This morning the UK Secretary of state for health Jeremy Hunt has stated that the Chancellor will not grant a pay rise for nursing staff unless the NHS becomes more productive.  It is unclear to me how the productivity of the NHS is linked to pay of nursing staff. As a response I am posting my short story, Late, which covers a few hours in the life of a newly qualified nurse on a coronary care unit. Late was  previously published in Bare Fiction magazine and highly commended in their 2015 Fiction prize.

LATE

I love you even though I have a blood bag in one hand and a drip stand in the other and I should be concentrating on explaining the need for a transfusion to my patient who tells me he didn’t understand a word the doctor said. I’ve got to check the details on the bag against his notes…