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Kai did feel a little stupid coming into the hospital with the injury he had. There wasn't anyone there to help him with a first-aid kit, so to Urgent Care it was. Now he was on the bed, waiting for the doctor with this rusty piece of iron stuck in his arm. Luckily, it wasn't too painful, but he was definitely hoping they would deal with this sooner rather than later.
Fortunately, the curtain soon opened up, and a gorgeous woman stepped up to his bed and grabbed the clipboard. "Alright, Mr. Kai Fong, 26 years old, with a... Piece of metal in your right arm?"
He held up his right arm, showing the doctor what that meant. "That's what I came in here for."
"So I see. I'm Dr. Asami Sato, and we're gonna fix that up. Let me take a look." She put on a pair of latex gloves, and gently took his arm, taking a closer look at the piece of metal. "How deep would you say it is?"
"Not sure. Didn't get a good look before I fell on it, but maybe a quarter or a third of an inch?"
Dr. Sato nodded. "Not too deep. It looks worse than it is. This part of your arm is almost all muscle. You'll be good as new in three or four days. We don't need an OR for this, so I'm gonna get the nurse, then we can get this out of you."
That was actually a big relief to Kai, because he needed his right arm to do his work properly. The doctor soon came back, this time with a very cute nurse in tow, making him think that he should injure himself more often. "Alright Kai, this is Jinora, she's going to help me, and afterwards is going to stitch you back up, and all the other care you need."
And just like that, Kai's good mood of being doted on by two beautiful women was gone. "Stitched? Can't it heal naturally?"
Dr. Sato shook her head. "It's a jagged piece of metal, and an inch-long cut. If we don't stitch it closed, it will scar badly, and might just hurt for the rest of your life."
Kai took a deep breath and reluctantly nodded. "Okay," he said with a small voice.
"Good. Jinora, when I pull the metal out, you let it bleed for a few seconds to clean the wound, then cover it with some gauze, and you know the rest. Kai, if you could put your arm on this towel, that way we don't make too big a mess when we pull the shard out." Jinora had pulled up a rack with drawers, presumably full of useful things, and put on a pair of gloves herself. Kai's arm was on the small table attached to his bed, and they were just about ready. Dr. Sato grabbed the metal with a surgical clamp, and turned to him. "Are you ready?"
He unsuccessfully tried to swallow the lump in his throat, because he knew what would come after. Then again, he couldn't really go home with a jagged piece of metal stuck in his arm, so he didn't have much choice. "I am."
"Okay Jinora, ready for the gauze, and in three..." Without counting down any further, she suddenly yanked out the piece of metal, forcing Kai to bite down any number of expletives. "Sorry, they say it hurts less when you don't expect it. Cover it."
Jinora pressed the gauze on his arm to stop the bleeding. "There we go, halfway done," she reassured him, her voice lower than he would have expected given her frame, but pleasant to listen to. "Asami, did you need anything else?"
"Yes, but that can wait until you get Kai to stop bleeding."
Jinora chuckled. "Okay, Kai, could you hold this in place?" she asked, referring to the gauze. "I'm going to clean your wound with a little bit of iodine, and that probably will sting a little bit." She had the cotton swab with the brown liquid prepared, and yes, it did sting, but Kai wasn't worried about this part at all. "So, how did you get this piece of metal stuck in your arm?"
Anything to distract him, he figured. "Well, I do parkour running, stunts for films and so on, and I fell while practicing."
"Ah. That sounds pretty cool, actually." She leaned back and took a look at her work. "That looks about right. Hold that again," Jinora told him, pressing a clean piece of gauze on his wound. "Now for the unpleasant part."
"No kidding," Kai muttered under his breath. "How many stitches do you think I'll need?"
Jinora briefly glanced down at his arm. "Eight, maybe nine? The more stitches I put in, the better it's going to heal." He sucked in a deep breath at that answer. That was way more than he was expecting, and he felt his feet go cold from the fear. "Are you okay?" she asked, picking up on his discomfort.
This was so stupid. Here he was, a 26 year old man, and he felt like he could break into tears at any moment. "I just... I'm not very comfortable with... needles." He reluctantly stammered out.
Kai could see Jinora's face contort, she was clearly trying to hold back a laugh. "Well, not to worry, I have done this dozens of times, you're in good hands."
"I have no doubt about that, I'm just really not looking forward to this part."
