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“He was in a car accident. Help him.”
There was no room to argue with his commanding tone, and besides, since my first sight of the bleeding man, the caregiver in me had been distracted, itching to get close and triage the situation.
“Why didn’t you call an ambulance?”
“You were closer, little nurse.”
“Right, like I’m the same as a hospital,” I muttered, pulling the metal supply cart toward me and surveying the contents. I reached for the disinfectant and doused my hands liberally before snapping on gloves. It was hot in the room with all the brooding and intimidating bodies packed in.
“When did this happen?”
“Not long ago. It was only a few minutes’ drive from here, and he was brought here immediately.”
I nodded and focused on the job at hand.
“Do you need something?” Renato asked, standing just behind my shoulder, watching me closely.
“Some space would be good,” I snapped, and shifted into nurse mode. It was easier to pretend that this was just another patient with well-meaning family hovering nearby.
Renato didn’t say a word, and apparently a look was enough to communicate his desires to his men, as they filed out, talking in low tones. Elio remained, lounging on the edge of a crate pushed against the wall and lighting a cigarette.
“Seriously?” I asked him over my shoulder.
He shrugged and spoke to Renato in what I guessed was Italian. I couldn’t make out much, but my high school Spanish gave me the gist of the situation. A turf fight with a rival family.
The bleeding man groaned, and I focused on him, shuffling forward on the dirty floor and spreading my jacket out beneath me, keeping my hands as clean as possible.
“What’s your name?” I asked him.
“P-Paolo… I’m Paolo,” the man muttered.
Up close, I could tell he was around my age, late twenties. He had blue eyes, clouded with pain, and as I got closer, they latched on to me.
“I-I don’t want to die. Please,” he muttered quietly.
“I know. It’s okay… I’m going to look and see what we have here,” I soothed, falling back on tried-and-tested phrases to calm and yet not make promises. Promises always bit you in the ass.
His head bled copiously. I was shocked that he could speak at all. I checked around the back of his head, hiding my grimace. The man had suffered head trauma, of that there was no doubt, and it always presented differently. I couldn’t know the outcome of that right at this second, so I moved on to his middle.
Shifting the blanket, I fought a gasp at the sight of this battered torso. I had no idea how this man was still conscious.
“This man needs to go to the hospital – now!” I called over my shoulder. “He’s minutes away from losing too much blood. He has blunt force trauma to the chest and internal bleeding. It’s a miracle it hasn’t killed him already. He needs surgery and blood, and honestly, a miracle.”
Paolo panted and gripped my arm. “I don’t want to die there…I can’t.”
“But I can’t save you here,” I protested, panic pressing down on me. Truthfully, no one could save him. His body was wrecked. I had no idea how many organs were bleeding and ripped beyond repair. He was already dead. It was a sobering realization.
“Please, no…” Paolo shook his head, his eyes losing focus.
I twisted around and stared at Renato, who watched the scene without emotion.
“Can he be saved?” Renato murmured.
No. It’s too late.Dread slid through me. Honestly, even if an ambulance had arrived immediately at the scene of the accident and taken him straight to the hospital, it wouldn’t have changed anything. There were too many broken parts, and not enough time to fix them. It was a cruel twist of fate that he was awake and coherent enough to understand what was happening to him.
This man was going to die, and I was the only person here who could have done a damn thing about it, and I was powerless. People died all the time in the hospital, but it didn’t feel like this. I was never alone with them. I was never the only one whose shoulders it rested on. There, it was clinical and professional. Here, in the stuffy dark, with Paolo’s fear filling up the room, there was an intimacy to his demise that hit me hard in the gut.
Renato must have seen the truth in my expression because he merely nodded and then took off his suit jacket. He rolled his sleeves up. He had ink on his arms, but I couldn’t make out what it was.
