InsaneJournal

Who: Anya and Julian
When: Monday evening
Where: UC Irvine emergency room
What: Clearing up the effects of an elbow to the face.
Warning/ratings: PG at most for blood/guts



It was bound to happen eventually. Put enough sex-starved, arrogant twenty-somethings into a room and fuel them with alcohol, energy drinks, and illegal drugs, and eventually a fight would break out. Julian just never thought he’d end up in the middle of one. When the elbow hit his face full-on, he felt the sick snapping of his nose, rolling like thunder between his ears. It pitched him backward onto a table, a heavy mahogany slab that hit the back of his head, making his eyes go bright then black. Lightning flash, everything dark after that.

My first fight, and I didn’t even get one punch in. I suck.

That night, Anya was volunteering for the first time in the ER, and honestly, it had been difficult so far. Her accent had been a problem - a panicked Mexican lady with a vomiting son had just looked at her in complete confusion, and a rude man had told her right away to ‘fuck off and get a real American to help’. At this point, she figured she could be ready for anything, though the next person who was rude would get a piece of her mind.

The next person was a young man, tall and thin with a shock of white-blond hair. He might be handsome if his face wasn’t bruised and puffy. Anya looked at the chart. “Mister Julian … Mait-land?” She guessed, hoping she was pronouncing it correctly. “I’m Anya.”

He couldn’t help but smile at her, even though that hurt. “Yeah, I’m Julian Maitland. Hi. Are you my nurse?” He couldn’t keep the hopeful tone from his voice. She just looked really... sweet. Pretty too, but she looked compassionate.

“Maitland,” she repeated, to remember the pronunciation. “I am medical student, but I can help until the doctor arrives.” Anya smiled, flipping papers. “Hello. I see you got into a fight? If it hurts to talk too much you can nod, or just use thumb up or down.” Obviously his nose was broken, and she guessed a mild concussion came along with it. Poor man.

“Not on purpose.” He chuckled. “Was just standing in the wrong place at the wrong time, someone sent me flying.” He liked talking to her, but he liked listening to her more. “You’re just a student and you already work here? You must be good. Glad I’m getting the best person here.”

Anya chuckled. “We rotate where we are helping. Tonight is my night here.” She set her papers down, holding up one finger. “First, please follow my finger as it moves?” She led him through the paces, not surprised when her suspicions were confirmed. “You may need keeping for one night, as I am thinking your head has mild concussion. I will look at your nose now, but I am sorry ahead of time.” She smiled a little, relieved that he was being kind so far.

“Well, like I said, I’m glad I have you.” He couldn’t help but go a bit pink. Following her finger was a bit hard, as it was a bit blurry, and he realized that wasn’t exactly something that was normal. “May we call my sister? She’ll worry if I’m not home tonight after work.” He smiled back at her, even though it made him wince.

“Of course; you can do this when I am done here. A few moments.” Anya smiled apologetically. “I must tell the doctor how bad is the break.” She carefully reached for his nose, touching it to test the skin, feeling the cartilage move underneath. Hopefully he wouldn’t swear at her.

He just closed his eyes, biting his lower lip and whimpering. He didn’t want to swear around her, and he generally hated swearing around women anyway. His sister had gotten the spitfire genes. He’d ended up with the sweetheart ones. “Is it bad?”

“It is not good, but no surgery is required.” Anya shook her head. “You have … ” Чёрт возьми, what was the word? “Dark-eye? And swelling. I’m sorry, my English is not perfect.” She gestured to the area under her eye. “It is common for the broken nose.”

“Black eye?” He smiled, biting his lower lip. “Are you from Russia? Your accent is beautiful.” He was glad he didn’t need to have surgery, but he was excited to talk to her more. “Your English is fantastic. You’re working in a hospital. I speak English natively, and I don’t know what half of the words mean.”

“Yes! Sorry. Black eye. I know the Russian, obviously, but forget things.” Anya smiled shyly. “Yes, I come from a place near Saint-Petersburg. And thank you. I try. I study English in school in Russia, but also medicine. My auntie is a doctor and I always liked it.” She wrote as she talked. “Did you lose consciousness when you were hit?”

He smiled at her, figuring he’d better stop ogling and flirting and focus on making the room spin less. “I did, yes. Is that bad?”

“It means you will probably have to stay here tonight, as I thought. It’s the kind of concussion where your brain may have sudden changes.” Anya hoped that made sense. “Your eyes look focused but your following my hand was bad. It means at least mild concussion, and that needs looking after.”

“I kind of need my brain,” he smiled. “Just a little.” He didn’t mind having to spend the night with the pretty Russian girl around. “Is it all right if I use my phone to call my sister?”

“Yes, of course. In here is okay, but if you get admitted please turn the telephone off. It changes the machine readings on some things.” Anya couldn’t help but chuckle. “One thinks they could make medical machines not affected by telephone signal.”

He nodded. “Oh, you’d think they could make airplanes the same way, but they don’t.” He grabbed his cell phone out of his pants pocket, called Abby, and got voice mail. He left a message saying where he was and that he was being admitted for observation, but it probably wasn’t a big deal. Once that was done, he turned his phone off and closed his eyes.

Anya smiled. “The doctor will come to you soon. Afterward they will send you upstairs. It is not extremely serious, so please don’t worry, but is better to keep you here in case you lose consciousness again.” She started to gather up her papers.

“That’s what I told my sister. What’s your name? I just ... I want to know who to ask for besides the pretty nurse.” Was blushing with a head injury good?

Anya smiled, looking away. “Anya,” she said. “Anastasia, but no one can pronounce that.”

He tried anyway. “Thank you, Anastasia.” He hoped he’d done all right, otherwise he’d look a bit silly.

