Summary: After a deep, soil-contaminated cut sends you into Baran’s ED, your medical anxiety spirals while a cruel doctor questions why Baran would ever choose you.
word count: 3.6K
Warnings: Medical anxiety, injury/blood, deep hand laceration, stitches, needles/numbing, wound irrigation, fear of sepsis/tetanus/blood disorders, ableist language/behavior, humiliation, panic, crying, brief medical cruelty, protective partner confrontation
Authors note: This was a request which can be found here!
You were not supposed to be in Baran’s ED.
That was the first thing.
The second thing was that you were definitely going to die.
Maybe not immediately. Maybe not dramatically. Maybe not in a way that involved alarms and people yelling “clear,” though you had already asked the triage nurse if that was likely and she had stared at you for three full seconds before saying, “No.”
Eventually though…probably from sepsis or tetanus or some blood disease you had not heard of yet because the body was a haunted house full of wet machinery and every door had teeth.
You sat on the edge of the ED bed with your left hand wrapped in a thick towel that had once been white and was now a deeply upsetting shade of red-brown. Baran’s hoodie swallowed your frame, the sleeves pushed clumsily up to your elbows. You were taller than most people in the room, taller than Baran, but sitting there with your shoulders hunched and your knees pressed together, you looked smaller than you ever did at home.
At home, Baran called you her girl.
At home, Baran kissed the top of your head even though she had to make you bend down for it.
At home, Baran bought your favorite cereal without being asked, refilled your water bottle before you remembered you owned one, and never laughed when you asked if chicken could still be raw after three hours in the oven because “what if heat only works on the outside?”
At home, she loved you gently.
At PTMC, everyone was trying to figure out why. You could feel it. The looks. The little glances between nurses. The way one resident had repeated the same instruction three times, each one slower than the last, until you finally said, “I understand the words. I just don’t understand what they mean when they’re friends.”
You had cut yourself on a broken ceramic planter. That sounded stupid when you said it out loud, which was unfortunate because you had already said it out loud six times. You had been trying to repot Baran’s basil plant because she always complained that the one from the grocery store died too fast. You had watched a video. You had bought soil. You had gotten distracted halfway through because the roots looked “too trapped” and then you tried to loosen them and the pot cracked in your hand.
A jagged piece of ceramic had sliced deep into the meat of your palm, near the base of your thumb. There had been soil in it. So much soil. Too much soil.
“I’m going to get dirt in my bloodstream,” you whispered.
The nurse at your bedside, Vivi, glanced up from where she was setting out irrigation supplies. “We’re going to clean it out really well.”
“But what if the dirt already moved in?”
“It didn’t move in.”
“What if it unpacked?”
Vivi pressed her lips together like she was trying very hard not to smile. “It did not unpack. I promise.”
You swallowed, staring at your wrapped hand. “Can you test for sepsis before it happens?”
“Sepsis is a clinical diagnosis. We look at your whole picture. Fever, heart rate, blood pressure, labs if needed.”
“My heart rate is fast.”
“You’re scared.”
“My blood pressure?”
“Fine.”
“My temperature?”
“Normal.”
You blinked at her. Then looked down at your hand. Then back at her.
“What if I’m pre-sepsis?”
Vivi’s mouth twitched. “You’re pre-stitches.”
That should have been comforting. It was not. A doctor you didn’t recognize walked in a few minutes later. White man. Tall. Short haircut. Badge clipped crookedly to his pocket. He looked vaguely annoyed before he even reached you, which made your stomach fold in on itself.
“Alright,” he said, picking up your chart. “Deep laceration from broken ceramic pot. Soil contamination. Tetanus status unknown?”
“I had one,” you said quickly. “I think. Maybe. Baran keeps the records. She has a folder. It’s blue. Or green. It was blue but then I put stickers on it, so now spiritually it’s green.”
The doctor paused. Vivi looked down at the tray. You knew that look too. The one people did when your brain took the scenic route and they decided the scenic route meant there was no destination.
The doctor gave a thin smile. “Do you know when your last tetanus shot was?”
