Reddie For You [On Hiatus]

| Chapter 3 |

Richie was sure he was having a heart attack.

His chest tightened and the words leaving the doctor's mouth physically hurt him. The room was spinning around him but thankfully he was sitting in a chair or he was sure he'd lose control of his legs. He turned to Eddie, who looked just as caught off guard.

"I uh..." Eddie returned the shocked look at Richie, his brown eyes open wide.

The doctor noticed some sort of hesitance and clarified, "I can further explain your condition and possibly set up some accommodation for her to-"

"No." Eddie spat, words moving fast as usual. "I'll take care of it, thanks. All she'd do is worry and not listen anyway, better not to waste your breath."

"If that's what you want Mr. Kaspbrak." The doctor shot him a questioning look but wrote something on his clipboard. "If you need to make a call, I'll have staff bring you a phone of some sort since you will be bedridden for a while. Mr. Tozier, I'll have Alex come in and run you through things as promised. Mr. Kasprak, you will go through the recovery in stages. No solid foods until at least tomorrow, we will monitor your intake and how you hold it down. As I've told your friend here, we will wean you off of the morphine before you leave. We will also attempt to help you build back strength during your stay, but until then we will mostly just be monitoring your progress, continued physical therapy is something we can discuss when you are cleared. Once again, if anything seems off don't hesitate to call me in."

And with that, he left and allowed Alex to walk into the room with a bunch of equipment in his hands. "So I'm not sure how long you'll be caring for Mr. Kaspbrak here, but it's good to teach you how to do it properly just in case. Once you're a master at it you can teach whoever else needs to know."

"Roger that." Richie saluted, the aching in his heart disappearing slowly.

"I hope you have patience." Eddie scoffed. "He's clumsy as shit." He nodded towards Richie, who was squinting his eyes back at him. Alex placed the supplies on the table next to Eddie and handed Richie a roll of bandages. "Stand up."

Richie listened, letting Alex take his seat. "Now when you are doing this, it is important that the chest is flat as possible." He beckoned Richie closer, grabbing the hand that was holding the bandages. "Grab that first." He pointed at another roll in the pile. "This is plastic dressing, it's sanitary and used to cover the wound itself. Don't worry, we will send you home with plenty of this."

Richie picked it up and weighed it in his hand, inspecting it. "Um, okay?"

"Unravel some of it and put it here." He lifted his shirt up high and pointed to a spot on his chest. "Make sure that the dressing extends at least 2 inches past the wound edges, say it ends right here. This prevents the dressing from being sucked back into the wound. It's best to tape the top and sides of the dressing and leave the bottom open. Leaving one side open allows for air to escape when he exhales. Since he has an exit wound too you'll have to repeat this twice. Sterile medical tape is ideal, we can give you that too but it should be in every pharmacy."

Richie followed his hands and carefully taped a patch of the dressing onto his skin. "This is oddly intimate, usually people take me to dinner first." He mumbled.

"Shut up and listen, Richie, this is important." Eddie scolded, pulling a laugh from both men. He was clearly watching too, listening to Alex's instructions carefully.

"You're doing good man. Now that's the field dressing." He pointed to the first roll that Richie had in his hands. "Wrap one tail under and around me. Good, now wrap the other tail around in the opposite direction and bring it back over the dressing. Tighten the two tails and tie them with a nonslip knot over the center of the dressing. Awesome, I'm officially bandaged up."