Chapter 1
The night started off annoying and steadily turned into hell. Flushing Meadows, better known as Corona Park, had been the temporary home to the both of the World's Fairs, tennis tournaments, boat festivals, the Queen's Theater, and a multitude of other gatherings. It was no surprise that Flushing Hospital had seen it's share of diabolic trauma nights; and they always came out of nowhere. It was Sylvia's personal opinion that Emergency Care Nurses got the short end of a short stick during them.
Sylvia had been carefully flirting with the idea of heading home at the end of her 16 hour shift. There was half an order of baked lasagna with her name on it tucked next to a single serving bottle of wine in her mini-fridge at her one room apartment. She daydreamed of enjoying both while tucked in bed with her ten year old kitty-cat.
A bubble bath if she was feeling really decadent; and oh goodness she was getting there. She hurt.
The 10 hour support soles of her white tennis shoes had given out mid-shift while she cleaned an eighty year old man's bedpan. A headache formed shortly after being yelled at by a doctor for something she hadn't done. The back pain came with being short and busty. Her medically trained mind wanted her to take some aspirin with codeine to get rid of it.
The voice of her mother, a registered homeopathitician, was telling her that the headache was mamboing away across her brain because of bad eating habits, stress, and the lack of anything resembling a sex life. Sylvia agreed. However since she wasn't going to change any of that any time soon she would have to settle for the aspirin.
"Hey! Hey Syl!" Sylvia looked up and resisted the urge to groan. Heading towards her was Raymond the X-ray technician.
Raymond, call me 'Studmuffin', Rodgers was under the impression that he was gods gift to the average women. He seemed to believe that every lady not destined to be on the front of a magazine should turn to putty when he turned his big blue eyes on them.
Oh sure, Ray was attractive in that American Boy sort of way. Tall, broad, and fit thanks to four nights a week at the gym. He kept his blond hair clipped close. Sylva thought there was a striking resemblance between him and every High School Quarterback ever. He looked like the guy you wanted to bring home to momma and have 2.5 kids with. He looked like the good guy. But Sylvia knew Raymond was not a good guy; not by a long stretch. He picked girls who were average on purpose. Ray liked to feed his ego with their simpering. And now he had turned those sparkling blues on her.
Sylvia took offense to his attention. Sure, she wasn't super model hot. She often kept her long brown hair pulled back in a tight ponytail. She never wore make-up and her scrubs were as sexy as her clothing usually got. She got to shop in the 10-14 size sections at clothing stores...but it wasn't in a bad way. She'd heard from Rita, the Head Nurse, that it wasn't her appearance that kept her from getting hit on; it was her personality.
If men were put off by a woman not turned on by the latest in basketball statistics…their loss.
"Hi, Ray." She said tapping out pills into her hand.
"Headache?" He asked letting his eyes fill with mock concern.
Sylvia gave him a tight smile, "Nope, I feel great. That's why I'm chugging down pills and water."
His face went blank with confusion. He looked less like an athletic dream boat and more like a dog who'd been asked to do math. Then the wheels clicked into place and he shot her a bright smile. She hated his smile. It reminded her of a like a light bulb, it was all flash and no substance.
"Oh! I get it. You're joking."
"Gold star for you." She muttered. How had he managed to become an x-ray tech? Didn't they have to be a little intelligent?
"You'll feel better in a minute." He said motioning to the pill bottle.
When Sylvia didn't reply to this sage remark he plowed on, "Listen, I was wondering…"
"No."
"But I…"
"Listen, Ray, you've asked like ten times. When are you going to realize that I'm not interested?"
"Why not?" He sounded honestly confused this time.
She let out a sigh of frustration bringing her fingertips to the vein she was sure throbbed in her forehead.
"I dunno, maybe because I don't want to end up on that list you keep on the inside of your locker, maybe because I don't like being referred to as a 5er, or maybe it's because I just don't find you attractive." Okay, that last part was a lie. Ray was attractive. A blind fishwife would have found him attractive. At least on the outside. Inside that glorious golden boy shell Ray was a withered old hag with no teeth, glaucoma, and a lazy eye.
"What do you mean?" He looked like a confused dog again.
"Ray, damnit. I said NO. It isn't hard!" She slammed back the water and stormed away. She didn't look back but she could almost hear the cogs inside Ray's head turning as he tried to figure out just where he went wrong.
The worst part was he wasn't going to just give up. Oh she could go to Human Resources and file a sexual harassment claim. There would be an investigation and in the end Ray would get fired. But if Sylvia did that she would get a label. Cold Fish. Heartless bitch. A plethora of other names that basically meant she didn't like getting hit on.
