#rip in piss you poor soul taking all that fucking lithium

[hartrathaway]

bipolar tiktok reminded me that when you’re bipolar everything is a symptom.  everything.

[writingandchocolatemilk]

A Vampire

Anonymous said: I love your spamano so freaking much 💖pls do more when you can!

obligatory “this is my line of work” fanfiction

On AO3. On FFn.

Lovino Vargas didn't fuck around. Lovino Vargas was the man you called in when you wanted shit done. Lovino Vargas didn't miss veins.

Lovino Vargas walked into room 321 and didn't expect much.

The patient was sleeping because it was ass-early o'clock. Lovino knocked on the door and placed his box on the soiled linens bin.

"Good morning," he said, already throwing open his box and ripping a piece of tape off. "I'm Lovino, from the lab. Your doctor has ordered some lab tests this morning."

The patient—the lab slip said Fernandez, Antonio—groggily opened his eyes. "Oh, hello."

"Good morning," Lovino repeated.

Fernandez had been admitted yesterday for pain in the left arm and lightheadedness. Lovino was under the impression that anyone who came in during the summer with lightheadedness was an idiot who didn't drink enough fluids, but what did Lovino know, he wasn't a doctor.

The nurses had managed an IV in his foot, which didn't bode well for Lovino. They had managed a lithium heparin tube, green top, yesterday, so at least the doctors had something to go on. It was Lovino's job to get the lavender, blue, serum separator, and another green top tube this morning.

"Are you a nurse?" Fernandez asked.

"No, I'm a phlebotomist. I have to get some blood from you. Which arm do they usually have luck with?"

"Oh, they don't have luck."

Lovino, hands full with a tourniquet, needle, gauze, alcohol pad, and tubes, gestured vaguely at Fernandez's right arm. "I'm going to try this arm first."

Lovino threw his supplies down on the bed and lowered the guard rail.

Fernandez peered curiously down at the supplies. "I can't believe there's a job devoted to this alone."

"Believe it because it pays my bills. Tell me your name and birthday, please."

Fernandez complied as Lovino stretched the tourniquet taught and tied it tight around Fernandez's arm.

Lovino looked away and felt slowly, carefully, at the crux of Fernandez's elbow.

"How's it going?" Fernandez asked.

"Fine."

"You say that, but I don't think I believe you."

Lovino paused and felt carefully on the inside of the elbow. "It is my job. I think I'll be okay."

"Want to hear something funny?"

Lovino did not. "Sure." Lovino was trying to find a fucking vein.

"I stopped going to doctor's appointments because they would order lab work and then I'd have to go through this whole process like three times before someone could get me. Not three pokes, three different locations."

Lovino took the tourniquet off. "I'm going to switch arms."

Jesus Christ, Lovino had never felt an adult man with such piss-poor veins. There was nothing, just hard skin. Lovino switched arms and repeated the process with the left arm, twisting Fernandez's wrist this way and that, pointer finger slowly, slowly, trying to find a vein.

"What are you doing?" Fernandez asked as Lovino twisted his wrist again.

"Veins can be positional." Lovino could feel his face start to heat up as he twisted this way and that, nothing, nothing, nothing.

"Ah." Fernandez wiggled his fingers. "What does that mean?"

"Sometimes, when you twist the wrist, they can pop out."

Fernandez hummed. "So, my bones push my veins out?"

"Sure."

Lovino let out a deep sigh and undid the tourniquet. Clearly, nothing was to be found in the elbow, which was odd for a man. But Lovino Vargas got shit done, and he wasn't about to let one idiotic patient fuck with his track record.

"Hands." Lovino grabbed Fernandez's left hand.

"What did you say your name was, again?"

Lovino tied the tourniquet tight around the patient's forearm, and then moved his hand until it hung off the bed. "Lovino." Lovino flicked at his hand, eyes intent on finding the slightest rise of skin, slightest sign of something.

"Lovino. That's a fun name, it sounds Spanish, like mine. But I don't think you're Spanish, I think you're—"

"I'm going to ask you very nicely not to be racist."

Fernandez laughed.

