The clinic was stifling. Not because of the people, some with crying children, others coughing, some sneezing, some staring off into space and mumbling to themselves, but because Ruby felt like she couldn’t breathe. She hated hospitals. She respected the work they did, and was glad for it. She’d be dead otherwise. But that didn’t mean she had to like the cramped exam room with it’s flourescent lighting and it’s sterile plastic smell.
There were no windows, so she couldn’t even see outside. Doing her best to take deep breathes, she distracted herself by recounting all the reasons she needed to be here. It had been almost a month since her ordeal with David. Almost a month since she had nearly died. She was following up with the doctor who’s care she’d been under during her week long admission. Making sure everything was still healing well, both her body and her mind.
The hospital gown that the nurse had insisted she change into was too big, as such things tended to be, and with no one with her to tie it, it kept sliding off her shoulders. Freddie and Ephram would have come if she’d asked, but she needed to do this on her own. She had some questions that were personal besides, things she would talk to them about later if she needed to, but right now she just needed a doctor’s advice.
Finally, the door opened, and a man walked in. He looked to be about Ruby’s age, maybe a little younger, but he wasn’t the man she remembered from the hospital. Ruby sat up, all of a sudden nervous. She didn’t need anyone new looking at her with pity. He carried a chart in his hand, and her eyes flicked down to it. She knew what it would say inside. She’d heard it over and over as the nurses gave report at shift change. Even now she could hear their voices, kind but slightly impersonal:
Scarlett Johnson. Thirty five year old female, 5′ 7″, 140lbs. No allergies. Kidnapped by her estranged husband, one David Johnson, a known Hunter from the Charleston area of South Carolina. This information was relayed by Elizabeth Bell, PI. Patient was raped and beaten. Brought in by ambulance. Drivers ressucitated patient en route after cardiac arrest. She was intubated on arrival and taken straight to surgery. Given two units of O+, human. Laceration to the right cheek, corner of the mouth to just beneath the buccal arch, requiring thirty stitches, repair performed by Plastic Surgery. Stab wound between the fifth and sixth rib on the right side causing pneumothorax. Chest tube inserted in surgery. Fracture of the left zygomatic bone as well as the orbital socket; vision loss in left eye. Multiple contusions and lacerations. Vampire blood inaffective after initial transfusion of human blood. Reason unknown. Suspect foreign substance.
Pregnancy and drug tests all negative.
Pt discharged home accompanied by E. Pettaline, her partner, one week after admission. Doing well. Full recovery expected, with slight scaring to the area of laceration on the face. Waiting on results of rape kit. Pt has IUD in place x 5 years. Pregnancy unlikely. Prescriptions for Keflex, Xanax, and Tramadol given to E. Pettaline. Pt instructed to f/u in 3-4 weeks with Dr. Lupin.
That foreign substance had been the Purge, a terrible concoction used by Hunters to deplete the magic of any supernatural. Ruby being human, David had injected her with it in a last ditch effort to kill her, and it had prevented any magic from healing her. Until Faye, Ephram’s sister, had given her the antidote and forced it from her body. And then Freddie had healed her, nearly depleting his own fairy magic to save her life. The doctors hadn’t know what to make of it, and Ruby wasn’t saying anything. At least not about the Purge antidote. They knew Freddie had healed her. How could they not? She figured it was somewhere in her chart. Either way, she was here and alive. That’s all that mattered.
Ruby smiled at the man as he came up to her, her hands clasped nervously in her lap.
