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Jimmy Sawbones had stuck a needle into his lung and reinflated it, saved his life.
He’s a good doctor, I tell myself.He’ll save Dante.
“I need you to hold pressure while I thread the needle,” he says, and then looks up at Nico, all business. “And for God’s sake, man, put on your flashlight so that I can see what the hell is going on.”
Nico fumbles with his phone but gets the flashlight on and I put pressure on the wound again as Dante mumbles out curses.
“What’s he had?” he asks Nico.
“Whiskey,” Nico answers.
“That’s not going to be enough.” He tosses Nico a bottle of pills. “Two of these now, one every six hours after.”
Nico nods and shakes out two pills, shoving them in Dante’s mouth and offering him the whiskey bottle again. Dante drinks deeply from it and swallows.
Jimmy takes the needle in hand and threads it, first try, tying it off with his teeth. Then he moves my hand out of the way and digs into the wound. I wince but I can’t look away, it’s like watching a train wreck.
He digs around in the wound and Dante howls, his hands clawing onto the chair arms for support. “Fuck, thathurts!”
“Good, I’d be worried if it’d gone numb,” Jimmy replies easily, cracking a smile.
I blink at him. Is that a joke?
After what seems like thirty minutes of Dante writhing on the chair while Jimmy gets hold of the artery, he says, “Got it,” calmly and puts the needle inside the wound. I can’t see anything but blood and tissue. I have no idea how he found the artery.
Nico takes off his belt and gives it to Dante, who puts it between his teeth. He’s sweating and I dab his forehead with the bloody handkerchief, having nothing else and not wanting to leave him.
Dante passes out when Jimmy gets the stitch in, and the belt drops to the floor.
“Dante?” I call, my voice high-pitched with panic.
“It’s for the best,” Jimmy says softly. “This next part isn’t pleasant.”
He starts to stitch the wound but what I don’t realize until he gets Nico to help him sit Dante up is that there aretwowounds, one where the bullet went in and the exit wound.
He stitches the back one in record time because Dante is coming to.
“The pills will make him loopy,” Jimmy tells me. “Keep an eye on him. It’s going to take a couple of weeks to heal, but he won’t be up and around tonight.”
He starts to wind gauze around Dante’s shoulder. Dante’s still out of it, his eyes rolled back, eyes slightly open.
“He-He’s going to be okay?” I stutter, and Jimmy smiles softly.
“He’ll be fine, kid,” he says, patting my shoulder. “And you did good. You’re a good wife, Mia.”
I nod slowly, feeling like I’m somehow floating outside of my body. I feel out of it just as much as Dante, I guess from the stress.
Jimmy looks at me intently, at the bruises on my face.
“I need to check you out, too. Nico, get out of here, I need to lift her shirt.”
Nico blushes slightly and leaves the room.
Jimmy lifts up my shirt and I wince. I look down and there’s a purplish bruise all the way across my abdomen, from the bottom of my ribs to my navel.
The doctor palpates there and I cry out.
“You’ve got a busted rib. Not broken all the way through, just cracked,” he says, and takes a bandage out of his bag. He starts to wrap my abdomen, right below my breasts and down to my waist. It hurts at first but when he’s done, I feel like I can breathe again.