“I think three years ago? Or seven. Three and seven have the same shape in my head sometimes.”
“They don’t,” he said.
Your face warmed.
“I know they don’t visually,” you said, quieter. “I mean in my memory.”
The doctor sighed. Actually sighed. You felt yourself shrink again, even though there was nowhere for your body to go.
“We’ll update it if we need to,” he said. “I’m going to take a look at the cut, irrigate it, maybe get imaging to make sure there’s no retained ceramic. Then likely close it with sutures.”
“Will it hurt?”
“We’ll numb it.”
“Will the numbing hurt?”
“A little.”
“Will I get sepsis?”
“Not if we clean it properly.”
“But not impossible?”
“Nothing is impossible.”
Your eyes widened.
Vivi cut in fast. “That is not a helpful answer. It’s very unlikely.”
The doctor’s mouth flattened. “Sure. Very unlikely.”
You looked at your hand and tried not to cry. The curtain shifted again and then Baran was there.
Black scrubs. Hair pulled back. Stethoscope around her neck. Her expression was calm in the way it got when she was forcing it to be calm, which meant something inside her was already sharpening itself. She had probably come straight from a trauma bay. There was a faint crease between her brows and her sleeves pushed up. Her eyes found you first. Everything in her softened.
“Hi, habibti,” she said.
Your mouth wobbled.
“I broke the basil.”
Baran came to your side immediately. “I don’t care about the basil.”
“It was supposed to be a surprise.”
“You are the surprise,” she said, and her hand came to the back of your neck, warm and steady. “The basil was garnish.”
You sniffed.
“I’m bleeding a lot.”
“I see that.”
“Do I have a blood disorder?”
“No.”
“You didn’t check.”
“I don’t need to check to know this is not how we diagnose a blood disorder.”
“What if this is how mine starts?”
Baran’s thumb stroked once under your jaw. “Then you would be very original.”
You let out a wet, startled laugh. There it was. The thing no one else understood. Baran could do that. Take the terror out of your chest and tilt it sideways until it became absurd enough to breathe around.
The doctor cleared his throat. “Dr. Al-Hashimi, I didn’t realize this was…”
“My girlfriend,” Baran said.
The silence after that was not huge. It was worse. Tiny. Precise. Needled. The doctor glanced at you again. Then at Baran.
His eyes moved down your oversized hoodie, your bloody towel, your tearful face. You watched the math happen behind his eyes and knew, instantly, that you had come up wrong.
“Oh,” he said.
You wished the bed would open and swallow you. Baran’s hand stayed on your neck.
“She cut herself on contaminated ceramic,” the doctor continued, professional voice snapping back into place. “She’s anxious and having some trouble following instructions.”
“I follow instructions,” you said, humiliated. “I just ask questions.”
The doctor looked at you with a tight smile. “A lot of questions.”
Baran’s fingers stilled. Vivi’s eyes flicked up. You did not notice because your brain was already running in frantic little circles.
“I’m sorry,” you said quickly. “I know I’m being annoying. I’m trying not to. I just don’t want to die from a plant pot because that’s a really dumb way to die and then everyone would have to say it at the funeral.”
Baran looked at you. “No one is planning your funeral.”
“They might.”
“They are not.”
“You don’t know what they’re doing in their heads.”
“I know what I’m doing in mine.”
“What?”
“Deciding whether I can convince you to let me throw away all the ceramic planters in the apartment.”
You huffed.
The doctor muttered, not quietly enough, “I’ll never understand it.”
Baran’s head turned. The room chilled.
“Understand what?” she asked.
The doctor froze for half a second.
Vivi closed her eyes like she had just heard a tray fall in slow motion.
“It’s nothing,” he said.
“No,” Baran replied. Her voice stayed gentle, which somehow made it worse. “You had a thought, Dr. Langdon. Finish it.”
You looked between them, confused.
Langdon shifted his weight. “I just mean… people are surprised. That’s all.”
“People?”
He glanced at you. Your stomach sank. You understood now. Not the whole thing maybe, not the polished social knife of it, but enough. Enough to know the blade had your name on it.
