Dead Still

by Barbara Ebel

  “We realized when we got engaged that we are both dealing with independent medical careers that we are committed to and need to work around.”

  “But your solo decision impedes our plans to even get started as a married couple,” she said, her voice rising as she gripped her hand in anger.

  “Yet two people can get married at any time … we could even do it tomorrow.” Regretting what he said, he backed up and sat down on the desk chair. The way this conversation was going, he wouldn’t want to marry her tomorrow let alone during the next week.

  “Are you for real? There’s more to this whole situation than you can wrap your head around,” she said and continued to stare at him.

  Robby finally lowered his eyes. “I’m sorry if I may have misled you about my career path or how it would ensnarl our plans.”

  “I’m going to go cool down and take a shower,” she said. After rummaging through her suitcase, she went into the bathroom and the water ran for at least ten minutes while Robby wondered what to do. Silence ensued until she came out dressed in lightweight pajamas. She marched over to the bed and picked up the food container.

  “This is what you can do with your marriage proposal,” she said, lifting the meal in the air over the garbage can. She let go and the white box thumped into the bottom of the can.

  -----

  By midnight, all the surgery students were in their bunk beds except for Ginny who was seeing a patient in the ER with Dr. Mack. That gave Annabel some relief because although the next admission was for her, the resident would be Brandy Wallace. Da’wan still had the table lamp on the low three-way bulb with his surgery book propped in his hands against his knees.

  “So, Annabel,” Bob said while turning on his side, “how did you score on the exam?”

  “You know we all passed,” she said, “so I’m keeping that old news to myself.”

  “It must be you who got by with that extra credit then,” he said.

  “Bob!” she yelled over to the other upper bunk.

  “I’m not being a smart aleck about it. Dr. Mack made a comment to Da’wan and me about the extra credit allowing a student to pass.”

  “I bet that he didn’t phrase it that kindly.”

  “See. You’re smarter than the score you got.”

  “I better pass the final with flying colors,” she said and laughed. “Who knows if Dr. Burk is going to be generous again and have the department plug in some extra credit?”

  Da’wan let his book slip down into his lap. “At the beginning of the rotation, he made a point of ten OR sayings and they only asked us for five during the mid-term. Seems to me they are going to finish up what they started.”

  Bob and Annabel looked at each other like they’d just won a trifecta. Da’wan shot a glance up at Annabel. “You’re not the only one to plug in the extra credit answers,” he said. “I listen to everything carefully and I’ve heard almost all of them.”

  “You can have my first-born if you tell me a new one from this week,” she said.

  “I’ll tell you if you don’t saddle me with your kid.”

  “Deal,” she said.

  “Dr. Mack reprimanded a scrub tech yesterday and said ‘I always do it this way!’ After he finished his temper tantrum, he said I could stick that one on my list and I could keep it to myself. That was while Dr. Burk was on the phone with the pathologist.”

  “Thanks for telling us,” Annabel said.

  “Why not? We should pool our resources for those.”

  Bob poked his head over to see Da’wan. “That Dr. Mack is such a nice guy. I can’t wait to grow up and be just like him.”

  After the three of them laughed, Da’wan turned off the light. Annabel picked up her phone lying next to the pillow and scrolled through her social app for new messages or guys who may be interested in her. The inbox of her messages had a new post so she opened it. It was from Mark, her hook-up from earlier in the week. In a friendly manner, he asked her if she’d like to link up again before he left town.

  How odd, she thought. She was interested in almost anonymous sex with him, not to date him. Her fingers scrolled across the alphabet as she considered her response.

  ‘Thanks. I think I’ll skip but have a great weekend. It was nice meeting you.’

  She pressed ‘send.’

  -----

  Although the atmosphere in the hotel room was cold as ice when Robby went to bed, he eventually went to sleep. Faye straddled the right side as far away from him as she could and, when he awoke, the freezing temperature between them hadn’t changed.

