29PARADOXICAL DREAMING
CHAPTER FOUR
22 Favourites and 46 Followers - thank-you my lovelies! And to everyone who reviewed, you guys are AWESOME.
LullabyWriter: That is exactly what I was aiming for, so thank-you very much! When the smut comes along, (which won't be too long now), hopefully that'll be good too!
Marina Oakenshield: I hope you like this chapter too :)
Guest: I do too! Especially if it's with Fili! Wink wink ;)
babayaga89: Thanks! Haha, well the smut will be soon so I hope you've perviness can wait until then! Not that I blame you - this is FILI we're talking about!
Sour: I love your long reviews! This chapter is all about Alethea so you can see her more as a person and get to know her better. I feel it's important that people get to know her more in-depth. Be sure to tell me what you think :) Haha, I love Natasha and Alethea and it's so tempting just to write about them to getting into trouble together and having a laugh but there has to be Fili too! :) Hehe long johns…. I might use something like that later. Oh yes, the cover photo is yummy, isn't it? Hmmmmmm :D And to answer you, smut is coming soon :)
parttimefangirl: I haven't heard of those video games. I'm glad you like the twist! Haha, you're not the only perv! And yes, this will be bumpd up to M soon. Haha, well if this helps feed your perversion, there's lots of goodness to come!
soulsistersinaslan: Btw cool name! Hehe, sweetie pie Kili may have a few things up this sleeve in the coming chapters, but you'll have to wait and see!
greaserlady: I also thought the chapters were too short and therefore I took longer to update with this one and made it longer. I hope you like! Tell me what you think :)
ameliemallette1: Merci! Dites moi qu'est-ce que vous pensez de ce chapitre :)
"Dispatch to Tango Charlie Six. Dispatch to Tango Charlie Six. Come in Tango Charlie Six. Over."
Alethea, given that she wasn't driving the ambulance, reached over and picked up the cackling radio. "Tango Charlie Six here. What you got for us? Over."
"Eighty-three year old female, suspected heart attack. Female is conscious and coherent. Name of Joyce. Location is the Hollingsworth housing estate, flat sixty-seven. Tango Charlie Six, are you able to respond?"
"Affirmative Dispatch. ETA is under ten minutes. Over." Alethea replaced the radio into its holder, then turned and spoke to the paramedic she was partnered with for that week. "Take the second exit off this roundabout and then I'll put on the siren."
"Where is the Hollingsworth complex?"
The paramedic Alethea was partnered with was the new one Natasha had spent the week with at the beginning on the month. Giving a fresh out of school, newbie paramedic to Natasha was akin to a baptism by fire for them. Natasha hated being partnered with the new paramedics assigned to their team at the hospital and by the end of their first day, those same rookies felt exactly the same. Natasha didn't really do "friendly" all that well. Well, not unless she was trying to have sex with said individual anyway. Indeed, her approach to welcoming the new paramedics onto the job and putting them at ease involved far too much glaring and huffing to be entirely effective. Shouting and swearing were also sometimes involved depending on the new paramedics' competence. This shouting and swearing was directly proportional to how capable Natasha deemed them. All Alethea could say about it was heaven above help the rookies if they somehow irked Natasha.
Robert - or Robbie, as he had said to call him when Alethea had met him that morning - had survived the week he had had by way as an induction with Natasha. And given that there had been only a handful of swear words following his name when Natasha had told Alethea about the time she had spent with the young man after its completion, Alethea therefore could deem that Robert wasn't a complete and utter idiot and was at least semi-competent at his job. Furthermore, this was their second call of the morning and so far, Alethea couldn't find much to complain about regarding the young man. He had seemed a bit put out that their first emergency hadn't been all that exciting, but from experience, Alethea knew that was something all new paramedics went through. The reality of their job was very different from what most people perceived. With any luck, Robbie would know this without having to be told at some point. And with even more luck, if that situation were to pass, Natasha wouldn't be the one telling him, because if that were the case, he wouldn't stand a chance at getting out of the situation with his hearing still intact (and quite possibly his balls, it really depended on her mood).
"South Bank, off the main Hedgeway Road."
The pair arrived at their destination several minutes later. The Hollingsworth estate was located in quite a scuzzy part of the South Bank and lay directly in the path of an increasingly growing re-generation project the city was pushing on lots of areas just like it. The local residents were currently fighting a loosing battle in the courts against the property realtors and developers to try and save their homes and avoid moving. If Alethea were to put money on it, she'd say the whole area would be bulldozed and levelled within the next two years. New, flashy buildings would then spring up and sell for ten times any flat in the Hollingsworth estate had ever been worth. The current residents would receive some sort of financial compensation, but nowhere near enough to afford the rent of the new buildings built.
