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“Here, baby,” Nettie crooned, insinuating a hand underneath her boyfriend’s head to help him lean up. “Drink this, it’ll help you feel better.”
Tiff lay on the bed, battered and fell as any man had ever been. His face was hideously bruised and disfigured by the two parallel stitched lines marring his visage, the surrounding tissue swollen and angry red, puckered between the black stitches holding the wounds closed. His left eye, lacerated up the lid as well, was dark purple and swollen shut. His jaw was peppered with stubble too painful to shave, and the remaining unmarred flesh of his face was pasty and shining with ill sweat. His cracked lips parted in a soft groan, and he tilted his chin forward to accept the glass Nettie offered him, the water blessedly cool and refreshing going down.
“There y’go,” she praised, setting the glass on the nightstand and lowering his head down onto the pillow. “You keep that down, ‘n I’ll give you your pills in another few minutes.”
He closed his good eye and sighed wearily, too assed-out on hospital pain meds to care. She felt a sharp ache of pity in her chest, and lifted a gentle hand to stroke the hair back from his sweaty forehead. They’d released him from Rochester General earlier that day, and the two-hour drive to pick him up was considerably less gut-wrenching and awful than following the medevac there two days ago through highway congestion and a construction zone, speeding the whole way and still an hour behind when she’d arrived bursting through the trauma center doors, frazzled and hysterical.
Heavily sedated, the doctor told her, blood-spattered and weary amidst the screaming chaos of the emergency room, where he’d pulled her aside to update her on Tiff’s condition. Ordered a CT to rule out brain damage from the fall…surgery to repair orbital floor fracture…recovery will be long and painful, I’ll write a prescription for Vicodin, he’ll have to take it every tw..
(and at that point ‘ping’ went the back of Nettie’s preoccupied mind, because hey, she could sell those once he didn’t need ‘em anymore, that heifer Moonbeam who danced to Nettie’s old song and lived three trailers down would sure eat them little pills up, Nettie knew this)
But now, as Tiff turned and pushed weakly against her hand - liking her touch, seeking comfort – all thoughts of selling his pain medication were pushed from her mind. He needed those pills. (And she’d promised to give them to him, hadn’t she? He had kept the water down, after all).
She reached for the washcloth sitting in the bowl on the nightstand, wringing it out and settling it over his forehead. He made a small noise at the wet weight of the cloth, and her brow furrowed. “I know, baby,” she murmured, lifting the cloth and dabbing gently over his brow, his temples. “I know it hurts. Try to go back t’sleep, you’ll feel better.”
He breathed in sharp pants, fingers curling to grab fistfuls of sheet, and he arched and moaned feverishly, head lolling away from her ministrations. A stab of self-loathing shot through her at the thought that she’d caused him pain, and she abruptly took the cloth away, setting her jaw.
The sun was hot, scorching the top of her head and soaking her velveteen-and-leather costume through with sweat as she hoisted her skirts above her heels and ran, sprinting as fast as she could, pushing through the throngs of brats and fatsos as she hauled ass down the midway to where the crowd of workers had assembled.
‘“Nettie,” ‘her coworker and confidant, Tawnee, had burst into her dressing room with wild, panicked eyes, broomstick arms braced against the doorway as she panted, ample chest heaving with exertion. ‘“It’s Tiff,”’ she’d told her, voice filled with dread, ‘“you better get down to the High Rise NOW.”’
Something terrible had happened; the High Rise had been broke down all day and Tiff was the dumbass who volunteered to fix it, got offered extra hazard pay and figured it’d do them some good to have that money on hand.
“Tiff,” she panted, chest heaving, when she approached the scene of the accident. “Tiff!”
Another groan from Tiff silenced her reverie, and she looked down at him, noting with a sense of dread the way he shifted and curled up on his side, pallor whitening even more underneath the vivid injuries. Oh, no, she thought, maybe that water wasn’t gonna stay down after all.
There was a hastily-erected crowd barrier in place to keep the masses back; Gary himself, who never left his air-conditioned office if he could help it, stood ruddy-faced and sweaty, animatedly waving his arms and shouting “BACK! BEHIND THE LINE!” to the persistently curious mob gathering at the scene.
“TIFF!” Nettie shrieked when she saw his limp body on the ground, surrounded by medics and firefighters, and the ride was smoking in great black plumes and cables were dangling like live cobras, sparks flying and ominous mechanical groans emanating from within the bowels of the High Rise itself; lights were flashing on emergency vehicles and sirens were chirruping and
and
And nobody would answer her frantic cries nobody was listening to her nobody would TELL HER if Tiff was dead or alive or had broke his fucking neck or
He lurched like a snake coiled to spring and suddenly heaved up the water with a grating gargle over the side of the bed, and Nettie cursed out loud and grabbed the bowl and held it under his chin in time for another fulsome wave of stomach acid, yellow and bitter and wrenching as it came up.
“Oh, baby,” she cringed, sitting beside him on the bed and rubbing his back, keeping hold of the bowl. “It’s all right, honey, I’ve got you,” she murmured, trying to comfort him through the wrenching spasms, feeling the muscles in his back tense and lock and push with each heave. She knew the straining had to be tearing at his stitches, exacerbating the throbbing pain. “It’s okay.”
“Nett!” Gary was yelling, making his way down the barrier to where she stood fulminating. “Tiff’s alive, they’re flyin’ him to Rochester General. GET BACK!” He abruptly roared again, as some stupid teenagers attempted to climb over the barrier.
“WHAT HAPPENED?” She screamed, voice high-pitched and hoarse, clutching the barrier and leaning over, craning to see past all the bodies in her way, searching for her man on the ground.
“Ride malfunction,” Gary gritted out. “Can’t say anymore. They’re leavin’ now, Nettie!”
He spat into the bowl and gasped for breath, disfigured face screwing up in pain, the cords in his arms flexing and tightening as he gripped the side of the mattress. “Jesus,” he ground out with a strangled groan, “need m’pills, Nett…”
The desperation in his voice, raw and rasping, tore at her heartstrings. “I know, I’m gettin’ em,” she reassured him, leaning over to set the bowl on the floor. She straightened back up and slipped an arm underneath his, situating herself for the levering to come. “Here, baby. Sit up.”
She managed to haul him upright without much protest, and kept his back braced to her chest, holding him in place with one sturdy arm. He felt lighter, the muscle of his chest and shoulders more stripped and wiry than she remembered as of late. This revelation only made the iron grip of pity swelling in her bosom tighten relentlessly, and she pursed her lips, unable to stop herself from leaning down and pressing a kiss to the greasy crown of his hair before reaching over with her free hand to retrieve the pills she’d already set out on the nightstand for this purpose.
“Here y’go, Tiffy,” she told him, holding the pills up to his mouth. “Chew ‘em up if you want, they’ll work faster.”
He did, and she offered him the glass of water again, holding him as he swallowed and screwed up his jagged face and coughed, respirations clouding the inside of the glass.
“There,” she soothed, setting the glass back on the nightstand and easing him back down onto the bed. She pulled the blanket up to his chest and picked up his rough hand and kissed his hairy knuckles before standing and leaving the room to let him sleep.
“Tiff,” Nettie panted when she reached the information desk at the Rochester General Trauma Center. “Tiff Jones, where is he?”
The receptionist glanced up over her glasses with a raised eyebrow and an unconcealed look of disdain at Nettie’s showstage getup she hadn’t removed before leaving the fairgrounds. “He’s in the ICU. Only family can see him, dear, and that’s only if the doctor says-”
“He’s my husband,” Nettie blurted out. “Let me see my man.”
(he’d already proposed to her last week, might as well start callin’ him that)