CHAPTER I: NEW YEAR, NEW FLO
Sounds of restless tapping of black leather shoes. A timeless cream uniform. Yet, the lack of a nameplate and worries over updates on her grades at the portal urged a young student nurse to visit the Health Sciences Library before her holidays officially began. Pages flipped, books scattered in disarray. Mumbles can be heard at a shelf far from the librarian’s counter. One, two, no, probably ten more books until she can find that antique book from the 70s that piqued her interest a couple of days ago due to its unique embellishments and case. Fringes from her affixed bun were slowly frizzing due to how tense she is in this so-called ‘mini journey’ of finding it. Hearsays about it mentioned of determining one’s fate through a rare encounter of it.
“Flo! What are you doing there?”, a young woman, dressed in the same outfit as her, called for her attention quietly. Unlike Flo, she does not feel any pressure.
“I need to know something- erm, also when did you get here, Hildy?”, Flo grimaced when her friend arrived. She couldn’t let her know she had a low grade on one of her courses. First year is a challenging part of the batch’s college experience. There’s a cutoff, of course. Having a grade so low would be embarrassing, surely, and to let anyone know that she nearly failed a clinical course would be even more- a wave of uncertainty crashed onto her, would she still be able to continue?
“Lost track of time, the moment I got back from the dorm, you weren’t on your usual spot”, Hildy responded. “Aren’t you headed back to your home place? It’s getting late, why not get a random book to read back home?”
Hildy boringly reached out for a book near the end of the shelf. “Maybe, you can get this,” Hildy continued and gave her a book that wasn’t embellished at all. Although the book’s hard spine, book cover, and card show how vintage it potentially was. Afraid that prolonging their stay there would lead to Hildy potentially asking more questions, Flo took it from her hands.
Dustiness added suspense as to what this book would unravel. Maybe, it’d be about her fate. Maybe and most likely, it’d be another general reference that other healthcare students borrowed back then.
~ o ~
It was nearly 12 noon. Year 2025. How fast did the night change? Bright and colorful fireworks, the noisy coin dropping, the sound of children cheering. The first New Year’s Eve of her college experience had come and gone, unnoticed. Now, she’s surprisingly a second year student of the same college. Flo had to process how she still made it to second year. It felt like the Health Science library search in first year was yesterday. With no schoolworks to give her the driving fuel, Flo lay down on her bed on New Year’s late morning. She realized overtime that nursing was not just a challenge- but an avalanche of the Swiss Alps and felt buried deep under the milk white snow. Her phone buzzed with greetings from her blockmates, some who had celebrated New Year abroad. She greeted all of them back, yet could not find the energy to continue any work.
With a sigh, she flipped through her textbook, her exhaustion blurring the words on the page. As she shifted to grab her notes, a folded piece of paper slipped from the book and fluttered to the ground.
Confused, Flo picked it up. It was yellowed and crumpled, as if it had been shoved into the book for ages. Unfolding it, she immediately recognized the handwriting—hers.
Dear Future Me,
Happy New Year! If you’re reading this, that means you’ve made it through your first semester of nursing school. I hope you haven’t forgotten why you started this journey. You wanted to help people, to make a difference. I know it’s hard, but remember that every late night, every test, every tear—it’s all worth it. Don’t let the bad days make you forget the dream you had when you wrote this. You’ve got this.
Love,
P.S. 2023
Flo blinked at the note, her heart aching at the words. She hadn't recalled writing it. All she remembered was placing notes of mnemonics in this thick reference book she borrowed in first year. When she felt her world was about to crash just by one course. Back when she thought she could handle anything this program threw at her.
She set the note on her desk and leaned back in her chair. Her mind wandered to the semester that had just ended. The first clinical rotation, where she’d spent fifteen minutes nervously fumbling with a bedpan. The clinical exam she barely passed by the skin of her teeth. The patient at the long-term care facility held her hand and said, “You’ll be a great nurse one day.” She thought about the nights she’d cried in frustration, convinced she wasn’t good enough, and the mornings she’d dragged herself to class despite barely sleeping.
She glanced at her phone, scrolling through photos from the past semester. There was the picture of her and her RLE group in their crisp new scrubs on the first day of clinicals, all smiling nervously. Another photo showed her curled up on her dorm bed, a half-empty coffee cup in hand, laughing at something her roommate had said. And then there was the picture of a patient’s thank-you note she’d saved, the shaky handwriting still burned in her memory: “Thank you for taking the time to listen. It meant more than you know.”
Flo’s chest tightened. She hadn’t thought about that in weeks. It was so easy to get lost in the grind, to focus on the next deadline, the next test, the next challenge. Somewhere along the way, she’d stopped remembering the moments that made it all worthwhile.
Hildy stumbled in her dorm, still in her pajamas upon arrival from Alabang. “Hey,” she said, her voice slurred with the excitement of the night. “You okay? What’re you doing sitting here?”
Flo smiled faintly, holding up the note. “Just… reminiscing.”
Her roommate plopped down on the bed, leaning over to read it. “Hey, this book seems familiar. Wasn’t this the boring reference book I gave you almost two years ago? Oh, cute, you wrote yourself a pep talk? Did it work?”
Flo laughed, wiping a tear from her cheek. “Yeah, I think it did.”
For the first time in months, Flo felt something she hadn’t in a while: hope. She carefully folded the note and placed it back in her textbook.
She gave herself a mental note to pass by the library and return the book to where it was back then. Maybe, another student needs a new year quote like this, she thought.
As the first rays of the New Year’s morning sunlight crept into her room, Flo finally crawled into bed. She didn’t know what the year would bring, but for the first time in a long time, she believed she could handle it.
As for the note of a peculiar book? No one really knows of its truest origins. However, its mysterious impact will be another story for another nurse in the making.
コメント