  He used the bathroom and threw on casual clothes. The situation posed a dilemma for him because their flights back to Cincinnati were the next day and they had planned this day to explore Tallahassee

  “I think I’m going to go get some fresh air,” he announced, picking up his wallet and rental car keys. Faye ignored him so he opened the door and left.

  He drove the route he had taken the night before and turned where he had seen a lake with a community walkway. Parking in a public gravel lot, Robby went inside a small coffee shop and ordered his morning brew. When he came out, he sat on a bench overlooking Lake Ella; the ducks and geese, and the walkers and runners passed him as if on a mission. Besides the peaceful location, the strong brew was just the way he liked it. But that’s where the pleasantries ended.

  This was the first clinical break he had taken for as long as he could remember and it had turned into a catastrophe. Maybe he was meant to stay single. Faye was obviously an independent woman but that did not mean he was supposed to give up his autonomy. Maybe two people who live by their own agenda shouldn’t marry to begin with, he thought.

  Robby took a sip and, as he watched a muddy turtle poke its head up from the dark water, he wondered about love. There was a saying he had heard someone recite in the recent past which now made one-hundred percent sense. ‘You’re madly in love one minute but the next minute you can’t even stand to be in the same room with each other.’

  He drank the last of the coffee, dwelling on the accuracy of the remark and then shuddered. Faye must be presently in the room throwing shade at him, he thought. It would be better to take a couple of long walks before reappearing at the hotel. Even if she doesn’t unleash some of her hostility, he would have gotten a decent break from her.

  He threw the paper cup in the city can and began walking the mile long circle. Thoughts of his Global M.D.’s position started coming to mind. But for some reason, even that didn’t seem right. What was it?

  It hit him like a brick and made his pulse quicken. He had just been served lawsuit papers from Mr. Simmons’ family and the allegations were extremely serious. A healthy middle-aged man ending up dead due to a non-life-threatening surgery? There would be a string of depositions, fact finding, interrogations, and motions with or without a trial. What if they put some kind of hold on him to prevent him leaving the country? Otherwise, how could the lawsuit proceed? His pace slowed down due to the heaviness of the possibilities and two runners admonished him for blocking the sidewalk.

  Robby repositioned himself to the side of the path. Spanish moss hung from majestic trees, in some places dangling close to the top of his head. He continued walking; what a beautiful way to spend a day in the Deep South … if only the hurdles of being a chief resident weren’t plaguing him.

  He finished one loop despite some brazen geese squawking at him and entered the small café again, this time for something cold. He also bought a biscotti and finished both on the outside patio where he savored the remaining minutes alone. Finally, he peeled himself away from the area and drove back to the hotel. He dreaded facing Faye again. What behavioral stance was she going to take with him? Where did they go from here on in with their relationship?

  When he opened the door to their room, she wasn’t there. Perhaps she was in the lobby or had walked to a local place for brunch but then he noticed her suitcase missing from the luggage stand. In front of the television,
she had left a note.

  “Robby,

  Rather than wait for tomorrow’s flight back to Cincinnati, I am taking a cab to the airport and will return home today. If there are any unresolved issues that we must discuss, I can talk to you in a week or two. However, let’s put our heated debates behind us, break our engagement, and go on with our lives without each other.

  All the best.

  Faye”

  Although her smooth departure wasn’t a total surprise, the magnitude of her response was. He sat on the edge of the bed. Well, he thought, its better they head off trouble now than pay to get unhitched later. He’d heard divorces for doctors could be nightmares. Strangely enough, he felt somewhat relieved.

  Robby put his head in his hands after looking over at the desk where the paperwork sat from Global M.D.s. Now the looming question was whether he could fulfill that job promise because of pending litigation.

  -----

  Annabel considered herself lucky to be home on Saturday before noon and to have escaped an admission in the middle of the night. She grabbed leftover jumbo shrimp from the refrigerator, tossed a salad, and sat at the kitchen counter with a surgery book on case examples. An hour later, she closed a chapter and rinsed her dishes. Changing her sheets and tackling a load of laundry was next but, as the washing machine spun noisily behind the paneled doors, she paced the tiled floor heavy in thought.

