A Doctor's Watch

by Taylor, Vickie

  Her lips trembled. “There was a…There was a man.”

  “A man where?”

  “In my room.”

  “In your hospital room? Upstairs?”

  She nodded, the movement jerky. At least he could see her breathing now, and a spot of color had returned to her cheeks.

  “Who was it?”

  “I don’t know. He was dressed all in black. He had a hood.” Her gaze jumped up to his, suddenly electric. “He was going to hurt me.”

  Damn. How could he have been so wrong about her? She’d seemed so stable yesterday, despite her confusion about being pushed down the bluff. That could be written off as a normal defensive mechanism. He wanted to write it off.

  He wanted her to be normal.

  But the paranoid delusion she described was anything but normal. Hiding beneath a stainless-steel counter with a butcher knife before dawn was anything but normal.

  A knot tightened in his chest as he realized how long and painful the road to recovery would be for a person with an illness like this. And not just for her, but for her family, too. She had a son, she’d said.

  “Mia, why don’t you put down the knife and we can talk about it, okay?”

  Confusion clouded her green eyes. She glanced down, and looked at the weapon she held as if she’d never seen it before, hadn’t realized she held it. Her eyes went wide. The blade clattered to the floor.

  Moving slowly, Nurse Renee leaned in and slid it away.

  “There, that’s better.” Ty slowly raised his hand toward Mia. She hesitated to take his hand, to trust him, but he waited out her reluctance. Her shock.

  What he wouldn’t give for a shower and a clean shirt. Yesterday’s clothes were getting a little ripe. He wouldn’t be leaving here for some time, though. When he did go, Mia Serrat would be going back to the Massachusetts Hospital of Mental Health with him—as a patient.

  And she knew it—her green eyes had gone so dark they were almost black. He steeled himself against the urge to comfort her, to tell her everything would be all right. She had to face her illness, and he had to help her do it.

  This was why he’d gotten into medicine. Into psychiatry. Because of people like Mia. People like his mother. Good people who needed help.

  He just hadn’t known how it would eat his gut.

  “Come on,” he urged. “Why don’t we go somewhere a little more comfortable and you can tell me what happened?”

  Ten minutes later, Mia was tucked back between her covers with a mug of steaming tea and Dr. Handsome was perched on a stool next to the bed.

  “You don’t believe me,” she said flatly.

  “I’m just trying to understand—”

  “Huh.” She gulped a mouthful of air. “Don’t give me the psychobabble. I’ve heard it all before.”

  He raked a hand through his hair and stretched his back. “Okay, why do you think someone would want to hurt you?”

  She cut him a sideways glance. “Oh, now you believe there is a man?”

  “Just go with me here.”

  She sighed, a wistful breath of air that rippled the tea. The steam above the mug swirled. “I don’t know.”

  “Did he say anything?”

  “No. He didn’t see me. Not at first.”

  “How could he not see you?”

  “I wasn’t in my room. I was in the hall…. Oh, what’s the use.”

  “No, go ahead. You were in the hall.”

  She blew on her tea and took a sip. “He stopped outside my door and looked around like, to see if anyone was watching.”

  The doctor scrubbed his hands over his face. He looked tired, and he was wearing the same clothes he’d had on yesterday. “Are you sure it wasn’t a doctor? You were tired and had hit your head. Maybe you just thought—”

  “How many doctors do you know that wear black hoodies pulled way up over their faces when they’re making rounds?”

  “So you’re basing your assumption that someone is trying to kill you on one person’s bad choice of clothing?”

  “He pulled a syringe out of his pocket!” She set her tea on the bedside table and crossed her arms over her chest. “Didn’t you tell me you left orders that I wasn’t to be given any medications so that you could clear me for release in the morning?”

  He just stared at her, his eyes unreadable. Tired, but unreadable. The doctor look. She hated it.

  “Fine,” she spat out and threw her head back on the pillow. “It was all my imagination.”

  “Stop.”

