Taquitos

  I wheel into the lobby of the hospital a little too enthusiastically and screech to a halt. The metal detector is stanchioned off. No guards are in sight. A sign stands nearby reads

Providence is a place for healing.

No weapons.

No threats.

No verbal abuse.

No physical violence of any kind

I wonder if the sign makes people feel better. 

        It’s another busy Monday at wound care. I hear people laughing and talking loudly through the door. I have to wait a very long time before KC steps out and snarls “Get in here, you!”

        She leads me to room one. “I learned how to use the saw this morning,” she says. I could’ve sworn she she did this for me before. Maybe it was the soft cast. All these visits get blurred together. I’m swept up in her presence; she’s like a ginger whirlwind.

        Sawing like a pro, KC makes short work of the cast. I’m nervous; I have no idea what is happening under there.

        “Tan drainage, moderate,” she says, looking at the cotton batting before throwing it out. 

        “I was hoping for small,” I say. 

        “No maceration though,” she says. 

     “Hi,” says Sjon.

     “Get out of here, he’s mine!” barks KC.

     Vicki comes in and sits at the computer. “There’s some blood but it looks dry. The blister stayed closed. I’m calling this not a wound.” 

     KC measures the wound that definitely is still a wound. . “One by one three by point two. Are we doing pictures? I’m doing pictures.” She takes pictures. “Wanna see?”

     “Hmm,” I say. It looks exactly the same as last week.

     “What were his vitals?” asks Vicki.

     “I forgot. I was too excited about using the saw,” KC says. 

     While she’s checking my blood pressure Vicki asks if I’ve gotten an eye appointment yet. I start to relate the saga. KC looks at my blood pressure and says she’ll recheck it in a few minutes. 

     Dr. Taggert comes in and says things are looking good. “Did you use the scooter at work like I said?” she asks. I usually tell her the truth but I say yes. 

     She debrides contentedly for a while, then Kaitlin comes in with the skin graft. It comes in a box filled with sealed pouches and envelopes. The product is called Epicord and is made from umbilical cord tissue, rather than placenta like I’d been told.  I don’t ask how they get it. They all gather around, curious and excited, while Taggert reads the literature aloud. 

     “This product is a dehydrated, non-viable cellular human umbilical cord allograft intended for homologous use to…yes yes yes we know all that.” She sees my face and says, “don’t worry, we do lots of these. we’ve just never used this particular  product before,” she says. “You’re our guinea pig.”

     “The pieces are awfully big,” says Vicki.

      “Yeah I thought we could cut it down and use the other half later…”

     “But you can’t,” interjects Kaitlin. “Dr. Thompson wanted that as well but it says here that once you open it you can’t save any of it. It’s too easily contaminated.”

     “What a waste,” grumbles Taggert. She cuts the tissue down so she has a white square the size of a postage stamp. Since it’s being discarded anyways, she plays around with the excess piece. “It says it accordions out but when I pull on it, it just wants to come apart. It’s not like in in the video.” She turns the instructions over then hands them to KC. “It doesn’t want to accordion. I guess you just… put it on?” She pats it onto the wound. “Okay. Huh. I guess that’s how it goes on.” She taps it gently.

     “It says to hydrate it,” says KC.

     “Yeah but if the wound is already wet, that will probably be enough, right? We don’t want to overhydrate.”

     “It says you CAN hydrate it if you want to,” says Kaitlin. 

     “Okay, then I don’t want to. And… I think that’s it.” She steps aside and watches as KC carefully bandages both the wound and the blister. “I don’t know why it won’t accordion,” she mutters.

     “Maybe that’s why it was donated,” I say. “How exactly does this stuff work, anyways?” She explains it to me, but I don’t really understand. Something about collagen and dermal appendages. She may as well be chanting spells and smearing my foot with newt eye ointment. The clinic is weirdly similar to a coven. 

     The excitement over, everyone drifts away and leaves KC and I alone again. She prepares the undercast, complimenting herself on what a good job she’s doing of the herring bone technique. I finally ask how things are going with dating.

     “Oh I’m done with all that,” she says. “I went out with that guy three weekends in a row but I realized I’m just not willing to put in that kind of time and effort. He was cute and all, and I had fun, but I really just like being at home with my cat.” Jenny waves to me and I wave back. “Who are you waving to? Is that Jenny? Don’t wave to him!”

     “You’re really possessive today,” I say.

     She pages Dr. Taggert and stays to assist with putting on the new cast. Taggert is more chatty than ever. She talks about her three kids, two of them still in high school. Her daughter is going to a track meet in Idaho this weekend and she won’t be able to make it. 

     “I’m mostly relieved. There are going to be nine teenage girls –nine!- but I wish I could just make sure the food is done right because of her Celiac. But she doesn’t appreciate me anyways. Get this: I went out and got the girls those Trader Joe’s taquito chips she likes, and she got really mad because I only got two bags. I mean, I don’t know how many taquitos nine teenage girls can eat! And instead of thanking me she freaking yells at me!”

     I tell her to bring her daughter to my next visit. “I’ll talk to her. If there’s one thing I know about teenage girls, it’s that they really enjoy having some creepy old man with no toes lecture them about respecting their parents.” 

     She laughs. “Stop it, I’m going to mess up the cast!” KC is laughing too, and I’m distracted by how much she’s leaning against my leg as she passes the rolls of Fiberglas to the doctor. “This is like being at the hairdresser,” says Taggert. “You probably know more about me than you ever wanted to.”

     “I know more about everyone here than I ever wanted to,” I say. 

     “You could write a book! But here I am telling you all this nonsense when I should be asking you how you’re doing.”

     “Well, my life kind of sucks, but at least I’m not stuck in a bus seven hours with nine teenage girls. Going to Idaho, no less.”

     “Hey, I’m from Idaho,” interjects KC. “Where is the track meet exactly?”

     “I don’t even know!” wails the doctor. “Boise? Everything’s in Boise, right? I’m a terrible mother!”

     It is well past five by the time they finish wrapping me up. KC tapes a plastic bag around my cast to keep it dry. “Hopefully this will work,” she says. 

     “I’m sure it’ll be fine, I’m just going straight home,” I say.

     “What, no dates tonight?”

     “Sadly, no.”

     “Come on, Really?”

     “Just with my cat. And I’m out of Temptations so it’s not going to go well.”

     She fetches my scooter and escorts me out of the office. As I wait for the elevator,she places her hand on my arm and quietly says, “Bye, hon.” I can’t seem to look her in the eyes. When I get outside, it’s so dark I can hardly see a thing. Headlights, tail lights, street lamps. The throb of a siren.  My own little lights blink off and on as I push my way up the hill.