Don’t get mad at me for speaking the truth! I’m right and you should hear it!

Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – New York City
Current Date: June 3, 2023

Character: Savannah Aeschimann
Race: Human
Age: 38
Current residence: New York City Ruins, New York
 

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I don’t know what to do with her. She’s in such a state of denial that I don’t know that there’s anything I can actually do about it all. Until she accepts that the truth that I’m telling her is, exactly that, the truth, she’ll go right back to her partner and in a week’s more, she’ll be back at my doorstep, wondering why he’s so rough with her but then thinking that it was probably her fault.

I hate people who gaslight others. I hate people who bully, hurt, or generally aren’t good to others. At times, they don’t fully seem to realize that they’re doing it, but at other times, it’s almost as though they revel in the fact that they can do this to someone. You’d think that whatever is going on through their minds is something along the lines of, ‘hey, awesome, I made myself feel great because I hurt that person!’, it makes me sick.

This woman’s current partner is somewhere in there, toeing that line just so well that I don’t think there’s anything even the security-and-safety folks could do anything about. That and the fact that she’s very intent on protecting them. Claiming falls down the stairs, clumsiness and tripping over her own feet and generally just about anything where she thinks she can explain away the new bruises she’s dealing with.

Because being clumsy, tripping over your own feet and stumbling down a short flight of stairs will result in a hand-shaped bruise around your wrist. I could maybe buy the partner reaching out and grasping at that wrist to prevent a fall, but this woman is so tiny that you wouldn’t need to be hanging on that hard or that tight to keep her from falling anywhere. No, those bruises don’t come from her being clumsy, not in the way she tells us.

I tried to gently get her to tell me more about the way her partner treated her when she was having her ‘clumsy episodes’, as she calls them. She instantly got defensive, told me that they were the sweetest person around, that they wouldn’t hurt a fly and, well I’m sure the picture is easy to get. I hadn’t pointed any fingers yet, I had just asked to know how their partners treated them during these episodes; all she could have told me is that they usually just worried and fretted and that maybe once all was said and done, they had a bit of a chuckle about it, but no.

So, when I told her I was worried that her partner might have been hurting her, the way she was coming in to get bruises, scratches and other things checked on almost weekly, she got mad. But you try to tell that kind of person not to get mad because you’re speaking something so close to the truth. They’ll refuse to hear it. One way or another, I try to help her whenever she comes to see me—her friend brought her to me the first time, stating that she thought it could do her some good to talk about everything—but I know for a fact that I won’t be able to get through to her.

I’m not a head-doc, mind you. I’m a nurse. There’s a world of things I can do, but I’m not a head-doc. I can’t do much other than the basic things, but I do try to get her to open up while I fix up the latest series of bruises, bumps, scratches, and cuts that she sports. It’s all I can really do.

My little ad on the billboard is still up and it’ll remain up. I do offer my help to women who are in bad relationships, but they have to understand that the help I offer is more physical than not. I’m all for listening and offering small bits of advice, but if you’re going to come to see me about a violent or otherwise abusive partner, I’ll take the steps necessary to get you out of that situation and then make sure you’re as physically healthy as I can get you to be. This is what my offer for help is about.

I did have one young man come to me a few months ago; I was surprised and a little baffled since my little offer stated that I was willing to mostly help women who were in dangerous situations because I figured that most men who were possibly in bad relationships might not have wanted a woman’s help in getting out—I know, it’s a generalization but I feel like it still possibly mostly true. There might be an exception or two but they’re rare.

This young man, though, had to be barely more than half my age, very early twenty if not younger. He looked so skittish that I couldn’t just turn him away. His partner at this point, a man with a temper, seemed to have been quite a bit out of control to the point where the young man in my office hadn’t even wanted to go back after our session. That day turned out longer than the rest since we had to find him a very, very safe spot for the upcoming while but it has been worth it.

Final Word Count: 885

If I wanted pity, I’d ask for it. I’m doing fine and all you’re doing is bringing everything back up.

 
Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – New York City
Characters: Savannah Aeschimann
Race: Human
Age: 36
Current residence: New York City Ruins, New York
Final Word Count: 750 words
 

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It might just be me; I mean, it probably is just me but listening to women gossip is just one of those things that I can’t wrap my mind around. Mere tells me that men gossip just as badly, and it makes me smile a little to know that much.

I’ve always been a pretty private woman and trying to escape the guy that landed me with Jayne didn’t help in the whole opening up to others deal. Not that I have any issues with the life I’ve had since I did start spending time at the retreat. There were ups and downs, but I think that even out there in the big bad world, there would have been ups and downs so I can’t complain.

All of this random bit of rambling because I recently offered my help to women that might need it. I know that men, just like women, can be in bad relationship situations but I also know that I’m not the only one to offer this type of help. I also can’t imagine that men currently in a bad relationship with other women would feel safe coming to a woman for help, you know?

Or maybe that’s just me.