  “Stop what?”

  “Telling me what you think I want to hear.”

  “Well you didn’t seem too pleased to hear the truth.”

  “That someone is trying to kill you.”

  “Well I’m not going to say that I was trying to kill myself.”

  “I found you holding a knife to your chest.”

  “For protection! Someone tried to kill me twice in one day!”

  He frowned. “You said you slipped and fell off the bluff.”

  “Then, I was telling you what you wanted to hear. Now, I’m telling you the truth.”

  “How am I supposed to know which is the truth and which is the lie?”

  She gritted her teeth, clenched her fists and groaned, then sank back against the bed, deflated. “Shrinks.”

  He opened his mouth. She cut him off fast and hard. “Don’t you dare ask me how I feel about shrinks.”

  He feigned innocence. “I was going to ask you if you’d like some more tea. Yours is cold by now.”

  Terrific. A little humiliation to go with her mortification.

  “No, thank you.”

  He straightened and took a deep breath. She braced herself—she knew what that meant.

  “Look, I think you should come to the MHMH for a few days. Straighten out in your head what really happened and didn’t happen yesterday and last night.”

  Someone had dropped a bowling ball on her stomach. “No!”

  He reached over and covered her clenched hand with his. His palm was warm, slightly rough. She jerked from beneath his touch.

  “I’m afraid I have to insist,” he said.

  She bolted upright in bed. She’d known this was coming, and still she wasn’t prepared. “You can’t do this!”

  “On the contrary.” He stood, his shoulders rounded. “It’s my job to do this, whether I like it or not.” The expression on his face made her believe that in this case, he definitely did not. It was small comfort.

  Every nerve in her body jumped. She was on fire. She licked her lips. “Look, you’re probably right. I slipped and fell on the bluff. And last night, I—I had a headache and I don’t sleep well in hospitals. It was probably just a nightmare. I didn’t really see anything at all. I overreacted a little.”

  He stopped at the door. “I really hope that’s all it was. But I have to be sure.” His lips pressed together. “Not just for your sake, but for your son’s.”

  If there was one thing in the world he could have said that would set her back, make her think about what was happening to her, that was it.

  Her son.

  If there really was something wrong with her, it wasn’t Todd’s fault. From the moment he’d been born, she’d vowed to protect him. Protect him she would—even if it was from herself.

  Tears welled in her eyes. Dr. Handsome stayed in the door, looking torn.

  “We’ll work it out,” he said quietly. “Don’t give up.”

  Then he was gone.

  Work it out? Hell, what was there to work out if she was losing her mind?

  Chapter 5

  Ty slapped the vending machine on the side trying to eke a few more drops of stale coffee into the paper cup.

  “They’re waiting for you,” Nurse Renee said from behind.

  He grabbed the cup, downed half, and turned. “I know.”

  She grimaced. “How do you think they’re going to take the news?”

  “Oh, about like a bad case of the stomach f
lu.”

  “Don’t let Dr. Serrat get to you. He treats everyone like crap. He’s not a happy man.”

  “Yeah.” Ty headed for the door to the conference room, stopped just outside. Karl Serrat was definitely not a happy man, and Ty had a feeling he was about to make him a lot unhappier.

  The Kaiser sat stiffly at the head of a scarred work table. Beside him, an older woman he recognized from the night before as Mia’s mother-in-law, Nana, fidgeted in her chair. Her short gray hair curled neatly around her head, but her face was as crumpled as the tissue she wrung in her aged hands. A woman about Ty’s age sat between the two Serrats, wavy red hair pulled back in a ponytail and just a smidge too much makeup.

  “Ma’am,” he nodded toward the older woman.

  “My niece Citria,” Karl introduced, gesturing toward the younger female. “Mia’s sister-in-law.”

  Ty hadn’t known Karl had a niece, or a sister for that matter. Then again, it wasn’t like the two of them sat around drinking beer and talking over a hand of cards on Saturday nights.

