The clover romance colle.., p.61
The Clover Romance Collection, page 61
But being qualified in a moment like this is a sliding scale. He’s doing more than I know how to do. I’m no good to her at all. Terrified of needles, I could never pierce her arm the way he just did.
Useless. I’m useless.
“Is she dead?” I finally find the courage to ask the question that might kill me if the answer is yes. Maybe I’ll open this back door and jump into traffic.
“She’s a fighter,” Jordan says, squeezing my hand, tethering me to her. “She’s fighting.”
Chapter Three
Mike
“Come on with me,” Click says, gesturing toward the back office. He’s ushered all the other students and parents out and locked the front door.
“I’ve got that duct work to fix.” I grab the bag, the one I was holding before all this started, and I try to push past him.
“Come with me.” I’ve taken orders from Click before; I know what they sound like. This is an order.
I shrug and follow, though I’m not in the mood for a sermon or a therapy session. Today is screwed up, but so is my life. “You pay me to work. I’d like to get to it.”
He rounds the desk in the back office and pulls out a bottle of whisky. It’s a tall slender bottle and half empty already. “I’m not one to suggest that drinking is an answer to all our woes.”
“Yet you have an office bottle.”
“It’s in case of an emergency.”
“The emergency is over.”
“When’s the last time you did CPR on someone?” Click fills a paper cup and slides it over to me.
“Ten minutes ago.” I know what he’s asking, but I’m fine and laughing this off is the best thing I can do. The shit we’ve seen—it’s a swamp and only fools dive to the bottom. For some reason I feel like Click wants to yank me down there.
“Besides that. I’m guessing there was a hell of a lot more sand and sun and bullets the last time you did it.”
“Probably.” I take a quick swig of the whisky and let it burn its way down my throat. It’s got a medicine kind of smell, and I try to convince myself this is the perfect prescription. At least I still feel something.
“It’s gonna sneak up on you. You’re running on adrenaline now, but in a little bit it’ll hit you.” It’s still strange seeing him in civvies. Uniforms always suited Click and no one had theirs starched tighter than he did.
“I didn’t know that girl. I hope she pulls through, but I promise you my nightmares . . . they’re not going to be full of pictures of her. That slot’s already taken.” I push my cup over to him, and he refills it then downs his own first shot.
“I almost yelled medic,” Click admits sheepishly. “I’m so damn used to those folks coming in and doing their thing. I looked around, and it was us or nobody.”
“You did great.” I had medical training in the field and used it more than I wanted to. It still doesn’t prepare you. Nothing does. Not when it’s a kid.
“Rudy is a sweet girl, and her mama has been through hell. I hope they’re both all right.” Click drops his head into his hands and blows out like he’s filling a balloon. This drink in the back office isn’t for me.
I raise my glass to toast that sentiment before swallowing another mouthful. “I’d rather get to work than sit around here, waiting to fall apart about something. If my mind and hands are busy, well you know what they say, idle hands. You’ve got people to call, your sister and all, I’m sure.”
“Come over to my mama’s house for dinner tonight,” Click says, slapping a hand on his desk as though he’s just had a brilliant idea. “The whole family will be there.”
“Any of your sisters still single?” I raise a brow and flash my teeth.
“No. And even if they were—“
“I’ve got dinner plans already,” I laugh. “I was just screwing with you.” I stand up and reach for the door. “Click, if you hear anything about the girl, will you call me?”
“Sure.” Click tucks the bottle of booze away and picks up the desk phone to start dialing. The sense that I’m abandoning him melts away. He’s got a line a mile long of people who love him.