She was flattered, but mostly just laughed. “You are a flatterer, Mister Maitland. I’ll look in on you upstairs.” Anya left with a wave, going back to her rounds.

She did keep her word, though, asking after the young man from one of the nurses once her shift was done. She was directed to a room at the far end of the fifth floor, opposite from where the last blue flu patients were recovering. She knocked on the door before coming in, wondering how he was and if he had a roommate. “Hello?”

He didn’t have a roommate, and he was listening to classical music on one of the channels that piped in music through the television. He liked all kinds of music, but after working in a club and hearing skull splitting dubstep all night, he liked to calm down by listening to classical.

When he saw Anya, his face broke into a grin. “Anastasia!”

Anya chuckled. “Hello, Mister Maitland. The nurse send me in here to see how you are. You look better already, I think.” Whatever pain medication they’d given him had helped the swelling go down.

“Nothing a little non-narcotics won’t hurt.” He looked down at his arms, knowing she had to have noticed some of his track marks. “Four years sober, don’t want to fall off because of a weird accident. I’ll just take Tylenol if I have to.”

Anya had seen needle marks before. “Congratulation,” she said. “Four years is a long time. Did you tell doctor? I’m sure they didn’t give you anything narcotic.” Nobody here would be that intentionally stupid.

“I did.” He smiled at her fondly. “I don’t know what they gave me, but they told me it wouldn’t be an opiate. And it’s not made me sleepy or strung out at all, so I’m sure.” He smiled at her. “And thanks. Four years is a while, but I try to remember every day why I fight, you know?”

“Good.” Anya smiled. She tried to think. “Don’t you work in dance clubs? It must be very difficult, to not go near drugs.” She wasn’t sure if she could deal with that. It was actually one of her fears, if she ever got addicted to anything working in a hospital.

She belatedly realized that she did in theory have to look after him. “Please follow my finger again. I have checks to perform.” Anya smiled, putting him through the paces again.

“I go to meetings before I work and right after I wake up. And honestly, sometimes seeing everyone looking so hopelessly sad really helps.” He smiled sheepishly at her, following her finger with his eyes, biting his lower lip to keep from blushing.

“Better! Good.” Anya smiled broadly, but it didn’t quite last when he talked about his meetings. “People are often sad here too, but it just makes me work more. And study more. I am going to study the surgery at UC Irvine so I can help people be happy.” She looked away. “Maybe it sounds silly, but this is what it is at its basic level.”

“I still have to figure out what it is that makes me happy that way. What drives me. I’m kind of envious, you know. It doesn’t sound silly at all.” He reached out for her hand when she looked away, squeezing it. But then he realized that was probably too familiar, so he let go.

Anya blushed hard - she could feel it - but it was easier to shrug off a patient than Dr. McCoy. “You are very nice to say so. It just happened to me that I like medicine.”

“You’re pretty when you blush, too.” God, he almost wished he was on some sort of opiate; he could blame his mouth being stupid on that. “It’s good that you like it. Someone has to, right?”

What a flirt! “Are American men flirts like this?” Anya was mostly amused, if embarrassed. Nobody had called her pretty since Yuri Telyapin back at secondary school. “It does brighten my shifts when people are so nice and not mean or rude.”

“I don’t mean to be, I’m sorry. I can stop, if you’d prefer. I just want to be honest.” He blushed too, chuckling down at his bare feet. “Most American men are pigs, if you want to know.”

“Most Russian men are worse.” Anya laughed. “I think you call it catcalling?”

Julian winced. “I’d never. It’s degrading to the man and the woman.” He closed his eyes. “I promise, I don’t always have a weird looking nose. I mean. If you want to get coffee sometime.”

Anya blinked. Was he asking her on a date? Best to make sure. “Like a date?” She tried to keep her tone as neutral as possible; she didn’t want to upset him whether he’d meant it that way or not.

He nodded, biting his lower lip. “Um. Yes?” Crap, he hoped that was the right answer.

That was charming, actually. “All right. I confess a curiosity of knowing what you look like with an unbroken face.”

That made him laugh, which made him wince, which made him laugh again. “It’s good to know that it’s not my charm, but your sense of curiosity that made you say yes.”

Was that mockery? Anya blushed again. “You are charming.”

“I’m not! I’m silly and more than a bit strange.” He was teasing, yes, but gently. He couldn’t help it.

“You just said you had charm. Don’t confuse the poor Russian girl.” Anya smiled shyly. “I did say my English is not perfect, Mister Maitland.”

“I do have charm. Just not much.” He held up his thumb and forefinger. “Your English is brilliant, just like you.” He closed his eyes, still smiling.

“Where is your telephone?” Anya looked around. “I will put in my telephone number.” She found it sitting on the chair with his shoes and clothes, and turned it on.

He was blushing brightly. “Put mine in yours too? So you know when I call and don’t let it go to voice mail.”

“All right.” Anya handed him hers, fishing it out of her purse. “You should, though, please. I spell badly.” Some of her contacts were in Russian, but there were a few in English.

He nodded, putting his number in, along with his name. “There. Now you know it’s that weird guy Julian from the hospital.”

‘Good.” Anya smiled again, this time a little more shyly. “I should be on my way, though. I have to check the rest of Five before I leave.”

He nodded. “Thank you. I’ll call you in a day or so, depending on when I get out of here. Anastasia? I appreciate your helping me.”

“It should be perhaps eighteen hours. Less. But if you wish to call, do when you want it.” Crap, had that sounded silly?

“I will.” It hadn’t sounded silly, and he reached out to squeeze her hand once more. “I’m looking forward to it.”

Anya waved and smiled, heading to the next room. She’d have to text Alyssa. Suddenly fancying Doctor McCoy seemed a little embarrassing.