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Chapter 3 - Timotheee Gargantuan
Timotheee yanks the leather strap tight, fastening the mummified patient to the gurney. He slips the mouthguard over the patient’s chin, trying to fit the ball into the fleshy mouth socket. The corpse leers at him and snaps its little teeth, causing Timotheee to jerk away.
“You behave yourself,” the orderly says.
The corpse smiles at him and willingly extends its jaws. Timotheee pokes the rubber ball between the teeth, gingerly tapping it into place with his pudgy finger. When he’s done, he stands back and straightens his aching spine. Then, reflexively, he smooths out his pencil mustache—the only bit of hair on his enormous, infantile body.
“Hello Timotheee."
Nurse Wretched shuffles past him, pushing another gurney down the hall. A puddle of blood sloshes atop her empty gurney as she wheels along, whistling a songless tune.
Timotheee stands to one side and graciously holds open the swinging door for her. His doughy face parts in a smile.
Nurse Wretched offers the most imperceptible expression. The small bits of peeling skin left clinging to her skull form a patchwork of geometry, like a craterous mountain. The left half of her upper lip is missing, creating the impression that she is always grinning.
To the untrained eye, a face like hers would be enigma. But Timotheee is far from untrained. He has spent a long time learning the secrets of Nurse Wretched's heart. He knows her genuine smile from the crinkle in her forehead. He knows her joy from the twinkle in her eyes. For him, she is the most marvelous creature in the House of God. She is the darkest rose in a garden of spiders.
If only he had the gumption to say something to her. Something beyond the usual chatter about the hellborn weather.
His desperation overtakes him as Nurse Wretched drifts further away, wheeling her bloody cart down the hall.
“Nurse Wretched!" he blurts out. "Will you be going to the lecture?”
The nurse turns her head toward him with that toothsome grin. For a moment, his heart threatens to explode.
“Of course,” she says softly. “I wouldn't miss it for the world. And you?”
“Of course,” he echoes. But his mouth runs dry, and the next words freeze on his lips. “Would you… I mean…would you…”
“I would,” Nurse Wretched's dry laugh sounds like leaves scraping over a grave. “I would be happy to go with you, Timotheee.”
The nurse’s gaze lingers a moment longer, and then she turns, her cart squeaking down the hallway.
Timotheee is acutely aware that he is coated in sweat, but there is a sudden, giddy buoyancy in his chest—as if all his ponderous weight had melted away, leaving a fluttering songbird in its wake.
Happy to go…
Happy to go with YOU...
He feels dizzy. He can’t stop smiling. On the gurney below him, the patient gurgles something unintelligible behind his bite block.
“Alright, my friend,” says Timotheee, grinning from ear to ear. “Let’s get you to the dentist, eh?”
He whistles a cheerless tune as he buses the gurney down the hall.
*
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