The Rainbow Maker's Tale (20 page)

“You know a shoulder
dislocation can often be more easily reduced in the period of time
immediately following the injury when the muscles are not yet in
spasm.”

Cassie managed to sound like a
medical training guide as she dismissed my suggestions. I grimaced
with irritation. Just the idea that we would attempt to mend
something like a shoulder dislocation on our own was crazy! Surely,
Cassie knew she was being ridiculous?

Apparently not – she was still
talking.

“I’m pretty certain I know what
to look for, so if you check me over
and
we think it’s OK,
will you try?” Her final plea was undeniably hopeful. “
And
if I promise to go to The Clinic if it doesn’t work?”

I couldn’t believe I was
actually considering doing this – despite Cassie’s confident
sounding words, I was sure that under any other circumstances she
would not be considering letting me loose on her body with just a
few weeks of medical training.

I said nothing. Partly because
I was still considering whether I might actually do this. The other
part of me had gotten mildly distracted with the phrase
let
loose on her body
as it ran through my mind. I shook the
thought away – this was neither the time nor the place to be a
ridiculously stereotypical boy, was it?

“You’ll do it?”

Cassie pounced on my silence,
obviously assuming it meant I conceded. Apart from the medical
aspects, her plan made sense: we would get into a world of trouble
for endangering ourselves by coming here.
Was I really selfish
enough to put my secret life above Cassie’s well being?
I tried
to defend my actions by telling myself it was what she wanted, but
that felt like a lame excuse even as I thought it. I was not ready
to give up everything I’d worked for…
not even for her?

“As if you gave me any choice,”
I finally muttered, shaking my head in disgust with my own
self-interest.

“Great!” Cassie grinned – happy
with her victory – until the movement made her frown in pain.

If we were going to do this, we
should get started. It was probably too late for ground rules, but
it felt necessary. I nodded to confirm I was going to do as she
asked, clarifying: “but I’m doing this
only
if we’re sure
it’s a dislocation.”

Cassie nodded obediently.

“I can’t believe I’m actually
agreeing to this…” I shook my head – mainly at myself – once again
dismayed with what I had consented to try. It was more for my
benefit than hers.

“Ready?”

She nodded.

“Let’s see then, shall
we…?”

Cassie’s gaze rested heavily on
me as her eyes tracked my movements. I tried to ignore that and
focused on her injuries instead. It’s just another patient at The
Clinic, I told myself as I leaned over her body and let my hands
begin the examination.

Even though I was as gentle as
possible and didn’t move her arm, Cassie still flinched away as I
touched her shoulder. “Are you OK?” I froze immediately. The anger
I felt with myself leaked into my voice as I spoke. “I’m not going
to do it if you’re in this much pain.”

Cassie shook her head, cringing
once more as the movement affected her shoulder. “No it’s OK, I’m
fine.” She was not a good actress.

“You’re a liar,” I told her,
adding a silent
“just like me,”
before starting again. I
watched her face for a few seconds, searching for any sign that she
realised what a selfish monster I was. I found nothing in her eyes
but trust and that pained me more than anything. “I can’t hurt
you,” I whispered, not really knowing whether I was talking about
her arm or the numerous other things about me that I knew could
cause her harm.

“I’ll tell you if it’s too
much,” Cassie promised.

I could only nod in acceptance.
Deep down I wished that I could promise her the same thing, but I
knew I was just not that honest. Looking into her face gave me the
terrible feeling that if I continued along the path we had begun
together, I would only succeed in bringing Cassie more pain…
Steeling myself I refocused on the problem before me. This was not
the time or the place to get distracted by my own confusion: it
would not be helpful for either of us.

Moving as slowly as before, my
hands resumed their examination. After a few seconds Cassie’s eyes
closed – perhaps because of the pain – but with some relief I felt
her relax a little too. Being wholly professional, I tried not to
notice how much I liked the feel of her bare skin beneath my
fingers when I touched her.
I am a Medic, she is a patient
I
told myself over and over again as I worked, it distracted me a
little.

