Writing in Reverse

Karen Sanders woke up on Tuesday the 8^th of September. It was a bit later than she usually woke up, but she had work off that day. For the past few weeks, she’d had a terrible pain in her back, and had an appointment with her doctor to see what was wrong. She got out of bed, got dressed, then headed for the subway, because unfortunately, the hospital was across town.

After a fairly boring subway ride, she made her way to the hospital. Once inside, she went over to the front desk and checked in, then she noticed a woman that she thought looked an awful lot like her heading for the bathroom. Of course, it was early, and she was tired, so she assumed it was just her mind playing a trick on her. A few minutes later, a young looking nurse called her in, “Hello miss summers!” she said as she lead her down the hall. She looked down at her clipboard, and then said “Says here you’re here for your injection?” Karen sleepily nodded. The nurse led her into a room, sat her down and then left, saying “I’ll be back in just a sec with your injection.”

Karen sat there by herself in the room for awhile, still not quite sure what was going on. The nurse came back in with a rather large needle, saying “Ok miss summers, here is your Morphine.” As Karen saw the needle, she began to wonder what was going on, but it was too late. Just as she was about to say something, the nurse stuck the needle into her arm, and injected her with the morphine. All of a sudden, she completely forgot what she was going to say. “There you go miss summers!” the nurse said, “now let’s get you on your way home.” As they went back into the front office, they passed by the front desk, where the woman who looked an awful lot like Karen was having a heated conversation with a doctor and the receptionist, “I don’t have a back problem, just give me my morphine!” The nurse had overheard this, and suddenly had a look of terror come over her face. “Oh-my-god, Uh… You can find your way home, right miss summers?” she said as she rushed her out the door. “I am SOOO fired…”

This was a project from Government class where we picked a picture out of Bill Sullivan's Turnstile photography project, and write a short story about it. Bill Sullivan’s Turnstile Photography Project