Lovino flicked again around the man's thumb. "Make a slight fist for me. Nice and loose, nice and loose."

"Why are you hanging my hand off the bed?" The man wiggled his thumb under Lovino's fingers, which was about as helpful as Fernandez punching Lovino in the nose. "Does that help?"

"No."

Wait—yes—there. Lovino gripped the patient's hand hard. "Do not move."

Lovino rushed back to his box and quickly set up another needle, and then sat on the ground, eyes trained on where he had maybe felt a vein.

Fernandez watched Lovino like his hand wasn't going numb from the tourniquet, which Lovino could appreciate, anyways. Lovino was only supposed to leave the tourniquet on for sixty seconds, but he usually found the longer he left it on, the better veins appeared.

Plus, what patients didn't know didn't kill them.

Fernandez shifted. "Oh, I know what that one is. That's a butterfly needle, right? They use that for—ah, mierda! Ah, fuck, that hurt!"

Lovino ignored this, of course. He gave the usual, canned response: "Sorry, hands hurt a little worse than the elbow, but I'm more likely to get you here."

"A little worse?!"

The fucking vein wasn't coming to Lovino. He could feel it, but every time his needle came near, it rolled away. All Lovino could do was pull back, pin the vein down the best he could, and then advance the needle again.

"All this because I got light headed. My friend, Gilbert, is a hypochondriac. But, for me. Well, me and my friend. He's a big believer in a balanced diet and regular doctor check-ups, and so of course he calls an ambulance just because I had asthma, or something."

As Lovino had suspected—dehydration. Idiot.

"My father died of a heart attack. My poor mother—may she rest in peace—never was the same after."

Lovino's face was growing warming by the second the longer the vein wiggled away from him. Lovino fucking Vargas didn't miss veins, and he wasn't about to start with this fucker who wouldn't shut up. He flicked the spot above his needled, trying to pump the vein up.

"Makes sense," Lovino said absently, to fill the air, "we're doing a test to check on a heart enzyme. Troponin levels."

"Why does that make sense?"

There, a flash of blood in the needle. Lovino slowly moved his hand away and attached the first tube. "Do. Not. Move."

"Yes, sir. Why does that make sense?"

Lovino's eyes were fixed on the blood dripping into the tubes. Already, Fernandez's vein was blowing up, Lovino had clearly nicked it in his search or gone through the back, but Lovino didn't fucking care as long as that liquid red gold was flowing into his tube. "Why does what make sense?"

"The heart test."

"Heart enzyme test. If your father died from a heart attack, and you came in after passing out, they need to make sure your heart isn't, well, you know, susceptible to a heart attack." Lovino's eyes flicked over to the man's labels, checking his birthday printed there as he switched tubes. "Little young for heart problems, though."

Fernandez shifted above him, and Lovino sucked in air between his teeth sharply. The blood didn't stop flowing, thank the Holy Mother.

Fernandez said: "Well, you know what they say about old souls."

Lovino frowned. "No, I don't."

"I guess our hearts suck because our souls are so old."

Lovino heard the words. Took a second to process them as he switched to the final tube. And then Lovino laughed. Lovino actually laughed at this sentence this idiot who had passed out from dehydration said.

Lovino glanced up to find Fernandez smiling at him. It was the first time Lovino had looked at the guy's face; round with sunburn on the cheeks, white, nice teeth, green eyes. Lovino averted his eyes quickly.

He held gauze over the needle and withdrew, putting the safety on the needle with one hand. He pressed firmly against Fernandez's hand, trying to stop the bruising with pressure, but Lovino knew he had fucked that vein up. Hopefully, he wouldn't need any more blood work and it wouldn't be an issue until the idiot passed out again.

Lovino put a piece of tape over the bandage and stood, gathering the vials of blood. "Well, I'm all done. I just need to label these and I'll be out of your way."

Antonio smiled at him. "You aren't in my way at all.

Lovino nodded and threw the needle in the sharps container. He labeled the tubes with Fernandez's stickers. "Hopefully I won't have to see you again."

Antonio laughed. "Hopefully not! I'm hoping they let me go before tomorrow night, I want to catch the soccer game."

