Stuck Read online

  Stuck

  By A.C. Whitten

  Copyright 2017 by Make Profits Easy LLC

  [email protected]

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER ONE: NAGGING HEADACHES

  CHAPTER TWO: UNEXPECTED VISITOR

  CHAPTER THREE: NO PLACE LIKE HOME

  CHAPTER FOUR: CONDOLENCES

  CHAPTER FIVE: LATE FRIDAY NIGHT

  CHAPTER SIX: PAINKILLERS

  CHAPTER SEVEN: UNDER PRESSURE

  CHAPTER EIGHT: JUDGEMENT DAY

  CHAPTER NINE: MOTHER OF ALL MELTDOWNS

  CHAPTER TEN: CHASING DEADENDS

  CHAPTER ELEVEN: GOING TO THE FARM

  CHAPTER TWELVE: THE BAD COMES BEFORE THE GOOD

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN: WARNING LABELS

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN: FALSE MEMORIES

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN: OUT OF OPTIONS

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN: OUT OF TIME

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: PLAN Z

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: KARMA OR GENETICS

  CHAPTER NINETEEN: VISITING DAY

  CHAPTER ONE: NAGGING HEADACHES

  The handwriting on the chart was illegible from my tired, dry eyes. Rubbing them offered no relief, neither did blinking. I tried to squint to see what in the hell the chart even said, but the florescent lights overhead were killing me. My head felt like it was going to split open with the migraine I had. Were the lights getting brighter or were my eyes just getting worse? I had to get some sleep sometime soon, or I was really going to lose it. Nightmares had plagued me every night that week; I woke up in a cold sweat in the wee hours of every morning, and never able to go back to sleep. I felt ridiculous for letting the nightmares dominate my sleep schedule—I didn’t even remember the dreams.

  I managed to make out the medicine’s name finally and headed to grab it. Each step felt like a mile, and every second felt like an hour. How long had I been at work? Checking my watch, I found a bit of relief to see my shift was over in just a few minutes. All I wanted was to get home and lay down. As I walked into the supply room, a massive yawn erupted from me, bringing tears to my eyes—at least it relieved some of the irritation. Grabbing the IV bag of medicine I needed, I headed back out to the patient rooms. Having to check the chart again to even see what room I was heading to, I ducked into the patient’s door. I had to put on a fake smile as I came into view of the patient. “Mrs. Reynolds, how are you feeling?” I asked her politely.

  “Well, I’ve been having quite a bit of nausea,” the sweet sixty-something-year-old said to me.

  “Good thing I brought this,” I chuckled, gesturing to the bag in my hand. Walking over to her IV stand, I hung up the bag and connected it to her IV. “Are you having any other problems, Mrs. Reynolds?”

  “Well, I,” I heard her begin, but couldn’t make out the rest of what she said. My brow creased. Was she just talking too softly? Then, I noticed a low, muffled noise coming from somewhere—but not Mrs. Reynolds. It sounded almost like murmuring, but I couldn’t make out any words. My eyes scanned around the room, looking for the source of it. Mrs. Reynolds didn’t seem to notice anything… Were my ears ringing?

  Shaking my head and putting on my polite smile yet again, “I’m sorry, can you say that again?”

  “Just that I’ve been having pains in my legs,” she repeated.

  “Unfortunately, we can’t do much as far as pain relievers go. We don’t want the medicine to mask a fever. However, I’ll see if the overseeing attending on duty will prescribe you a mild painkiller to make you comfortable. The nursing staff will have to check on you a little more, though.”

  “That’s just fine. Those ladies are so sweet. You know, Dr. Gilmore, you could probably sweet talk one of them into a date. There’s that one who—”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Reynolds, but I’m not looking for that right now,” I forced a smile. I don’t know what it was with the old patients trying to set me up on dates with nurses or their family members, but I wasn’t interested in dating at that time. There was no need to bring a woman into my messy life. At least not right then. Maybe in a few years, I could consider it.