“It doesn’t feel like a
shoulder separation,” I told her, as I ran through the various
diagnostic indicators we’d been taught to look for in the Emergency
Medicine sessions. I ran my fingers around her shoulder. Her skin
and subcutaneous tissue yielded to the light pressure of my fingers
in all the wrong places: I could detect no connection at all
between the bone and socket. Despite my inexperience, I was
confident it felt like a complete dislocation.

“The humerus has definitely
lost contact with the scapula,” I told Cassie as I moved on from
her shoulder and began checking the bones in her lower arm. “There
don’t seem to be any obvious breaks…from the position of your arm,
it looks like a dislocation.”

Finished with my examination I
leaned back on my heels. When I touched her arm, I had felt her
flinch away from me. It was obvious she was trying to hide how much
pain she was in, so that I wouldn’t take her to The Clinic. She was
a stubborn girl.

“Definitely feels like the
humerus is sitting at the front of the shoulder blade.” I gave my
final diagnosis, watching her face carefully for any reaction.
Something that might make me do the right thing, perhaps?

“An anterior dislocation?”
Cassie clarified my words immediately, drawing the correct
terminology from our recent training.

I nodded, smiling. “I told you
that you were good at this.”

“So are you.” Cassie offered me
a small grin, before prompting me to get to work. “Now we know what
it is, we need to get it reduced then…”

“It seems straight-forward
enough…” although, my uncertainty as to whether I could actually do
this, was beginning to return. “But, if I get it wrong it could
lead to worse complications.”

“If that happens you can take
me to The Clinic,” Cassie promised. I felt her working to find my
eyes with her own; as if she somehow knew what kind of power they
held over me. Her gaze locked onto mine and I found her confidence
surging into me as she told me: “I won’t need that, you’ll get it
right.”

I nodded. Maybe I would get it
right.

“We need to get you stood up to
try this.” I worked hard to sound professional and capable. “Do you
feel OK to do that?”

“Can you give me a hand?” She
asked, by way of an answer to my question. Taking her left arm as
she offered it to me, I lifted her from the ground. Her body swayed
slightly once she was upright and I held on until she stopped
moving.

“I can’t believe you’re making
me do this,” I muttered to myself – talking to the selfish beast
inside me. I felt Cassie twitch and realised she must have thought
I was talking to her. Clearing my throat I addressed her now,
trying to cover for my misdirected accusation. “I’d at least feel a
little better if we had some pain relief for you.”

“Well, look at it this way: if
it hurts that much I’ll probably black out again anyway!”

Cassie was trying to joke with
me. Trying to make
me
feel better about what we were about
to do. I couldn’t have felt worse about how I was behaving. Even
though I thought I was falling in love with this girl, I was still
putting everything
I
wanted first. I was an idiot. I was
selfish. I wanted to keep my secrets.

“Let’s just do it,” Cassie
prompted, stirring me from my trance.

She was right. “Turn around,” I
said, helping her to spin into position in front of me. Our bodies
pressed close together, slightly out of line so that I stood behind
Cassie’s right shoulder – my chest and right arm able to move
comfortably around her injury. I tried to sound less brusque when I
spoke again, it wasn’t fair for me to sound angry with Cassie when
I was only disappointed with myself. “I’m not going to give you a
countdown I’m just going to do it, OK?” She merely nodded in
response.

In preparation, I gently
circled her right arm in front of her body, so that it sat across
her stomach to form a L-shape. Cassie didn’t resist my direction,
although I felt her tense as she registered the movement. Once in
position, I secured her arm in place, grasping her wrist in my left
hand.

At first as we stood there, I
could feel Cassie’s heart racing inside her chest. The light,
thrumming beat pumped through her back and into my body where I
held her close against me. I didn’t want her to be scared when I
tried to do this. For a while – long or short I don’t really know –
I just held her and waited. Finally, her heart rate slowed and her
breathing calmed. In a couple of breaths I synchronised my own
breathing with hers and on the fourth breath rotated her arm away
from her body, coaxing her shoulder back into the socket.

