Red Wedding

I had just finished changing the blade on my exact-o knife yesterday when the knife slipped from my hand and landed on my thigh. Or rather, IN my thigh. Point down. Perhaps because the knife was so wonderfully sharp, it didn’t hurt at all- which made the profuse bleeding all the more shocking. For a few seconds, I fumbled around as rivers of red ran down my leg and a pool started to form on the floor before finally just using my hand to apply pressure as I hobbled to the bathroom for a towel, carefully avoiding the pristine sheets of vellum I had been cutting. Luckily, they remained unbloodied- but wedding DIYs are a dangerous game.

After an unsuccessful call, I hobbled BACK to the living room- which now resembled the set of True Blood- to Gchat Nick. As you can see, I implored him to “home hom.” That was the best I could do with one shaky hand, but he got the idea. I retreated back to the bathroom to await my fate, which was surely death.

Nick came through the door in a manner I can ONLY describe as “gangbusters.” He might have broken the sound barrier coming home, that’s how fricking fast he made it back. Immediately, he got to work, pulling Steri Strips, iodine, gauze, tape and coagulants from his backpack. “Does he carry this around with him all the time?” I wondered. Like a damn hero doctor, he cleaned and bandaged the cut. Even the nurse at urgent care (where I later went to get a tetanus shot and to assess how deep the cut went) commented on what a great job Nick did packing the wound. Just add “triage and emergency care” to his never-ending list of skills.

This, unfortunately, will not be the last time one of us is sick or injured. In fact, I suspect the future will hold many more scary and bloody events. But as I hobble around today, I can’t help but smile. I would have preferred to not have an exact-o plunge into my thigh, yes. But it also reminded me that I have a person who will speed home for me at the drop of a hat and will clean my bloody handprints from the floor. He’s the only person I need in my corner when the end of the world comes.