  Should she continue to stall telling her parents about her malignant melanoma diagnosis? Would they be angry at her for doing so? Perhaps she should go ahead and tell them now. Her father may be able to help her with supplemental information after her upcoming doctor’s appointment when she would learn more. There was no one in her life she could share this with; no one that would really care except for her own family and maybe David, her tried and true friend.

  Annabel picked up her cell phone and ignored a return message from Mark. What did he want again anyway? With a choice between calling the house or her mother or father, she decided to call her mother’s cell phone.

  “Hi, honey,” her mother said right away. “I’m getting my car serviced at the dealer’s. Can we talk later if everything is okay?”

  “Yes, Mom. Or I’ll call Dad.”

  “That’s fine. Talk to you later or your dad will fill me in.”

  She disconnected the call, took a deep breath, and called her father.

  “Hi Annabel,” Danny said when he picked up. “Good timing. I had an elective back surgery this morning but now I’m with your Uncle Casey at Serious Gyms.”

  “We can talk later if I’m interrupting you.”

  “No, right now is fine because we haven’t started working out yet. I’m telling Casey about this morning’s scary incident in the PACU.”

  “I’m learning that every day it’s something in medicine. Our own surgery and anesthesia departments are up in morbidity and mortality statistics for the last two months.”

  After telling Casey who he was talking to, he laughed. “You students don’t have anything to do with it, do you?”

  “I don’t think so, although there was a bring-back death that one of the residents tried to blame on me.”

  “That’s a serious accusation.”

  “It’s not true, Dad. Anyway, is your patient okay?”

  “Now he is. It’s a good thing I was with the anesthesiologist. I’ve never seen this occur before but she took full responsibility for it.”

  Danny nodded at Casey sitting across the small table. His friend listened intently as he slid on gloves for lifting weights.

  “The reason I ask is that I’ve befriended an anesthesia resident and we’ve been talking about some of our strange cases. I’m getting to learn a little about their pharmacology and plan on taking an elective with them.” She walked over and put a softener sheet into the dryer and said, “So what happened?”

  “I had no problems with the surgery and then the patient was extubated, awake, and ready for discharge in the PACU. I went back to check on him before leaving the hospital. Halfway through our conversation, a look of fear registered on his face, and he couldn’t breathe. The anesthesiologist reintubated him. I shudder to think what could have happened had he already gone to the surgery floor.”

  “Dad!” she exclaimed. “That’s crazy; it sounds like a carbon copy of one or more cases here. What did she say as far as an explanation?”

  “She thought it was due to residual muscle relaxant because she failed to give an adequate dose of reversal.”

  Annabel planted herself back on the kitchen stool, ran her fingers through her hair, and continued clutching the phone with her right hand. There it was again … the subject of muscle relaxants.

  “You are the best doctor I’ve ever met as far as getting to the bottom of things,” she said. “Would you mind asking her if she used an aminosteroid and which one?”

  “No problem.”

  Danny waved at Casey to start their routine without him but Casey stayed put and waited.

  Realizing she still had to tell her father the reason for her call, Annabel bit the inside of her lip and let a few seconds of silence pass. She felt the heaviness of her diagnosis now more than ever. It was time to tell him and Casey but she felt as if the whole world was listening.

  “Annabel, are you still there?”

  “Yes. It’s just that … I had this little spot on my arm that the dermatologist biopsied.”

  Danny shot his glance over at Casey and gripped his fist. “And they told you the results?”

  “Yes. It’s malignant melanoma.”

  Danny closed his eyes tight while Casey leaned in, concerned as to where the conversation was going.

  “I’m sorry to hear that, honey,” Danny said. “We will deal with this. I’m sure treatments keep getting better. Are you okay?” He kept a steady voice even though he wasn’t okay.

