Free Forever Viper by Sammie J

going to be harder than we think. We walk up to the entrance of the hospital it looks like Fort Knox. It has doors that open when you walk up to them and you walk into some sort of lobby. You can see the reception part through the glass and the woman sitting at the desk stares back at us as Monica bangs on the glass. She shakes her head at us and points in our direction so I take a glance around and find an intercom with buttons to press and one button saying reception. I press the button and we watch as she picks up a phone and speaks into it and we hear her prim and proper English voice say, “Good afternoon, how may I help you?”
    Monica stands right in front of the intercom and bends so her mouth is near the speaker. “Good afternoon, we are hoping you can help us. My friend here has had a falling out with her family and she has been told that her brother is at this hospital. She didn’t even know he was ill, so it has come as a bit of a surprise. Can you please tell me if you have a Mr. Noah Blaise in your care?”
    I do feel bad that Monica has to lie and I get butterflies in my stomach at the thought of being caught out. Her stern voice comes back to us, “I’m sorry, I can’t give that sort of information out without any identification.”
    Monica bangs her head on the intercom out of frustration as she knows we don’t have any, “Can you please look at this photo and tell us if you recognize him.” Monica turns to me, “Peppa hold the photo up to the glass so she can see.”
    I do just that but the woman puts the phone down and turns her head away from us. Monica continues to press the button but we are ignored and when the security guys turn up, I pull a fuming Monica away.
    When she gets in the car she shows her annoyance by slamming her hands down on the steering wheel. “What is wrong with these people? It will take less than a minute to see if his name is in their database?”
    I remain quiet and I open the piece of paper in my hands and focus on the next address. A part of me thinks of giving up as I can see we will probably get the same reaction that we have just received from these places too. I glance over at Monica and I'm about to tell her we should go home when she says, “Right, we can’t let this deter us. Give me the address for the next one.” I don’t argue with her as she has that determined look on her face so I give her the address for the next location.
    We stand for a good ten minutes pressing the button at the next hospital but no one answered it. Once again Monica loses her temper. I will admit to getting agitated as it seemed everywhere we turn, we come up against a brick wall.
    When we get back into her car I turn to her and say, “We should head for home. This isn’t getting us anywhere and you’re about to blow.”
    She shakes her head, “One more ok? Let me look at that list to see which place is nearest from here.”
    I hand it over and it’s not long before we are on our way. This time there is no buzzer to be let in, we walk straight in and walk over to the receptionist. Monica doesn’t waste any time and once again I find myself surprised by her actions. She takes the photo of Noah from me and puts it down on the desk so the woman behind it can get a good look. Monica points to the photo, “This is Noah Blaise, he’s a good friend of mine and my friend here is his girlfriend. He was taken from our local hospital and we were told he has been transferred here. Would you mind telling us which room he is in so we can visit him please?” At least this time most of what comes out of her mouth is true.
    I notice the woman frown and then you see her put two and two together and I know we are in trouble when she says, “You are the second person to ask me about Mr. Blaise today. If I remember rightly, she said she was his sister. And you sound just like the woman I spoke to and you were very rude.”
    Monica slaps her hands down on the desk, “Look, it will take two