It doesn’t hurt. I’m surprised. The puncture, filling with blood, makes me think I should be feeling pain. Maybe there aren’t any nerves there. A cut this size on my hand would cause a burning hot pain through my entire right side. Instead, I only feel a dull throbbing. A pressure like someone’s wrapped their hands around my arm, with their fingers against the inside of my forearm, and is squeezing.
The window, just a moment ago, was stuck in place by a small, but formidable chunk of ice. The frost on it had melted and then pooled along the guide—freezing it in position about half an inch from closed. It remains in the same position, but the glass is shattered. Shards of it lay between the window and its screen. I feel only the rush of air, not the temperature, but I know it’s a cold draft against my skin.
My water bottle lays on the couch under my lofted bed. I threw it there in order to concentrate on trying to get the window open. It’s filled with water, about room temperature, that I was going to cool in the window. We have no refrigerator and the icy air cooled it faster than the appliance would. I glance down at it, then back at the window, and back down at my right wrist.
The blood is pooling. I rush over to the sink before the first drop hits the porcelain. Unsure what to do, I turn on the water. I watch the blood flow down my hand as I adjust the temperature. It’s such a deep red. I’ve never seen such a red. Or maybe I have and I’m too stunned to remember. I push my hand under the faucet and all the red dissipates and rinses down the drain.
I can see into the hole, about an inch and a half wide by an inch long. It looks deep and dark, like tiny fleshy cave. I don’t know what to look for, but I see no pieces of glass. I push against the outside of the wound. I don’t feel any stabs or extra pressure—nothing sharp.
My face in the mirror is pale. My expression is somewhere between astonished and confused. I turn my head left and look back at the window that was. The handle runs vertical along the right side. It sticks out about three-quarters of an inch, with a small lip. I was bumping the heel of my hand against it on the right, trying to slide the window left. After a couple tries with no success, I hit it harder once. Then I pulled my hand back so I could generate more force. An instant later my hand stopped just short of the screen. I had held it straight out like that, surrounded by a ring of broken, jagged glass, for what seemed like moments.
The throbbing was getting worse. I turned my eyes back to the hole, now flushed out, exposing the fleshy red walls, and tried to think of what to do. I couldn’t hold it under the water much longer. I yelled for help, but there was no response. No one was around. If they were, they’d be listening to music or busy. My door was closed. I couldn’t yell loud enough for anyone to hear. My roommate was working and wouldn’t likely be back for more than thirty minutes.
I had to stop the bleeding. It wouldn’t be long before I’d start shaking and only a bit longer before I passed out. I already felt like the blood was draining from my face. I couldn’t reach my phone. I reached out for the first thing I could find, a light blue cotton wash cloth. I folded it, but I did it so quickly that it was more wadded than anything. It would have to do. I pressed it firmly against the wound, wrapping my fingers around my wrist to hold it in place. I had nothing to tie it with.
I took my left hand away just long enough to open my door, and then put it back with as much pressure. It felt good. If only because I felt like I was doing something. I used my foot to open the door the rest of the way and stepped out.
The hall was vacant, and I couldn’t see any open doors on my end of the hallway. None of the rooms I knew had anyone in them. Timing probably couldn’t have been worse. I knocked on the door of the C.A., with no response. I walked down the hall, toward the stairs, at a quick pace. None of the doors were open until I was only two from the end of the hall. I knocked on the open door to get their attention.
“I think I’ll need to get to a hospital, can you help me out?”
Leah spoke before she looked up from her project. “What? Why would you…” And then she saw me in the doorway. “What happened?”
Her expression changed to astonished, with a hint of worry, when she saw my wrist and how pale I was. “Maybe they can help downstairs. Call someone or something.”
I started to feel lightheaded as her and Briana, her roommate, led me down the stairs. I walked with them to the front desk, but when the girl there had to make phone calls and sort out how to handle things, I sat on the bench against the wall. The dizziness was getting thicker and, even seated, was feeling uneasy.
