She rubbed the back of her neck and grinned sheepishly, her gaze drifting back down to the ground. "I don't know what you mean, Doc—" Ava stopped herself, cleared her throat, and figured she should address the medical professional in front of her in a more formal manner. She lifted her eyes to meet Dr. Fleming's deep maroon eyes and took in a deep breath. "I mean, Dr. Fleming. I'm as ordinary as they come."

"If you were an ordinary human," Dr. Fleming lowered her voice to an almost animalistic level as she rolled the stool closer to Ava's bedside, "you wouldn't be able to walk away from being resuscitated. You would be weak, unable to move more than a few steps. Your brain would be so desperate for oxygen that you wouldn't be able to do anything but focus on breathing. No," she stopped her ceaseless train of thought and took in a long sniff. Ava tensed for a moment, realizing that a vampire was standing next to her and taking in her scent. Dr. Fleming noticed this and backed off, resuming her observations, "there's something special about you," she looked down at her chart, "Ava Murphy." She chuckled to herself.

"What's wrong?" Ava asked, curiosity painting her voice. She knew that despite every effort to sound calm, to sound nonchalant about the whole doctor-being-a-vampire issue, her voice still warbled with fear and concern.

"Murphy. That's a good, strong, Irish name. An ancient name, even." Deep in thought, Dr. Fleming's tongue traced her fangs as she sat and let her brain process. "You Irish, love?"

"I'm sure I am somewhere deep in my family. I just like to think of myself as an American mutt."

"You're no mutt," Dr. Fleming said, care and concern in her voice. "You're far more special than that." She flashed her fanged smile, and Ava could swear that her fangs were bigger this time around.

A deep blush set into Ava's cheeks. Even without a mirror, she could feel it. The room felt about a hundred degrees hotter. Normally, she hated all this attention, all of this "you're incredibly special" talk. But from someone as... extraordinary as Dr. Fleming, she almost appreciated it. As she watched the doctor's deep maroon eyes settle on her, her fangs poking their way through her lips, Ava came to the realization that the world was definitely changing. And Ava knew that she was somehow changing with it.

"Well," With a final wink and a pat on Ava's lap, Dr. Fleming pushed back from the exam table, "aside from being one of the more... extraordinary patients," Ava stifled a gasp at Dr. Fleming using the same words Ava had just used to describe the doctor herself, "I see nothing out of the ordinary with you, love." She reached over to the desk and grabbed a release form on a clipboard. "I hope that you and your friends..." Ava stifled a laugh, making Dr. Fleming chuckle and grin, "have a wonderful rest of your time in our Great North." She handed the release form to Ava, the paper donned with a report of flying colors. As far as the vampiric doctor could tell, nothing was out of the ordinary with Ava. At least, not physically.