  Karl folded his hands on the tabletop. “I’ve filled in my sister and Citria on Mia’s condition from your report last night and what the hospital staff told me this morning. What do you have to add?”

  Ty took a moment to study the faces in front of him before answering. Karl sounded almost blasé. Not at all the belligerent defense of a family member he’d expected. The man had to know where this was going.

  Nana seemed appropriately concerned, her eyes welling and hands clutching that ragged tissue. Citria mirrored Nana’s worry, but there was something a bit more…saccharine in the expression.

  Strange family.

  “Mia has had two delusional episodes,” he said carefully, waiting for an explosion that never came. “She believes someone is trying to kill her.”

  “Oh.” Nana dabbed at her eyes. “I should have seen this coming. I knew something was wrong. I knew it wasn’t right.”

  “What wasn’t right?” Ty asked.

  “She was talking about leaving. Why would she want to leave? Take Todd away?”

  “Did she say why she wanted to leave?”

  “Just that it was time. She needed to get back on her feet. She wasn’t ready. I told her she wasn’t ready.”

  Citria rubbed her mother’s forearm. “It’s not your fault, Mom.”

  Nana shook her head. “I should have known.”

  “Your daughter’s right, ma’am. It’s not your fault. Sometimes these illnesses reappear without warning, or the warnings are so subtle they’re easy to miss. Did Mia ever give any indication that she wanted to leave because she was afraid of something here? Because she thought someone was watching or stalking her?” he asked, trying to confirm the onset of paranoia.

  “No. No, nothing like that. Do you think she made up those stories because she didn’t want us to know she tried to hurt herself again?”

  “It’s possible,” Ty said. “But I got the feeling that she really believed what she was saying.”

  “So what is your recommendation, Doctor?”

  Ty resisted the urge to squirm at Karl’s question. He looked squarely at the man who held his career in his hands. “Mandatory seventy-two-hour commitment to a mental-health facility for full evaluation.”

  “Based on what criteria?” Karl knew the drill damn well. But it would be unethical for him to make a psychological evaluation on a member of his family. He needed an independent opinion, thus putting Ty smack between a rock and a hard place.

  “She is a potential danger to herself and her son.”

  “Mia would never hurt Todd,” Nana chimed in.

  Citria didn’t look so convinced. “Mom, we can’t take the chance.”

  “We don’t know the extent of her delusions,” he explained. “She could mistake him for her assailant at some point. Or if she believes she is being attacked and he is nearby, she could actually hurt him in a misguided attempt to protect him. What if, for instance, she thinks she’s being chased by a car, and she drives recklessly while Todd is with her, thinking she needs to escape? We really need to get a handle on the extent of her delusions, and the best way to do that is to control her environment, keep her under observation.”

  Silence lay heavy in the room. Karl finally spoke up. “We agree. We have a judge faxing over the papers now.”

  Ty’s heart bounced. He’d expected a fight. Most families weren’t generally so quick to accept that their loved one needed that kind of intense help. But then, most families weren’t the Serrats.

  Mia soaked in the scenery as the ambulance ambled up the winding drive to the Massachusetts Hospital of Mental Health, knowing it would be the last she’d see of sunshine for a while. Her stomach turned, and she fought in vain to tamp down the fear. Locked doors, cries rolling up and down the hallway in the night, walls that seemed always to be closing in on her. Those were the memories of her first days at the California hospital where she’d been confined for eighteen months.

  Later she had to admit this place didn’t look quite so bad. The fence outside was brick and wrought iron, made to look ornamental from the outside, but still tall and sturdy enough to discourage climbing from the inside. The corridor walls were painted pastel yellows, greens and blues instead of austere white, and fresh flowers sat on small tables outside each patient room.

  Mia was led to room 213. Inside she found an old-fashioned spindle bed with a soft chenille cover, a marble-topped dresser and a wicker rocking chair in the corner. It would have passed for a guest room in a quaint bed-and-breakfast if it wasn’t for the wire mesh over the window.

