"Oh man…," Tweek whined, "I feel dizzy…"
"Hang on, dude," Stan spoke, "We're only like a block from the hospital."
The group quickly approached the big sliding doors underneath the red 'Emergency' sign.
After herding into the building, Stan and Kyle helped the injured boy into a chair as Craig approached the nurse at the desk.
She did not seem too concerned.
"Hello?!" Craig spoke in an urgent manner, contrary to his usual calm self to get her attention.
She lazily looked over the counter at the worried boy and spoke in a painfully unenthusiastic tone, "How can I help you…?"
"My friend cut his hand bad…," he pointed at the blonde boy sitting across the way cradling his blood-covered makeshift-bandaged hand to his chest, "He needs to see a doctor!"
She nodded before handing a clipboard over the desk, "Fill this out and we'll get him in as soon as we can."
"His mom will be here soon, I'm sure she can -," He was cut off.
"Look, kid, it's protocol… I'm just doing my job…"
Craig angrily took the clipboard from the desk and walked back over to the other guys.
"Unbelievable…," he whispered to himself.
"What happened?" Kyle asked as Craig approached.
"I gotta fill this stupid thing out before they'll see him…," Craig sat down beside the other boys.
"Gah!" Tweek twitched, clearly in pain.
"His mom will be here soon?" Stan inquired, confused.
"It's protocol," Craig mocked.
"What the hell?" Kyle was clearly irritated.
"I know…"
Craig began filling out the paper.
The first few lines were easy: first name, middle name, last name, date of birth.
The rest of the form, however, not so much.
"Do you know what your social security number is…?"
"Wh – What?"
This was about as complete as Craig was getting the form.
He took the clipboard back up to the front of the room and dropped it on the desk.
"I filled out as much as I could, his mom will fill out the rest.
"Alright," she did not sound happy, "Have a seat and we'll call him in a few minutes."
"He's already been waiting long enough… This happened like a half hour ago!"
"The doctor is busy. We'll call you when we're ready," she reiterated.
Craig looked around the empty room, "Busy with what? We're the only ones here!" Craig was extremely frustrated, "He's bleeding all –".
"Take a seat!" She said firmly.
"What a bitch…," he whispered to himself as he walked back over to the other boys.
Not long after sitting down a panicked mother ran through the emergency room door.
"Tweek!?" She rushed over to her son and the other boys, "What happened?!"
The group quickly explained what happened.
"We've been sitting here forever…," Craig said, "I told that lady behind the desk that he was bleeding and she didn't seem to care too much… Just told me to sit down."
Mrs. Tweak did not look happy at all.
She moved from comforting her son to standing him up and walking him to the desk.
After a brief exchange all three of them disappeared around a corner down the hall.
The group waited patiently for about a half hour.
Kyle pulled out his phone to look at the time.
"Five already?! I've got to get home!" Kyle quickly stood up, promptly followed by Stan.
"Oh, crap! It's five already?!" Stan asked.
"Yeah."
"I need to go too!" Stan agreed.
Craig remained seated.
"You should probably get home too, Craig. All of our parents told us to be home by five. I'm sure Tweek will be fine… We can talk to him at school tomorrow," Kyle suggested.
"You guys go on ahead… I want to stay and make sure he's okay," Craig tried not to sound too sentimental.
"Alright, dude… Tell him we hope he feels better, okay?"
"'Kay."
With that the two other boys hurried out the door.
Craig waited about another 30 minutes before Tweek and his mother emerged from a small room down the hall.
Craig could see Tweek's hand was covered in a thick layer of white bandages from about his fingertips to his wrist, his mother holding the other hand.
Craig stood up to greet them.
"Tweek! Hey, dude! You okay…?"
Tweek sniffled, it looked like he had been crying.
"He's alright," Mrs. Tweak answered, "They just cleaned the cut out to make sure it didn't get infected and gave him stitches to close to it up."
Before Craig could say anything, she spoke again, "It's getting late, Craig. You should've gone home by now, your mother is probably worried sick."
Craig looked at the ground, "I – uh – just wanted to make sure he was alright is all…"
Tweek still did not say anything.
"I'll leave now…"
He was about to turn to start walking before Mrs. Tweak stopped him, "There's no sense in you walking, just come with us. I'll call your parents at our house and tell them what happened and where you were. They can pick you up there."
"Alright, thanks."
Craig followed the two out to their car.
Mrs. Tweak helped Tweek into the back seat and buckled him up.
Craig got into the back beside him.
Craig watched Tweek during the car ride home, he had still not said anything.
He looked oddly calm, way to mellow for his usual hyperactive self.
This worried Craig.
"Are you sure you're okay, Tweek? You don't seem like your normal self…"
"He'll snap out of it soon…," Mrs. Tweak began, "He really didn't want to have stitches… Or the tetanus shot they wanted to give with them… They gave him some medicine to calm him down in addition to a pain killer."
It all made sense now. Tweek was probably so high on tranquilizers and pain meds he had no idea where he was or who Craig even is.
They arrived at the house a short time later.
Mrs. Tweak ushered the two boys in and sat them on the living room couch before she walked into the kitchen to call Craig's parents.
The two sat in silence until Mrs. Tweak came back in.
"I just got off the phone with your mother, Craig. She said that your dad had to work late tonight and that he'll swing by to pick you up on his way home in about an hour."
"Okay," Craig acknowledged, "Thanks."
The two sat in silence for a few more minutes after she had left the room before Craig could not take it anymore.
"Do you want to maybe watch some TV, dude…? This is getting kinda weird…"
Tweek looked around him.
"The remote is right on that table beside you," Craig pointed out.
Tweek picked up the remote and pressed the volume up key, the channel down key, and the menu key before finally hitting the power button.
The TV flicked on to the nightly news.
Tweek sat the remote down on the couch between him and Craig.
Craig blankly stared at his friend.
"Man, what the hell did they give you?" Craig reached over and took the remote, turning the channel to cartoons.
"I – I'm not sure…," Tweek spoke in a confused tone.
"I'm sure you're not," Craig chuckled.
Only a few minutes later Craig felt something hit his shoulder: Tweek's head.
He was fast asleep.
Craig let out a sigh and rolled his eyes.
At least he was okay.
