by J. G. Sumner
“The police weren’t able to identify him. He was unconscious when he arrived. Laney was cleaning some blood off of his face and was able to give the police officer his name. I was curious as to how she knew him, and she said she went to high school with him.”
“So, you’re telling me Laney knew it was Scott and she stayed there and tried to help him anyway?” Herb barked at Josh.
“Yes, sir, she did.”
“Unbelievable!” Herb left Eileen’s side and paced back and forth around the room. “I should’ve killed him when I had the chance. What the hell was she thinking?”
Elaine scurried out of her chair to her husband’s side. “Herb, you need to calm down. Getting yourself worked up isn’t going to help her now. Let’s just work on getting her better so she can come home.”
“I see by your reaction there must have been something bad that happened between the two of them. Was this something that could affect her recovery? Something I might need to know to help her get better?”
Herb crossed his arms defiantly. “What he did to her happened a long time ago. It wouldn’t have an impact on what she’s going through now. Besides, this is a private family matter.”
Eileen took Herb’s hand. “Doctor, we’d like to have Laney transferred to the hospital near us in St. Louis. We have one of the nation’s best heart centers. No offense to you or all the work you have done to help our daughter, but we want her home where we can take care of her.”
Josh felt like he had been kicked in the stomach. The thought of Laney being pulled away from him was devastating. He had to take charge of the situation. There was no way he was letting Laney out of his sights.
“I’m sorry. At this time, Laney is too unstable for transfer.”
“Well, when will she be able to move?” Eileen stared at Josh with her arms crossed as she tapped a foot on the floor.
“I can’t give you that answer. It depends on how Laney’s body responds to the treatment. If everything goes right, we could conceivably transfer her in about a week. That’s only if there are no other complications. Even then, we would have to take it day-by-day. The cost to transport her across the country with all of the medical equipment she would need is exponential. Insurance wouldn’t cover it because there’s no medical need to transfer her. She can receive all her care adequately in this facility.”
“Money isn’t a concern for us. We’ll pay what we need to get her home; the sooner, the better.”
“If you don’t mind me asking, what’s your hurry?”
“Doctor…”
“Please, call me Josh.”
“Things have happened to Laney in the past. We never thought it was a good idea for her to continue living here after we moved. Instead, she adamantly refused to go with us and started building a life here. Clearly, that was the wrong decision.”
Josh suddenly realized if Laney told her parents about the letters, they would have had her on the first flight home. “I understand your concerns. But, Laney is doing quite well here. She’s perhaps one of the best nurses we have in the emergency department. I know she’s friends with a lot of the other nurses. I think maybe it’s important to respect her wishes and not uproot her just yet.”
“I appreciate your concern for our daughter. I’m sure you’re a wonderful surgeon and a good friend to Laney. We’re her parents, and we know what’s best for her. Coming home to recover is what she needs.” Eileen’s mind was made up. Josh took Laney’s hand and squeezed it firmly.
“Okay, I’ve heard your request. We’ll take it day-by-day, and I’ll let you know when she is stable enough for transfer. We’ll have to get a physician and hospital to accept her. When we get closer to that point, I’ll have the discharge planner work on it.”
Herb jumped into the conversation. “Why don’t you start arranging it today?”
“Because she’s too unstable and too critical right now. No doctor would even consider transferring her.”
“We have some friends and connections in the St. Louis area. What if we were able to find a doctor ourselves?”
“Again, you are more than welcome to do that, but I won’t let her be moved yet. She’d most likely die in transport. It’s my job to make sure she makes it so she can return to her life no matter which life she chooses.”
Laney’s parents had a bad case of tunnel vision. Their daughter was right there hooked up to tons of machines and tubes. She almost hadn’t made it out of the trauma room alive, and all they were worried about was getting her moved across the country. He had to get through to them and make them realize their daughter was teetering close to death.
Herb looked defeated as he stood over Laney processing the information he had received. “So, Doctor, it’s obvious we may have gotten a little bit ahead of ourselves. Can you please tell us the extent of her injuries?”
Finally Laney’s parents were concerned with her actual injuries. Hopefully, they were starting to get it.
“Certainly. Laney was shot four times, twice in the chest and once in the abdomen. One other bullet went into her heart. It was the more life-threatening of the injuries. If she’d not been in the hospital when she was shot, she wouldn’t have made it.”
Eileen placed her hand over her mouth.
“Fortunately, we got her immediately into surgery. Dr. George was the surgeon who repaired her heart and her lung. While it was certainly touch and go for a while, he was able to perform the necessary repair to get her heart functioning again. During that time, I was able to repair the other two wounds. At this point, she does have a high risk of infection for which we have started her on prophylactic antibiotics. The next day or two will be the most critical. She needs to keep her heart rate down so she doesn’t blow the repair to her ventricle. If the hole opens up in her heart, there is a good chance she won’t make it through another surgery.”