“You’re Dr. Al-Hashimi,” he said finally, with a weak laugh. “You’re brilliant. You’re respected. You could date anyone. It’s just… why would Dr. Al-Hashimi ever date you?”
The words landed so cleanly that at first you did not even feel them. Then your face went hot. Your throat closed. You looked down at your bloody hand like maybe the cut had been useful after all because now you had something else to stare at.
“I’m sorry,” you whispered.
Baran went very still. Not frozen. Still. There was a difference. Frozen was fear. Still was control.
“Get out,” she said.
The doctor blinked. “Excuse me?”
“Step out of this room.”
“I’m assigned to this patient.”
“No,” Baran said. “You were assigned to a patient. Then you insulted her while she was scared and injured. Now you are no longer touching her.”
“Dr. Al-Hashimi, I didn’t mean…”
“You meant enough.”
He looked toward Vivi, like she might rescue him.
Vivi suddenly became extremely busy adjusting the saline bags.
Baran’s voice lowered. “You are going to leave. You are going to grab Dr. Santos to take over. Then you are going to document the handoff accurately, without editorializing her cognition, her affect, or her worth. After that, you and I will have a conversation with whoever is supervising you today.”
The doctor’s jaw worked. Baran smiled. It was not a kind smile.
“Now.”
He left. The curtain swayed behind him. For a moment, there was only the hum of the ED, distant monitors and rolling carts and someone coughing two bays over.
Then you said, very quietly, “I know I’m not smart like you.”
Baran turned back to you.
Her expression cracked.
“Don’t do that.”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“I’m just saying true things.”
“No,” she said. “You are saying cruel things in other people’s voices.”
That made you stop.
Baran moved closer, standing between your knees so you had to look at her. You were still taller than her even sitting on the bed, but somehow she had always been the one who could make the whole world sit down and behave.
“You process differently,” she said. “You need more time with some things. You ask questions. You get scared and your brain latches onto the worst possible outcome because it thinks that is how it keeps you safe.”
You swallowed.
“That does not make you stupid.”
“But I say stupid things.”
“So do I,” Baran said.
You blinked. “You do?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“When I told Robby I was fine after working sixteen hours and drinking only coffee.”
“That is stupid.”
“Exactly.”
A tiny laugh escaped you.
Baran cupped your face, careful not to jostle your injured hand.
“And for the record,” she said, “I date you because I love you.”
Your eyes burned.
“Even though I thought basil needed emotional support?”
“Especially because you thought basil needed emotional support.”
“It looked trapped.”
“I know.”
“And I was right.”
“You were absolutely right.”
You sniffed again, but the corner of your mouth twitched.
Baran brushed her thumb over your cheek. “She makes me happy,” she said, not looking away from you. “She makes me laugh.”
Vivi made a very small sound behind her, suspiciously close to a sniff.
Baran continued, voice steady. “She remembers that I hate cold rice but love cold pasta. She puts my socks in the dryer before I get home because she says my feet look sad after shift. She sends me pictures of pigeons and names them after hospital administrators. She once cried because a grocery store lobster looked resigned to his fate.”
“His name was Benjamin.”
“I know his name was Benjamin.”
“He was innocent.”
“He was very innocent.”
You breathed out a shaky laugh.
Baran’s face softened further. “She makes my life lighter. Do you understand? I spend all day in rooms where people are hurt, terrified, angry, dying. Then I come home and you ask me if ducks know they’re waterproof.”
You looked down.
Baran tilted your chin back up.
“And I get to breathe.”
Your lips parted, but nothing came out.
“She makes me happy,” Baran repeated. “She makes me laugh. That is not small. That is not silly. That is not less than intelligence or ambition or whatever shiny thing people think I should want. It is everything.”
The curtain opened again before you could answer.
This time, Trinity Santos stepped in.
Black scrubs. Hair pulled half up, a few strands falling out. Tablet in one hand, gloves tucked into the other. Her eyes moved from you, to Baran standing between your knees, to Vivi, then to the empty space where the previous doctor had been.
She took in the room in one quick sweep.
