At lunch time she was brought into a meeting room, as far as she knew that food was produced somewhere else in the building and then delivered to their doorstep and it looked quite appetizing at first. Sally could notice that only two other people had joined her for lunchthat day, the first was Diane, whose face she was still getting accustomed with, while the second person was James, who was probably the janitor, considering the gray color of his uniform and the dirty patches on the lower part of his pants.

Sally sat down in front of them, toying a bit with her food before tasting it for the first time, it certainly didn’t taste like hospital food and she felt glad for that.

“So, Sally, are you ready to meet Dr. Roseberry?” Diane had not eaten most of her food, which consisted mostly of salad. 

“Isn’t him the man who spoke to me?” Sally leaned back on her chair, pondering curiously at her new work mate.

“He’s completely different during a surgery, you’ll see.”

“So it will be just the two of us at the operation room?”

“Well, there’s the patient.”

Sally furrowed her eyebrows; she thought there’d be more people there, maybe a more experienced nurse to help her with a few things she still needed help with, “What about the anesthetics?”

“Doctor Roseberry will teach you how to manipulate the machine. I thought you had read the procedure by now.”

The young nurse bit her lower lip, she was a nurse practitioner, not a nurse anesthetist, she did have a few classes on the subject, but shewasn’t certified, not that they’d care, apparently. A nod would be the only appropriate answer.

“Not everything goes by the book, though, it’s best that you learn this right now.”

Another smile formed in her face, almost as fake as the first one, Sally felt unnerving. “What do you mean, exactly?”

“Sometimes it’s best to go over the procedure, for a better result.”

“But it might be unsafe.”

“Then I’m glad Doctor Roseberry is an excellent surgeon.”

Sally nodded, pondering what kind of relationship Diane might have with the doctor, she was quick to praise him, but not in an annoying, bootlicker, way, it seemed like a genuine admiration, coming out so intense like a borderline affection.

The janitor seemed to notice her nervousness around Diane and approached the pair of women, offering to take her plate and wash it, thus putting an end in the conversation. 

James, as the card read, seemed amiable, his thick grey mustache making him look almost like an old, loyal dog, especially when you considered he was rather short and quick to please.

Sally just watched as Diane took her phone out of the pocket and dialed someone, they seemed to talk about jewels and other kind of accessories that were unknown to Sally, whom decided it was best to check her own phone. 

She had sent a message to her boyfriend once again, he should probably be asleep by now, but she hoped to pass down the same kind of inspiration he gave her whenever she woke up. 

After lunch, she noticed how Diane’s face had stuck to her mind, the overstretched likeness of her skin were perfectly recalled as well as the stubby noise, which reminded her of an unused Barbie, left to age at some girl’s shelf.

She had decided to go straight at the doctor’s room, preparing herself for the surgery and reading about the procedure, her first case would be a man, a farmer, who had nearly lost his eye after an accident and found himself with a swollen cheek and a mangled face.

The pictures weren’t shy in exhibiting how the eyeball of the man was spared by less than an inch, the report read how a bull had lost control, broke a fence and advanced against the farmer. He had tried to control the bull by himself, but was stopped when a horn of the creature pierced through his skin, breaking  some facial bones and nearly impaling the eye.

The result was three facial flaps that had opened, a torn eyelid and a fat check for Dr. Roseberry.

Sally had not yet seen such an accident before, even though she had been acquainted with a few corpses during practice and became quite acquainted with the scent of blood, the look of an open body and the texture of some organs. However, this was different, this was chaos, and Sally Brown did not like chaos, she had always been orderly and well mannered, these were the traits of a good nurse, in her opinion.

The speakers of the operation room beamed out on Diane’s voice, “Nurse Brown, your patient needs you at the preparation room.” 

She would need to prepare the patient for the surgery, a process which involved a lot of disinfection, antibiotics and, in this particular case, a lot of courage from both sides.

Lying down on a patient bed, there was a man dressed in a hospital gown a bit of bandage covering the left side of his face, he seemed in pain as a rather fat hand grabbed a piece of the blanket and held it tight against his body, almost quivering. Sally could notice his hair had been left intact, while most of his face was compromised, even on his best case-scenery he’d still be left out without any prospect for facial expressions.

“Good afternoon, sir, I’m Nurse Brown and I’m here to help you.”

Behind the bandages, the man nodded as the effort of speaking was too much for him.

Sally leaned in, taking the chemicals from a metal plate and applying them as needed, she tried to keep a calm tone while dealing with the man, comfort like this is always needed when you’re about to go under the knife. 

Once the patient was ready, Sally dragged him with the help of Diane towards theoperation room, where Dr. Roseberry waited.

Just like the receptionist had predicted, his attitude was completely different there. He wasn’t the smiling man that professed kind, inspiring words to newcomers, but rather a stern man whose focus was solely given to his patient.

What followed next seemed like a miracle to the young nurse, with some nip and tuck, they both had operated in such a way that most of the face had been reconstructed. Of course, there were still some limitations, but as soon as the swell had subsidized, Sally was sure that the patient would be satisfied with the end result.