Survivor's Guilt

by Cassy Roop

  My pager went off as I was sitting in my office filling out the paperwork from my earlier rounds. Reading that the main hospital reception was paging me had me questioning why. My parents had direct access to my pager, so all they had to do was put their number in for me to return their call.

  Picking up the phone, I dialed reception.

  “Good afternoon. University of Miami Hospital, Audrey speaking, how may I direct your call?”

  “Hi, Audrey, this is Doctor Taylor returning your page.”

  “Oh, yes. Dr. Taylor. There is a woman on the main hospital line for you. I told her that you were probably doing rounds and unreachable, but she insisted, saying it was an emergency and that she needed to speak with you.”

  “Did she happen to tell you her name?”

  “Um, yes. Yes she did. It was—hang on let me find the piece of paper—Carolyn. Carolyn Burnette.”

  I tried to think of who this Carolyn Scott could be, racking my brain to try and jog up any memory I could, but I couldn’t think of anyone.

  “She said it was concerning her daughter. Would you like me to put her through to your extension? Are you in your office?”

  Then it hit me.

  Ellie’s maiden name was Burnette.

  “Yes, please. Thank you Audrey.”

  I hung up and waited nervously for the phone to ring, and when it did, I nearly jumped out of my chair.

  “University Hospital, Dr. Evan Taylor,” I answered, trying to keep my voice as steady as possible.

  “Thank God I reached you. I didn’t know where I should call or even what hospital you worked at. This was my second try.”

  “Everything okay? What’s wrong?” I asked as my heart rate began to speed up. I couldn’t explain it, but I had a bad feeling something wasn’t right.

  “It’s Ellie. I was at her house this morning when she collapsed. She’s been sick since she returned home from Florida, but I could never get her to go to the doctor. They are doing tests and stuff now. I—I probably shouldn’t have called, but I couldn’t not tell you. Ellie may try to push her feelings aside, but she has suffered ever since she came home after leaving you.”

  I stood up from my chair so fast, the motion sent it crashing into the wall behind me.

  “She’s still sick?” I asked, suddenly hit square in the chest from the news. It was so obvious now all the times she told me she felt fine, but she was in fact hiding her discomfort from me.

  “What do you mean still?” Carolyn asked me. Shoving my wallet into my back pocket, and fishing my keys from my drawer, I was ready to dart out of the building.

  “She was sick here the last few weeks before she left. Dammit, she swore she was feeling better.”

  Carolyn grew quiet on the other end of the line and it made me nervous.

  “Listen, I’m leaving work now and hopping on a plane. Call me or text me on my cell if you hear anything.” I gave her my phone number before I hung up the phone. Shoving files into the drawer of my desk, I grabbed my cell and called Robert, my chief of staff’s phone to let him know that there was an emergency and that I had to leave.

  By the time I had gotten to the airport my nerves were beyond frazzled to the point my leg was bouncing as I sat and waited to board. So many different scenarios ran through my mind, and none of them had a good outcome.

  No matter what news was waiting for me when I got to North Carolina, the one thing I knew for sure was that I let Ellie go once, I’ll be damned if I did it a second time.

  ***

  MY HEAD FELT LIKE a sledgehammer had taken residence and proceeded to beat up every part of my brain. When I opened my eyes, the sun was shining brightly from a window, instantly causing me to wince in pain. Finally, I was able to hold them open long enough to notice that I was lying in a hospital bed.

  “How are you feeling?” A deep voice said to me from the corner of the room. I was surprised by the sudden awareness of the familiar voice that I had to sit up slightly to look and see if I was just imagining it.

  “Evan?” I questioned as I saw him get up from a chair in the corner of the room and come and sit in the one right next to my bed.

  “What are you doing here?” I accused, although my voice may have sounded impassive, my racing heart was anything but. It had only been a few weeks since I had seen him, but to me, it felt like an eternity.

  “Your mom called me. She told me that you were sick. The surprise was on her when I told her that you were sick before you even came home. Why have you been lying, Ellie?”

  His voice was a little angry, but laced with concern.

  “It’s just a bad virus. I didn’t want you to worry. You—you’ve done so much to help me, I felt like I could have been a burden on you.”

  “Ellie, I love you, you never have been a burden to me. You have been my saving grace. You have been the only person to keep me going.”

  Before I had the chance to react to the fact that Evan had just told me that he loved me, a doctor walked in, followed by my mother.

  “Good morning, Ellie. How are you feeling?” The middle aged man asked as he came over and shook my hand.

  “My name is Adam Clark, I’m the doctor on call today and will be taking care of you.”

  Evan stood up and extended his hand to Dr. Clark, introducing himself as a doctor as well.

  “You gave your family a pretty good scare. Your mom tells me that you’ve been sick for several weeks now. Is that true?”

  I looked at both Evan and my mother before returning my attention to the doctor.

  “Y—yes,” I managed to croak out.

  “How long,” He asked as he wrote down some notes on his clipboard.

  “Several weeks, now,” Evan chimed in, his mouth set in a hard line.

  “What have your symptoms been?”

  “I’ve been having dizzy spells and they’ve been making me sick to my stomach to the point that I vomit,” I admitted.

