The taxi driver knows a better way to drive to the hospital. Not. We arrive there with only a few minutes to spare. We are in the wrong building. We should have known better. Having checked in at the right desk, 15 minutes late, we wait. After an hour KS’s blood is taken and the dressing around the Piic line changed. This also takes quite a while. We now have to wait for at least an hour for the blood results. We are back at the desk after an hour. We wait. We are waiting. Still waiting. There is a blood shortage. I have known about this for a while. This means that there may or may not be a blood transfusion, a nurse tells us. It may not happen today. Because it is perhaps too late in the day and a transfusion will take a few hours. If it does happen, if it is decided it will happen, it may have to be another day. KS is walking up and down through the corridor. I am delighted he has enough energy for some non-functional walking. He is back in the chair next to mine. And we are back to waiting.
I am slowly starting to conclude it may not happen today. But we are also still waiting for today’s calcium value, which could create a whole different scenario for the rest of this day. A nurse comes and tells us the transfusion will be tomorrow. What will happen, will happen, says KS. I don’t mind, he says. He is reading the news on his phone. Blood products are wheeled down the corridor. I am trying not to slide off my chair.
I study the windows. The patterns of accumulation of dust on the glass. I wonder if this phenomenon has a name. KS asks ChatGP and comes up with accretion. I observe the concrete wall, the lighting, the smoke alarm in the ceiling over my head, which has a number on it. I look at the radiators in this corridor. I count ten in this stretch of corridor. ‘You know what I mean?’, the woman next to us says to her companion. This is also something that gets repeated.
A nurse calls us in. And the outcome for today is they are taking more bloods now so they can match it correctly tomorrow (?). And a bit later we hear the calcium is within bounds. Gratitude flows. Not within bounds.