“Oh my, it’s worse than what I thought.” Eileen looked horrified and the tears were now a constant stream cascading from her eyes. Herb walked up behind her and placed his hands on Eileen’s shoulders. “She looks so normal or as normal as could be expected lying here in this bed. I expected Laney to be hooked up to machines, but seeing her lying here like this is just too much.” Eileen buried her face into her hands. “Oh my precious baby girl. None of this should’ve happened to her. She’s already been through so much in her short life.”
“We don’t need to rehash any of that stuff,” Herb whispered softly.
Eileen whipped around and looked as though she was shooting daggers straight into his eyes. “What do you mean we don’t need to rehash it? That man, the one we’re not supposed to be rehashing, tried to kill our daughter. You don’t think it’s a good time to rehash it? If not now, when?”
“Eileen, that’s not what I meant.” Herb, who was so calm and in control a few moments earlier, now seemed to be dancing delicately trying not to upset his wife.
“Just exactly what did you mean then?”
“Talking about the past is not going to change what happened yesterday. We knew he was out there somewhere. If he really wanted to, he would find her.”
“He wouldn’t have been able to get her in Frohna. Nobody in town would have let that scumbag within ten feet of her. He surely would’ve been tarred and feathered if he ever walked into town.”
Herb rubbed Eileen’s shoulders. “Settle down. Laney didn’t want to move to Frohna. Her life was here. She was very adamant about that.”
All of the posturing Eileen had exhibited only moments ago seemed to melt away. Eileen was resigned, if not defeated. “We should’ve done more to encourage her to move. We should’ve forced her.”
“Eileen, you know as well as I do Laney can be stubborn. She wasn’t moving no matter how hard we pushed. It would’ve only made her resent us. She wanted to live in a big city and work at a big hospital with a trauma center. Those were opportunities she wasn’t going to find in Frohna. We had to let her live her life.”
“I know. I know. It
’s just our job to protect her. Now look at her. We’ve failed!”
Josh stood quietly watching the ping-pong match between Laney’s parents. As uncomfortable as it was, he couldn’t walk away.
“Excuse me, I don’t mean to interrupt. Is there any medical history I should be aware of that may affect her treatment?”
Herb and Eileen looked at each other. Herb shrugged and Eileen nodded at him. “Doctor, I don’t know if what happened to Laney in the past will affect how you will treat her. I can’t imagine it would. It was so many years ago.”
Herb took a deep breath, placed his hands on the back of Eileen’s chair, and braced himself before he spoke. “Laney was fifteen. She was young and very impressionable as any girl is at that age. She met this boy at school. She was infatuated with him, and he was all she ever talked about. He’d asked her on a few dates. However, we wouldn’t allow her to go out with boys until she was sixteen. It was the rule in our house. So, they never went out, or so we thought. One day, she asked if she could go to the beach with a couple of her girlfriends. They were going to have a bonfire there and roast some marshmallows. She said her friend’s mom would chaperone them. We didn’t think anything of it because she’d gone to the beach with this friend and her mom before, and we trusted Laney.
“She had a ten o’clock curfew. When eleven o’clock rolled around, we grew very concerned. Eileen called the friend’s mom. She told Eileen she didn’t know what we were talking about. They had never made plans to go to the beach. Eileen hung up and immediately called the police. Shortly thereafter, Laney came through our front door. She looked disheveled and dirty.
“We asked where she’d been, and she stated she was at the beach and didn’t want to talk about it. We asked who she was with and she said she was with the boy, and wouldn’t say anymore. We told her the conversation was not over, and we would be discussing this further in the morning as she stomped off to her room. We were both very confused and concerned by her behavior but thought maybe the boy let her know he wasn’t interested in her and maybe that was what was making her act that way.
“By eleven o’clock the next morning, Laney still hadn’t come out of her room, so Eileen went to check on her. Eileen noticed our daughter’s face was extremely pale and blue. She tried to wake Laney up but was unable to. We called nine-one-one. Once she was at the hospital, they found she had some internal bleeding from her liver and her spleen. She had lost a lot of blood, which was why she was unconscious. We found out much later, the boy and some of his friends had beaten her up and raped her. She was in the hospital for a couple of weeks recovering from her injuries.
“Physically, she made a full recovery. However, she continued to date him, for God knows what reason, without us knowing for several months after that. During that time, he abused her both mentally and physically. Eileen had been working during those years and wasn’t always home in the afternoon. I learned after the fact he came over and did things to her, things I can’t even speak of, while we weren’t home. Mentally, I think she still struggles with what happened to her even though she has gone through years of counseling. She’s never had a serious relationship and doesn’t really date very often. That’s why we thought by moving her to Frohna, she’d be able to start a new life. One in which she would feel safer.”
Josh was floored. If he weren’t ready to kill the bastard who shot Laney before, he was certainly ready to slowly torture him now.
“Those are some pretty significant injuries she sustained. Did she have any complications from them?” Josh worked to remain composed.
“I know they had trouble at first getting the bleeding to stop. But once they got it under control, it was no longer an issue.”
“That’s good. The internal bleeding is important for me to know. I’ll need to make sure she doesn’t have any bleeding issues while she is here. I’ll have her blood drawn frequently so I can keep an eye on her coagulation levels.”
“I guess it was good to share that information.”