  The orderly in purple scrubs who had shown her to her room lifted the bag Nana had packed for her. “I’ll have this back in a flash.”

  Mia nodded. She knew the drill. They’d take her shoelaces, the compact from her makeup case because it contained a little glass mirror. Anything that could possibly be used to hang, cut, poison or otherwise do herself in. She supposed it was necessary, but that made it no less humiliating.

  She flinched when the door snicked shut behind her, and then lowered herself into the rocker to wait. One of the first things a patient gave up in a place like this was control of her schedule. She would eat when they told her, go to bed when they told her, see the doctors at her assigned time. Resistance was futile.

  The wicker creaked as she swung slowly forward and back. On the table next to her was a small book of poetry. Not the heavy, dreary stuff, but a collection of silly little rhymes.

  Mia smiled as she turned page after page, thinking how much Todd would like the limericks. Maybe she’d ask if she could take it when she left in a few days.

  If she left.

  Floor nurse Nancy Popadopalous’s curly black hair bobbed into view over Ty’s shoulder as he leaned a hip on her desk, flipping through patient charts. He’d finally had a shower, shave and a change of clothes. He felt almost human. Now he just needed to read through staff notes on what had been happening with his patients and prioritize twelve hours’ worth of work into the six hours left in his day.

  In reality, he already knew what his priority was. She should be settled in her room by now. She was a puzzle he needed to solve—how a person who appeared to be so together could fall apart so completely. But first, he had a responsibility to the twenty-two other patients in his care.

  Nancy poked him with her pen. “Get your butt off my desk, hotshot.”

  “Sorry,” he mumbled, standing.

  “Heard you drew the short straw.”

  “Huh?”

  “Got Mia Serrat as a patient.”

  He looked up. “Yeah, you know her?”

  “No. My son Scott goes to school with her son, though. Heard she downed a whole bottle of phenobarb a couple of years back. Man, I can’t imagine taking on the Kaiser’s niece as a patient. Talk about pressure—you screw up, or just piss him off, you’re toast.”

  “Thanks for the pep talk, Nance.”

  “I’m just sayin’�
��”

  “Yeah, yeah. So maybe you help me stay un-toasted? Request her files from California. The family will sign the consent.”

  He left Nancy cracking her knuckles as she booted up her computer and strode down the hall with a stack of charts under his arm and a pen between his teeth.

  Three hours later, he’d seen the most urgent of his patients, rescheduled the therapy sessions he’d missed this morning, and finally gave in to the need to check on Mia.

  Peeking through the small window on her door, he saw her sitting cross-legged in the wicker chair, her head sagging and a book slipping off her lap. For a moment his pulse leaped, sure something was wrong, but he realized when he opened the door that she was sound asleep.

  He watched her unabashedly, enjoying the occasional soft snuffling sound and the way her lashes fluttered. In her sleep, she looked vigorous, happy, healthy, the way a young mother in her prime should. There was no sign of the malignancy within her. She was so different from many of the patients he saw, from his own mother, whose face had twisted in misery even in sleep.

  She didn’t belong here. This place would eat her alive, steal that vitality bit by bit. He’d seen it happen too many times already, even in his brief career. Hospitals were supposed to help, but so often the isolation and the fact of being surrounded by a population of the mentally ill only seemed to make people worse.

  His hope to help her hardened to resolve. He had to help her, had to help her get back what she’d lost.

  And that was a slippery slope, professionally.

  How many lectures had he sat through on the importance of professional detachment?

  Quietly Ty pulled the cover off the twin bed against the wall and tucked the spread around her, pausing to sweep a lock of dark hair away from the corner of her mouth.

  She was a picture, a painting. She rubbed her cheek against his hand as he pulled it away.

  How was he supposed to detach from that?

  As he walked out of the room, Nancy stopped him. How long had she been standing there?

  “Those records are on the way. They promised to e-mail them within the next hour.”