Lovino nodded. "Feel better."

"Bye, Lovino."

…

While Lovino fucking Vargas didn't miss veins, other phlebotomists weren't as fucking awesome. Lovino walked into 321 and threw his box once again on the linens bin.

"Good morning."

"Lovino!"

Lovino glanced over. Antonio grinned at him like the stupid syncope bitch he was and waved. "It's so good to see you again! I have had one very, very, very rough night. They kept coming in every six hours to take blood, and I had to have a CT scan and then I had to talk to this cardiologist and he was talking about putting in a pace maker like I'm some sort of old man."

It was illegal for Lovino to ask any follow-up questions to this stream of information that was shoved upon him so rudely at six in the morning. Lovino opened his mouth to tell Antonio as much when he caught sight of his arms.

"Jesus, Mary, and Joseph what did they do to you?"

Lovino marched over and grabbed ahold of Antonio's hand, twisting it this way and that. The poor idiot's arms were covered in bruises, not only in the crux of the elbow—phlebotomists' preferred spot—but all down his forearms, and his hands were utterly unusable now, black and blue as they were.

Antonio let him look with a sort of bemused, helpless expression on his face, like he had been caught out in the rain. "I told them to go where you went yesterday but they said they didn't feel anything. But they tried to put a new IV in, too, I think a couple of times."

Lovino let Antonio's arm go. "A rough night? It looks like you were—" Lovino clipped out the swear word, "—brawling all night."

Antonio let his head loll back onto the pillow. He was wilting like a flower indoors, and for the first time, Lovino wondered if this idiot might actually be sick.

But. Lovino wasn't a fucking doctor. That was none of his business. His business involved finding a vein in the train wreck of this man's arms. Still, it was irritating none of these fuckers could do their job, and that Lovino had returned after one night to find Antonio in such a state.

"Lucky for you," Lovino said, turning to gather the tubes and needle, "I don't miss. I'm going to get every color tube on you so they can't piss and moan and add more tests on later."

Lovino came over and tied the tourniquet tight on Antonio's arm, near the armpit.

Antonio watched him, work; Lovino could feel his eyes on his hands.

Lovino carefully felt around Antonio's bicep, praying that he was no one had bothered to try this high yet. Only IVs and desperation lurked anywhere above the elbow.

"Do you like this work?"

Lovino shrugged one shoulder as he worked. "It's alright. It's challenging, and every day is different, but it can get very… repetitive, after a while. Once you get good, anyways. And then a lot of it is chasing after doctors and telling them they ordered tests at the wrong time, and patients being grouchy. It gets f—irritating."

Lovino paused, poking and judging a superficial vein. Privately, and Lovino would never admit this even if someone was stabbing hot pokers into his eyes, he admired Antonio's muscles. They weren't huge, by any means, but—

"So, lobotomy isn't you career?"

Lovino's mouth threatened to twitch into a smile. "Phlebotomy. No, I don't think so. I'm actually trying to get into medical school."

He felt Antonio move with surprise under his fingers. "Really? Dr. Lovino?"

"Vargas. Dr. Vargas."

"What would you be? Would you be a heart doctor?"

"Don't move."

Lovino carefully pulled the skin taught and weaved the needle underneath the skin, eyes trained on the vein he was going for. It was close to the surface of the skin, and Lovino suddenly doubted it would hold under the invasion of the needle, but he got the flashback.

He popped the first tube on.

Lovino decided this next question would be neutral enough: "What about you? What do you do?"

"I'm a gardener."

Lovino tried to bite back a snort. "No offense, but how are you paying for this room?"

He glanced up to see Antonio smiling sheepishly at him. "Remember my friend I mentioned? The hypochondriac? Well, he's. Uh. Sort of paying for me."

"Some friend."

"Well, he can afford it. And I told him it's his fault to begin with I'm even here, stuck with all these medical bills, so it's the least he can do."

"Shit, my brother is in fancy art school and he pays dick-all for me."

Antonio leaned closer to Lovino, and Lovino was just about to snap for the idiot to sit back, did the fucker want to get stuck again, when he whispered: "Are you allowed to be swearing in front of me?"

