Spoiler Meta Spoiler Meta
To Roast a Squirrel
Josh was three weeks into the EMT program. He already knew how this was going to go.
“Okay. This one. Unconscious patient, airway compromised. OPA or NPA?”
Ben was at the counter, spreading jam on toast.
“Most of the time it’s OPA. Sometimes it’s NPA. Obvious once you see it.”
“Obvious for you. The rest of us need rules. Details.”
“Like, I walk up. I’m looking at color first, lips and nail beds, before I’m even down on a knee. Chest rise tells me rate. Then I’m watching their head, are they protecting it, are they slack. By the time my hand’s on their jaw I already know if I’m reaching for an OPA or—”
“You’re not explaining anything. You’re just narrating what it’s like to be in your head.”
“That’s how it works.” Ben handed a plate to him. “You just know which one fits.”
“It’s been jam every time I’m here.”
“Nothing wrong with jam.”
“We’ve been eating berries for two months. Fresh. Frozen. Pie. Cobbler. That weird crumble thing your sister sent. Now jam.”
“No Ralston berry goes to waste. You know this. Bumper year.”
“You don’t go home for Christmas but you’re quoting the family motto?”
“The berries don’t care. They just find you. We’re almost out of jam, though.”
“Just jam?”
“Lucy banned me from dropping berries at their place. Matt can’t make any more. Last batch is what’s on your toast.”
Josh took a bite. Raspberries. It was, unfortunately, very good.
“Hey. You should ask Matt.”
“Matt? No way.”
“Why not? We took our advanced certs together. Only reason I survived the written. Guy was an instructor at the department, too.”
“I don’t know. He doesn’t even know me.”
Ben pointed at the jar.
“You’re on revision eleven of that recipe. He’d teach a squirrel CPR if it gave him something to do. You’d actually be helping him out. Trust me. Just go.”
Josh rehearsed three times on the drive over and it still sounded exactly like what it was. Asking his boyfriend’s best friend for a favor.
He rang the bell.
“Josh.”
“Hi. Ben said you might be able to help me. With EMT prep.”
“Ben said that?”
“Yeah. He said you’re the best at this stuff.”
“Ben doesn’t usually send people to me unless they’re a lost cause. Guess that makes you special.”
“I—”
“Relax. If I didn’t want to do this, I wouldn’t have said yes.”
“You already said yes?”
“Got nothing better to do. Might as well build a tutoring empire.”
Josh couldn’t tell if that was a joke.
“Thanks. I wasn’t sure—”
“Save the gratitude until after we start. Come back Saturday.”
“Saturday?”
“I wasn’t planning on diving in today. And just so you know, this is a favor for Ben. Don’t make me regret it.”
“Right. Got it.”
“Don’t be late.”
Saturday afternoon. Josh sat up straight at Matt’s kitchen table. It smelled, very faintly, like berries. Or he was making that up because he was nervous.
“Breathe. I don’t bite. Not on the first day,” Matt said. “Patient assessment. Go.”
“Uh. Airway, breathing, circulation.”
“Patient’s airway is compromised. What do you do?”
“Um—”
“Don’t check the book.”
“I wasn’t—”
“You were thinking about it.”
“Reposition the… the head?”
“Asking me or telling me?”
“Reposition the head. And jaw thrust. If there’s a spinal injury.”
“There it is. Circulation. Someone’s bleeding out. What’s your priority?”
“Apply pressure. Elevate the limb if possible—”
“—and pray they’re not on blood thinners.”
“Wait, are you serious?”
“Had a guy pinned in a wreck once. Joking the whole time. We cut him free, I go to lift him, and he just comes apart in my hands. Like a wet bag. Whole seat’s a swamp. Medics are looking at me like what the fuck did you do. Turns out he was on warfarin.”
Josh gasped. Matt grinned.
“Anyway. Ask.”
“I—what is wrong with you!”
Matt waved his right hand. The bad one. “You want the full list?”
One hour of getting roasted and his notebook was a war zone. Whatever. He had nothing left to lose.
“Can I ask something? Unconscious patient, airway compromised. OPA or NPA? Ben says you just know. I still don’t know.”
“Nobody just knows. There’s a tree.”
“…There’s a tree?”
“Top of the tree, gag reflex. If they tolerate an OPA, use it. If they gag, go nasal.”
Josh wrote furiously.
“Exclusions live on the nasal side. If there’s facial trauma or you suspect a basilar skull fracture, the anatomy’s disrupted. The route could go somewhere it shouldn’t. Bag them instead.”
Rules. Details. Finally.
“Seizing’s its own branch. Don’t try to tube an active seizure. You won’t get past the clench, and you’ll hurt them or you. Position them on their side, clear what’s around them, ride it out. Once they stop, you reassess.”
“…Oh.”
“Since we’re on trees. MVC, single car into one. Go.”
“Wait, that’s—we haven’t done trauma yet.”
“You’ll do it eventually. Driver’s conscious, complaining about his neck. What’s your index of suspicion?”
“Uh… high? Because of the neck?”
“And the mechanism. Spinal precautions. Suspected injury. What do you do?”
“I—stabilize. Neck and back. Don’t move them, I think—”
“And if you’re me, you accept the damage’s already done and move on.”
Josh looked up, horrified.
“What? Too soon?”
“I don’t—am I allowed to laugh at that?”
“Don’t. It only gets worse,” said Lucy, walking through.
“Lucy. We’re working.”
“Josh is working. You, are just having fun.”
“Stress inoculation. Survive me, he’ll survive the field.”
“I think he’s killed me twice.”
“Only? I’ve lost a step.” Matt shrugged. “Literally.”
“Yeah, you have. Take a break.”
“Lucy.”
“Ten minutes, Matt. I’m not asking.”
The same person who stopped the berries had stopped Matt. Josh decided Lucy was the only person in this whole orbit who actually had her shit together.
Ben’s office door was open, the way it always was. Inside, he crossed to the bunker, shut the door behind him, and stood a second with his hand on the knob listening for the corridor. The station was not the place to talk about a boyfriend.
Clear. He called Matt.
“How’d it go.”
“He survived.”
“That’s not the bar.”
“Fumbled some basics. Froze once. Sharper than he thinks. He just needs to stop second-guessing.”
“Take it easy on him. He was trying to get into social work but didn’t work out. This is the first thing he found. Don’t scare him off.”
“…He bounced back. Got rattled, but he didn’t fold. Kid’s got potential. You were right about him.”
“Write that down.”
“Don’t get used to it.”
“And how was your afternoon. Really.”
“Wasn’t terrible.”
A knock on the bunker door.
“Cap? Chief’s asking on the Oakridge report.”
“Two minutes, Jackson.”
“Copy.”
The footsteps went back the way they came.
“Gotta go.”
“Heard it. Tell him to bring snacks next time he comes.”
“Tell him yourself.”
“Later, Ralston.”
“Later, Hartfield.”
- ← Previous
Process Complete - Next →
Thirty-Six