Contaminating the sterile field in the OR was not a minor incident. It sometimes required having to entirely reschedule an operation, which was the case with this surgery. Imagine having everything prepped and ready, including the patient, and then someone does something as little as placing their unclean hand on the very instrument that was to be used to cut a patient open.
“A fourth year should’ve known better,” I tutted.
“Absolutely. Ruined his chances of being accepted into the program.”
“As it should have.”
“Absolutely,” Rachel agreed. “Anyway, just be forewarned. We try not to schedule newer nurses with Dr. Reynolds, but you’re not a first year, so …” She shrugged.
I slightly inclined my head. A first year I was not. I’d been a practicing nurse for the past four and a half years. So while I was new to Memorial, I wasn’t new to this world and I loved my job.
“I’m going to go look at the board and patient charts, and then start prepping,” I told the women over my shoulder as I exited the nurses’ station.
“Have a good one,” Katie wished as she grabbed her purse from the desk. She’d worked the night shift and was headed home for the day, to return later that evening.
Stopping, I looked at the mounted whiteboard with all the scheduled surgeries, operating room numbers, and names of patients and physicians on it. Confirming the time and location of my surgery, I continued down the hallway to the patient’s room, pausing to look at the chart in my hands to again confirm I had the right room, patient, and surgery.
“Mrs. Lyons,” I greeted with a smile as I lightly tapped the door before entering.
The woman in the bed smiled. “Yes.”
“I’m Nurse Young. I’ll be the head nurse in the operating room during your surgery today. I just wanted to check on you and introduce myself before you’re wheeled out.”
“Aren’t you a pretty thing,” she sighed, her smile growing. The strands of her red hair peeked out of the hair covering that’d been placed over her head. “If I had that body thirty years ago, I wouldn’t be having this surgery now.”
I lifted an eyebrow, letting my eyes quickly scan the outline of her body, which was covered by the hospital gown she wore.
“Well, thank you, but you look great yourself.”
“All it took was having my stomach cut open two years ago.”
I nodded, assuming she was referring to the bariatric surgery she had at this very same hospital two years earlier.
“Says here, you’ve lost a total of a hundred and fifty pounds,” I confirmed by reading her chart.
“And that’s before this excess skin removal surgery.”
“Which we’re doing today. You’re going to be up and at ’em in no time.”
Mrs. Lyons’ lips parted for her to respond, but she was cut short by a deep, gruff voice behind me.
“We don’t make promises like that around here.”
A shiver ran down my spine so quickly, I jumped a half an inch off the ground. Pivoting to look over the new occupant in the room, the first thing I noticed was the black scrubs indicating he was a surgeon. And just in case that wasn’t clear enough, emblazoned across the left side of this scrub shirt read ‘Dr. Jacob Reynolds.’
Slowly, my gaze rose past the cleft chin, chiseled jaw, pink lips, and aquiline nose to collide with the grey eyes that caught me off guard when I opened that healthcare magazine back at the nurses’ station. I’d thought there was no way this guy’s eyes were grey in real life, but now here I was, standing face-to-face with him, and sure enough, they were. They were also narrowed and filled with storm clouds that I found intriguing.
Lifting my chin, I stated, “Dr. Reynolds, a pleasure to meet you finally. I’m Nurse Young and will be assisting you with this surgery today.”
Slowly, those almost hypnotizing eyes scoured the length of my body before he snorted and moved past me.
I jutted my head back.The hell?
“Mrs. Lyons,” he said curtly as he moved closer to the patient’s bed. “The nurse will finish preparing you for surgery. We should begin in about another thirty minutes. Do you have any questions?” He was focused on the woman as he held out his hand to me.
I suddenly realized he was silently demanding I hand him the patient’s chart. I placed it square in the middle of his palm. Rather harshly if the way his sharp gaze rose to meet my eyes was any indication.
I gave him a little smirk in return. Katie and Rachel may have been right about this one. It didn’t matter, however. I meant what I said as well. I didn’t need him to be anything more than professional as we got this surgery done.
