“Ryan,” who is the youngest at twenty-one, scored the highest marks of the group on his EMT certificate. He’s book smart, but a little naive sometimes.
“Kim,” Kim is of Vietnamese heritage, but grew up in Maine. Twenty-four years old from memory.
“This is Tremaine. Everyone calls him ‘T-Bone’ or just ‘TB.'” TB is tall, black, with an undercut hairstyle, although no lightning bolts this week. He had his twenty-third birthday last month.
“Sean,” the redhead ex-army Brit. The most mature in the group and not just because he’s thirty-three years old.
“Nick,” who is blond with an athletic build. He grew up in a rural part of Tennessee I recall from his CV. Twenty-three years old. He seems to have enough street smarts to survive in a city like Boston, but comes across as a little reserved.
“Sarah,” who is a bubbly, blue-eyed blonde just a little too nerdy to fit into the ‘cheerleader’ set. She is sitting with her arm around Nick, which is a new development, or might be just on a whim. I know she had a thing going with TB previously. Kids studying medicine get so little time for a social life, that short-lived relationships with fellow students seem to be the choice of convenience. She’ll be the next birthday celebration, twenty-three in a few weeks.
“And Jess.” Twenty-four year old Jess I’ll simply categorize as a ‘cutie’. Long, dark hair on a square-ish face with a cute button nose with a sprinkle of freckles, captivating light-blue eyes, and a mouth you just want to kiss. Of course, I wouldn’t admit this to anyone, teachers aren’t supposed to have favorites, but Jess is my favorite. She’s adorable.
With the introductions done, Brooke leads us all back to the elevator. I fall in step immediately behind her to separate myself from Katherine, my ‘secret’ wife for the next three hours. As a bonus, I can safely gawk at Brooke’s curves from behind. I have been horny since Kath’s side-boob in the hotel room this afternoon. Actually, my anticipation has been growing since we made plans for Kath to come to Boston for our anniversary. Only a few more hours, until I have her alone.
In the elevator, TB strikes up a conversation with Katherine. “So, you’re a model, huh. What type? Catwalk, bikini, nude?”
Kath can tell TB is toying with her, a fifty year old bikini model is a bit of a stretch, so she playfully replies, “I’m a bit old for that stuff now; although, I did do a topless gig last month. These days, I’m mostly behind the scenes on big commercial shoots. But I was in-frame for a National Parks job in Cape Cod last year.”
My mind is racing to keep up with Kath’s deception. I immediately recognize the National Parks reference; Kath did some hyper-spectral processing to map the extent of an invasive plant species – some type of ‘Asian Rose’ – she was actually in Cape Cod the day the survey flight took the imagery. She showed me the aerial photograph of her standing next to the calibration van with the special coating on the roof. She was just a dozen unrecognizable pixels but she said it was her from where she was standing in relation to the van, so technically she was in-frame.
I thought the ‘topless gig’ was an outright lie, but then I remembered Kath had a mammogram a few weeks ago. She showed me a picture of one breast scan on her phone (the left mediolateral oblique), as she thought it was ridiculous the whole platen gets imaged, despite her squished luminous breast only making up a fifth of the X-ray frame. “It damn well hurt,” she said, and joked that the operator was pressing the plates extra hard to make her small breasts go further.
Kath knew better than to dwell on her ‘modeling career’ so bites back with, “I’m told you guys are all paramedics. Why are you still studying, is it so they’ll let you drive the ambulance?” Which got laughter in response. I’m not sure why Katherine is so confident and playful tonight, she hasn’t been drinking. Perhaps it’s the relief of completing the Tucson job?
Having broken the ice, Kath is accepted by the group, as evidenced by the resumption of multiple discussions we probably interrupted in the cafeteria. In the midst of the chatter, she looks over to me with an enigmatic grin. It was probably about our private joke. Is she still teasing me, or flirting with me vicariously? Two can play that game I decide, whichever game it is.