Robert parked the ambulance in a parking space reserved for emergency vehicles at the front of the specific block of high rise flats they wanted. Alethea quickly jumped out of the passenger seat and hurried around the bright green and yellow checkered vehicle to open the back of the ambulance. Robert joined her and helped her unload the gurney. He looked around, trying to locate the flat number they needed. A bulletin board caught his eye.
"Fourth floor."
Alethea nodded and slung her paramedics bag over her shoulder, while Robert secured the necessary equipment they might need to the stretcher. The pair swiftly rolled the gurney into the apartment building and headed for the lifts.
A large "OUT OF ORDER" sign that looked like it had been hung there for a considerable amount of time met them.
"Stairs it is." Alethea muttered as Robert let out a groan. "Oh come on Robbie! It's only four floors."
"Four is enough with this gurney," was his disgruntled reply. "It weighs a ton!"
The two paramedics started climbing the stairs, carefully manoeuvring the stretcher around the stairwell's tight corners. Getting a patient down this same way when they were strapped to the gurney was going to be difficult. Difficult, but not impossible. Luckily, as a paramedic, Alethea had to keep very physically fit so the strength and stamina needed to do the task ahead were already checked off her on "need this" list. Still, it wasn't an ideal situation.
"Well, last week Natasha and I had to heave this gurney up over twenty flights of stairs, so quit complaining."
"Blimey, how long did that take you?"
"Well there was a patient in severe anaphylactic shock at the top of those stairs, so not as long as my poor legs would have liked. There was a lot of sprinting involved. Robbie, pivot a bit more, my end's getting stuck on the railing." Alethea lifted the stretcher a bit higher and managed to angle it just so to allow it to get around the tight corner. "I swear broken lifts, patients always living high up and carry this gurney is the only reason I'm not the size of a whale because I love cake like I've never loved anything else."
Robert laughed. However, her statement was true. Given how much Alethea ate and how unhealthily she ate (midnight snacks were very commonplace), if she just did a normal office desk job, with 9 to 5 hours, she would have had trouble fitting through doorways. There was no doubt about it. Keeping her body physically fit was probably the only upside to the incredibly physically demanding and strenuous job she did. Well, not really, but when carrying a gurney that weighed only a little less than she did, it certainly felt like it. Plus, it was good motivation as the lactic acid built up in her muscles and they started to ache.
"Fourth floor, here we are."
Alethea and Robert wheeled the stretcher along the corridor until they reached flat sixty-seven. The green door had chipped paint and the potted flowers outside it where mostly dead, though Alethea noted they had been watered recently anyway. The door was closed so Alethea knocked loudly and announced their presence. Hopefully they wouldn't have to force the door.
There was no answer. Robert moved closer to her as she repeated her actions, this time raising her voice to a louder level. They waited several moments longer before the door swung open and revealed a little old lady smiling at them, hunched over from the passing of years.
"We're here for Joyce. She dialed 999 for an ambulance?" Alethea told the older woman, glancing over her much shorter frame to see if anyone else could be seen inside the apartment.
"Oh that's me dear. Do come in." The old woman beamed at the pair of paramedics, before turning and walking further into her flat. "I'll put the kettle on, shall I? I have biscuits too! Chocolate this week, you're in luck dearies!"
Robert shot Alethea a look, before following her into the woman's home.
"Joyce, you said on the telephone that you thought you might be having a heart attack?" Robert called after the small lady as she disappeared into what Alethea assumed was the kitchen.
"Oh that," Joyce answered, then paused and they heard the kettle brewing slowly. "That, yes, that was very unfortunate. I felt terrible, so I called. Yes, awful business that. Do sit down dearies, I'll be right out with your teas."
Robert looked to Alethea, unsure as how to proceed. Alethea held a hand out to reassure him, then took charge of the situation as she had much more experience with such things. She quickly followed Joyce into the kitchen and stood besides her.
"Joyce, do you still think you're having a heart attack?"
The older woman laughed softly. "At my age, you never know, dear. Terrible business all that is really, hm?"
The older woman continued pottering about the kitchen, making three teas and getting out the chocolate biscuits she had mentioned earlier.
"Joyce," Alethea said slowly, but firmly. "Joyce, we need to check you over and see how you're doing. OK?"
