No one had died. Dr. Angela Torrey stared at the reports on her desk. The hospital was at its lowest capacity in thirty years. Not only was no one dying, but no one was getting sick. No flu, no strep throat, no allergies. The whole city seemed to be in perfect health. She thought she should call someone, but what could she tell them. Dear WHO, "Everyone seems to be perfectly fine and not dead. I'm worried."
She shuffled through her papers and pulled out Mr. Tomlinson, a seventy four year old man with stage four pancreatic cancer. Complete remission. He should be bedridden, knocking on death's door, but she had seen him walking around the hospital laughing and sharing his war stories. They had only discharged the ones that were easily explained, but it was getting harder to keep healthy people in sickbed. Blood work on all the healthy individuals was normal. The only thing remarkable was how normal it was. She was angry at herself for wanting people to be sick, but it just wasn't natural.
Cloverdale had become a strange place. Everyone had noticed, but no one had said anything. Some people just seemed happy to smile and ignore whatever was going on. Others, if they were worried or outraged, kept quiet out of fear or wonderment or the simple inability to explain what was going on. No one had died. Not in months. No one had been born either, but that was less noticeable. In fact, Angela hadn't seen anyone under the age of 18 since it all started. If she put all her mind to it, she could accept that somewhere in the city, someone had to have children. But she never saw them. Playgrounds were bizarre relics from a past age. Most people just looked right through them. Angela had briefly considered the idea of mass hysteria or mass denial. She checked records for any large scale tragedy. Maybe a school burned or a virus wiped out a generation and rather than accept the facts, a whole town had chosen to believe it never happened. She found nothing. She found nothing three times, actually, because she kept losing track of her research.
If the lack of death and lack of children worried her, the sudden increase in beautiful people absolutely terrified her. She had been married for forty years before losing her husband at 64 to a heart attack. Even before then, she had lost interest in the other sex and decades before that she had lost interest in her own sex as well. But now, she couldn't walk to her car without a gruff chiseled jaw catching her attention. It was ridiculous for a woman her age to even think about it. She should be shocked and appalled at this generation of - there wasn't really any other word - sluts. These girls paraded around in barely any clothes, with bright cocksucker lipstick on and their ass cheeks hanging out. It was becoming common to see them grinding against each other in the darker street corners, young men with their hands groping up skirts of girls wearing no underwear. Angela thought that such lurid displays should disgust her or make her angry at the lack of morality, but it stirred feelings in her she thought she was no longer physically capable of experiencing.
She stacked her reports neatly on a corner of her desk. Her joints popped as she stood up and hobbled over to the door of her office. She picked up her coat and bag and flicked off the light, trying to put the inexplicable out of her mind. Instead, she focused on going home to her cats and a hot cup of tea. In the hallway, she passed one of the nurses. The young Hispanic lady wasn't wearing her normal scrubs, but instead a tight top which allowed full view of her cleavage.
"Young lady, why are you not in standard scrubs?" she asked.
The nurse batted her long eyelashes, "These are the new ones Mrs. Triplett picked out."
"Mrs. Triplett, huh? Well, I'll have a word with her about professional attire. In the meantime, get a sweater and put those things away. I know your patients probably appreciate having jugs in their face while you sponge them off, but we're running a hospital not a cat house." She waved her hand, and the nurse darted away. She shifted her bag on her arm and headed toward the head nurse's station to see what had gotten into Triplett's head.
Miranda Triplett had been at the hospital almost as long as Angela. The old nurse came from a different era. Back then, nursing was more about bullying patients than taking care of them. Miranda had distributed her philosophy to every other young nurse that came through her department. Angela had been friends with her for years. The woman was reliable and steadfast, and she'd lined up right behind Angela when the boy's club profession went after her. Maybe the old girl had finally given up the fight. Angela knocked and the familiar gruff voice beckoned her inside.
"Oh, Dr. Torrey, I wasn't expecting you. You're working late?" the lady said. The room was dim, lit only by a small desk lamp. Angela flicked on the fluorescent as she closed the door behind her.
"Miranda?" she exclaimed when the light hit her. The woman looked twenty years younger. Her hair was a deep brown, and her skin had smoothed. She still dressed as the frumpy old nurse, but she wore little ruby earrings. Her fingernails bore the same color. "You... uh... dyed your hair."
Miranda looked around not nervous, but uncomfortable, "Oh, yes, do you like it? I thought, why not? Those old grey hairs could use a little life in them. Now, uh, was there something I could help you with doctor? I have a nurse coming in for her evaluation in a little bit, but I'll be glad to help out with anything I can."
The older woman's appearance had startled her, but Angela regained her composure. "It's actually the nurses that I wanted to talk to you about, Miranda. I've been told that you're allowing a new variation of the scrubs, is that right?"
"Oh, yes. I thought it was high time we modernized a bit. I've been reading that bright colors help with the psychology of the patients."
"The color isn't what has me concerned. Some of the uniforms are very revealing. We have enough grabby patients as it is. The last thing we need is a harassment problem because our staff is wearing low cut, skin tight scrubs."
Miranda glanced at her clock. "I completely agree. And I'll tell you what happened. The sales rep kept going on and on about how loose clothing can get caught on things and cause so and so many accidents in hospitals a year. And I let him talk me into buying the standard smaller sizes, but then we get these skin tight numbers. Honestly makes me think that these young folk might be getting the better of me. I'm no happier about it than you, doctor, but until the next order comes in and we can rotate properly fitted ones in, there may be a few ill fitted nurses walking around."
"Yes, I passed on in the hall outside my office. I told her to get a sweater."
Miranda stood up. She had lost weight. "That's an excellent solution. I'll bring it up with the nurses tomorrow morning. That should solve the issue for the meantime. Now, if you'll excuse me, I need to prepare for this meeting."
"Oh, alright then. I'll see oh - excuse me." Angela had backed into a young man on her way out of the office. He was tall and very handsome. His eyes glittered at her, and he flashed a beautiful smile.
"That's quite alright," he crooned. "Miranda, I have your order." He held up a small silver case.
