Read Commune of Women for Free Online Page B

Sophia says again, annoyed this time.
    Pearl advances, just to the right of the fat woman, extending the holder. Sophia gives her a real scowl this time. There’s no time to waste here.
    “The sugar, Pearl!”
    A look close to desperation clutches Pearl’s withered face into even deeper gouges and ravines. Then, in the voice of a terrified and ashamed child, she whispers, “Ye’ll have ta find it, yersef. I cain’t read.”
Ondine
    Ondine doesn’t know who this giantess is, but she’s absolutely awed by her composure. She seems to know just what to do.
    Some quality utterly lacking in Ondine – and in most women she knows – comes effortlessly to her. Ondine would have to call it command. She’s in command of herself, and not afraid to command the rest of them, either!
    As she watches her minister to the injured woman, Ondine sees no hesitation, no self-doubt, just the forward momentum of self-assuredness.
    She’s so fascinated by what she’s doing that it’s almost too late when Ondine looks at her assistant. This poor woman must be a hundred pounds overweight, and wearing a royal blue polyester suit so hideous that Ondine wouldn’t even use it as a Halloween costume. But she’s been hanging in there, right at the giantess’s shoulder.
    Right until she hands her the first sugar-dipped sponge, that is. When the giantess turns and shoves the sponge straight into the wound and blood spurts out and the patient shrieks, Ondine looks over just in time to see the fat woman swooning. Her face has gone the color and waxy consistency of library paste, and she sits back on her big bottom with a plop.
    Ondine jumps up and dashes to her. “Are you okay? Can I help you?”
    The fat woman shakes her head and Ondine can see that if she opens her mouth to speak, she’ll vomit.
    “Here. Take my hand. I’ll help you up. You need to go to the bathroom and splash some cold water on your face. I’ll take over, here.”
    She’s dense as iron. It feels like it’ll take a fifty-ton crane to winch her up from the floor. But Pearl comes forward and hefts an elbow, and between them they get her up.
    The giantess seems oblivious to all of this. She’s reaching her hand over her shoulder, calling for another sponge. Ondine slips into the fat woman’s place, tears off a bit of sponge, dips it in water and then sugar before handing it to her. The transition is almost seamless.
    The big woman packs the entrance and exit wounds as deeply as possible with the little sponges, and then says, “I’ll need another of those clean rags in hot water.”
    As Ondine hands it to her, she says, “Thanks for taking over. I could tell that other one wasn’t up to it. Some people just can’t take the sight of blood.”
    “I’m glad I can help.”
    “Do you know what I’m doing?”
    “Well, my husband’s a doctor. My ex-husband. I know a little. You’re packing the wound. But I don’t know why you’re using the sugar. Won’t that cause sepsis? Isn’t it a medium for bacteria?”
    “No,” she says, wiping up around the wounds. “Just the opposite. Sugar’s an end product, metabolically. It’s clinically sterile and the body recognizes it as something of its own. It’s used as an emergency field dressing in combat zones.”
    She wipes the wounds clean again.
    “Are you a nurse?”
    “No.”
    “Then, how...”
    “Now, where’s that needle and thread? Can you thread it for me?”
    Ondine struggles just to break the thread off from the spool. It’s thick and brown and very tough. Without a word, the giantess whips her knife toward her, blade up. Ondine cuts the thread against it and threads the needle.
    Without hesitation, the giantess turns to the wound and runs the needle directly into the ragged skin. For an instant, Ondine feels light-headed. It’s the other woman’s voice that keeps her focused.
    “I’ve learned the proper suture stitches,” she says, matter-of-factly, “but I still prefer the buttonhole stitch.