To Cassie it probably felt like
a single movement. Her body sagged forwards as the pain obviously
increased and I struggled to hold her fully upright with just my
left arm around her waist. But I was able to continue the circular
movements we had been shown and on the third rotation, I felt her
shoulder slide back into the joint.

On the verge of blacking out,
Cassie staggered into me. I pulled her arm back in front of her
body to rest, now it was reset, and tightened my grip around her
waist. Her knees buckled and we both sank to the ground. I did my
best to break her fall with my legs, whilst protecting her right
arm as we moved. It wasn’t a bad effort: we ended up in a neat
sitting position, with Cassie’s body wound inwards, wrapped inside
my arms.

“Shhhhhhhh,” I whispered into
her hair. “It’s done now. It’s over.” There was no answer, but I
wasn’t expecting one. Cassie’s eyes fluttered closed and I held
onto her as her breathing became less ragged, more peaceful. I
don’t think she felt it when I kissed her head.

While Cassie dozed, I let my
mind wander, freely enjoying how it felt to sit here with this
beautiful, albeit rather worse-for-wear, girl wrapped inside my
arms. There was something exhilarating in knowing that she felt
safe with me – ironic though that may be. I knew that in reality my
questions and mistrust of the SS Hope would endanger her if she got
drawn further into my life. But, earlier today and just now, she
had trusted me to help and protect her. Cassie had faith in
me
.

For me, a new bond had formed
between us: blossoming out of the nightmare we’d been through in
that short space of time. I was bound to Cassie now in a different
way than I had been. Something inside me wanted to stay this way
always: shielding Cassie from anything that could hurt her.

Was this love?

My feelings for Cassie were
beginning to overshadow everything else, including my desire to
escape the Family Quarter. When I thought about it now, I couldn’t
imagine going through with my plans – not if it meant leaving
without her.

I leaned my cheek against
Cassie’s forehead, blowing away a tiny blade of grass that had
attached itself to her eyelash. She barely moved, just lay in my
arms, peaceful it seemed. I sighed. How could I feel so attached to
someone I barely knew? I had existed on my own for so long –
wrapped up in my plans and theories – I had no idea that I could
feel the way I did right now. This wasn’t about research, or
knowledge, or even the lies anymore. It was about
us.
Well,
it was for me… But, if I laid bare all of my secrets, how would
Cassie react? Even though she trusted me, could I say the same
thing about her?

I didn’t shake my head. I
didn’t do anything, because I still had no answers. These questions
were too similar to the ones that had been chasing themselves
around my head, ever since I’d decided to follow my final path of
investigation, and spoken to Cassie after our exams. I searched for
something else to think about, an easy distraction from these
complicated questions that I had no idea how to solve.

Without intending to, I began
dissecting what had happened in the last twenty minutes. When I
thought back to Cassie falling, I found myself incredulous that I’d
had the strength to hold on to her, despite the genetic
enhancements I’d made. Holding her weight had pushed me way beyond
any of the tests I had put myself through. How far I might actually
be able to go…?

Wriggling my shoulders lightly
– so as not to disturb Cassie in my arms – I felt the unmistakable
ache of pulled muscles. As I adjusted, I felt the burning throb
further down my body: my neck, back and arms had all been pushed
hard, but was it to the limit of my capabilities…?

I could lift reasonably heavy
weights: I exercised in the fitness centre during my allotted
physical care sessions, just like everyone else, but the weights
there were limited for safety, of course. In Park 42, I’d been able
to fashion my own weights from the discarded stone resin that
decorated the landscape, and so I’d practised with much heavier
weights, both before and after my experiment with the gene therapy.
Cassie might be slim, but she was still a lot heavier than anything
I’d ever lifted before.

Could there be another key
factor at play, besides my training and experimentation? The only
answer I could come up with was adrenaline. I’d read about it, but
had never believed it was possible for a surge of chemicals in the
body to make such a difference. Fight or flight…life or death… It
had been one of those moments, hadn’t it?