"Yes, yes, dear. You can do that after you've had a cuppa. Here you take that and the biscuits." The old woman pushed a cup of tea and a plate of biscuits into Alethea's hands and then picked up the two remaining cups herself. "Let's go into the lounge and sit down, hm love? Yes, let's do that."
Alethea followed Joyce back out of the kitchen and into the hallway where Robert was still looking lost and unsure of himself. Alethea gave him a smile and nodded at him to follow behind her into the lounge. Joyce sat down in a very dreary looking armchair and gesture to the love seat at a right angle to it for Alethea and her partner to sit down on. Alethea did so, but Robert remained at the lounge doorway, observing the pair.
"Joyce," Alethea set down the cups on the table and made sure she had her patient's attention focused on her. "I need to check you over, Joyce. Will you let me do that now, please?"
Joyce looked rather put out, but the determined and professional demeanour that Alethea emitted didn't leave much room for argument so she relented and let her.
Alethea explained each medical thing she was doing - monitoring her pulse; measuring her heart beat; checking her pupil dilation; etc. What she didn't tell Joyce was how she was observing the woman. Alethea was watching her as she talked to Robert and chatted amiably about the weather then spoke about her husband and how he had been gone for over a year now, followed by her new neighbours who were rather rude, the price of milk, how Robert liked his cup of tea and how she liked hers, then back to her deceased husband and then onto various other things. Robert nodded and added a word in here and there but otherwise didn't say anything. He wasn't sure how to proceed. They had been called out for a heart attack of an elderly person - and Joyce most certainly wasn't having a heart attack.
Alethea's findings showed Joyce to be perfectly healthy. Her blood pressure was slightly high but nothing alarming or life threatening. Though truth be told, Alethea's instincts had told her that the moment Joyce had opened the door. Alethea had to make sure her hunch was correct though.
"Joyce - Joyce, listen to me please, thank-you - Joyce, there's nothing wrong with you. And something tells me that when you rang 999 nothing was…?" Alethea said it gently, all the while maintaing eye contact with the older lady.
"Well, um, well, I, I," Joyce averted her gaze and clutched at her cardigan nervously. "Um, yes, well, you see when I rang I didn't feel all that well, so it wasn't really a lie, and um, yes, um…"
Joyce trailed off and Alethea nodded. She felt sympathetic towards Joyce and was about to talk to her about various options and services that could be provided for her when Robert spoke from the doorway.
"You lied to get us here?" He sounded annoyed. More than annoyed in fact.
Alethea shot him a sharp look, but didn't orally reprimand him. That would come later. When he caught her eye, she glared at him, hard, before turning back to Joyce who was almost on the brink of tears.
Alethea reached and put her hand over Joyce's. The contrast of young, vibrant sink on top of much older, wrinkly and slightly spotted skin was noticeable.
"It's alright, Joyce. We're not angry at you." She said delicately. "It's alright."
The much older woman sniffed, her hands still trembling slightly, then muttered something so softly Alethea barely heard it. "He is."
Alethea glanced over her shoulder at her fellow paramedic and raised an eyebrow. When nothing happened, she raised the other one. It was how she did her 'I'm threatening you but I'm doing it politely' face. Robert shifted his stance and cleared his throat.
"No, no I'm not. Um… dear? I'm not mad."
Alethea thought he could have put more effort into it, but let it go. For the moment at least because she had more pressing things to focus on.
"Joyce, it's alright. Really it is. I think I understand what's going on here."
Joyce sniffed some more, before meeting Alethea's eyes, her own hopeful.
"You do?"
The way she said it caused Alethea's heart to ache. There was so much hope and, well, desperation in just those two words. Alethea nodded and tightened her gripped ever so slightly on her octogenarian's hand.
"You said your husband, Nathan, passed on about a year ago?" Joyce nodded and Alethea continued. "It's been very hard for you since then. You've been alone in this flat, where you used to know a lot of people but not any more. And with the building projects going on, the broken lift and your bad hip, you can't get out too much or go too far any more. Am I right, Joyce?"
Alethea had been listening to her as she chatted and had put the pieces together. Sadly, very sadly in fact, she had seen this before but even so, it was her natural instinct that had told her what was actually wrong. Those instincts were part of what made her such a good paramedic (and human being, but that was just was Natasha said, though only normally after she'd downed a few drinks).
"Nathan took care of me. We were married right after the war, you know." Joyce turned a picked up a photo frame of a young couple and handed it to Alethea.
