1.
The day was slow at Ponyville Hospital. The ponies were being unusually healthy and no accidents had occurred during the fine spring day. With fewer patients most of the hospital staff was off-duty; the only ones there were mostly nurses taking care of check-ups and tending to older patients, most of which were to be released soon anyways.
One of these nurses was a white mare with a pink mane and a red cross with hearts for a cutie mark. Her pink mane was tied up in a bun to keep it out of the way as her light-blue eyes scanned over a clipboard at the edge of one of the patient’s beds. She looked at the clipboard with a smile and looked up to the patient, a light-blue stallion with a music note for a cutie mark looking at her questioningly.
“Alright, Mister Noteworthy,” she said in a kind, sweet voice. “Your vital signs are all normal and it seems any traces of the virus have left. You can follow me and we’ll go and get you checked out of here.”
The stallion smiled and got out of the bed, trotting down the hallway after the nurse. “Thank you so much, Miss Redheart,” Noteworthy said. “You even managed to get me better by next practice session, and Octavia won’t be mad at me! How can I repay you?”
Nurse Redheart giggled. “Oh, it’s not a problem. It’s just my job. All you have to do is pay me for the time spent and we’ll have you on your way.”
Noteworthy followed Nurse Redheart down the stairs and to the main desk, where she had him fill out some paperwork for his release and filed a prescription for him before sending him off to get it filled. Once that was done, he headed back over to her desk with the medicine and Redheart ran up the charge for his hospital bill.
“Hey, you’re a pretty mare,” Noteworthy said to her as he counted out bits for payment. “I guess what they say about the nurses are true, then. Are you single?”
Redheart looked up at him questioningly. She took the bits from him. “Yes. Why?”
“Well, I was just wondering if you wanted to go out tonight and get ice cream from Sweetcream Scoop’s parlor.” A noticeable blush had appeared on the stallion’s cheeks and his face had turned into a sheepish grin.
Redheart smiled at him as she processed the payment. “I’m sorry, but I’m not interested,” she answered, keeping her light tone.
“What is it?” Noteworthy asked her. “Do you already have plans?” His smile faded. “…do you already have a date?”
Redheart shook her head and her own smile lessened. “No. I’m just not interested.”
Redheart finished the stallion’s payment and went to work filing away Noteworthy’s paperwork in his file and updated the computers with the same information, the smile she had put on vanishing from her face. She organized some records and checked the cash in the registers. She soon went back to her office and started working on some more paperwork, records to turn in to her superior that afternoon about patient progress and her own work schedule.
The sky outside went from bright blue to orange and even pink. Evening had come and Redheart was making her way to the staff lunchroom after making another round of the patients. She went to the refrigerator and pulled out a bottle of water and a daffodil and daisy sandwich, which she sat down at one of the nearby tables with. She started to unwrap the sandwich when her superior, a light brown unicorn stallion with a parted chocolate brown mane, entered the room.
“Evening, Doctor Stable,” Redheart acknowledged him dryly.
“Evening, Nurse Redheart,” the stallion said as he went and pulled out something from the fridge himself, what looked like a bowl of vegetable soup. “I saw that you managed to release the patient Noteworthy today. It certainly required some dedication to do so that fast.”
“It was nothing,” Redheart said dismissively. “Just a matter of finding the right medication. It’s strange that a case of the feather flu should have been found in an earth pony, but it wasn’t that hard to fix.”
“Yes…” Doctor Stable sat down at the table across from her and opened his soup, taking out a long spoon from one of the nearby drawers. “Look, Miss Redheart, your clinical procedures and attention to detail make you a valuable asset to our hospital. Vital, even, considering you are able to handle most patients with ease, confidence, and calmness some of the other staff don’t have, impressive work for someone so young.”
“You can’t freak out in this line of work,” Redheart answered him. “If you freak out the patient assumes you don’t know what you’re doing and begins to panic themselves. Calmness and confidence that you will heal them come first; whatever worries are left for behind closed doors.”
“Well, we’re behind closed doors now,” Doctor Stable answered her sternly, “and frankly I’m worried that your bedside manner is becoming… well, forgive the metaphor, but as cold and clean as the metal we use for our surgical equipment.”
Redheart stopped mid-bite. “I’m not sure what you mean.”
“Well, when you’re out in the rooms with the patients, you are very clean and practical, you do little more than what is necessary. However, lately you aren’t putting in any feeling into your work. You do care about patients and want them to feel better, but in the sense of that is your job and not another pony you are taking care of. You have been showing this distinct lack of personality more and more often the past few days, and I think I know what the reason is.”
Redheart looked at him as she set her sandwich back down, not bothering to take another bite.
“A mare your age usually has had one or two stallions in their life,” Doctor Stable said. “Some are even married. You… well, you’re married to your job. I don’t know how well you’ll be taking it, but I would like you to have a few days off to relax.”
Redheart glared at Doctor Stable. “And how long do you plan to have me away from my job?”
“Oh, just a week or so. That ought to give you enough time to get some fresh air outside of the hospital and some time to relax. Go out with some friends to the lake, get some sunshine. Or take a few hikes in the hills around town. Even better, do both. Heck, you could find that Noteworthy fellow and ask him to go with you.”
“Ha ha ha,” Redheart laughed sarcastically. “I’m guessing you saw that whole little conversation at the main desk.”
“Every second of it,” Doctor Stable said. “Oh, and you’ll be off early today, what with the few patients and nice weather we’ve been having. I’ll pay you full time for your work, but you can go ahead, pack up, and head home for the evening.” Doctor Stable finished his soup, rinsed out the dishes, and put them in a cupboard with his name on it. He turned back to Nurse Redheart with a smile on his face. “Enjoy your vacation,” he said, and walked out of the room.
Nurse Redheart couldn’t even complain. She rewrapped her sandwich, got her bag out of her own cupboard, packed up her bag and left the hospital for home.
Home was a small apartment in the center of town, close to the hospital but also close to the main marketplace where she did her shopping. Redheart unlocked the door and entered the apartment, sparsely furnished with a bed, a couch, a desk, a bookcase filled with her old textbooks and notebooks from nursing school.
Redheart went to the small kitchen and finished her sandwich, looking over the empty expanses of the apartment. It looked so bare, but that’s how she liked it. Clean. Simple. Organized. Just like her office at the hospital; the only change was a beige wall instead of white and simple lavender curtains in front of the windows.
Once Redheart had finished eating, she took out the pin holding her bun and let her mane down. She went to the bathroom and took a nice, cold shower to clean her off. Her soap was simple and plain, without scent and just enough to clean her whole body and keep her mane nice, clean, and not tangled. She finished and toweled off before going to her bedroom, depositing the pin in a little container with a bunch of other ones and took a brush to her mane. She gently brushed the mane until it was straight and flowing, then looked in the mirror and sighed.
Maybe I should have called Noteworthy, she said, considering I have a whole week with nothing to do. Ah, well. I can worry about it tomorrow. With that, she climbed into her bed, pulled the sheets until they were completely straight and without wrinkles, and fell asleep.