  “Yes. I haven’t had my return appointment yet so I don’t know what to expect.”

  “Do you want one of us to come up and give you support when you go?”

  “No. It’s just that I don’t know what’s going to happen.” Her voice choked up and she trembled from the fear and uncertainty. “Even continuing medical school may be in jeopardy.”

  “No, sweetheart. Let’s wait and see what develops. And in the meantime, I’ll ask around here to see what the state of the art is for malignant melanoma treatment.”

  Chapter 21

  On Sunday afternoon, the sunshine and low humidity tempted Annabel away from her studies. She could afford the break to enjoy the fresh air because she’d studied a small paperback on surgical complications as if she had wielded the scalpel and electrosurgical Bovie herself. She slipped on sneakers, trotted down her steps, and looped around the block several times. Stopping at the corner café, she ordered coffee and sat outside.

  Annabel scrolled through her favorite iPhone app. She had contacted a young man named Tony days ago and they had begun a sparse dialogue in which they had hinted at meeting. Her last message had warned him: Not looking for a relationship. Life was too full and complicated for that.

  While she had been deep into her studies, Tony had responded. Meet for a craft beer this week or next?

  Sure, she typed, maybe next week.

  As she finished the mocha, she savored a few more minutes outside but Robby Burk infiltrated her thoughts and she wondered how his interview went; she hoped they gave him what he wanted. She would never see him again in any case. However, it dawned on her that she could bump into him again after surgery … if she did an anesthesia elective.

  Her app indicated a new message. From Tony, it said: Cool. Set up later. g2g.

  She studied his profile picture again. Nice. But not as nice as Robby Burk.

  -----

  As she looked in the mirror on Monday morning, Annabel wrapped a finger around a lock of hair to give it a needed curl. With the moisture in the bathroom after her shower, it did what she wanted. She applied a pastel lip gloss, got dressed, skipped
coffee at home, and headed out.

  During the drive to the hospital, she kept her thoughts positive; she had studied well over the weekend and promised herself to keep up the momentum. If she had to leave medicine for any of the issues going on in her life right now, it would be because she had to and not because she flunked out of the written part of her test grade. The clinical grade was another story but the promise to herself was mandatory; her own academics came first.

  Inside the hospital lobby, Annabel stepped over to the café counter and ordered a white mocha. As the machine ground the beans, she looked through the bins of overpriced items on the shelf for Bob’s favorite morsels.

  “There’s a med student that buys them all the time,” the red-headed woman said.

  “Don’t I know it,” Annabel said. “It’s my turn to treat him.” Annabel paid for both things and went upstairs. All her patients were adjoining one nurse’s station so she lined up their charts and flipped pages while she finished her coffee.

  The first patient she went to see was Gustavo Blair who was on Monday’s surgery schedule and someone who Dr. Pittman would probably discuss later on. When she went into his room, his small body was dragging his IV pole as he paced the floor like a big caged cat. She felt bad for him because a buttock infection had caused his admission … one brought on by an injection given by a quack. For a man in his twenties the abscess had caused him a great deal of embarrassment so she talked to him quickly and professionally about his symptoms and pain.

  “It don’t feel right,” he said pausing, “that a lady is one of my doctors. I’m glad they’ll knock me out for surgery so I don’t have to know you’re there. I never known this to happen to nobody.”

  “All gluteal muscles are the same to male and female doctors, Mr. Blair. Don’t think twice that I will be there.”

  “Aww, you’re just saying that cuz you’re supposed to.”

  Annabel did a small physical, checked his overnight bedside chart, and reassured him again. She felt her words were heartfelt and true; although in the beginning clinical phase of her training, she already couldn’t care less about someone’s private areas. Each sex had the same parts…big, little, white, black, wrinkled, smooth…it didn’t matter. The issue was whether or not they needed medical care. An hour later, the team cluttered outside Mr. Blair’s doorway.