Code Blue

The doctor apologizes for the delay. It's only ten minutes but in this place, ten minutes is ten minutes too long. She's sitting 8 floors above people dying. Dead people, all around her. People in agony, writhing, screaming, moaning, drugged up beyond belief and still in unbelievable pain. Suffering. Uggggggh. Anabelle can't stop fixating on being trapped in a building filled with sick people. Sure, some people are fine, perfectly healthy; they're the ones dealing with the sickies every day. It's their jobs. Wandering the maze of corridors and elevator banks downstairs Anabelle is overwhelmed by the amount of hospital gowns and lab coats and wheelchairs and walkers and oxygen tanks surrounding her. It's like a convention for the walking or rolling wounded. Obviously she's missed the cafeteria and food court section. There has to be some part of this massive infrastructure where the happy, healthy, living people full of recovery are at. Suddenly the PA system crackles to life. Booming, full of static, like the morning announcement in elementary school. She is half expecting Mrs. Williams to announce today's birthdays and lunch specials. Then a calm, neutral female voice, repeats, three times, with the exact same inflection: Attention, attention. Code Blue, 2 N U, Cisto room, Room 3. Over and over. Then the sharp pop of the system disengaging. Unplugged. Maybe it's too much television but Anabelle always imagined Code Blues or Reds or Whites or whatever colour would be far more frantic and authoritative. It's exactly like the woman at Superstore who calls out for clean up on aisle 5. That's disappointing. Anabelle waits, listening for some massive rumbling of carts and gurneys, hoards of people running, jostling, shouting medical terminology at 90 miles an hour. Then she remembers she's 8 floors above them. The land of pamphlets and offices cubicles, potted ferns, hand sterilizer and wall posters full of encouraging affirmations and success stories. She's here for an hour and a half according to the appointment. Hopefully long enough that by the time she leaves, the crisis will be over. No more death and dying, at least for today.

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