Finding Safety • •

[gaia starling-everston]

When Gaia had time away from the hospital she tried to get some fresh air. The sterile walls of the ER departments had a scent that followed her home. She woke up smelling disinfectant from the night before, or feeling the powdery residue of latex gloves on her skin, even after she had showered and washed them. It was one of the less pleasing aspects of her job. However, it did make her more appreciative of the outdoors. People might not consider a built up city like New York a place to get fresh air when there was traffic on every street, and often a foul stench down by the warehouses. Still, Gaia loved it as much as she loved her hometown of Seaford, Delaware. The two homes were completely different, but they complemented different sides of the trauma surgeon’s bold personality. She had no plans to leave New York City though. She had strong foundations for her life there. Her career was booming, and she knew there was going to be a chance for promotion in the somewhat near future. She was still young in her profession, but she was good. She kept a calm head in what was a chaotic corner of the universe complete with races against the clock and sometimes blind starts to try and snatch someone back from the Grim Reaper’s grip. If there was such a being as a scythe wielding skeleton, Gaia suspected he would be having some words with her when her own time came. She couldn’t count how many hourglasses she had turned around in the final moments, choosing tricky manoeuvres and rarely done procedures to save a life.

She would never regret it though, even if her peers and superiors questioned it. A few times she had been called into an office about how she had chosen a far riskier operation than the norm – despite her way buying the person some more time on earth. Gaia wasn’t without her flaws. She had lost patients, too. She’d never forget those who had bled out on her table, or flatlined because their bodies just couldn’t take any more. She wouldn’t give up on them though. And she refused to be scared off by one thing because it hadn’t been able to save one person. She tried to appraise every patient when they came in, though she had little time and often had to make quick decisions about what came next if someone took a turn for the worse. She was a trauma specialist. She worked on those in fragile states, some with a tiny survival chance. She didn’t take those who wanted beautifying, or just needed a bone reset. Her patients were bloody, messy, and often held together with what EMT’s could do on the scene.

Getting away from all of that was what kept her sane. On a day where the skies were clear of rainclouds she found the parks of New York. Gaia might have been six months shy of celebrating her thirtieth birthday (hopefully somewhere that had good wine), but she was still strapping on a helmet and knee pads to take her skateboard for a run. Sadly, there was little by the way of BMX routes in the city, and she only had one day off before she was due back in work. It wasn’t enough for her to head out somewhere and really enjoy the bike she had in her apartment. So, the old skateboard that was worn and fixed up countless times would have to do her. She had her earbuds in, listening to her favourite playlist, as she pushed herself along, finding her centre when she needed it to keep her balance. It was all second nature by now for the surgeon. She was only pulled out of her little world when a child came running across the path trying to escape a bellowing parent that she swerved quickly to avoid them, and in doing so found herself colliding into the shoulder and chest of a man. Her board skidded from under her and stopped at the edge of the grass, but Gaia was quick to regain her footing and readjust the lopsided helmet on top of her short brown waves. “Sorry! Are you alright?” She asked, placing her hand on the arm of the man in case he was – like her – suddenly thrown from his own private world and left baffled by what had happened.

• • •

TAGGED! Lazarus Christian Park
WORDS! 743!
LYRICS! Safety - - - Fireflight
NOTES!