‘Probably?’ Shelly checked.
‘He’s quite sick, they’re still deciding whether or not to transfer him to the Children’s Hospital in case he needs an ICU cot as our intensive-care beds are all taken. Ross is just heading off down there to see him.’
‘Well, I hope Ross takes into account there’s only three night staff on and Nicola’s only a grad,’ Melissa said with a warning note to her voice that had Annie again ducking for cover. Melissa was a straight talker and didn’t care who got hurt along the way. Feelings didn’t come in to it when she was dealing with her beloved babies. ‘It’s not like on days where staff are falling over themselves. One critical baby is bad enough but there’s a couple more here that could go downhill quickly.’
‘Ross knows all that,’ Annie said defensively. ‘But this baby has been down in Emergency for eighteen hours now, and there’s hardly a paediatric intensive care cot left in Melbourne, so someone’s going to have to take him. Anyway, Emergency just had a big multi-trauma come in and they need to start moving some of the patients.’
‘Well, maybe you should have thought of that earlier,’ Melissa carried on, without even blinking. ‘You know as well as I do that we’re going to get this baby. He should have been admitted and settled by now while there were enough staff to do it comfortably, not left till Emergency’s bursting at the seams and there’s no choice but to move him.’ And without another word she headed out onto the ward, leaving the rest of the staff chewing their lips and rolling their eyes.
‘Good luck with her tonight,’ Annie said with a grimace. ‘She’s in a right old mood.’
‘I don’t blame her,’ Shelly said quickly, and to the other staff’s obvious surprise. ‘That baby should have been admitted ages ago, not just left for the night staff.’
Minor bickers like this were uncomfortable but commonplace on a busy ward. Even though Shelly hadn’t done a stint on nights for ages she knew how busy it was, and also knew that as much fun as Annie was to work with she was also very good at putting things off for the next shift to deal with. Melissa had been right to say something and Shelly was only too happy in this instance to defend her. As the day staff departed Shelly gave a comforting smile to a nervous-looking Nicola.
‘When Melissa said you were “only a grad” she wasn’t aiming it at you personally, just pointing out the staff levels,’ Shelly said, moving straight to the point.
‘I know that. It’s just that she seems so fierce. I know I haven’t worked with Melissa but I’ve seen her in handover and it’s enough to put anyone off. I’ve been dreading coming on nights.’
‘You haven’t worked with Melissa yet,’ Shelly pointed out. ‘You’ve only seen her in here. She’s nothing like that out there.’ Shelly gestured to the ward and gave Shelly a reassuring smile. ‘Any bad feeling stays in the handover room, that’s an important rule on the children’s ward. The patients pick up on bad vibes otherwise. Anyway Melissa’s as soft as butter really. Once the day staff are gone you’ll see that for yourself. As fierce as she can be, Melissa’s also the best nurse here, you can learn a lot from her. There’s nothing about sick children Melissa doesn’t know. She’s been doing this job for more than thirty years now, so if there’s anything you’re worried about don’t sit on it, just tell her, OK?’
‘OK.’ Nicola nodded but Shelly could see the poor girl was still terrified.
‘It will be fine, you’ll see.’
It was fine. The obs and drug round went smoothly. Even the raucous older children, some bored from weeks in traction, seemed fairly settled, exhausted from too many visitors and computer games and a day spent good-naturedly teasing the nurses.
Melissa was in charge so she worked both sides, overseeing all the patients and keeping a watchful eye on Nicola as she settled the children and did the late round. Shelly took the cots, which consisted of eight airy rooms all surrounded by glass, which meant at any given time she had an uninterrupted view of her patients but they were all effectively isolated so as not to spread any infections. Six were occupied and Shelly checked each child carefully, smiling to herself as she did so, taking in the little bottoms sticking up in the air, thumbs tucked into mouths, the babies sleeping on blissfully as Shelly watched over them. A couple of the cheekier babies had extensions on their cots to stop them climbing out, but for now they all looked like cute little angels.
Angus was sleeping and Shelly roused him gently, carefully checking his observations and the little toes sticking out of the damp plaster, making sure the circulation to his foot was adequate. Annie was right, Shelly thought as she flicked on the cot light and checked him more closely, Angus was beautifully kept—his little nails short and clean, his hair soft and shiny, no rashes or bruises, nothing to indicate he was anything other than loved and cherished.
‘Is he all right?’ Mrs Marshall’s anxious face appeared at the end of the cot. ‘I was just getting a coffee.’
‘He’s fine,’ Shelly reassured her. ‘He’ll probably sleep soundly for the next couple of hours. He was given a strong painkiller so he’s quite comfortable. Would you like me to get you a camp bed? We can set it up beside the cot.’