This time, Jinora failed to bite back a chuckle, and thought for a second. "Well, it's not very busy right now. Do you want me to call in another nurse so that you can hold my hand?"
Kai felt his blood rush to his face. He was tough, he could do without that, he spent hours in the gym every week, he took falls and bruises every day, it was his job! He didn't need to hold her hand, he was... a complete pussy. "Yes please." he said in the lowest possible voice.
"You're actually serious," she said in surprise. "Well alright then. Opal!" she called out the curtain. "Could you give me a hand?"
A second nurse walked over to his bed, and another pretty one. Were all doctors at this hospital beautiful women? "Sure, what do you need?" she asked.
"Eight or nine stitches," said Jinora.
"You can't do that yourself?"
"Well, I could, but..." Jinora reached behind herself, and showed Kai the package. "So this is a suture needle, it's what we're going to use to stitch you up..."
"Oh my God, that's really big..." he breathed. A needle that looked big enough to skewer a whale, with a diabolical curve to it making it look like it had been forged by Satan himself. That was in his mind of course, in reality, it was maybe an inch long, and the curve was just to make it easier for the nurses to work.
Opal nodded. "Say no more. Don't worry, it's a common phobia. Okay, give me that."
Jinora moved to the other side of the bed and took off her gloves, throwing them in the trash can. She rolled up on a little stool so that she could be at eye level with him. "Don't worry, Opal is a professional, she can stitch people up with the best of them," she chuckled, holding out her hand, which Kai gratefully took. "Just look at me, don't focus on Opal."
This was not something that Kai needed to be told twice, and he could tell that Jinora was giving him a once over. "So tell me this," she casually continued, pretending like she wasn't holding a grown man's hand like he was a six-year old with a boo-boo. "If you're so afraid of needles, how did you get your ears pierced and your tattoos done?" she asked, gesturing to his left arm. and both ears. Two studs in the left, a small ring in the right.
Kai tried not to flex the muscles in his arm, that would probably only make Opal's work harder. "Well, tattoo guns have really small needles, I could pretend it was something else. The piercings... I had to get a little creative for that." God, he wished he could use that solution right now.
Jinora raised an eyebrow, but also smiled, seeming genuinely curious. "Go on."
This was a little embarrassing, but nothing could make his current predicament more awkward, so what the hell? "The guy who did it for me was a friend, he agreed that I could smoke enough weed to get so stoned I couldn't feel my face. He did all three in one go, and I haven't a single memory of it, which is fine by me."
This actually made Jinora laugh. "Okay, 'creative' is definitely the right word to describe that. Not exactly what I was hoping for, though."
"What do you mean?" he asked.
"Well, I normally work in pediatrics, just filling in a shift for a coworker here today, and children who are afraid of needles happens all the time. But I can't go around telling them to smoke weed, now can I?" she chuckled.
Kai laughed too. "No, I don't think many parents would sign off on that."
"And I'm done," Opal interrupted them. He was surprised. Jinora had actually distracted him enough that he hardly noticed a huge needle being jabbed into his flesh nine times. Kai looked down at his arm, seeing a neat row of black threads, with a little knot on each end. It pulled a little bit, but nothing too bad if he didn't move his arm."Do you need anything else?"
"Nah, I got this. Thanks, Ope." Jinora rolled back to Kai's other side and picked up the iodine again to dab the wound clean. "Okay, aftercare. It's going to be itchy, but you can't scratch it. Slap it if you have to, but if you scratch it, you'll only pull out the stitches, and then you'll have to hold Sangu's hand when you come back for us to redo them," she said, nodding to a third nurse just walking by.
Kai glanced up, seeing an old, overweight woman with a mole on her forehead so large he could see the hair on it from here. "No scratching, gotcha." So much for all doctors in this hospital being gorgeous women.
"Good. Should take about seven days to heal, the thread will dissolve by itself. If it doesn't, come back, and we'll cut them out. Also come back if it's excessively sore, or red, or irritated, because that could be an infection. Any questions?"
"No, I don't think so."
"Then we're almost done," Jinora said as she dove back into her little cart to find something else.
"Almost?"
She turned around, and Kai felt his heart sink again. There was another needle in her hand. "You still need a tetanus shot, sorry. But if you're a big boy and don't cry, I'll give you a lollipop and a cool Iron Man band-aid, and you can hold my hand again when I walk you to the exit."
Kai closed his eyes and sighed. How was this both a terrible and a good day at the same time?