Something in her expression flattened.
“Okay,” Trinity said. “I’m taking over the lac repair.”
Baran did not move from between your knees. “Thank you.”
Trinity glanced at her. Not casual. Not exactly.
There was a question there.
Baran answered it without words.
Trinity’s jaw shifted once.
Then she looked at you, and her face softened enough that your chest loosened a little.
“Hi,” she said. “I’m Dr. Santos. I’m going to fix your hand.”
You stared at her.
“Am I going to get sepsis?”
Trinity blinked once.
Then she pulled the stool closer with her foot and sat down. “Starting strong. I respect it.”
Baran’s thumb brushed your cheek.
You swallowed. “The other doctor said nothing is impossible.”
Trinity’s eyes flicked to Baran again.
Baran’s mouth did not move, but her expression said plenty.
Trinity nodded slowly. “Yeah. That was medically useless and emotionally violent.”
You breathed out, startled.
Vivi made a small noise that might have been a cough if anyone wanted to be generous.
Trinity set the tablet aside. “Here’s the actual answer. You have a deep cut with dirt in it. That means we take it seriously. We clean it aggressively, check for foreign bodies, make sure your tetanus is handled, and decide if you need antibiotics. You came in quickly. Your vitals are okay. You are not currently septic.”
“Currently?”
Trinity pointed at you with one gloved finger. “Do not litigate my adverbs.”
You shut your mouth. Then opened it again.
“But my blood?”
“Your blood is staying inside your body at a socially acceptable rate.”
You looked down at the towel. “It doesn’t feel acceptable.”
“That’s because hands bleed like they’re trying to win a drama award.”
You looked at Baran.
“She sounds less haunted,” you whispered.
Baran’s mouth softened. “She is less haunted.”
Trinity gave a tiny shrug. “Debatable, but I hide it better.”
That made you laugh, small and shaky.
Baran’s hand slid to the back of your neck again. “There she is.”
Trinity washed her hands, then came back with the supplies. “I’m going to unwrap this and look at the cut. No surprises. No sudden movements. If you need a second, say so.”
“I need a second.”
“I haven’t touched you yet.”
“I’m preparing.”
“Valid.”
You nodded seriously. Trinity waited. No sigh. No eye roll. No impatient shift of her weight. She just sat there, one hand resting on the tray, letting your brain catch up to the room.
After a moment, you said, “Okay.”
“Okay,” Trinity said back, and carefully peeled the towel away.
You watched her face because doctors always tried not to react, which meant their not-reacting became its own reaction.
Trinity did not make a face.
She only looked.
Then she said, “That is a very committed cut.”
Your eyes went wide. “Committed?”
“Deep enough to need stitches. Not deep enough to make anyone in this room start running.”
“Is it going to get infected?”
“It could, which is why we’re cleaning it well and possibly giving antibiotics. Could is not the same as will.”
You nodded slowly.
Then looked at Baran. “Could is not will.”
Baran squeezed your uninjured hand. “Exactly.”
Trinity glanced between you two, and something faint passed over her face. Not confusion. Not judgment. Understanding, maybe.
Then she leaned back and said, “Before I irrigate this, I’m going to numb it. The numbing part burns. I’m not going to lie to you because that’s rude and also you seem like someone who would remember and bring it up forever.”
“I would.”
“I can tell.”
Baran looked at her. “She once reminded me of a mushroom fact from six months ago because I questioned it.”
“You did question it,” you said.
“I said I did not want mushroom facts during dinner.”
“That is different.”
Trinity glanced at Vivi. “I’m learning a lot about this relationship.”
Vivi nodded. “Same.”
The numbing hurt. It hurt enough that tears spilled down your face before you could stop them. You tried to hold still, but your shoulders jumped, and Baran immediately leaned closer.
“Look at me,” Baran said.
You did.
Her eyes were steady. Warm. Yours.
“You’re doing well.”
“I hate this.”
“I know.”
“Do I have medical trauma now?”
Trinity, without looking up, said, “You can schedule that for later. Right now we’re doing hand trauma.”
You made a strangled sound that turned into a laugh.
