But stay awhile and then you'll see

2005-09-02 - 6:00 p.m.

There was a blood drive happening at my hospital today and I asked Lolo earlier this week if he would like to go donate with me. He told me he'd never donated blood before but he always thought he should so ok. So this was my hot date with Lolo today--giving blood. We decided to do it during his lunch break today, which was before my shift started, but I live so close I didn't have any issues coming in to do it on my off time. But that meant that I would be wearing street clothes. I'm such a dork, I went out this morning and bought a pair of jeans that fit me nicely just for the occasion.

So we met up and went inside without saying much more than hello. I got through the interview part much faster than he did (they skipped asking me the embarrassing questions for some reason) and was practically done giving blood before he'd even started. So I went and waited for him in the little recovery area. It took forever. Finally he came over to my area. He was looking really pale and he wouldn't look at me. At first I was a bit annoyed because I thought he was continuing the ignoring me thing which I saw no need for, but then he seemed to get paler and then he was hanging his head down and I was starting to get worried about him. One of the phlebotomist people came over and took him back to a bed and had him lay down again. They were busily applying ice packs to his forehead and taking his blood pressure and whatnot while he layed there with his eyes closed.

I totally didn't know what I should do. I mean, what role am I supposed to play? How caring am I allowed to be? I probably opted for not nearly caring enough, but I didn't want to cross any lines or embarrass him any more than necessary. The time rolled around when he was supposed to be back to work. His eyes were still closed so I touched his hand briefly and asked, "Would you like me to call and tell them you're going to be late?" He didn't say anything, but the phlebotomist said, "Yes, you'd better do that." I patted him on his leg and said, "I'm going to call them, ok?" He still didn't answer me but I got out my cell phone and called anyway.

Eventually the color came back to his face and he perked up quite a bit. It was sort of funny, when they let him go they "released" him to me. They actually took down my name and told me I was responsible for him. As we were walking back to the pharmacy I told him the story of how I passed out the first time I donated blood at a blood drive in my high school. I don't know if that made any difference, but at least he started talking to me after that. We discussed our plans for tomorrow. He's picking me up at 5 (!) tomorrow morning and we're going for a hike up near Mt. Baker if the weather holds out for us.

I hope he doesn't think I would think any less of him about this. Guys can be funny about that sort of thing. Of course I don't. I think he's awesome for agreeing to donate in the first place.

And oh man, I touched his hand. I just brushed the back of his hand with the back of my fingers, but...