Chapter Four
Lu-Ella
She’s stable. I don’t know what that means, but it feels like Christmas morning and the moon landing wrapped into one. Exciting and joyful. I’ve asked a bunch of questions, but the nurses will only tell me a doctor will be in soon to tell me more. I’m trying to be patient, but the hours are piling up. I’ve seen every nurse twice. The one with the school secretary haircut and the perfume that assaults you like a jackhammer to the nose. A full, dark-skinned nurse with a heavy Spanish accent who flashed me the sweetest smile and patted Rudy’s damp hair affectionately. The male nurse who trotted in looking like he was late for football practice. But the doctors have been scarce. Skittering away, their white coats making them look like scared bunnies. That can’t be good.
I’m making a list in my head of who to thank and how. Tasks that can be crossed off make me feel better. I didn’t get much out of Mike during our brief meeting, but maybe he’d like some cookies. Rudy and I can bake them when she’s feeling better. We can write a nice note and drop them off.
Like I’ve conjured him from my thoughts, Mike stands in the doorway of the hospital room with a straggly bouquet of flowers. “I thought Jordan might still be here. I was going to give these to her to give to Rudy.”
“I told her to go on home,” I explain, making a move to stand, but he waves me down. Good. I’m too tired to stand.
“I won’t bother you. I didn’t think to put them in a vase or anything. I actually picked them on the side of the highway, that’s why they look so bad.” Mike looks ready to throw the flowers in the trash when I gesture for him to lay them on the shelf by the window. It’s sweet and the thoughtfulness is not lost on me.
“I appreciate it.” I smile. “I’ll grab one of those plastic water pitches they put the ice chips in and fill it up later.”
“That’s a good idea. I’ll get going.” Mike tucks his now-empty hands into his pockets and makes a move for the door. I imagine he’s skilled in all manner of things, but small talk must not be one of them.
“I was just thinking about you,” I stutter out like a fool, my mouth feeling stuffed with cotton. “What you did for Rudy today . . . I’ll never be able to thank you. I know I was yelling for you to stop and all, but I was so scared.”
“It’s normal. Trust me, I wasn’t going to stop. You were in shock.”
“Thank goodness you weren’t.” My eyes sting from the salt of my tears, and I gulp back the next round.
“Is she doing all right?” Mike gestures over to Rudy with his chin and looks her over. She’s pitiful right now. Tiny in the big bed. Attached to all sorts of medical stuff. The room is meant to be cheery. They do that in children’s hospitals. But no amount of sticky wall decals or bubbly words of encouragement can cover the pain that bleeds into this room. How much bad news has been gingerly given here to hopeful parents? How many last breaths? Cheery curtains can’t do much for that.
“I’m waiting for a doctor to come talk to me. They say she’s stable, and it’s the medicine making her sleep, but for some reason it’s taking a long time to find out what really happened. Every time a doctor goes by, they whisper something and keep going. Do you think that’s normal?”
“Not sure. Probably. This is a real good hospital. You can tell. Lots of rich people have wings named after them. That’s always a good sign.”
I crack a smile and think of what it must be like to have so much money you can pick something to put your name on. “When we get out of here, I’ll donate too. It won’t be much. Maybe I’ll get a brick or a light switch with my name on it.”
“Mrs. Annerton,” a voice calls from behind Mike, and he takes a big step forward to get out of the way like a dog is nipping at his heels.
“It’s Miss.” Maybe the correction doesn’t matter, but to me it’s always been important. I do this alone, and people need to know that.
“Sorry, I’m Doctor Linley. I’m an ICU physician at the hospital. The head of the cardiac unit.” He extends a hand to Mike who gives him a firm shake, though Mike looks like he wants to make a run for it. His highway flowers have been dropped off. He’s done what he came to do.
Dr. Linley is a lot like I would expect. With Rudy’s history we’ve seen a lot of doctors, and some things always ring true. The white lab coat. The stethoscope. A pinched look, as though their brains are full to the rafters with information, and it weighs on them.
His nose is pointy and his lips are thin, but he’s an otherwise fine enough looking man. Full head of hair, gray all the way up the temples. Smooth hands that look pristine, washed dozens of a times a day.
