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#4:

Although I wanted to change rooms, I couldn't, they were all full.

Even if I wanted a new roommate, I didn't have one, all the girls were terrified of my bedroom, none even deigned to enter, even my classmates waited for me at the door when we were to leave the dormitory building and head to the hospital.

Amalia's parents packed up all her things, only the standard dorm furniture, which of course is owned by the university, was left on her side of the room.

During day hour reality was more bearable, between classes, practices and seminars time flew by, but at night, loneliness was oppressive. Especially if you have experienced true horrors, like me…

Looking at the empty side of the room, the unmade bed, the bookshelf that was already beginning to grow cobwebs, the sinister locker, which door never seemed to close completely…yeah.

There was nothing strange about the fact that every time I presented myself to a night shift i got there with a raccoons´ face .

I had spent the night (like so many other times) tossing and turning in bed, fearing that Amalia's ghost would come out from under her bed and grab my ankles during the early hours of the morning.

"Bad night?" commented Lizet, one of my classmates.

"The worst." I replied in a growl.

´´ Have you considered taking sleeping pills? It could help you with insomnia.´´

I compressed my lips. The only thing that could have helped my insomnia would be changing rooms, but it was impossible.

´´I'll think about it.´´ I mumbled, while we joined the medical visit pass.

Duty went smoothly, until three in the morning a sixteen-year-old girl arrived with an acute abdominal condition. The surgeon indicated the corresponding emergency tests and woke me up from my calm and peaceful sleep, telling me with a smile that he needed my help.

I felt important, I felt remarkable.

Finally someone saw my qualities and highlighted them.

I went up to the operating room full of emotion, happy and proud of myself, the surgeon and two residents were waiting for me (a resident is a doctor who has already graduated and is studying to become a specialist), the professor smiled sweetly at me and asked me if I would be so kind as to go to the lab and bring them for the results of the patient's tests, they were still anesthetizing her so the operation would take a while.

Neither short nor lazy, I went downstairs (at that time the elevator never worked) and headed through the dark and gloomy hall in the direction of the laboratory, which, coincidentally, was right in front of the morgue.

I had at least four corners to go when I heard footsteps behind me. I turned and my life froze. Only fifty meters from me was someone standing. It was impossible for me to see his face because he was wearing a black coat with a hood that covered his entire face. At first I thought it was a patient who got lost or something, but then he raised his left hand, and the dim light in the hallway made the edge of a knife flash.

What is this, the first episode of hospital hell?! I thought.

In truth, I was about to scold the guy for his sick joke, but then I remembered that there was a murderer on the loose, I noticed that the knife edge was quite real, and I did what anyone would do in my place. I ran!

Terrified and blind, I fled. Like a soul carried by the devil, like a bat out of hell. I probably set a new record in the four hundred meters, even Usain Bolt did not run that fast.

I reached the door of the clinical laboratory and knocked desperately on the wood, not once or twice, but fifteen times.

The doors opened and despite the laboratory worker's protests I entered that shelter, which, although it reeked of disinfectant and biochemical reagents, offered me the only possible salvation, and I closed the door behind me.

''What the hell…? Are you nuts?!". Screamed the plump woman, flushing furiously.

I was shaking like a leaf in autumn, and also sweating cold. I don't know how I didn't faint, first from fright and then from relief.

"Hey, what do you think you're doing?" the lab tech asked, oblivious to my predicament.

"My...My roommate, she is...d...dead." I stammered. "She was murdered, and...someone's just..." I bit my lip to prevent it from shaking.

The laboratory worker opened her eyes so much that I thought they would pop out of her face. I swear she even turned pale.

"You mean…someone's attempted to …" she whispered.

“It was a man and he had a knife in his hand.

Neither short nor lazy, the woman filled with air, it seemed to me that she turned even redder, she took a few steps, grabbed a stick that was nearby and looked at me with a determined expression.

"I'm carrying this because I'm getting divorced," she explained to me, "my idiotic ex doesn't understand that it's wrong for him to be with me and two other girls at a time, he tried to scare me, but well..." she smiled mischievously.

I returned a weak smile. Suddenly, I remembered what I was coming for.

" Sorry I , hmm… came for the results of the patient with appendicitis' tests.

"They aren' t ready yet , it'll take another ten minutes. But, as soon as they're done , I'll escort you back to the operating room.

By now, you are surely are thinking…wow, two for the price of one! The murderer will surprise them through a dark corridor and leave an impressionistic painting with the blood, the guts and the heads of them both!

Eh no.

Carmen, that was the lab tech's name, she accompanied me back to the second floor and to the operating room with equal doses of fear and caution. Luckily, we didn't find the guy with the knife, the corridors were deserted and dark, just as if nothing had happened. I gave her a thousands thanks, for being such a very brave woman and she returned to her job.

In the end, the operation was carried out. It was the first time I've seen an appendectomy and I pray to God it's the last.

The surgeon made a small incision in the lower right region of the patient's abdomen, inserted his gloved hand into the girl's body, and pulled out her intestines from inside her.

He meticulously checked section by section of the digestive organ, until he found the appendix, blackened, inflamed and purulent, proceeding to stretch it out happily. He then inserted the girl's intestines back in and sutured the wound.

An hour earlier, I had been chased through half a hospital by a rabid would-be killer, and yet I found the appendicitis operation that much choking and scarier .

It was also very special, because I spent all the time the procedure lasted, holding on to the ceiling lamp, suspended from it like a spider monkey, because a screw had come loose and it was lighting crookedly.

What else can I say? I already said that I felt important, remarkable and proud of myself.

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