The Life Criterion 6c/??
anonymous
August 7 2010, 14:33:06 UTC
Arthur didn’t utter a word since then, even after the nurse left again and the injection should already take effect.
“Any better?” Alfred said with a mask spinning around his forefinger, somehow he doubted Arthur would hear him if he put it on. “If you are tired I can come around in the morning, that is,” he glanced to his watch, “about four hours later and ask you then.”
Arthur rolled over from where Alfred stood.
On the way back to doctors’ lounge on the second floor, Alfred found his exhausted mind swirling about Arthur’s silence. He stopped his thought before it drifted. A few hour sleeps and he would be in his top shape. He set his pager and glasses on the coffee table, shrugged off his white coat, and then jumped straight onto the sofa, didn’t even bother wriggling out of the shoes.
The next thing he knew was something shaking his shoulder. Dr Jones. Annoying dreams, go away. Dr Jones, wake up! More shaking. The voice broke off. The meeting . . . started . . . five . . .
“Dr Jones!” A sudden jolt that came with a shout too loud against his ear snapped him out off drowsiness, “The morning meeting started five minutes ago!”
“I’m up. I’m up.” Alfred forced his eyes open as his hand clumsily explored the coffee table in search for his glasses, which was shoved right onto his face, nearly poked his eyes in the process. “The meeting what?”
“It started five minutes ago and Dr Honda said you didn’t answer his page.” The nurse blabbered on, “Don’t you have a cell phone or an alarm? And where’s your pager? All the doctors are already there so he sent me to look for you and- ah, here it is,” she picked up the pager at the other end of the room, “How did it end up here? Anyway they are all waiting for you to do presentation and Dr Braginski said if you didn’t show up soon enough-”
“I get it, I get it.” Alfred grabbed the pager; he had finished putting on his not-so-shining armor of a white coat and whatever that Braginski had in store for him, he said bring it on you section-staring tissue-slicing drunk wretch-
It happened like this: a few days after he took his new position at Brehmer, Alfred was turned to for his opinion on a case, which he had been-and still was now-sure that the patient had multiple myeloma. Back pain, anemia, and elevated calcium in blood; even the serum electrophoresis came back with a prominent peak in the gamma zone, he meant, how obvious was that? So Alfred, the one and only junior, did a bone marrow biopsy and all Ivan Braginski the chief pathologist told him was “Not enough plasma cells under high power field.” And the diagnosis hung.
The patient hopped to another hospital and the diagnosis was settled there. But by then, time had been wasted.
Before this happened, Alfred was cool with Braginski not liking him or judging him or whatnot; just don’t let it get into their work and it’s all fine by him. But after that, it was full range and mutual. Ivan saw Alfred as an overconfident upstart who had neither manners nor respect and thus deserved so much a lesson while there’s nothing Alfred hated more than figuring out an answer yet being deprived the right to reply solely because of his age.
All this lead to no surprise at the end of Alfred’s rushed presentation, when most other doctors filed out to take care of their own duty. Ivan approached with upward twists on both corners of his mouth, “I heard you diagnosed tuberculosis based on the tuberculin test, alone?”
“Any better?” Alfred said with a mask spinning around his forefinger, somehow he doubted Arthur would hear him if he put it on. “If you are tired I can come around in the morning, that is,” he glanced to his watch, “about four hours later and ask you then.”
Arthur rolled over from where Alfred stood.
On the way back to doctors’ lounge on the second floor, Alfred found his exhausted mind swirling about Arthur’s silence. He stopped his thought before it drifted. A few hour sleeps and he would be in his top shape. He set his pager and glasses on the coffee table, shrugged off his white coat, and then jumped straight onto the sofa, didn’t even bother wriggling out of the shoes.
The next thing he knew was something shaking his shoulder. Dr Jones. Annoying dreams, go away. Dr Jones, wake up! More shaking. The voice broke off. The meeting . . . started . . . five . . .
“Dr Jones!” A sudden jolt that came with a shout too loud against his ear snapped him out off drowsiness, “The morning meeting started five minutes ago!”
“I’m up. I’m up.” Alfred forced his eyes open as his hand clumsily explored the coffee table in search for his glasses, which was shoved right onto his face, nearly poked his eyes in the process. “The meeting what?”
“It started five minutes ago and Dr Honda said you didn’t answer his page.” The nurse blabbered on, “Don’t you have a cell phone or an alarm? And where’s your pager? All the doctors are already there so he sent me to look for you and- ah, here it is,” she picked up the pager at the other end of the room, “How did it end up here? Anyway they are all waiting for you to do presentation and Dr Braginski said if you didn’t show up soon enough-”
“I get it, I get it.” Alfred grabbed the pager; he had finished putting on his not-so-shining armor of a white coat and whatever that Braginski had in store for him, he said bring it on you section-staring tissue-slicing drunk wretch-
It happened like this: a few days after he took his new position at Brehmer, Alfred was turned to for his opinion on a case, which he had been-and still was now-sure that the patient had multiple myeloma. Back pain, anemia, and elevated calcium in blood; even the serum electrophoresis came back with a prominent peak in the gamma zone, he meant, how obvious was that? So Alfred, the one and only junior, did a bone marrow biopsy and all Ivan Braginski the chief pathologist told him was “Not enough plasma cells under high power field.” And the diagnosis hung.
The patient hopped to another hospital and the diagnosis was settled there. But by then, time had been wasted.
Before this happened, Alfred was cool with Braginski not liking him or judging him or whatnot; just don’t let it get into their work and it’s all fine by him. But after that, it was full range and mutual. Ivan saw Alfred as an overconfident upstart who had neither manners nor respect and thus deserved so much a lesson while there’s nothing Alfred hated more than figuring out an answer yet being deprived the right to reply solely because of his age.
All this lead to no surprise at the end of Alfred’s rushed presentation, when most other doctors filed out to take care of their own duty. Ivan approached with upward twists on both corners of his mouth, “I heard you diagnosed tuberculosis based on the tuberculin test, alone?”
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