~ ~ ~ The Prayer Room, Fifth Floor, Essex Hospital. 7:03pm ~ ~ ~
As I enter our ‘classroom’ for the night, I can tell the heating is still on as requested, maybe even bumped up a few degrees.
“Prayer Room,” says Sean, reading the new signage on the double doors as he follows me in. “So it’s not a chapel anymore? Is that so the administrators didn’t have to pay for a synagogue and mosque, too?” he jokes.
“That wouldn’t help. If I know Abrahamic religions, they’d just start arguing about who got the most floor space,” I reply.
Inside the room, Ryan, Jess, and Kim fetch a chair each to place their bags and jackets on. Everybody then gravitates to the massage table in the absence of any other furniture. As usual, there’s some random administrative stuff I like to get out of the way first, mostly paperwork to be sighted, approvals to be signed, plus a proficiency certificate Sean produced for ‘Flight Paramedics,’ I photograph this for addition to his record. The table makes a useful desk for this paperwork.
It is nearly a quarter-past by the time I’m ready to start the lesson proper. The talking ceases and the students turn to me expectantly.
“Last time we covered the knee joint and femur,” I start, “I’m sure you’ll remember the insertions; gluteus maximus, minimus, iliopsoas, lateral rotators, and hip abductors… all of which have their origin in the subject of tonight, the pelvis.” I briefly raise the plastic model in my hand. “So, the first tip of the night is that every femur action has a corresponding pelvic action. For example, the gluteus medius in the lateral rotator group performs medial rotation of the thigh. Or it can perform abduction of the hip, if the leg is planted and the torso is being moved.” I demonstrate these actions with my own body as I talk. Maybe Katherine’s attendance will be wasted? I think. She has already drifted away to look at the stained-glass mural while the students, and Brooke, are all attentive to me.
A few minutes later, I’m discussing paralysis after a question from Sean. “…The gluteus medius muscle is controlled by a combination of the fourth and fifth lumbar nerves, which originates from which vertebra?” It’s a trivial question I’ve thrown in, just to keep everyone engaged. Emulating Ben Stein from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off I add, “…Anyone? Anyone?”
“L4 and L5,” answers Nick.
“Are you sure?” Sarah jumps in. Nick flips her off.
Sarah turns to the group grinning; obviously, she’s been waiting to make this announcement. “TB, Nick, and I were in the ER today. Dr Cheng made us each write a triage table for the four admissions we had. One was a motorcycle cop with a herniated disc, but Nick got his spine ass-about, or skull-about, or whatever, and counted the lumbar vertebrae backwards.”
Nick tries to defend himself. “Yeah, yeah. But you took my clipboard. I was turned around writing up against the wall, so I couldn’t use my fingers to count. I fucked up and counted the wrong way.”
“Well that’s an important lesson for everyone,” I announce, “something as simple as a different orientation to the patient can cause mistakes. Learn from this slip-up now; otherwise, someone might get the wrong leg amputated.”
This made me think of the skin pen I asked for because surgeons do get their patients to mark a big ‘X’ on the correct leg before surgery. I wasn’t sure if I’d even need the pen, but I now had an idea that would get Katherine involved again. She is currently looking at her phone.
I retrieve the gown from under the table and pass it to Brooke. “I’ll need Katherine soon, could you help her with the ties please?”
Brooke takes Kath to the kitchenette area to enrobe, while I continue the lecture. I was expecting Brooke to re-emerge while Kath undressed, since she only needed help with the string ties at the back of the gown, but they re-emerge together a few minutes later, with Kath looking beautiful in the bland, unflattering hospital gown.
They both re-join the group circled around the table while I’m finishing up talking about the sacral ligaments.
Kath is barefoot now, and is equally the shortest with Kim. She’s not actually short, it’s just this group seems to be on the taller side. I think she’s standing tall in response. The plain, round collar of Kath’s gown is underscored by bumps of her clavicles, plus a few superior ribs proximal to the sternum. The most prominent anterior feature are her nipples; from these, the material falls away, except for the small bulge of her belly.
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