  After running over all of her other symptoms and seeing if there was anything else she needed, I headed out of the room. My head was throbbing as I jotted down a note on her file for the attending to see about giving her a small dose of pain medication. Cancer patients were prone to random pains, and she had been battling the disease for years. Mrs. Reynolds deserved a bit of comfort. Putting the chart away, I glanced at the time and saw it was finally time to leave. Letting out a massive sigh of relief, I headed for the staff locker room.

  Changing out of my scrubs and into my street clothes, I put my backpack on and headed for the door. As my hand reached for the door handle, I could hear that same low murmuring I heard in Mrs. Reynolds’s room. Glancing around, I saw a few other doctors, but none of them were talking. The sound was even louder when I raised a hand to cover my ear. Was it in my head? Weird… My mind must have been playing tricks on me with how tired I was. Tapping on my ear a few times, the sound faded away. Shaking my head, I finally headed out the door.

  My hands busied themselves by plugging my earphones into my phone, wanting to keep to myself as I got out of the building. I was far too tired to force my way through meaningless small talk. Placing the buds in my ears, I turned on some soft music, not wanting to play it too loud and make my head hurt worse. Ah, it was like instant relief, my anxiety already deflating as the music shut out the world around me. Going to the elevator lobby, I waited with the small crowd of people. When a set of doors opened, I moved with the group into the lift. I stood in the corner of the small metal box, closing my eyes to block out the unbearable lighting overhead. I could have fallen asleep standing there. The only thing that was keeping me awake was the nagging pain in my head. God, it was getting unbearable. Surely with how tired I was, I would get some sleep tonight—or maybe that was just wishful thinking.

  After several minutes, I opened my eyes to see the elevator was finally approaching the garage floor. I stepped off as soon as the doors opened. Digging in my pocket, I found my keys and hurried over to my small, beat up silver Toyota that was older than me. It was a piece of junk, but it was my piece of junk. I had managed to save up five hundred bucks working odd-end jobs in med school to buy it. Hopping in, I cranked the engine, took out my earbuds, and pulled out of the parking garage. I relaxed into the seat, letting out a long exhale. Most people hated driving downtown, but it strangely decompressed me after a long day. It was a few minutes out of the day where I didn’t have to think about anything but what was happening in the moment. I could focus on the cars and the lines on the road rather than the stress of work, my studies—and my past. Ever since I entered my residency at the hospital, a long forgotten guilt had returned to me. What kind of cruel sort of fate was getting placed at a hospital just outside of my hometown? My little brother, being stuck at home… I distanced myself from the thought. Nothing good ever came of thinking about it.

  In just a few short minutes, I was home. Getting out of the car, I paced over to the porch, my eyes glancing around the street. It wasn’t a bad part of town, but it certainly wasn’t the nicest either. The houses were small and plain, the families were hardworking, blue-collar folk. There wasn’t much crime except the occasional break-in. It wasn’t like my hometown at all, where everyone knew everyone. Hell, I wouldn’t even know my neighbors’ names if it weren’t for the mailman mixing up the mail from time to time. Speaking of which, I reached into the metal tin next to my door and scooped out the pile of mail from today’s delivery. Getting inside, I placed my bag down and idly flipped through the mail as I strolled into the kitchen. Putting a kettle of water on the stove, I lit the burner before going back to the mail. Junk, j
unk, bill, junk, student loan reminder, student loan reminder, student loan reminder… I groaned. My debt was like a never-ending storm cloud over my head. Due to the fact I ran away from home to go to college and couldn’t contact my father for his tax information, I didn’t qualify for financial aid and had to take out loan after loan to cover the costs my scholarships didn’t. The debt was crushing and all-consuming.

  I tossed the mail to the side, not wanting to make my migraine even worse. I’ll deal with it tomorrow, I lied to myself. The kettle started to whistle, turning around and cutting off the stove. Pulling a mug and a bag of chamomile tea down from the cupboard, I made a cup of tea and moved into the living room. The house I was renting was tiny but cheap, making it affordable to live by myself while getting through my residency at the hospital. So, I couldn’t really ask for more. Sitting down on the couch with tea in hand, I relaxed into the cushions. Finally, I could focus on getting rid of this damn migraine. The migraine was what was making life so miserable the last couple of days. Perhaps I seemed bitter in disposition today, but it was because I was in pain. In general, I was happy with my life. Sure I had a lot on my shoulders with my school debt, but at least my only problems were problems of my own. It was the definition of freedom to me, no longer bound by family obligations.

