Emory Clinic; Atlanta, Georgia, 1964. Sunday Evening.
A needle. Tiny little metal pinprick, stabbing into flesh, breaking skin, digging down through tissue to find a warm vein. The opposite of a mosquito, the needle then injects instead of removes, drawing from the liquid inside the syringe to infiltrate the bloodstream, instead of taking out of it, although sometimes the mosquito leaves something behind. Itches. Bumps. Malaria.
The needle awakes dead nerves. She didn't even feel the prick, the plunge of the syringe, the injection of fluid. And then, all of a sudden, the feeling of everything roared in her ears and her arm flailed sharply, slapping the syringe away, pulling out blood that dripped down her arm as the neurologist shouted in surprise and the instrument skittered against the floor. "Jesus Christ, Adah!"
"Damn it!" she shouted back, cringing, trying not to whimper in pain as she cradled the arm, marveling at the blood as if, despite all her knowledge, she couldn't fathom that dead limbs could still bleed. Or move for that matter.
"You have to hold it still," the neurologist informed her.
"I know!" Adah informed him, just as quickly and as sharply. "How was I supposed to know that would happen? You're the neurologist here."
"I didn't expect for you to slap me."
"I didn't know I could!"
"Jesus!"
"It tingles," Adah noted, staring at her right arm. "It feels funny."
Carefully, the neurologist started to pry Adah's fingers away, starting to clean up the faint rivulets of blood. "I'm not sure if this is going to work," he admitted.
"It has to work."
"What would work is if you just went with the whole program, Adah. I don't like this localization; that goes against everything I want to be doing with you."
"I can't do that yet; you know that. I'm not going back to my old school in a wheelchair."
"But you're going to subject yourself to these half-assed ideas just so you can move your right arm? If you stick to the program, Adah, you might be able to move your whole body."
"But only before not being able to move any of it first," Adah grumbled. "Just the arm, that's all I need."
"...Why?"
"I need to be able to shake someone's hand."
The neurologist blinked, staring over at Adah, at the fingers that still cradled the arm after he'd tried peeling them away, at the pain dancing in her eyes that she wouldn't dare mention. And then he slowly shook his head. "Jesus Christ. You aren't kidding about that pride shit, are you?"
[[ Establishly! Although OOC comments or IC contacts to Georgia are more than welcome! Cut for length and because I know needles and medical crap squick me, so... ]]