Lovino was already opening his mouth to apologize because he was definitely going to get fired if he was caught swearing again, but he caught the mischief, the flicker of a smile, the inside joke suddenly hanging between them. And Lovino realized how close their faces were, and how weird it was he had a needle in Antonio's arm.

Lovino snapped the tourniquet off Antonio's arm. "I'm done," he said, loudly, like a fucking idiot.

Antonio leaned back and beamed at him. "You're the best phlebotomist ever."

Lovino wished that sentence didn't haunt him for the rest of the day.

…

Wh…

What the fuck?

Was someone calling him? Was someone calling Lovino on his fucking day off at fucking seven in the morning? On Sunday?

Lovino scrambled for his phone and answered. "What?"

"You need to come in."

"Like fuck I need to come in! I worked forty hours this week! I did my time!"

"It's a patient. We need you to draw him. He refuses to allow anyone to touch him, and he requested you by name, and the doctor needs the results."

Lovino glared at his phone. "Is it that fucking idiot Antonio?"

"No."

"It is him, isn't it?"

"Maybe."

"That mother fucker!"

…

Lovino threw his box into an empty chair. "How did you end up in the ICU? I honestly thought when I first saw you, you were just and idiot who passed out from heat stroke. And then you told me you were a farmer—"

"Gardener."

"—whatever, and then I really assumed you were an idiot who passed out from heat stroke. But now you're in the fucking ICU." Lovino shot a look at one of the nearby nurses. "And I'm allowed to swear, by the way, because I am technically not on the clock."

Antonio waved weakly from his bed. "It's good to see you again, Lovino."

"Yeah, I bet. You know what you need? You need a fucking port, because your veins are clearly shit and you're clearly actually sick. Ridiculous. What did they do to you?"

Lovino wondered faintly if Antonio had been put on blood thinners, because his arms looked even worse than when Lovino had seen him a few days. As he tied the tourniquet around Antonio's arm again and searched for another vein on the poor guy, Lovino rubbed his thumb gently against Antonio's skin.

A small comfort for Lovino, mainly. Antonio's arms were one giant bruise, dark purple and angry like storm clouds. And they were hard bruises, the kind that obstructed the bounce of veins from underneath Lovino's fingers.

Lovino let out an irritated sigh.

Antonio rolled his head to give Lovino a sad look. "I'm sorry I made them call you. I just… couldn't be poked again. Unless I knew they could get me, and only you can get me."

"Oh, stop moping. I'm here, aren't I? I'm not mad, you're fucking sick."

"You're going to be a good doctor."

Lovino rolled his eyes. "Thanks."

"No, seriously, Lovino, I mean it."

Lovino looked up from his search to find Antonio gazing at him with wonder in his eyes. Lovino away sharply, taking a calming breath. "Well, let's see if I can even find anything first, before you switch primary care doctors to my ass."

There, above where they had tried for an IV in the forearm. Lovino held his breath and put the needle in, eyes fixated on the spot where he had felt the vein winding, faintly, over Antonio's muscle.

But it wouldn't come.

Lovino could feel himself start to panic, his face start to heat up the longer the vein rolled away. Somewhere, deep down, he knew he hadn't gotten it. But he wasn't going to poke Antonio again, fuck that noise.

Lovino flicked around the tip of the needle, trying to make the vein rise up again. God, please, please not today, not with this patient, Lovino liked Antonio, he didn't want to have to poke him again, please, just come back.

"Oh, thank God," Lovino breathed as the needled showed a flash of blood into the tubing.

Antonio smiled gratefully at him. "Thank you."

"Do me a favor and tell your dickhead friend to never send you to this hospital again."

Antonio laughed. "Since it's your day off, will you stay and have lunch with me?"

"What?"

Antonio shrugged his free shoulder. "I mean, what, are you going to go to church?"

"Fuck you, maybe I was. Are you seriously asking me out on a date in the IC fucking U?"

"I think so?"

"Sorry, I don't go on dates with people who have shitty veins."

Antonio laughed again, and Lovino grinned like an idiot at the sound.