Baran’s thumb stroked over your knuckles. “Breathe, habibti.”
“I am breathing.”
“You are bargaining with oxygen.”
You sobbed once, then laughed again, which made Trinity pause with the needle.
“No moving,” Trinity said.
“Sorry.”
“You’re fine. Just don’t giggle your way into a crooked stitch line.”
“I’m not giggling.”
“You are medically adjacent to giggling.”
Baran looked down at you with helpless affection. The irrigation was worse. Not painful exactly, but horrible. Pressure and cold and the strange sensation of your body being cleaned from the inside out.
You stared at the ceiling and asked, “What if the bacteria are hiding?”
Trinity said, “They’re not paying rent.”
“What if they have tiny apartments?”
“Then I am evicting them.”
“What if one refuses?”
Baran leaned close to your ear. “Then I’ll handle the legal side.”
You turned your head toward her. “You can’t sue bacteria.”
“I can be very persuasive.”
Trinity snorted softly. “I’d pay to watch that deposition.”
By the time the X-ray came back clear, you were exhausted. No ceramic left inside. Tetanus up to date, confirmed by Baran through the sacred sticker-covered folder she had pulled up on her phone. Antibiotics prescribed because of the soil contamination. Stitches placed cleanly across your palm while you squeezed Baran’s hand and whispered increasingly strange questions about bloodstream behavior.
Trinity answered every single one. Not sweetly, exactly. Trinity was not sugary. She was sharp-edged in a way that made the room safer because nothing vague could survive her.
“No, your veins are not a highway for dirt.”
“No, pus is not guaranteed.”
“No, you should not Google necrotizing fasciitis.”
“No, I’m not going to describe it to you.”
“No, Baran should not describe it to you either.”
Baran’s brows lifted. “I wasn’t going to.”
“You thought about it.”
“I did not.”
“You’re an attending. Of course you did.”
You looked between them, mildly betrayed. “You both know what it looks like?”
Trinity pointed at Baran. “Do not answer that.”
Baran pressed her lips together.
You gasped. “You do.”
“Almost done,” Trinity said quickly.
When the final bandage was wrapped around your hand, Trinity sat back and peeled off her gloves.
“Alright,” she said. “You survived the basil incident.”
“The basil was not the aggressor.”
Baran’s expression hardened. “The basil is on thin ice.”
“It’s a plant.”
“It knows what it did.”
Trinity handed Baran the discharge paperwork. “Keep the bandage dry for the first twenty-four hours. No dishes, no soil, no lifting anything heavy with that hand. Watch for spreading redness, warmth, pus, fever, red streaking, worsening pain. Come back if any of that happens.”
Your eyes widened.
Trinity immediately pointed at you again. “That is a watch list, not a prophecy.”
You slowly closed your mouth.
Baran’s voice softened beside you. “We’ll check it together.”
“Fifteen times?”
“As many as you need.”
Trinity looked down at the chart, but her mouth twitched.
You noticed.
“You think I’m annoying too.”
Trinity looked up.
The room quieted.
“No,” she said, very plainly. “I think you’re scared. There’s a difference.”
Your throat tightened.
She stood, tucking the tablet under her arm. “And for what it’s worth, Dr. Al-Hashimi has good taste.”
You blinked.
Baran looked at Trinity, surprised.
Trinity shrugged. “What? She does.”
Then, after a beat, Trinity added, “Also, anyone who gets Baran Al-Hashimi to make that face over a basil plant is clearly powerful and should be respected.”
You looked at Baran. “What face?”
“No face,” Baran said.
Trinity nodded toward her. “That face.”
Baran narrowed her eyes. “Santos.”
“I’m leaving.”
Trinity slipped out through the curtain, but not before giving you one last look.
“Don’t Google anything weird.”
You nodded.
A pause.
Trinity leaned back in. “I mean it.”
“I won’t.”
Baran looked at you.
You looked at the floor.
“I might ask Baran to Google.”
“No,” Trinity and Baran said at the same time.
The curtain fell shut.
For the first time since you walked into the ED, you laughed without crying.
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