© irene waters 2014
Working in a hospital that is being closed is not enjoyable. Bit by bit the life that fills the corridors and wards decreases. The demoralised staff, worry about their future, as the patients become smaller in number. The Intensive Care Unit is the first to have no patients. Routine surgery requiring intensive care ceases weeks before the closure. The ambulances are diverting traffic accidents and medical emergencies to other hospitals. Highly trained nurses sit and twiddle their thumbs. They aren’t used to such inactivity and are bored. Bored out of their minds. Their help is not required elsewhere as the wards too are winding down.
“Come on,” the two nurses begged Jake. “We’re bored. It’ll be fun.”
“Okay”. Reluctantly he submitted to their plan.
Lying on the trolley, wrapped in a shroud, he heard them make the intensive care unit look as though recent action had taken place. He heard the swing doors open.
“Can you take the patient to the morgue Nurse? We have a lot of work to do here.”
“Yes sister.”
Jake felt the trolley rolling. Hearing the lift doors open, he sat.
The nurse screamed.
Hours later, the morgue doors opened, the trolley rolled in. No longer would Jake sit.
I have pondered long and hard on this event. It was creepy and has spooked me ever since. Was there peace to be found inside that shroud?
In response to Charli’s prompt October 22, 2014 prompt: In 99 words (no more, no less) write a creepy story. It can be prompted by the green fog in the photo, an imaginative idea about the Beals or take place in a cemetery. If other creepy ideas take hold, go for it! We’ll all shudder and be in the mood for Halloween–or grateful for its passing.
Respond by October 28 to be included in the weekly compilation.
Reflections and Nightmares- Irene A Waters (writer and memoirist) 
Creepy, Irene. Very apropos of Halloween!
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Yes. Halloween is becoming big in Australia also but as I grew up without it I personally haven’t embraced it. The little kids will come and get their bags of lollies though.
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Abandoned places (hospitals would definitely be on the top of my list) are creepy to me. Anything set there would thoroughly do me in. I know this one was just closing but, still. Great flash.
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Thanks Sarah. Yes they are creepy. You have just reminded me of the malevolent ghost we had in the Thoracic Unit when I was doing my training.
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ACK!
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Oh, do tell us about that!
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This photo is very spooky. Empty buildings like this really do creep me out and your flash has given me much to ponder about Jake…getting shivers just thinking about it. In Salisbury there is a huge mental health hospital that has been boarded up and closed for many years. Whenever we drive by it I get the shivers, just imagining what it would be to walk around it alone at night. I torture myself with things like that! Great flash my friend, perfect for Halloween 🙂
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This place is going on my “things to do in England” list! But not alone! 🙂
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Yes there is nothing more spooky than huge empty buildings that are meant to be full. It’d be the same in your Salisbury institution. Sometimes those places are spooky when filled. There is one on the Hawkesbury River near Sydney and when you stop nearby you can hear the screams of the inmates. Really scary.
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Now that is really scary…
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Creepy INDEED ! – and all the better for being left to our imagination. Bravo, Irene !
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Thanks M-R.
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The photo is so empty that it oozes creepiness–it’s just not supposed to be that way! It must have felt depressing as everything came to a halt. And the perfect time for a little fun that can go wrong against the pranksters! Creepy is found in the unexpected!
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Very true Charli. I have never worked amongst such demoralized people as at that hospital
Empty is creepy. Some parts of hospitals are creepy of a night for that reason in day surgery areas and the like. You’re right – it is the unexpected that gives us the creeps.
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I worked on the nightshift in a London Hospital and there were some really strange noises going on. Spooky. 😀
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I know what you mean. Really Spooky. 🙂
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Ooo! A fab twist – made the hairs stand up on the back of my neck!
I used to get the eebeegeebies working late in an office. A near deserted hospital must be really creepy! And all those ghosts.. 👻
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Full of them but Mrs Green was the worst. Will write about her soon. 🙂
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