Anyway. We have a small billboard with information on services others are offering and all and just, my name is on there. I’m not sure what led me into wanting to offer my help other than I guess I just wanted to be a little more useful than I’d been recently. Part of that billboard is in a bit of a nook; people really have to go looking at it to see what’s on there and that’s where my info is. In case, you know. Someone who doesn’t really need any help tends to not go into that spot. That’s how I figure it is, in any case.

I hadn’t really had any visitors up until that point, though a few days ago this pair of girls came to see me. They were teenagers as far as I could tell, maybe eighteen going on nineteen. It made me feel old though I know I’m not.

One of them was just sitting in the little waiting area there is that is set up in the quiet building where other health workers do their things. I have my own little room, but the waiting room is kind of a general area sort of thing for everyone.

I assume that the other girl at her side was possibly her friend, they looked nothing alike though I’m aware that certain sisters look nothing alike. Anyway. The one that was sitting down had her head in her hands and I could hear her sniffling roughly as she waited, and it was as I was stepping out that they started to half-argue. They were keeping mostly quiet but there was a couple across the room, possibly waiting to see someone else and the woman was whispering to her pair and that there is the gossip part that I hate. She kept on shooting the girls ugly looks as though they didn’t belong.

I stepped up to the pair as the crying one lashed out at her friend, telling her that if she’d wanted pity, she would have asked for it. She’d been doing fine before her friend had started to bring all the bad back up and she went on to say that she didn’t really want to be here and that her boyfriend was fine and just, the whole thing.

I let them have a few moments to maybe put themselves back together, so to speak. I did clear my throat when I was within reach, calling out the girl’s name and letting them gather their things. By that point, they both could have walked out. No one is forcing them to come into my little room to talk. I would have only had to make a note in the file I have to keep that yes, she came, but no, she didn’t stay around to talk.

At least, even the other couple had gone quiet, and the girl shot her friend an ugly look before turning to me and apologizing, stating she hadn’t meant to use up my time like this while someone else who really could have needed it could have come and just, it was clear she needed to talk to someone, but I wasn’t going to force her.

So, I let her walk out. I figure she’ll be back around.

Not that I believe you’d do such a thing, you wouldn’t happen to know anything about the broken window, right?

 
Timeline/World: Until Tomorrow – New York City
Characters: Savannah Aeschimann
Race: Human
Age: 35
Final Word Count: 664 words
 

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Kids will be kids, is what I believe the usual statement for this goes, but at the same time, ‘kids’ who like to throw around rocks and break what remaining windows, well, remain, seems to not be a thing that should be allowed. I can understand that kids will be kids but, at the same time, there are limits to what kids should be free to do without repercussion and I’m sure I can’t be the only one who thinks that way.

Though I suppose it might also have to do with how I was raised, but I know that the rest of the people I share this building with—people I trust in ways I know I might not have trusted much before—think similarly.

Thankfully, I guess, the broken window so happened to be on one of the apartments that couldn’t have been salvaged. It was locked and still is supposed to be locked and kept from use for anyone since the floor and walls were too messed up by the snow and the resulting greenery growth to be of use. Instead, it was turned into a sort of support room. The ceiling and walls were reinforced with beams and structures so that the apartment above it could be safe for use.

The thing is, though, is that its windows were still intact and we were trying to keep it that way so that any potentially roaming bugs wouldn’t be able to get in and wander through the building in any way. Now, with the window broken, we’ll have to board it up and while none of us are really that worried about aesthetics, this is also pretty frustrating.

Glass is a precious commodity. It’s not something that any one of us—in this hub—has managed to make. I don’t think anyone here has the necessary equipment or knowledge to make windows. Glass figurines, perhaps, with a lot of effort since I sort of half-recall reading something about the requirements for it, but full-on glass panes? I don’t think anyone has that knowledge anymore. I could be wrong but, at the same time, I just don’t know.

So when we heard the breaking of glass, just a day or so ago, most of us who were at home at that point were downstairs to figure out what was wrong. That particular sound is rare nowadays, as I said, windows are a precious commodity. There was a group of kids standing not far but they’re usually spending their time there. One of the kids actually lives in our building. I wasn’t the one to approach them; I probably would have wrung their necks.

It was Mere who stepped to them and stated that while he believed they wouldn’t do anything of the sorts, he asked them if they knew anything about the freshly broken window. Most of them looked almost instantly guilty while a few somehow managed to remain looking nonchalant.

We didn’t really find out which of them had thrown the first rock but we did manage to get out of them that they’d just wanted to have a place to call their own and this place was going to be perfect but with the door sealed and locked, which, according to them, was just plain stupid, they’d had to resort to finding other means of getting inside.

With a whole lot of frustrated sigh out of most of us, we got together, we managed to find timbers and other things because, let me tell you, perfect planks of wood in this day and time, they’re also a commodity, and we got not only the broken window boarded up but the rest of the windows around that particular unit. The teens were groaning and whining all through the fixing up process as they watched us from afar but that’s what it is going to be.

