Bip-Bip-Bip!
"Over here!"
"What are you doing?"
"Don't worry, madame, we're just going to take some blood. Since it's urgent we'll have an answer within a few minutes, but it's most likely..."
He couldn't see properly, he felt like he was going to be sick, noises all melted together as if he was underwater. Most frightening of all was that he couldn't move. It wasn't like the numb feeling of your feet being frozen after a long day of skiing. He was too tired to move.
The feeling of helplessness as he was moved to a bed like another sack of potatoes upset his stomach; if he'd had anything in it he would have lost it at that point, but he hadn't been able to even drink something more substantial than the occasional sip of water for two days now.
"This might hurt a little..." a calm voice said, and then there something was inserted into the crook of his arm. His body responded to the intense discomfort by trying to discard his intestines through his mouth. He could feel blood rapidly draining out of him, only to suddenly stop. Something like tape was wrapped over it, then cloth, then more tape.
Footsteps falling rapidly, leaving the room.
His mother's hand carefully touching his, as if she was afraid he might break, stroking it slightly.
"Anteeksi," she sobbed quietly.
He wanted to say something to comfort her, but he was too tired, exhausted, and his tongue was dry, his lips stuck together and cracked. No point in fighting it. He slept.
Tino watched the red bead of blood swell up on his finger. It smelled like wet iron, sickeningly sweet, and a lump of discomfort grew somewhere behind his windpipe. The nurse let go of his hand, put a tiny, white plastic strip into a device which beeped alive. He put the end of the test strip to the bead of blood and the machine beeped again ad numbers appeared.
"Dreihundert-sechs-und-sechzig..." the nurse muttered and jotted something down in a file before cleaning up, giving Tino a piece of tissue to dry off his finger on. The nurse turned to leave, but then stopped himself and turned back to Tino.
"Ach, ja," he said, "Sie wurden später zum Pediatriksklinik transferiert, also..." his eyes travelled across the room, searching for something, frowning when he didn't find it. "Sie haben nichts zu packen." The nurse nodded slowly to himself. "Hmm..." After an awkward moment where they both stared at each other the nurse cleared his throat.
"Guten Tag." He left.
Tino sank back against the pillows. Just having people around and being awake was almost more trouble than it was worth, and it most certainly did not help him understand what the nurse said in the harsh-sounding language he did not speak. Thinking was tiring too, so instead of dwelling on things beyond his means to understand, Tino fell asleep again.
There was a soft knock on the door. Berwald looked up from his book, sitting as proper as he could in the bed with both his legs in casts. He'd been told another boy was coming. The previous one hadn't stayed long and had completely refused to talk to him. Not that Berwald minded that much, he didn't speek French or German very well, and most certainly not Luxembourgish, so he would probably have made a fool of himself. The other boy hadn't known any English, and Swedish was just too much to hope for.
The door opened, and doctor Engels rolled in the intravenous, followed by two nurses rolling in a bed, placing it in the empty spot left behind by the other boy. Doctor Engels and the nurses quickly went over everything, making sure all the settings were correct on the apparatus regulating the intravenous and making sure the bed's breaks were down so the bed would stay in one place. Then the nurses left, giving Berwald a clear view of his new roommate. He almost wished they hadn't, he looked really pitiful.
The boy was tangled up in the covers, the pained look on his face hinted at unpleasant dreams and the face itself of painful days. The short, blond hair was tangled, and he looked stark white, even against the white covers, except for the cracked lips and around the eyes. The hand, clenched into a fist, was dry with the fingertips all scrunched up like they would be after being in water for too long, only he obviously hadn't been properly washed recently.
Miserable.
Doctor Engels came over to Berwald's side, taking care to be silent so as not to disturb the other's sleep.
"It's sad, isn't it?" he whispered. The doctor was shorter than most at the hospital, even shorter than Berwald, even though he easily was ten or fifteen years older. He had long, brown hair with loose curls which was always tied up in a pony tail at the nape of his neck. Somehow the doctor managed to make it look elegant rather than homeless.
Berwald merely nodded. He liked the doctor, because he never got pushy, accepting nods and small noises as answers where others would have demanded a novel.
"He was alone in the other room, so I'm afraid he's become a bit introverted... Only natural, considering what he's been through... But I would like to see you two trying to get along. It might do you good."
Berwald nodded again, not finding anything to respond with. Doctor Engels smiled understandingly, perhaps a bit sadly, and left.
Berwald could not bring himself to pick up his book again.
Haha, I've actually written the second chapter already, but I want to type up the first chapter of Au Pas, Camrade! today, too. This is based on my own visit at the hospital, though this is more dramatic (fortunately), and I only shared rooms with old ladies (that had some incredible snoring-powers, I swear, I thought the first one would shatter herself, she looked so fragile!). Thus, I have no real experience of pediatrics wards, and I'll just adapt it the way I want to. This is not meant to be very serious, but knowing my own, stupid self it probably will become serious. :I
The other Nordics will show up, and France. And probably others too.
Och det här lär väl gå käpprakt åt helvete.