“I’m Mike. I just dropped off flowers.” He points to the blooms as though that’s some kind of proof of his agenda.
“He’s the man who did CPR on Rudy right away.” I beam as though we share a secret, a pact, even if there is nothing else between us. I feel bonded to him now that he’s saved Rudy’s life.
“Oh,” Dr. Linley lights up. “You did a great job. She’s very lucky you were there to help.”
“I should get going.”
“Uh, Mike,” I call out before he leaves, my chest tight with an anxiety I can’t place. She’s stable. Rudy will be fine. Yet some cloud, a dark thunderous mass, seems to have come with Dr. Linley into this room. “Jordan was going come back later and listen in on all the medical stuff. I’m so tired and sometimes having an extra set of ears helps. Do you mind?”
“No, I can do that, I guess.” Mike rounds behind us and plants himself next to the flowers, as he leans against the window frame.
Dr. Linley looks somber suddenly. “Today was very scary. Rudy’s body has been through something very traumatic.”
“But she’s stable,” I cut in, as if he maybe doesn’t have the latest information.
“She’s stable right now because of the medication we’re providing. But unfortunately, it’s not a long-term solution. Rudy suffered cardiac arrest today. One of the tests we preformed earlier was a heart catheterization.”
“That sounds serious.” I bite hard at the inside of my lip, trying to keep it from quivering. “A heart attack? She’s six years old.” My anger starts to boil over. They’ve mixed up the charts. What utter incompetence to come into my daughter’s room and not even know what he’s talking about.
“I see in her records she recently began taking a new medication.” He takes her chart and skims it for the information he’s looking for.
I run at full speed through her medical history. I’m a walking, talking chart when it comes to Rudy. “Something for a cold she couldn’t shake.”
“Pseudoephedrine.” He says the word with a hint of apology as though his medical degree made him somehow responsible for the medicine itself.
“Yes. She hasn’t been on it very long. The cough was just so persistent.” I ball my hand up in a fist and put it over my heart, feeling to see if I’m still alive.
“It seems as though she had a reaction to that medication. We can’t be positive as that reaction is very rare. But with her otherwise normal cardiac medical history and the recent introduction of pseudoephedrine, we believe that is what happened.”
“The cold medicine?” Again I’m angry for this man’s incompetence. I wonder for a moment if this is some kind of sick joke.
“Yes. There have been case reports of it causing coronary artery vasospasm, which if severe enough, leads to heart damage.”
I think about that day in the pediatrician’s office. A wave of unease had rocked me. “I told him I didn’t want that medicine. That’s what people use to make meth. I told him it was too strong, and he was adamant it was what she needed to get rid of the chest congestion and cold symptoms. It could have killed her.”
Watching a doctor fidget while explaining things is one of the most disheartening things I’ve experienced. The unease in Dr. Linley’s body is frightening me more than his words. “We don’t believe she had only the one heart attack. There is damage in several walls of the heart, so it looks like she’s had multiple attacks over the last week. Was she showing any signs of distress or pain?”
“Well,” I run my fingers over my scalp, trying to will my brain to kick into gear. Was my child having heart attacks and I didn’t notice? Is that even possible? “We aren’t together all the time. She goes to school two days a week for three hours a day.” I flash to the moments of the previous week where something was off. “She did seem to be having some pain in her chest. I thought it was from all the coughing. Like she had pulled a muscle or something. Are you saying she was having heart attacks, and I didn’t know it?”
“In a nonverbal child with her limitations, it would have been very difficult for even a trained medical professional to know that’s what she was experiencing. You can’t blame yourself.” His empathy barbs at me like a southern woman who’s blessing my heart. It feels cold and merely camouflage for a deeper message.
“I’m not blaming myself. I’m blaming that damn pediatrician. He’s lucky this turned out the way it did because I can tell you if it was any worse I’d be down there right—”
“Miss Annerton,” the doctor cuts in, “the situation is very severe. We can’t say for sure yet, but it looks like the damage done to Rudy’s heart is irreparable. Her heart is barely beating, and I’m worried it is past the point of possible recovery.”