Alethea looked down at the photo and quickly realised the woman was a smiling and much happier Joyce from years ago. She was dancing, held in the arms of a handsome, young soldier as he twirled her around the dance floor. Alethea assumed the man was Nathan.
"He proposed to me that night." Joyce's eyes were bright, even though there were still the remnants of tears in them.
"You make a striking couple," Alethea said and raised her head to smile at the woman next to her. "Joyce, I'm very sorry you're lonely now, really I am, and I want to help you."
"Oh, no dear, I'm just a silly old woman, really." Joyce waved her hand, dismissing the notion and took the photo frame back.
"No. No, I promise you you're not." Alethea wanted to do something here. Technically this wasn't in her job description and by now she really should have left and radioed dispatch that it was a false alarm and they weren't bringing a patient or an emergency in, but that wasn't the sort of person Alethea was, so instead she formed a plan inside her head. "Joyce, I'm going to talk to some people about getting you some company. I know you don't want to leave this place, so maybe you'd like someone to come around and visit you a couple of times a week, or perhaps go out to the shops with you? Things like that."
Joyce seemed to consider it for a moment. Alethea could practically see the internal battle she was having - torn between not wanting to be a burden to the younger generations but also so desperately wanting not to be forgotten about by them.
"It wouldn't be any trouble." Alethea offered and it seemed to do the trick in swaying Joyce's mind.
"Well, dear, that would be awfully nice. I do miss talking to people."
Alethea couldn't help the smile that was spreading on her face. It felt so good to be able to make a small difference.
Half an hour and several cups of tea later, Alethea and Robert were heading back to the ambulance. Robert didn't speak until they reached the bottom of the stairs.
"We could have been out of there in under five minutes."
Alethea sighed. It seemed she was going to be the one to let the new paramedic know a few world truths.
"Yes, we could have, Robert," she used his full name and made sure he was listening to her, "but listening to and helping that old lady is just as much a part of our job as any other call we may have gotten."
"But there was nothing wrong with her. She lied and wasted our time. We could have helped someone who actually needed our help."
Alethea stopped walking sharply. "She needed our help. Robert. Joyce, need our help."
"She was lonely. She wasn't having a heart attack."
"Maybe not," Alethea said slowly. "But does that mean we should have just left her?"
"Alethea, we're aren't social workers."
He said it like it was so simple. Alethea could feel the prickle of heat rising on the back of her neck, like it did every time she got angry. Alethea was a professional though and reigned in her anger.
"Is that the kind of paramedic you want to be? Strike that actually. Is that the kind of person you want to be? We are here, doing this job to serve those in need. Those in need, Robert. It seems like you didn't get the memo but each day isn't going to be sirens and emergencies. This job isn't all guts and glory, mate. Yes, there are times when a person's life is solely in your hands but there are far, far, far more times when the situation is just like Joyce's. It's actually not serious enough to warrant a paramedic, but a person is worried or lonely or scared and needs us - for whatever reason, they need us. And that's our job. To be there. And Robert, if you didn't know that or you don't like the reality of what this job actually entails, then I can safely say this job isn't for you."
Alethea hadn't known where she was going with what had turned into quite the speech, but she knew it had to be said. Robert didn't say anything and they continued on to the ambulance in silence. However, during the next call-outs they had that day, he certainly did try harder with their patients and that was something Alethea was glad about.
Natasha waved at Alethea as the ambulance she was in drove into the parking bay of the hospital. They were finishing their shift at the same time and she was just waiting for her to return from her last call-out which had been all the way across town at rush hour.
Natasha watched as Alethea and the new paramedic she had had to partner with a few weeks ago - she hadn't bothered to remember his name - went about unloading their ambulance and restocking the inventory for the next paramedics on shift. She didn't look around as Spencer, their supervisor for the past few years came to stand besides her. Both of them watch their mutual friend in silence.
"How's she doing?" the man besides her asked, his eyes still following Alethea.
"Marvellous. Bloody fantastic even. You wouldn't even know she'd been so ill."
Natasha didn't like to think how she'd very nearly lost her friend several months ago. She'd supported Alethea through the whole ordeal and her various surgeries and then her recovery. Though she hadn't told her best friend, she was both extremely proud and awed by Alethea's recovery and determination after everything she had been through.
"Hm, looking at her now you wouldn't even know she'd had a heart transplant at the beginning of the year."
'No, no indeed you wouldn't.' Natasha thought. Without seeing the long scar down the middle of her chest, a person wouldn't be any the wiser. Alethea was amazing, there was no doubt about it.
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