  Lyle, my brother, still haunted my thoughts, though. It was hard to get him off my mind these days, knowing he was turning eighteen in just a couple of weeks. I hoped he could get away like I did. Maybe we could talk again if he did... That’s if Lyle didn’t hate me for leaving him behind. I had wanted to take him with me, I did, but I was only eighteen when I left and was going to college. I couldn’t have fed him, I hardly fed myself in those early days. It was cruel to leave Lyle in the living situation, but what could I have done?

  Sitting up, I snatched the remote from the table and turned on the television. I needed to drown out my thoughts. I couldn’t spend another day sitting around wondering about all the what-if’s of past decisions; all it did was stress me out. There was nothing I could do about mistakes I made in the past. I had a new life that I worked hard to build. I just wasn’t willing to bring the kind of crazy in my life that could come from trying to contact my brother while he still lived with our parents. Turning up the volume, I flipped through the basic cable stations until I found one that was playing old black and white movies. Reaching to the coffee table, I grabbed a bottle of acetaminophen and took three of the extra strength tablets. My eyes rested on the television screen as I drank my chamomile tea, hoping the herbal beverage would help ease my migraine and get me to sleep. As I relaxed, I got lost in my thoughts again, but this time they were encouraging ones. Even though I had off days like the one I was experiencing, I knew I was doing the right thing with my life. I got away from a toxic environment and put myself through medical school and was now in a residency program at a good hospital. I was going to have to work a long time to get out of debt, but one day I would, in fact, be free of it. And the only one I would have to thank for it would be myself. Knowing that day was going to come was what got me through days like these.

  My vision started to blur as the tea, and my exhaustion, finally took over. Standing from the couch, I stretched and then stumbled to my room. Flopping down on the bed, I begrudgingly pulled the covers up to my chin. I said a silent prayer, despite not being particularly religious, because I was so desperate for sleep. Please, please let me sleep through the night; it’s all I ask.

  CHAPTER TWO: UNEXPECTED VISITOR

  The Next Day

  And just when I thought I couldn’t be more exhausted, I had to push myself through another day of work with just a couple of hours of sleep. The nightmares were relentless. The one I had the previous night, I actually remembered vividly, leaving my mind plagued with twisted and tormented images all day. They certainly weren’t welcome, my head hurting even worse because of it. Could things get more miserable for me? I could hardly function, and I knew my attending physician was starting to notice. It would be impossible to hide it if I became any more sleep deprived. I was trying to avoid using sleeping aids, knowing how habit-forming they could get, but I was starting to seriously consider getting some.

  By perhaps a stroke of luck, I managed to pull myself through another exhausting day without incident. But I couldn’t do it again, I knew that for sure. In the final hour of my shift, I was truly struggling. Thankfully the nurses seemed to have a soft spot for me and helped out quite a bit with the minor procedures I needed to do. I think it was because I was one of the youngest ones in the program, if not the youngest. They had always seemed kind of protective of me—but it wasn’t like I was going to complain about that. I walked out of a patient’s room and headed to the nurses’ station for another chart. As I approached the center, Nurse Salone walked out from behind the counter and handed me one. “Here you go, hun, Mr. Stanley just needs his wounds redressed,” she said with an empathetic smile.

  I returned the expression weakly, “Thank you, Salone.” Taking the chart from her gently, I sighed and turned to go to the supply room. At least I could this alone. Turning a corner, my eyes lifted from the chart and instantly fell on a vaguely familiar face. I stopped dead in my tracks, staring at him. Lyle…? The last time I saw him, he was just nine years old. But even from yards away, I could see my mother’s steel gray eyes and a mop of my father’s black hair atop the young man’s head. He even had freckles across his nose just like Lyle. It had to be my brother. What was he doing here? Slowly, I headed over towards him. My pulse was racing from the anxiety of just seeing him.