The hospital floor crumbles under my feet and my faculties leave me. I reach out and clutch Rudy’s hand desperately wanting her to wake up and prove him wrong.
“What can we do?” Mike asks, taking a step forward. “A transplant?”
His words boom in my ears, but I’m glad he’s here. I’m too faint to know what to ask next. I don’t know how to process the information this doctor just wounded me with.
“Not an option in this case.” Dr. Linley puts the chart in his hand down on the small table in the corner of the room. “I’m very sorry.”
Tears well in my eyes as little whimpers escape. My shoulders stoop and I snatch up Rudy’s other tiny hand greedily. She’s mine. You can’t take her. Death can’t have her. She can’t die. “There must be some mistake. She’s stable.”
“I’m going to have one of our grief counselors come in to speak with you. Is there a member of the clergy I can invite as well? Once you’ve had some time I’ll come back and discuss any questions you might have. Know that right now she is not suffering or in any sort of pain. We’ll continue to manage that.”
I nod, whimper, and pull Rudy’s hands to my lips. Her heart is too broken to keep working. All we’ve been through, and some medication is what takes her from me. It’s vile. Cruel. Not a world I want to live in.
“Why not in this case?” Mike’s voice is brash and accusatory. I feel him looming next to me, but my eyes can’t focus on anything besides Rudy’s tiny chest rising and falling.
“Excuse me?” Dr. Linley has a hand on the door and barely turns around. His back is his attempt at punctuating this exchange.
Mike doesn’t seem deterred as he clears his throat in a gravelly way. “You said a transplant isn’t an option in this case. Why not?”
I’ve fallen under the ice and given up the attempt to smash my way back to the warmth. But his words spark something in me.
“There’s a process,” Dr. Linley explains, his eyes darting away. “A set of criteria that is met when a patient is placed on the donor list. Like I said, once you’ve had some time to process this, met with the counselor and your family, we can talk more. I have other patients I need to see.”
“What’s the criteria?” Mike has closed in on the doctor like an animal cornering prey.
“It’s complex. I’ve conferred with the transplant team and the decision-making committee. They have all the pertinent information and have decided Rudy isn’t a candidate for the organ donation list.”
“Why?” Mike tilts his head as though he’s confused. “How did they decide already? She’s only been here eight hours.”
“Sir, I understand how upsetting this is.” Dr. Linley purses his lips and pulls his thick brows together.
Mike puts up a hand to quiet him. “Can you tell me why they decided Rudy is not getting a heart? If the answer to that question is no, then find me the people who have that answer, and bring them here. Save your counselors and your priests, bring doctors.”
“I can ask the transplant team to write up their findings. That is within your rights.”
“Now?” Mike asks, his eyes wide with expectation.
“It’s late and—”
“Now,” Mike says simply, pushing past Dr. Linley and opening the door. He waits for the doctor to step out, barely giving him enough room to get by.
“I don’t understand,” I gasp wildly. “What’s happening?”
“I’m not sure,” Mike admits, pacing around.
“Why wouldn’t they give Rudy a transplant? Is it because of her autism? Because she doesn’t speak?”
“I don’t know.” Mike shakes his head and sighs.
“Can they do that?”
This time he offers a shrug. My anger is like an arrow quivering in its bow, ready to be released. He’s the only target around.
“Is there anything you do know?” I bark then cover my mouth.
“The only thing I know for sure is that I’m going to get you answers.”
Chapter Five
Mike
“I need you to come to the hospital,” I tell Click as he groggily answers the phone. It’s been a while since I’ve felt this way. My fingertips tingle until I ball my hands into fists. I want to punch something. A wall. A face. I don’t care. I can’t swallow the knot in my throat. The skin on my scalp burns with the rush of my quickly pulsing blood.