If they want a ‘place to call their own’, they can find something else.

It leads them inside.

 
Timeline/World: New York City – Surviving Earth
Characters: Savannah Aeschimann
Race: Human
Age: 34
Final Word Count: 557 words
 

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I’ve always been a little wary of most wild animals. I can’t really help it. I suppose it comes from the fact that when I was so much younger, my parents took us to this petting zoo of sorts and I was not only run over by a pig—another kid had come up with some food and clearly I was not interesting enough—but I was bitten by a goat while trying to feed it something with my hands wide open, palms offered.

Now, I’m aware that both of these events don’t prove anything beyond the fact that it just wasn’t my day but it left a mark, I must have been something like three or four. Probably even closer to three than four. I’m pretty sure I’d never really liked animals much at that point either because I just didn’t know them. We lived in the city and my parents were a little—okay, a lot—compulsive about their cleaning, so a dog or a cat, let alone a bird or say a hamster, were far out of the question.

So sure, yes, I was wary when, about a week ago, I was asked along with Mere to help with a group of people who’d been stuck in a cave for a few hours. As the story goes, somehow, an animal of sort found these people who’d been stuck following a cave in that had changed the layout of the cave and led them outside. I think the part of the story that doesn’t sit so well with me though I don’t have the details, is the one where supposedly they were already following that animal at the start. That thing was leading them into the cave. Not that caves have proved to be bad places before but they require caution.

There weren’t a lot of booboos to treat, not really. A few scratches, a few cuts, a whole lot of bruises. We did what we could and not a single one of them was considered in bad enough shape to warrant more than a nurse helping them so no doctors bothered following that particular outing. At least, no doctors for any physical wounds. I’m pretty sure Jayne had a field day talking to them about their day to make sure nothing was dislodged in the brain either.

I don’t think I would have given it much thought if the general story had been about just the animal—one of those new ones that have cropped up since our short-lived ice age—leading them out of the cave, but seeing as it has led them both inside and then back outside, I just don’t know what to think.

I believe I’m too old to honestly be able to learn to like animals much. Then again, they do say that thing about teaching an old dog new tricks or whatever that is. Except the fact that I wouldn’t like the idea of being compared to a dog, let alone an old one but beggars can’t be choosers, right? It’s just one of these things, I guess. There’s not much to be done about it and it’s not my job to judge other people for what they might or might not do, I’m just here to fix up mild physical issues as they arise.

Can we release this information?

Timeline/World: New York City – Surviving Earth
Characters: Savannah Aeschimann
Race: Human
Age: 33
Final Word Count: 581 words

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For as long as I’ve worked with medical professionals, I’ve always kept a closed-lip policy on the patient-professional secrecy. It’s just one of those things that seem the most important to me. I’ve lost track of how many people I’ve met, while in the field, who would blab about their patients while talking with friends or other people, though they would clam up around law folks because, oh no, talking about what goes on between me and my patient is strictly private and you’ll need the proper paperwork to see it! Jeez.

One of the last patients we’ve ever had before the resort mostly closed its door other than for particular clients that came highly recommended for Jayne’s care, was this odd couple. The woman was clearly delusional and her husband seemed to want to enable her at every turn. I have no idea why the pair were sent to us when it was clear it was just the woman who needed Jayne’s care.

Now and again, the husband would ask me if we could release the information from his wife’s file to him. I always gave him the same answer I gave everyone else but it confused me. Why did he want that information? He already spent all of his time with her; he knew how she was doing. The only information he didn’t have was of the time she spent in therapy sessions and those really were private. No one but Jayne was allowed to have that information; I wasn’t even privy to it, myself.

In the long run, it made me wonder if the husband wasn’t just trying to find something to work towards his divorce. I mean, he was the one with the money but who knew if they hadn’t signed whatever it was they did back then that would ensure she got half of everything. If he could prove to the court that she wasn’t of sane mind, would that be null? Would he keep all of his money? It likely was just one of those crazy ideas since they were transferred to another place a few weeks after their arrival but we never did give the man anything from within the files of his wife.

Every time he would ask me, I would be telling Jayne and he’d make note of it in the files. I don’t know what came of that and I never asked. Once the patients left the place, they were out of our hands and into the hands of wherever they were going. The only patient we still keep up with even now is the patient who was with us when the snow started falling.

Not that he gets ‘sessions’ often anymore if he does at all. I know he still talks to Jayne now and again but it’s not a common occurrence that I know of. Not that the whole thing is really done in any official way anymore. The world ending has certainly changed the way everything works. I never thought we’d survive but I’m glad I did. For a while, I think I was going to let myself fall into the pits of despair as far as all that snow was but it saved me from having to ever deal with my ex-husband again. Does that make me a bad person? Not that I care what you think.

I only truly care about what one particular person thinks of me and everyone else can get bent.