  The young man gave a weak grin, his gray eyes darkened by sadness, “Hey, Jason,” he murmured.

  Pain shot through my chest like lightning. It was him. What… what was I supposed to do? How was I meant to feel? After all of this time wondering what it would be like to see him again, I had no idea how to react. I never thought this day would actually come, especially not at my job. “What are you doing here, Lyle?” I asked, my eyes scanning around the halls to make sure none of my colleagues were in earshot.

  Lyle’s smile faltered and brow creased as he scoffed. “You don’t see me in over eight years, and that’s the first thing you want to ask me?” he questioned me.

  “You know it isn’t like that, Lyle,” I defended, but he glared at me. “Look, I’m sorry I left all those years ago. I was looking out for myself, and I should have thought about you more. But I’ve worked tirelessly to build the life I have now, and I won’t jeopardize that. I can’t get mixed up with my past, you know how encompassing it is. And I hope for your sake, you’re planning to get away from it. And when you do, then you can come and find me. But whatever is going on at home, I want no part of it. Okay? Once you get away from there, you’ll understand. I’m sorry, Lyle.” Swallowing a lump in my throat, I stepped to the side and walked around him. It wasn’t like I wanted to hurt his feelings, but I had to make it clear that he couldn’t just show up at my work. The last thing I needed was my past getting mixed in with my professional life. And once Lyle got away from our parents, he would understand where I was coming from. Once I broke away from it, I never wanted to look back. I knew he would feel the same.

  “Dad is dead, Jason,” Lyle called after me. Once again, I was stopped in my tracks. Turning back around, our eyes locked. His steel gray eyes were glossy, looking like he could break down in tears at any moment. I knew the tears collecting in his eyes weren’t for my father, though. I don’t think anyone would cry over him but my mother. “He died yesterday morning. Overdosed on heroin, of course. And mom has completely lost it. If you thought she was bad before,” Lyle let out a bitter chuckle, shaking his head, “You have no idea. I can’t handle her alone, Jase. I can’t.”

  My resolve was cracking. Could I be so cold to leave my kid brother with my unhinging mother and the burden of a funeral on his shoulders? As much as I wanted to fight tooth and nail against going back to my hometown, I knew in my gut I wouldn’t abandon h
im. If my father had been alive, I wouldn’t have even considered going home. So at least all I would have to do is bury him. Pacing over to Lyle, I got out my wallet and handed him a couple of bucks, “Go down to the cafeteria and get yourself a drink or something. I’ll come meet you when my shift is over,” I glanced down at my watch, “Which is in thirty minutes.”

  Blinking away his tears, Lyle nodded. Patting his shoulder, I turned back around and finally got to the supply closet. As soon as I closed the door behind me, I slumped against it. I couldn’t believe my father was actually dead… Honestly, I didn’t know how to feel about his death. All my life I wished for his death, but now that I was older and out of the house, I knew he was the only one who could control my mother. He had always been abusive and vicious to my brother and me, but my dad was sweet as sugar in the eyes of my schizophrenic mother. And when she got out of hand, my father could use his strength and authoritative tone to make her listen. It was twisted and dangerous considering he was a hustler and a major drug addict, but my dad was the only way my brother and I could both get a clean break away from the family. Because even if the two of us left, my dad would still be there to care for our mom. But now we would have to figure out what to do with her.

  My body had gone on autopilot, grabbing the supplies to dress Mr. Stanley’s wound and moved to his room without giving it any thought. I remained in that same state even as I bandaged the man up. It wasn’t until I was jotting down his response to a question I couldn’t remember asking that I came back to reality. Once again, my home life was dragging me back down with it. After I had finished surveying Mr. Stanley’s pain level and symptoms, I returned to the nurses’ station and turned in the chart. “Dr. Gilmore, sweetheart, you alright?” Nurse Wanda asked me.

  I looked over to the plump older woman. After a moment of hesitation, I painfully forced a small smile, “I’m fine, Wanda. Just tired.” It wasn’t like I could say my father had just died. I didn’t want condolences over him; he didn’t deserve them.