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He reached across for his pen as he stood, deliberately flashing his gold wedding band at me under the bright theatre lights. He gestured to the monitor, the fluid pump, the gas vaporiser. “Bog-standard anaesthesia. Nothing exciting. I’ve written the post-op chart. Make yourself comfortable, Val, as there’s probably another hour or two watching paint dry here. I’d leave you the newspaper, except I haven’t quite finished with it yet.”
Tight bastard.
“It’s fine, I have this month’s copy ofAnaesthesiaI want to leaf through.”
My previous good cheer from chatting to the delightful Mrs Fortescue evaporated. Somehow, Mike always managed to make me feel…less. An unfamiliar sensation, aside from when he was around, and I hated it. I hated him and his knowing, pudgy face. The smarmy way he sucked up to whichever plastic surgeon boasted the biggest private practice. I hated his shiny white Tesla and hearing him brag about it in front of hard-up theatre staff. The way he never thanked his anaesthetic nurse at the end of the day. The fact I was single and lonely, and he wasn’t.
Mostly, I hated that he was married to Samantha, my ex-wife.
Once Mike had departed, I settled down. The rest of the theatre team did too. He had one aspect right—on the whole, fit, youngish blokes were relatively easy to anaesthetise, which unfortunately gave me ample headspace to brood—never a good idea. Josie, the anaesthetic nurse, brought me a cup of tea, parking it on the anaesthetic machine. None of my colleagues ever addressed the ex-wife issue directly, yet I sensed their sympathy, nonetheless. Maintaining a professional persona with the bastard your wife had been carrying on with for the last two years of your marriage was tough. And it wasn’t as if Mike attempted discretion. God, no. He slipped her name into every conversation, and they even had the gall to turn up together at the theatre’s Christmas party. Awkward doesn’t even begin to describe it.
I spent the next hour lost in my own glum thoughts, flicking through my medical journal and, on autopilot, keeping an eye on the patient’s obs. My favourite scrub nurse was working today, so at least the scenery was pretty, even if I’d never get any closer to it than I already was. Sensing my eyes on him, he looked up and smiled politely.
“Good afternoon, Dr Valentine.”
I nodded a greeting, aware of my face reddening at having been caught staring. Not that anyone would guess for a second the direction of my thoughts. Dull, plodding Dr Valentine entertaining lustful fantasies during work hours? About a sweet Filipino nurse, practically young enough to be his son?
Ramil sure was cute though, with his smooth tanned skin and bright, brown eyes. His long black hair, neatly tied up in a bun, was hidden under a theatre hat. A few tantalising tendrils had escaped and curled onto his cheek. Still blushing, I dropped my gaze back to the boring medical journal and an article on anaesthesia for liver transplantation that I’d already read twice. I couldn’t recall a single word. I picked up my phone instead, and began Internet browsing, comparing different brands of petrol-driven hedge trimmers.
Power tools. Christ. When had purchasing one of those become the most riveting part of my week?
Conversation and movement around me swelled as the painstaking operation drew to a successful close. With the delicate and intense part of the procedure over, the surgeons relaxed, chatting about lunch, a patient on the ward, an interesting CT scan. I checked my patient’s medication chart and, as expected, Mike had been stingy with the post-operative pain relief. I corrected his prescription then switched the flow of anaesthetic gases to pure oxygen as the last of the dressings were applied. Josie bustled around, dragging the patient’s bed into theatre, and removing the monitoring.
“He looks like he’s gone ten rounds with Mike Tyson,” she joked, as we peeled away the surgical drapes. “That’s going to smart a bit.”
She wasn’t wrong. I doubted the guy’s mother would even recognise him. A tuft of black hair poked out from the top of a bandage secured, turban-like, around his head, below which were two swollen black eyes and a puffy, bruised face. My anaesthetic breathing tube snaked out of his nose, which had been re-straightened at the start of the operation. Josie busily smeared Vaseline over a cut on his lip.
The patient began to stir as the anaesthesia lightened, and in response to being transferred from the operating table into the bed. Once he settled, and I removed the breathing tube, I gently applied an oxygen mask over his damaged nose and mouth, then waited for his consciousness levels to rise before he was safe enough to be deposited in the post-operative recovery area. Like all patients after lengthy surgery, waking took a while. The surgeons departed, and Ramil occupied himself gathering and sorting the used surgical instruments. Josie gave the patient a firm shake of the shoulders.
“Mr Leeson! Time to wake up! The operation is all finished.”
The guy groaned a little, then settled down again. At least some of the intravenous painkillers must be working. With his injuries, I didn’t blame him for not hurrying to re-join the sentient world. And post-concussion headaches could be brutal—I’d experienced one or two myself playing rugby. Josie, however, was keen to finish work tonight on time, and Mrs Fortescue’s operation wasn’t going to be swift.
“Mr Leeson!” she tried again, a little louder. “Wakey, wakey! Matthew!”
After twenty years, reversing healthy patients from anaesthesia became almost as routine as brushing my teeth in the morning. Small babies still required one hundred percent of my attention, as did sick, frail old folk like Mrs Fortescue. But fit, younger men? I’d only been half paying heed to Josie, already planning my strategy for best anaesthetising Mrs Fortescue, and wondering whether I’d have time to nip down to the coffee shop to grab a sandwich before she arrived.
“Matthew! Matt! Mr Leeson!”
I froze. A sliver of something small and alien coiled in the pit of my stomach. Did she just…? He couldn’t be. Oh god. Please, no. Not Matt, notmyMatt.
“Are you all right, Dr Valentine? You look as if you’ve seen a ghost. You’re as white as these bed sheets.”
Maybe I had seen a ghost. Not daring to breathe, I collapsed into the swivel chair. Surely no. Not my beautiful, precious Matt. Not here and not like this after all this time. Overcome with dizziness, I suddenly became aware that the theatre around me had gone very quiet. Ramil joined us and crouched in front of me, those sweet kind eyes anxiously peering up into mine. Josie’s face, too, was full of concern.
I opened my mouth. Nothing but hot air came rushing out. I tried again. “Yes…I…I’m fine.” I fanned my face with the prescription chart. “A bit hot, that’s all. I…I think I probably just need some…some lunch. No time…you see.”
I must have formed the right words in the right order because Ramil stood, giving my arm a gentle pat. “I’ll bring you something back up—I’m going down to the canteen now. You can give me the money later.”
Letting out a shuddering groan, the man in the bed shifted. Josie placed a reassuring hand on his shoulder. “It’s all right, sir. The operation’s finished, you’re just waking up.”
Thank God Josie was caring for the patient, because I could scarcely suck in air myself, let alone be responsible for someone else’s respiratory function. His observation chart lay on the anaesthetic workstation in front of me, a patient identity sticker attached to the front. I’d had no reason to know his name until now, and Mike hadn’t offered it.
Matthew Leeson, I read. This patient and I were almost the same age, his date of birth listed as six months after mine. My Matt had been seventeen to my eighteen, although you’d never have known it from his attitude. An old soul, my Matt.
My hands shook as I lifted the obs chart closer and read it again. God, could it be possible? Bournemouth Hospital was a three to four-hour drive from Stourbridge. I hadn’t been back there in years. What the hell could Matt Leeson be doing down here?
“Hurts,” the man mumbled under the mask. He shifted again, as if trying to find a comfortable position. “Fucking pissing hurts.”
