Bloody veins

She had small, narrow veins. It meant her blood took its sweet time travelling through her. That was probably the reason why her hands tingled when she was too excited or nervous. She could almost see the blood stuck in the shifts and corners of veins and arteries, pumping its way through slowly, without much success. She learned to calm herself down quickly since she was a teenager, with breathing exercises from the internet. Without it, she thought, her veins would probably pop.

Still she wanted to donate blood. A friend’s mother had had an accident and she thought it was just a nice thing to do. But she didn’t expect to not be able to. By the time she reached the 15 minutes they let you stay in that chair, the bag was barely half way.

‘Can’t I just stay and wait until it fills up?’

‘I’m sorry sweetie, we can’t let you stay there for more than 15 minutes, blood is a serious issue. Plus, people usually fill it in less than ten.’

‘But the nurse said if you don’t have a minimum it’ll go to waste, because of coagulation or something.’

‘I’m afraid that’s true, darling. I’m sorry. There’s nothing we can do.’

Then the nurse gently slided the huge needle out of her tiny vein. The feeling was the inside-out version of taking off a shoe that was one number too small.

Her head went on and on. ‘Fifteen minutes and not half a liter of blood. What does that mean? How do I work? Is this normal? How am I even alive?’

The cold sweat of low blood pressure poured down her back. The nurse took her to sit in a waiting room and gave her water. She closed her eyes and sat there, breathing.

She only opened her eyes again when her friend touched her shoulder with a very worried face. It was dark outside.

‘What are you doing here? Are you ok? You had us worried sick.’

‘What, why? I came to donate blood for Anna’s mom and my pressure dropped. How long was I out for?’

She looked at the nurses, different ones. Actually, nobody in the room was the same.

She grabbed her phone. Out of battery.

Her friend was not worried anymore. Her face had been steadily transitioning to anger for the past few minutes.

‘Excuse me, nurse. My friend sat here for the last three days and nobody checked on her. What’s the matter with you? This is a hospital, you’re supposed to look after people.’

The nurse answered in a bored yet attentive hurry.

‘I’m very sorry Miss, this is an emergency hospital, and a public one. We’re way over our capacity and we need to make choices. I hope you understand, we really can’t afford to focus on someone who’s not bleeding.’