Out of Nowhere Read Online Free Page B

too.
    “James Larson!” a nurse called from the front of the room. A short man with crutches got up and followed her through the double doors.
    “This hurts the most,” the guy across from me said, lightly touching his scraped skin. The blood surrounding the abrasion had coagulated, but it still vaguely resembled raw hamburger. I felt woozy again, looking at it.
    “Don’t touch it,” I said firmly in what my friends called my Dr. Tate voice. “Bacteria.”
    “That pavement was dirtier than my hands,” he pointed out. “Look at the dirt and rocks in there.”
    My stomach lurched. Some doctor I’d make. “Still…the doctor needs to clean it with an antiseptic solution and then bandage it with sterile gauze to prevent infection.”
    He studied me with this wary expression, like he was wondering which mental institution I’d escaped from. “You look a little young to be a nurse.”
    “I’m not. I just…I like medical stuff.”
    “And serial killers.”
    “What?” I said, bewildered. He gestured to my true crime book. “Oh. Yeah. It’s my mother’s. There was nothing else to read.”
    Two more names were called. I peered at my watch; almost three. I wanted my granola bar, but I wasn’t about to eat in front of this boy. For one, his injuries weren’t exactly appetizing, and for another, it would be kind of awkward. I batted around the idea of going to the washroom and then sitting in another seat when I returned. Nah, too obvious. Besides, talking to him was distracting me from my itching.
    “Do you, um, live around here?” I asked, hoping he hadn’t heard my stomach growling.
    “Rocky Lake. But I come to Weldon a lot on weekends, for the skatepark.”
    I’d noticed the skatepark before, of course, but the idea of hurtling along hard surfaces on a small board always seemed sort of pointless to me, not to mention reckless. I didn’t even like bike-riding, especially with drivers like Eva on the roads.
    “I’ve lived here forever,” I said. “I think I’d go crazy in a rural place like Rocky Lake.”
    “It’s not so bad. You need a car to get anywhere though.”
    “I don’t drive.”
    “No?” He repositioned his arm again and his face turned pale. Maybe he was about to go into shock.
    “I can drive. I mean, I have my learner’s permit, but a lot of people don’t use cars in the city. It’s easier to walk or take the bus. Traffic, you know.” I figured if I kept talking I’d distract him from keeling over and bleeding out at my feet. Why in the hell hadn’t they called his name yet?
    “I’d die without my car,” he said, his voice suddenly strained. Beads of sweat formed on his forehead, mixing with the dried sweat from before.
    “You okay?” I asked, hovering at the edge of my seat. Another thing I didn’t handle well was puke, and I didn’t want to be anywhere near him if he was about to toss his cookies.
    “Yeah.” He breathed deep through his nose. “I’m okay. Just got a little dizzy there for a second. I haven’t had anything to eat or drink since this morning.”
    Of course! I should have known. He had all the symptoms…pale, sweaty, dizzy, shaky. “Hypoglycemia,” I explained. What a relief. This was something I could help fix. “Your blood sugar dropped, that’s all.”
    “My what, now?”
    I extracted a granola bar from my bag and held it out to him. “Here. Eat this. You’ll feel better.”
    He perked up at the sight of food, but seemed hesitant to take it from me. “No, it’s yours. You eat it.”
    “I have three of them. Look, I’ll even…” I rooted around in my bag again, coming up with a second granola bar. “I’ll eat one too.”
    “Okay.” He took the bar with his good hand and ripped open the package with his teeth.
    “Sorry. I should’ve opened it for you.”
    He didn’t answer because his mouth was full of granola. The entire bar disappeared in two bites. “Thanks,” he said once he’d swallowed. “I’m starting to feel better