The Eye Magpie Tales#13

‘Eyes are the most precious things we have and yet some people don’t think to protect them,’ said the surgeon, as he got ready to demonstrate the technique.
Laura was standing the nearest of the two and the smell of the antiseptic he was using had started to make her feel quite queasy.
‘Pass me the scalpel nurse,’ and he held out his hand to receive the instrument.
She turned away as he made the cut and when she turned back, curiosity getting the better of her, she was surprised to see a watery bloody fluid leaking from where he had inserted the knife.
‘Dish please nurse.’ he said.
‘That’s right,’ he said as she held it out and he put the eye carefully into the sterile water which half covered it.
‘Now let’s see,’ he said as he looked into the opened covered box he had, ‘what would be the best colour match?’
Laura leaned over to see.
‘Yes I think this one,’ he said as he picked up a browny green coloured one, ‘this is perfect, what do you think Nurse?’

She watched fascinated as he carefully pushed the round glass eye into the empty socket, making sure it looked straight and matched the other one. Then closing the eyelid, he took a small strip of tape and placed it on the lid to keep it closed, then cleaned up the cheek with a gauze swab.

‘If only all dead people would donate their eyes, their corneas would give sight to so many people,’ he stated.
They stood back and watched as the mortuary attendant pushed the trolley back into the fridge. Then all three, the Doctor, and nurses left, he carrying the precious eye now covered with a cloth. ‘It will be put in cold storage until that young man with the injured eye is in theatre,’ he explained. Laura walked behind him and still marvelled at the miracle she was about to observe when the cornea was transplanted onto a living eye to give back the sight that had been lost.
‘Yes eyes are most precious,’ she thought, 'but they look horrible when out of the socket!'
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