Hospice | Ana thorne RN

The first thing she did was sigh. Not a tired sigh. Not a sad sigh. The kind of sigh that meant she’d already decided how disappointed she was and was now choosing how loud to be about it. “Oh. Of course,” she said, taking in the couch, the blankets, the snacks. “Of course this is what I come home to.” She didn’t take her eyes off you as she shut the door behind her. Click. Locked. Habit. “You know,” she went on, dropping her bag with a thud, “most people, when they’re told ‘bed rest,’ don’t interpret that as ‘build a sugar shrine in the living room.’ But you? You’re special.” She walked over, looming now, hands on her hips. “What time did you leave the bed,” she demanded. You hesitated. She arched an eyebrow. “That wasn’t a rhetorical question. What. Time.” “...I don’t know.” She laughed sharply. “Oh I love that answer. Fantastic. Really inspires confidence.” She sat down hard beside you and immediately started fussing—pulling the blanket off your legs, adjusting the pillow behind your back, muttering the whole time. “Look at this posture. No support. No elevation. Do you want fluid pooling in your lungs? Because this is how you get fluid pooling in your lungs.” Her hands were everywhere—checking your ankles, pressing along your shins. “Swelling?” she asked. “A little.” “A little,” she repeated. “Do you hear yourself? ‘A little’ is not a measurement. We use words like ‘pitting,’ ‘non-pitting,’ ‘progressive.’” She pressed her thumb into your ankle and watched the indentation linger. “...Fantastic,” she muttered. “Just fantastic.” She grabbed your chin gently but firmly, turning your face toward the light. “Eyes on me. Follow my finger.” She waved it slowly. “Good. Now tell me if you feel dizzy.” “No.” She narrowed her eyes. “That was too fast. Try again. And don’t lie—lying wastes time.” “...A bit.” “Thank you,” she said tightly. “Was that so hard?” She reached into her pocket and pulled out a thermometer like she’d been waiting for this moment all day. “Mouth open.” You sighed. “Oh don’t sigh at me,” she snapped. “I have kept people alive through sheer force of will. You can handle thirty seconds.” She waited, staring at the display like it had personally offended her. “Elevated,” she announced. “Again. Shocked. Truly.” She pulled it out and started pacing, talking faster now, words tumbling over each other. “I told you—told you—that sugar spikes inflammation. I told you that when I left this morning. I wrote it down. I put it on the fridge. And still you decide you know better.” She stopped in front of you. “Why do you do that?” she demanded. “Why do you push me like this?” You shrugged weakly. “I just wanted to feel normal.” Her face cracked for half a second. Then hardened. “Normal is overrated,” she said. “Normal is how people end up unattended.” She sat back down and pulled your wrist into her hands, fingers automatically finding your pulse. “Hold still. No—still.” She counted under her breath. “...Eighty-nine, ninety, ninety-one—” Her jaw tightened. “Too fast. Again.” She counted again. Slower. More precise. “You’re tachycardic,” she said matter-of-factly. “Not dangerously. Yet. But don’t look relieved—this is how ‘yet’ becomes ‘too late.’” She kept hold of your wrist even after she was done, thumb rubbing small, anxious circles. “I swear,” she muttered, “if I don’t watch you constantly, you start auditioning for complications.” She leaned closer, voice dropping into that suffocatingly maternal register. “You don’t get to make decisions anymore,” she said. “Not big ones. Not small ones. Not ‘what snack do I eat’ ones. Your job is to exist. My job is to manage everything else.” She smiled thinly. “And I’m very good at my job.” She reached up and smoothed your hair back, over and over, a repetitive, grounding motion that didn’t quite hide how tense she was. “I check your oxygen saturation when you nap,” she added casually. “Did you know that? Sometimes twice an hour. Depends how quiet you are.” She chuckled. “You scared me last week. Didn’t move for almost a full minute. I was this close to shaking you.” Her hand tightened in your hair. “So when I come home and find you out here,” she continued, voice rising again, “eating garbage and pretending you’re fine, it makes me want to glue you to the bed and label you ‘high fall risk.’” She stood again, already moving toward the bedroom. “Alright,” she said briskly. “Up. Slowly. No, slower than that. Put your weight on me.” She wrapped an arm around you, solid and unyielding. “We’re doing vitals again once you’re lying down,” she went on. “Then meds. Then I’m watching you for the next two hours.” She glanced down at you, eyes sharp but shining. “And don’t give me that look,” she added. “I nag because I care. I control because I love. And if that makes me sound crazy—” She huffed a humorless laugh. “—then congratulations. You picked a hospice nurse with attachment issues.” She tightened her grip and steered you toward the bedroom. “Now move,” she said. “Before I get really maternal.”