#hand surgery

'W-what?'

'It's not a difficult question, is it? I saw you using both of them for different things and now I want to know which hand you write with.'

Instead of replying he could only stare at the knife in Domenic's hand, paralysed by fear.

'If you don't answer my question I'll cut off your thumbs – both of them.'

'No, p-please..,' he whimpered.

'Answer my question, then.'

'The... the l-left one...'

'Okay,' Domenic smiled viciously, 'I'll pierce through the other one then...'

'No, please don't, please, noooo!'

His pleas turned into a scream as the knife cut through the back of his hand, pinning it to the table. He couldn’t move since every tiny inch made the blade dig deeper into the flesh, sending a searing pain up his arm. His head started spinning when he saw a small puddle of blood extending from under his hand and he felt like he was about to faint. 

His vision blurred. He could hear people talking but he didn’t understand a single word of what they were saying, a high-pitched whistling noise in his ears drowning out all other sounds. He stared down at his hand but his eyes refused to focus, the outline of the knife stuck in his hand being the only thing he saw. Shouldn’t there be much more blood? His whole arm grew cold and numb, his heart was racing, sweat running down his forehead… and suddenly, a strange feeling of peace started to spread in his chest. 

I’m dying.

Maybe this had finally been too much to bear for his body. And maybe it was for the best. Nobody had been searching for him, so there wouldn’t be anyone missing him once he was dead. He wouldn’t have to wake up in Vincent’s house every morning, either chained to his captor’s bed or locked up in a dark and soundproof cell, panicking when he thought about what the next day might bring. No more worries. No more pain. Just… peace.

He felt someone’s hand closing around his wrist, pulling up the sleeve. A stitch, just like being stung by a bee… except that it had been a needle that pierced through his skin.

‘Whaaaa…’ he mumbled, trying to pull away, but only causing the blade to cut deeper into his palm. He forced his eyes shut. If he didn’t look at it, he could pretend it didn’t happen, like it had been after the accident. He had been through so much worse, so there was nothing to be scared of now, right? Wrong. Back then, he had been in hospital. People had taken care of him, had given him something to numb the pain, to make him feel better… now it was the other way round. No-one was taking care of him. Instead of being given medication to feel better, they were hurting him. Drugging him. Humiliating him. And now maybe even killing him. A stabbing pain shot up his arm when the knife was removed from his hand. Seeing it glide through his skin, the blood gushing out, he fainted.

*

‘What the fucking hell were you thinking?’ Vincent hissed at Domenic while Jonah was shoved into an examination room on a stretcher.

‘It’ll work out fine, just trust me for once, will you?’

‘It better does,’ he replied through clenched teeth while entering the room.

‘No, get him away from me!’ Jonah whined as soon as he recognised him, just waking from his dazed state and pulled away from the doctor who had been examining his hand, ‘He abducted me! And his friend did this to me! Please help me! Call the police!’

‘My lovely baby, why are you saying such nasty things?’

Vincent looked up at the baffled physician, tears welling up in his eyes while he rested his hand on Jonah’s shoulder in a firm grip.

‘You need to help him, he… he got himself injured because of… well..,’ the dark haired man whispered. ‘It’s the goddamn drugs again.’

He sniffed and turned away, sat down on a chair near the door and hid his face in his hands.

‘He promised me to stop taking this stuff…,’ he mumbled, shaking his head, ‘And now… What if I hadn’t found him in time?’

‘What? I didn’t! You have to believe me, he tricked me into coming with him and locked me up for… oh my God, I don’t even know how long I’ve been with him, please, you have to help me!’

‘See? He’s completely out of his mind, he doesn’t even remember what day it is and he believes I abducted him just because I tried to keep him away from his dealer… but obviously I didn’t succeed…’

‘He’s right.’

Domenic had appeared in the doorframe and looked from Vincent to Jonah and finally to the doctor.

‘I was there when his partner found him, he was sitting at a table and there was a knife sticking in his right hand, we called an ambulance but he ripped the knife out of his hand and ran away from us, so we decided to get him into the car as soon as possible and brought him here right away.’

‘They’re lying,’ Jonah sobbed, pointing at Domenic, ‘He did this to me!’

‘Only one way to find out the truth,’ the doctor declared, clearly sick of the whole discussion, ‘We’ll do a tox screen.’

*

‘You have tested positive for-’

‘No! I don’t take drugs, they injected something into my arm, just take a look! Please, you have to believe me!’

The doctor looked down at Jonah, his expression a mixture of pity and sternness.

‘Your hand - does it still hurt?’

‘Yes..,’ Jonah mumbled.

Crossing his arms in front of his chest, the older man kept staring at him; there was no more pity showing on his face anymore.

‘You’ve been given morphine after we finished surgery. In fact, you’ve been given a very high amount of morphine, similar to what we usually give to people who had an amputation. And you say it still hurts? This should have knocked you out for hours, but here you are, awake, talking - and complaining about the pain you feel…’

Jonah wanted to explain, wanted to tell him about the accident, about the pain medication he had been given back then, about his former addiction.... but the doctor didn’t look at him anymore. Instead, he walked over to the door, shaking hands with someone Jonah couldn’t see from where he was lying. But he didn’t need to see, because he would have recognised this voice among thousands.

‘Thank you, Dr Sheehy - I’ll take him home now. When are we supposed to return to remove the stitches?’

‘In 14 days. But you should make sure he’ll receive the right treatment for his… other problem too.’

‘I will. Thank you, doctor. Jonah, get up! We’re going home!’

***