“Absolutely, you provided me with some important details that could significantly affect her care. Thank you. If you don’t mind me asking, how’s that thug still on the streets?”
“That’s the kicker to the entire story. The boy was a minor and was already living in a home with other delinquent kids. I’m not sure what he did to get there. I do know, not just anyone goes to these places. You have to be a real troublemaker. At any rate, the other boys in the group home were the ones who helped attack Laney. One of them had a gun and put it to her head. He said if she ever told anyone, he’d kill her and her family. I guess Laney believed him because she didn’t say anything to anyone for a very long time.
“It was about two years later while she was in counseling. Her counselor encouraged her to report the incident to the police. When she had finally worked up enough courage to do so, we took her down to the station to file a report. She wanted to talk to the police officer by herself because she didn’t want us to hear all the details. When she’d finished and came out of the room, she looked at us and said the police officer didn’t believe her. Since she didn’t tell anyone she’d been raped while in the hospital, no forensics team ever came in to collect DNA. As a result, there was no physical evidence we could give. All we had were the medical reports describing the extent of her internal injuries from the beatings. Unfortunately, she didn’t want to pursue it any further. Honestly, I think being as young as she was, it was a blow to her when the police officer, someone she thought she could trust, let her down.”
Josh struggled to subdue the anger building within him. “That’s horrible. I can’t even imagine what she went through. Nor would I have ever guessed she went through something like that. She has such a good rapport with many of the police officers who come through the emergency department. It must’ve been very hard for her to trust people again.”
Herb took a couple of steps away from Eileen. “Laney is an unusually strong person. She didn’t want what happened to define her. She has worked very hard to move forward and never look back. We’ve wanted to coddle and protect her, but she would have no part of it. She doesn’t like people feeling sorry for her. She’s always felt there are people who’ve had it a lot worse than she has.”
Josh watched as Laney slept. Learning these details about her past made him love her so much more. He wanted to be her protector and knight in shining armor. Josh vowed to himself he would never allow anyone to hurt Laney again.
“Gentlemen, if you don’t mind, I would like to stop rehashing the past. This is my baby lying here. I don’t want her to have to relive it either. Doctor, do you have all of the information you need to take care of my daughter?”
Josh had almost let his guard down. He knew it wasn’t the right time to inform her parents of their relationship. Instead, he buried his emotions and put his doctor-hat back on.
“Yes, I do. Thank you for being so patient with me. I’m going to go order some tests. They’ll be repeated every few hours so we can keep an eye on things. If there’s anything else you need, please let me know. The nurses have my pager, and I’m here for you if you have any questions or concerns.”
“Thank you, Doctor. We appreciate everything you’re doing for our daughter.” Eileen looked up at Herb and squeezed the hand he extended to her. Josh nodded, took one last look at Laney, and left the room.
Chapter 8
Jillian
Jillian woke up refreshed. Normally she was cranky and wouldn’t talk to anyone until she had at least two cups of coffee. Being a night person, she normally dragged herself out of bed at about two or three in the afternoon. Today, Jillian got up at noon excited for the first time in a long time, to start her day. She wanted to do something special for Josh. He had been at the hospital so much lately. With the recent events surrounding Laney, he hadn’t been able to leave. Barring any unforeseen circumstances, Josh would be home today. He was never gone more than three days. He claimed it was because he had to take care of
Duke. But, Jillian knew differently. Josh wanted to make sure she was doing well. Deep down Josh loved her and needed to take care of her. As much trouble as Jillian gave Josh, she felt the same way…well, most of the time anyway. Some days she really hated how he tried to control every aspect of her life. He always had a say in what medications she took and when, what job she had, and what her sleeping and eating schedule should be.
Jillian convinced herself today would be a good day to call in sick to work. This would allow her to spend more time with Josh. She had not called in sick at all and had even picked up extra shifts lately. How bad could it be to call in just one day?
Jillian couldn’t see when she wasn’t doing well. To her, things were always good. Her thoughts were rational, and she wasn’t having any setbacks. Josh repetitively explained that he and her doctor could see things she wasn’t able to. Hopefully, they could see how well she was doing now.
Josh rarely ever needed anyone, and he certainly never asked for help. With the recent events surrounding Laney, he would need some support. It was Jillian’s turn to take care of him and she was thrilled about the opportunity to reverse their roles. It was her chance to make Josh see she could handle things on her own.
More than anything, Josh enjoyed spending time with his dog. Jillian was baffled by the connection he had with Duke. They had never had pets as kids because they moved around a lot. As soon as Josh had purchased his own home, he adopted the dog. The only way to get Josh to relax and take his mind off things was to get him with Duke. Jillian formed the perfect plan and had been putting it in place all afternoon.
Just as Jillian had finished preparing a picnic dinner, Josh barreled through the door. Duke jumped from his bed on the floor and ran to greet Josh.
“Duke, buddy. I missed you. What’ve you been up to?” Josh always talked to Duke as though he could respond. Sometimes, Jillian thought she sensed an unspoken dialog between the two. At times, she could hear them speaking to one another, but would quickly erased those thoughts from her head.