  “How often are you having these spells?”

  “They come and go, but have been a little more frequent the last few days.”

  “I see. Well, we definitely want to get some blood drawn to see if we can find out what is going on with you. Once we get those back from the lab, we can make a plan from there.”

  “Okay. Thank you,” I replied politely and the doctor left the room, promising that the nurse would be in shortly to draw my blood.

  My mother and Evan both stared at me, and I shrunk into the bed hoping that they would ease up the intensity of their faces.

  “So you’ve been hiding being sick from everyone?” My mother asked. I couldn’t hide the guilty look on my face.

  “It’s just a weird virus, there’s no need to anyone to be concerned.”

  “A virus that has landed you in the hospital, Ellie. You have been sick for a while now. You should have told someone,” Evan chastised, concern evident in his voice.

  “I’m going to go and get some coffee. Can I get you anything, Evan?” My mom asked as she headed toward the door.

  “No, thank you.”

  “Please let me know anything you learn while I’m gone.”

  “You got it.”

  My mom looked at me with concern on her face and then walked out of the room, leaving me trapped with Evan and all the tension radiating off of him.

  “Since when do you and my mom act like you are best friends?” I asked with sarcasm, trying to mask the concern brewing in my stomach about why I was feeling the way I was. I didn’t want to let my mom or Evan know just how worried I was about me being sick. When one week turned into two and then two turned into more, I knew something was wrong with me, but I didn’t want to find out what it was.

  “Since when was it you decided that your health wasn’t important? You should have come to the doctor a long time ago, Ellie.”

  He was angry. I could see it in the way he clenched his jaw and in the way his blue eyes darkened when as he didn’t take his eyes from me.

  We stared
at each other for a few minutes, me not knowing exactly what to say to him, when the nurse walked in.

  “Hello, Mrs. Morris. I’m going to be taking your blood. Your husband is welcome to stay, I’ll just need him to go sit over there,” she said pointing the chair in the corner of the room. Nausea turned in my stomach and I winced in pain. Not from physical pain of being sick, but the pain of missing Jeremy coupled with the fact that when she referred to Evan as my husband, I wished it could have been true.

  I have missed him to the point that I thought I was sick because of it. I thought maybe the stress of being apart from him made me still get sick just about every day and how my knees would tremble when I walked.

  Evan didn’t say anything as he went and sat in the chair. Didn’t correct her, or say anything about my dead husband, but instead stared at the nurse as she tied the rubber string around my arm to get a good vein.

  When she stuck me with the needle and my red blood began filling the vile, I had to turn my head away and try to keep from wanting to lose the contents of my stomach.

  “It’s okay, Mrs. Morris. A lot of people are turned off by the sight of blood. I’m almost done and hopefully we can find out why you have been so sick. There are a lot of things that can be detected just through your blood work.”

  She finished up her work and then took the vials to the lab. I watched as Evan held his head in his hands and stared at the ground, his fingers knotted in his hair.

  “Evan?” I asked quietly, not sure what kind of mood he was in. It warmed my heart that he was here, made me giddy with the need to have his arms around me.

  He looked up, his eyes glassed over with concern, his brows knitted together, and my heart squeezed at the sight.

  He got up and walked over to the bed and sat down next to me as he reached for my hand and threaded our fingers together.

  “Losing Lilly was one of the hardest things I have ever done in my life, Ellie. You understand more than anyone how that feels. But you, you made it better. You healed me from the inside out. You are the one who kept me sane, and in the process I fell completely in love with you.”

  He rubbed the back of my hand with his thumb, stroking the skin with tenderness.

  “When you walked away, it was like someone had taken the knife of pain from losing Lilly, and re-inserted it into my chest. I couldn’t breathe anymore. I couldn’t close my eyes without seeing your face. I tried to work, but I couldn’t focus on anything but missing you. Never in my life would I ever have imagined that one of the hardest days of my life and losing my very first love, would lead me to find true love. I don’t care what this is, Ellie, that is making you sick, but you damn well better fight it, because I am refusing to let you go a second time.”

  The determination in his voice coupled with the way his eyes softened as he looked at me made the tears swimming in my eyes fall down my cheeks. He lifted his other hand and wiped the tears from my face with the pad of his thumb all the while keeping a secure hold on my other hand with his.

  “I love you, too,” I whispered just before the doctor returned into the room, breaking the moment.

  “Hello, how are you feeling?” Dr. Clark asked as he rubbed some sanitizer onto his hands.

  “I’m okay for now,” I replied.

  “Have you been experiencing any abdominal pain when you get sick or with the dizzy spells?”

  “A little, but I thought that it was just from throwing up so often.”

  “Why don’t you lie on back and let me take a look?”

  I nodded and Evan moved away from me, releasing my hand. Instantly, I missed the warmth of his touch. The love that only moments ago, overwhelmed me. Saying the words out loud was one of the most freeing, and wonderful moments of my life. I did love him. So much so that thinking about spending another day without him would shatter my heart into pieces that I wouldn’t be able to put it back together again.

  I leant back as the doctor laid the back of my bed down so that I was no longer in a reclined position. Pulling down the blanket to my thighs, he then lifted up my hospital gown to expose my abdomen.

