Chapter 3
1017 Words
"Oh, God, please help her!"
Loads of blood are gushing out of Thea's nose. She is having a seizure, and it stopped after seconds, but the nosebleed did not stop. Her clothes are already drenched with her blood, so are the stranger's clothes.
She is turning bluish-pale due to blood loss and lack of oxygen in her body. She stopped breathing when she fainted.
The man is still holding Thea gently in his arms, careful not to dislocate her head.
"She is bleeding nonstop! She might die! She is not breathing, too! We should do something to save her!" The old lady is crying out of worry about Thea's situation.
The man, still kneeling while he is holding Thea in his arms, did not respond. He froze and suddenly removed her right hand from supporting Thea's head and body, letting his muscular, well-built left hand do the job, and inserted his right hand in the pocket of his Levi's jeans and got a hold of two white handkerchiefs.
He wiped Thea's face and the sides of her nose that had semi-solidified blood which blocks her ability to breathe some air.
He continued to what he is doing, but somebody interrupted him.
"Are those handkerchiefs of yours even clean?" A cynical lady at the back asked him. She asked it in an offending tone; in a sarcastic way. Whispers can be heard.
"I am sure they are not. What can you expect, coming from inside a man's pocket? How audacious is he to use his filthy handkerchief near a woman's skin." Another old lady remarked, laughing.
He continued wiping Thea's face, gently, even if many people disagree with what he is doing. He did not answer the lady's query, nor respond to the other people's degrading remarks being thrown at him.
He then stopped what he is doing and threw the completely soiled handkerchief away in the direction of the onlookers who had the not-so-good attitude approach towards him. They ran a few meters away from him.
"You rascal! How dare you do that to us? We are older than you. Do you not know how to be respectful of your elders and ones of higher status than you?
The two old ladies stared at him, scrutinizing him from head to toe. They belittled him, deeply insulting his appearance.
"Look at how you dress, how you look. You look like a thug. If you did not help the lady, we will mistake you for being a thug. You even look like a scammer. Don't you know how to dress properly?"
The stranger bowed at the pale, thin unconscious Thea in his arms, and put his right palm in the center of her chest. He mildly pressed it.
The crowd was in awe, unbelieving of what they are seeing, and realized what is happening. They saw him as a bad man and protested. They threw stones and dirt at him.
"p*****t! He's got a fetish! Get away from her! Get your hands off her!"
Despite the countless protests of the crowd, he did not mind them, like he is not hearing or seeing anything, except Thea, the lady lying in front of him.
He then held his face high, closed his eyes, and breathed deeply. He then held his face down, near Thea's face.
He touched her lips.
With his lips.
The crowd fell silent again. They are speechless.
He tenderly parted her lips with his lips, blowing some air in them. After some seconds, he holds his face away from Thea's, lightly presses the center of her chest, and raises his head to inhale deeply some air again. He did it for more than a minute. He is doing some cardiopulmonary resuscitation to bring the lady back to life. He did fifty chest compressions on Thea.
Thea started to breathe again, though shallowly. Her nosebleed stopped also.
He then got his unopened cold bottled water from his bag, gripped it open, poured some cold water into the handkerchief, and squeezed the excess water out. She damped the wet handkerchief into Thea's face and neck, poured another glassful of cold water in the clean handkerchief, squeezed the cloth dripping with cold water some more and put it in her head. Thea quivered at the cold sensation in her forehead. She frowned a little.
"Are you a licensed first aider?" People asked him.
More and more onlookers are flooding the scene. The man finally shouted:
"Go away, you people! She needs more air! This is not a telenovela scene for you to feast your curious eyes upon! This is real life!"
Most of the people dispersed themselves, continued about with their chores like they did not care an ounce about what happened hours ago. They became apathetic.
An hour later, the sound of an ambulance can be heard, echoing throughout the scene. The ambulance stopped in front of the mall, where the scene occurred. Thea, the man, and the old lady are the only ones remaining present in the scene. The back of the ambulance opened and the responders of 911 came out of it. They rushed to where the patient is.
The stranger man handed Thea carefully to the hands of the responders, and they put her gently on the stretcher. He said some medical terms that the old lady did not understand. The man and the responders nodded at each other at times, as if agreeing with each other.
"Are you a certified medical first aider? Did you undergo the tedious national certification test? You did a great job like you are a doctor. The lady had only a few wounds, few scratches, and even if she fell to the ground, you caught hold of her just at the right time, so she did not have a serious head injury, a contusion.
"I am sorry, I am not a first aider. I just read a few medical textbooks I downloaded illegally from the internet, for I am fond of reading. It is my first time applying it, I mean my textbook knowledge in real life."
Who are you?
- Writer