- – - – -
I don’t know how long I waited there, but more people came by and others stopped to ask what was going on. There was a small huddle of five or ten people when the EMTs came through the door. The first man sat next to me, peeled away the soiled wash cloth, and placed a large pad over the hole. He wrapped it quickly in a thin cloth, or gauze, or something, so that it would stay against my wrist.
He was talking to me, and I was responding, but I wasn’t listening. He asked someone for something and a moment later I had a glass of water in my hand. I didn’t think it would do much good, but I felt better after half the glass was gone. Not well, but not as dizzy as before. He helped me to my feet and I walked with him out to the ambulance. It was parked about fifty feet to the right in one of the smaller lots.
A second man followed us out. He must have been talking to some of the other people, but I hadn’t noticed him. When I’m about half way to the flashing lights I look back and Leah yells that she’s got directions and will meet there. It’s good that she’ll be there, because I have no idea where I’m going.
The cot isn’t as comfortable as I would have thought. The two guys sit opposite me and try to keep up conversation. Or, at least First Guy is. Second is using a flashlight in my eyes, checking my pulse, and sitting there watching me. For half the trip First is reminiscing about his college days and how he missed out on so much. Apparently the fact that my dorm is coed means I’m living better than he had. I’m mildly annoyed, but I don’t really have a choice. I make light of things and joke a bit.
- – - – -
At the hospital, First leads me to a couple nurses, Second goes to the counter and starts talking to the woman behind a computer there. Nurse One asks what had happened, I answer. Nurse Two asks if it was an accident and I laugh a little. Maybe being pale and shaky made the laugh unconvincing. She asks again. I firmly say no, but add that I would have waited until after Dawson’s to try something like that. She’s not amused.
Nurse One takes me to an all-white room. She pulls the curtain out and around, shielding my bed from the one next to it. A black man lay there with his eyes closed and headphones on. She sets me up on the bed and asks me some questions. Again, whether it’s an accident is asked. Again I answer that it was. The standard questions come out then: are you allergic to medications, no; do you have any preexisting conditions, no; etc.
She leaves and a few moments later, Two comes in to ask if the people waiting outside can come in. Leah’s the first to sit bedside and we talk about what happened, some things about class, how it felt, and some other idle talk. We joke when the man next to me starts singing along to Nelly. She leaves, saying Briana’s waiting out there alone and they should take turns.
Just a few minutes after Briana takes a seat, a doctor comes in to check out the wound. He’s an older man. He lifts the bandage off and looks closely at it. He asks a bunch of questions regarding the pain and how it happened. He says he’s going to test for nerve function and that I can’t have pain killers until after he’s finished. He pulls out what look like a pair of tweezers and moves the small flap of skin to the side.
An icy hot bolt of pain shoots directly to the back of my eyes as he pokes into the hole. It feels like he’s digging in my wrist with an iced knife. I look down to see him leaning in again. My entire body tenses and my left hand goes white gripping the bar at the side of the bed. I think I’m yelping expletives, but things are getting foggy. He digs again and then says something. I don’t hear him.
- – - – -
I don’t really know what transpired after he left. I must have gotten groggy because I have no idea how long I was actual in that room. I remember Leah and Briana switching places so that both were in the room twice. I don’t remember an I.V., but I think I was being dosed with pain medication through one. There was another nurse, but she may have been one of the first two.
Someone hands one of the girls a slip of paper, explaining that the pharmacy somewhere would be open. A doctor mentioned a surgery in a few days to repair something. Another doctor came in to sew up my wrist, wrapped it in gauze, and then wrapped it with a large splint with an ace bandage.
Leah and Briana and I went to a Walgreen’s, but I don’t know where it was. Leah helped me get a prescription filled. I felt loopy and completely out of it. I didn’t even what hospital I had gone to until my mother called later.
I had to answer some questions from friends when I got back to the room, but I don’t remember any of them. There was a piece of plywood in the place of my window by the time I was back. Some people were around for awhile, discussing what had happened. I was telling them about the hospital and then they started to file out.
And now I’m staring at the television, dosed on generic Vicodin, drifting off to sleep on my couch with my wrist confined to a slightly bent position. The television is on, but I’m not watching. The drugs are making my head fuzzy and I’m exhausted.
