| OCR Text |
Show Nocturne/ 8 nodded. Hannah Lloyd and Jessica Arnold thought about applying to graduate school, computing the increase in their salaries and how difficult the math portion of the graduate placement examination could be. The two women graduated in the same class and were used to competing with each other on exams. Because he had recently become engaged to his girlfriend of seven years, Benjamin Rostow mentally planned a Caribbean cruise he would have to save thousands of dollars to afford. The nurses thought about what they to eat for dinner and how much money they needed for car payments. They tried not to think about their beds or about sleeping. They repressed thoughts of their cotton sheets and down comforters and ignored revisiting images in their minds of the men and women they called lovers whose heads were resting on feather pillows in dark bedrooms. Quietly, they began to fantasize about calling the morgue, then collecting cash. Then a new patient died (it was Nina Broadbent next, double mastectomy), and Chase Jensen walked off with a wad of twenties he used to buy new climbing gear. When it happened everyone wished they knew better how to estimate with greater accuracy. Sometimes they caught themselves thinking about a simple change in dosage or an accidental trip over a switch or a cord. A few millimeters or a few minutes could make all the difference. Anika was the first to joke about denying a patient care. For several consecutive twilights, she'd been assigned to a particularly difficult patient named Carl Hunter. He picked the sores on his legs and arms, he scowled and squirmed when the nurses replaced catheters, he yelled when the doctors made dietary changes. He wanted to die, and when he could, he tore out his IV. He crossed the line when he told Anika her tits were too small, and she walked out of the room in a huff about hostile work environments. |