Funny, if she did just take Ray up on his offer...let him take her out on a few dates and have a roll between the sheets and cry when he decided she was boring...if she did all of that Sylvia would get an entire different set of labels. The workplace wasn't fair.
"Of course it ain't fair."
Sylvia leaned over the nurses station the pluck a pen from the woman who was shaking it at her.
"It should be, Rita." Sylvia countered.
Rita shrugged a pair of painfully slim shoulders. Rita was nearly six feet tall with skin the color of unground coffee beans and skinny as a celery stalk. She smoked like a chimney and didn't give a rats ass what it meant for her lungs. She was also Sylvia's best friend.
"You got lady parts, honey. If this shit was fair you wouldn't see me working here, I'd have a whole harem of pretty boys fanning me and...well..." She waggled her eyes brows lecherously and sighed.
Sylvia opened her mouth to reply but paused when she heard the sounds of ambulances and emergency vehicles squealing away from the hospital. She frowned exchanging a glance with Rita.
"Well," Rita said plopping a pile of paperwork on the nurses station desk. "That can't be good." Her voice was thick with southern country thanks to her years raised in Charleston.
Sylvia nodded and checked her watch, "There goes my hope of getting off in an hour."
Rita snorted. "Yup. You an' me both, honey-child. Maybe one of those scientists down at the Stark Expo thing went crazy."
Sylvia shook her head. The Expo had caused nothing but work and trouble at the hospital. Whoever thought of putting in a bunch of scientists from a bunch of different countries all together on a thousand acres of land for an entire year…was an idiot. Since Stark Enterprises was holding this fiasco she could only assume that the blame was to be placed squarely on the shoulders of the one and only Tony Stark; Ego maniac.
Sylvia had nothing against Iron Man, nor what Tony was doing under that title. She did have a problem with the over confident air that Mr. Stark seemed to pour out…even across the space of camera and television.
"Awww shit." Rita cursed and pushed past Sylvia to mess with the waiting room television. Sylvia watched the green bar increase with the volume and froze in place.
The screen was filled with painful images of explosions. Screaming and running. The cameraman's view settled on massive robotic monstrosities as they leveled their arms and fired into the crowd.
Rita turned around screaming out orders to every nurse in a voice that would have made a drill sergeant proud. Sylvia found herself manning the emergency room doors, shouting directions to EMT's and paramedics as they wheeled in patients. She sent the worst to surgery and emergency rooms, taking up hall space when necessary, she over saw people getting patched up right in the waiting room. She took names and vitals and called out orders while Rita and others began to steadily go through patients person by person and help where they could.
It was a mess. A complete and total mess.
Christ she wanted to get out of these shoes. Arch supports be damned they did not feel half as good as a pair of soft slippers.
"We gotta live one!" Someone cried out. Sylvia turned and faced the door as the paramedics pushed through a man on a gurney. Sylvia had to do a double take. The man was not incredibly tall, only around six feet tall, but he was in excellent physical condition. His hair was black, streaked with white. However none of these things mattered once she saw all the tattoos. His arms, his legs, his hands his feet. God this man must love needles.
"Sylvia….take care of him." Rita said pushing her towards the paramedics. Sylvia blinked but didn't question the head nurse. The doctors were beyond strained.
"What do we have here, Frank?" Sylvia asked the familiar paramedic.
"Burns, lacerations, bruising everywhere…." Frank began listing off a plethora of ailments. "However…this is the worst of it.
Frank gently pulled back a mass of white gauze revealing a large expanse of blackened skin that had cracked and ripped away to show a bright redness beneath the flesh. She could see the yellow of fat tissue and the dark of muscle…..it did not look good. "Burn Ward….stat." She says guiding the gurney down the hall to the large elevators to get him to the burn unit.
Sylvia had every intention of letting him go at the elevator…but she felt a strong callused hand latch around her wrist, she watched as the tattooed fingers spasmed in pain. That was no surprise. He looked like he had been hit by a truck on fire. What did surprise her was that he did not cry out, Her pursed his lips till they turned white. His nostrils flared as he took in deep breaths, but he did not cry out. She hadn't the heart to pry his fingers from her arm. "Alright, big guy." She says stepping into the elevator and hitting floor three. "Let's get you taken care of."
His eyes opened for a moment. She watched the fog in them clear, and he zeroed in on her. Sylvia felt a jolt rush through her body. It settled in her stomach like a miniature storm. She opened her mouth to say something…though she wasn't entirely sure what.
" Ti privlekAtelnaya" He grunted out, before his dark eyes closed once more
*translation Ti privlekAtelnaya- I am {very} sorry