Me: uhm, no. I ... there’s something stuck inside—
I close my eyes and tell the operator without getting into too many details about how the ‘incident’ happened. And thankfully the person on the other end of the line is too professional to ask.
Operator: hold on tight, ma’am. We have a unit not too far from you, they’ll be with you in under five minutes.
I’m asked about access to my condo and I guess today’s a real bummer of a day because we have no spare keys under the doormat or anything, so they’ll probably have to force their way inside and break in.
I know the ambulance has arrived before I hear the deafening noise of someone kicking the door in because Frank’s high pitch bark alerts me about the intruders.
If I could, right now I’d smile at the fact that my puppy is guarding the house but I actually realize that I’m lying naked on the floor. I try to yank one of the bedsheets off the bed to cover myself with it but I can’t even stretch that far without more waves of pain threatening to overwhelm me. The nearest object is the paperback I was reading while I was – I grab it and open it flat placing it over my crotch just before the footsteps of my saviors climb up the stairs.
“Good afternoon, ma’am. My name is—”
“Thor?” I ask, looking at the Norse god who’s crouching by my side with a compassionate look on his chiseled, handsome features.
Redness immediately rises from my chest up to my cheeks and I shake my head, convinced that I must be hallucinating. Maybe I’m in shock, because I’ve honestly never seen a more handsome man in my entire life.
Max
“THOR?” THE GORGEOUS creature on the floor asks and I don’t react with the usual eye roll.
Lately I’ve barely been able to contain my annoyance at the fact that except for Blake and Porter, the rest of the world seems to have decided that my given name is Thor.
“Max, ma’am,” I offer and then ask “What’s your name?”As I realize that the naked girl lying in a fetal position on her bedroom floor is the sexy jogger I’ve been trying to find the courage to approach.
“Magnolia,” she utters softly, her hazel eyes fixed onto mine.
Goddam she’s beautiful I think, and I have to fight the urge to look at her tits. Remain professional, asshole, I tell myself moved by the vulnerable and embarrassed look in the girl’s eyes.
“You have a very beautiful name, ma’am.” I compliment her, trying to distract her from the embarrassing situation, as I cover her body with one of those thermal blankets in our kits.
My colleague is right behind me and I noticed the way he was staring at Magnolia too, so I feel relieved once she’s covered up.
I feel oddly possessive all of a sudden, it’s such an overwhelming feeling that I struggle to make sense of it.
Yeah, I’m well aware that I don’t even know this girl, lusting after her every time we crossed paths when running at the park certainly doesn’t qualify as knowing someone, but I’ve liked her for weeks.
I’ve been trying to find a clever and possibly non creepy way to talk to her and I guess today I just got a hell of an icebreaker.
“Magnolia, I’m going to lift you up in my arms and bring you to the ambulance. Did you hit your head or anything? Did you fall?”
She immediately understands where I’m going with my question.
“I fell off the bed. Don’t worry, I have no spinal injury.”
“Ok, then. Does it hurt when you try to move?”
She nods.
“I’ll try to avoid moving you too much, ok? There’s a stretcher waiting for you in your living room but the spiral staircase makes it impossible to bring it up here. Hold onto my neck.”
I lift her up in my arms and she instinctively hides her face in the crook of my neck.
The unexpected contact goes straight to my groin where my cock stirs in my pants, already semi-hard from seeing her naked.
Fuck, this is so unprofessional but I try to ignore my physical reaction to the hot girl in my arms and make my way downstairs as carefully as possible.
This is my last call of the day and I immediately decide to wait for her in the ER and offer her a ride home if she gets discharged.
I know it’s not very professional but it’s a grey area at best, because once she’s discharged, she isn’t technically a patient anymore.
I can’t waste this unexpected gift from fate, right? What are the odds that I’d be called to the house of the girl I’ve been trying to meet for weeks?
I think this is definitely a sign.
4.
Ardha Chakrasana
Magnolia
I SPEND THE WHOLE AMBULANCE ride fretting about the embarrassment of being rescued by one of the hottest guys I’ve ever seen. Surely the 911 operator told him what my emergency was and I can only imagine what he must be thinking.
I groan, closing my eyes. He’s seen me naked. And it wasn’t a good naked, like laying seductively on the bed in a way that enhances the good parts of my body ... no, ma’am.
It was a ‘curled up in pain like an overweight walrus’, wailing like one too. I mean, do walruses wail? They make that weird sound ... but that’s beside the point. It wasn’t an attractive view, that’s for sure.
Thor ... er, Max was kind and compassionate but I can only imagine what he must be thinking of me. What kind of person uses a deodorant can to get herself off? Seriously, I should’ve thought about the potential for shit to go wrong.
Dang, I’m so far gone that I’m even swearing flat out. My mom would be horrified right now.
Oh sweet Jesus! The thought that being a student I’m still on my parents health insurance hits me like a wrecking ball. They’ll get the bill and I can only hope that they won’t look at the details.
Then again, I’ve never really bothered looking at the health insurance statements, surely they don’t say stuff like ‘remove foreign object from your daughter’s vadge, right?
The ambulance comes to a stop and as the doors open, I meet Max’s blue eyes.
This guy must be a true professional, all I see is kindness in the dark blue of his irises, not the judgement I’d expect.
“We’re here. You’ll be taken care of in no time,” he soothes as his colleague helps him get the stretcher out of the ambulance. And that’s when a dreadful realization hits me. There’s only one hospital in Silver Springs, the same hospital where I’m attending the final year of my nursing degree. I know everyone on staff. So whoever will be on duty now makes no difference, regardless of confidentiality. Even if my colleagues today were discreet, I know for a fact that the head nurse reviews every case. She’s the one that signs off on all my work and I’m pretty sure that she hates me, so this won’t help matters.
For a second, I think that I might be all right. At least the nurse who’s approaching us is Carol. She’s been working at Silver Springs Memorial for twenty years and she’s always been kind to me.
Maybe she won’t gossip too much.
“What do we have here?” She asks the EMTs, maintaining a professional tone but throwing me a concerned gaze.