  He rubbed his hands together to try and make them warm before he placed them on my stomach and began small, palpitating movements.

  “Let me know if you experience any pain. Does it hurt if I press here?” He asked as he pressed between my rib cage and in the center of my stomach. I shook my head and he continued the same action on nearly every surface of my abdomen until he reached the spot right where my bladder would be.

  “Ouch,” I winced slightly and as soon as I did, Dr. Clark removed his hands immediately. He reached over to press the button on my bed and in a matter of moments, my nurse was walking back into the room.

  “Please have Mrs. Morris scheduled for an ultrasound immediately. It looks like we could have a possible case of appendicitis.”

  “Yes, doctor,” the nurse replied before walking out of the room.

  I looked over at Evan whose face was contorted in worry. His hair was wild from the numerous amount of times he had run his hands through it.

  “I didn’t even think about that. She didn’t seem to be in any pain,” he sighed.

  “It’s okay son. You know as well as I do that appendicitis can have many different symptoms. We’ll get her checked out and then we will have some answers. It’s possible that you will need surgery to remove your appendix if it is on the verge of rupture.” He said turning to me.

  “Okay,” was all I could reply.

  “The nurse will be in shortly to take you to ultrasound. I’m going to go check on your labs.”

  “Thank you, Doctor.”

  Dr. Clark left the room and Evan once again joined me at my side, taking my hand in his and kissing the back of my knuckles.

  “See? Just my appendix. Nothing to be worried about.”

  His blue eyes lifted to mine, and although they didn’t look completely devastated anymore, they still held concern and worry.

  “It’s still serious, Ell. If your appendix ruptures, it could be fatal, but at least we are here now and can get it taken care of. I need you better so that I can enjoy some time alone with my girlfriend.”

  “Girlfriend?” I asked, arching my brows at him.

  “Yep. I told you, Ellie. This time, there’s no walking away. There’s no pain or grief. Just two people who under unconventional circumstances, fell in love.”

  Even though I was elated by his words, I also felt a hollow pain fester in my stomach. How were we going to make it work? I couldn’t leave my family in North Carolina and I couldn’t ask him to give up his life in Florida. Over the months that Evan and I have spent together, I knew one thing for sure. He loved his job. He loved the kids he got to care for and truly made a difference in the lives of the terminally ill.

  “Evan, I don’t see how things are going to work—”

  I was interrupted by the nurse coming into the room and announcing that she would be wheeling my bed to another part of the hospital for an ultrasound.

  Evan leaned down and kissed me on the forehead as the nurse unlocked the wheels of my bed.

  “We’ll talk about it later,” he whispered in my ear and then I was on the move out of the room, and down the hospital hallway.

  Revelations

  LYING IN MY BED in the darkened room, I looked over at the large machine the technician sat at.

  “Can you lift up your gown for me, dear?” She said as she took a small bottle from the side of the machine and shook it. I did as she requested, pulling my gown up and making sure I was covered by the sheet over my hips.

  “This might be cold at first,” she said as she poised the bottle over my stomach and then reached for a wand and holding it to my abdomen.

  “Just lie on back and relax. I may need to you hold your breath a few times in order to get a good shot of you. Hopefully we can find out what it is that is making you so sick.”

  I nodded as she began moving the wand around on my stomach. She started u
p high at first, directly under my rib cage.

  “It’s okay sweetie, deep breath in and hold it.”

  I did as she asked and we continued the same process on different areas.

  “Can you tell anything?”

  “Nothing yet, but the doctors will need to review.”

  She continued to move the wand around as she descended to my lower abdomen and she paused, snapping several pictures with the machine. I watched her brows knit together as she brought her face closer to the screen, her eyes squinting as she reviewed it. I couldn’t see the screen from my angle in the bed, but I could tell she saw something just from her facial expressions.

  “What do you see?” I asked, nerves starting to stir up within me.

  “I’m almost finished. We’ll take you back to the room and Dr. Clark will come in and tell you everything.”

  I blew out a shaky breath, fearing the worst. The serious look on the technician’s face didn’t do anything to suppress the anxious feeling in the pit of my stomach.

  “I don’t feel so well,” I stated as I covered my mouth. Moving quickly, she turned and reached for a plastic tub and handed it to me mere seconds before I lost the contents of my stomach.

  ‘Are you okay, sweetie?” She asked tenderly while handing me a towel to wipe my mouth.

  “I’m okay,” I lied, even though I was anything but. My hands trembled from getting sick and the anxiety that overwhelmed me.

  “Let’s get you back to your room so that Dr. Clark can come and talk to you. Don’t worry. Everything will be okay.”

  She smiled at me sweetly, her reassurance doing nothing to help calm me. I was wheeled back to my room where Evan sat in the corner of the room. His blue eyes gazed up at me at the sound of the door opening. He was on his feet and instantly at my side as soon as the nurse locked my bed into place.

  “Well?” He asked looking between me and the nurse.

  “Dr. Clark will be in shortly to discuss the ultrasound with you. Is there anything I can get you in the meantime?” She asked turning to look at me.