Mrs Marshall shook her head. ‘Thanks, but no. The day nurse, Annie I think her name was, already offered, but I’m going to go home. I’ve got the other two to sort out and it’s been an exhausting day.’
‘I’m sure it has. We can always ring you if there are any problems, if he gets too distressed,’ Shelly said.
‘Of course.’ Mrs Marshall gave a tired smile. ‘But he normally sleeps right through.’ The mobile telephone ringing in her bag made them both jump and Shelly waited patiently as Mrs Marshall took the call.
‘That was my husband, Doug. He’s come to pick me up.’ Walking over to her son, she gave him a tender kiss and stroked his little lock of hair. Shelly knew she should mention that mobiles were supposed to be turned off on the ward, given her little lecture about the interference they could cause with the equipment, but she didn’t. Trying to put herself in Mrs Marshall’s place for a moment, she figured it could wait for the morning.
Shelly had always been a quick worker and was grateful for the chance to make up a few bottles for when the babies inevitably awoke and to prepare some jugs of boiled water and change the sterilising solutions. Happy she was on top of things, Shelly set up an oxygen tent for the inevitable new admission and prepared the sterilising equipment and nurses’ gowns along with some literature on bronchiolitis for the undoubtedly anxious parents.
‘How’s it going?’ Melissa popped her head in the darkened room and smiled as she saw Shelly setting up the room. ‘Finally, someone who doesn’t have to be told! How are they all?’
‘Settled. I’ve put the new admission in here so it’s nearer the nurses’ station, but cot six needs an eye kept on—she’s still a bit wheezy even after her nebuliser. Cots two and four are due for a feed at eleven so I’ve left their obs till then. Their mums aren’t staying, so if they wake up at the same time I might need you or Nicola to feed one of them—their bottles are all ready.’
‘Good.’
‘How’s Angus?’
‘Fine.’
‘And the mother?’
‘She’s fine too, she’s gone home.’
Melissa shot her a shrewd look. ‘So what’s the problem?’
‘I don’t know,’ Shelly admitted. ‘I know lots of mums go home, that it doesn’t mean anything at all…’
‘Just that you wouldn’t?’
‘I’ve only got one child.’ Shelly flicked her eyes down to her handover notes. ‘Mrs Marshall’s got three and one of them is a young baby. She might be breast-feeding so it’s totally understandable that she had to go home.’
‘So why aren’t you convinced?’
Shelly shrugged. ‘Her husband rang her from the ambulance bay. Surely he’d want to pop up and see Angus and say goodnight?’
‘Maybe he’s got the other two asleep in the back of the car,’ Melissa po
inted out. ‘Imagine if Security found two children unattended in the car park. The social workers would have a field day!’
Melissa was right, of course. There was a perfectly reasonable explanation and Shelly gave her head a small shake, determined to concentrate on the facts. But she’d misjudged Melissa, the conversation wasn’t over yet.
‘Just keep your eyes and ears open. I’m not entirely happy myself.’ For a moment their gazes lingered on the sleeping toddler, both women deep in their own thoughts for a moment. ‘Come and have a cuppa before they wake up,’ Melissa said finally with forced cheerfulness. ‘I’ll go and put the kettle on.’
‘Sounds marvellous.’
‘Wait till you taste the cake I’ve made. Ross is already champing at the bit.’
‘Melissa?’ Shelly called as Melissa made her way out of the ward. ‘Just what did you say to Ross exactly?’
‘That I’d baked a cake!’ Melissa gave Shelly a quizzical look as if she’d gone completely mad!
‘I’m not talking about the cake, Melissa.’ Shelly took a deep breath. She didn’t want to ruffle any feathers but the fact Melissa had taken it on herself to tell Ross so much about Shelly’s personal life needed addressing—the very last thing she needed was Melissa playing Cupid. Ross Bodey had enough women after him without thinking he had Shelly on his list of swooning fans. ‘Ross knows Matthew’s name, he seems to know all about the divorce, I just wondered how.’
‘I might have said something…’ Melissa shrugged.
‘You mean you gave him a life update on me the second he entered the ward. Why?’
‘I didn’t,’ Melissa said quickly. ‘I hadn’t laid eyes on Ross until I saw him when I was with you, honestly,’ she insisted as Shelly gave her a disbelieving look. ‘Believe it or not, as riveting as your life might seem to you, it’s not my favourite topic of conversation. Ross and I have kept in touch while he’s been away, I probably said a few things then in passing.’
‘Oh.’ Thankfully the room was in semi-darkness and Melissa couldn’t see the blush flaming on her cheeks, but with the heat it was radiating Shelly was sure she must be able to feel it winging its way across the quiet room.
‘He’s rung a few times at night when he’s needed something looked up or wanted a bit of advice on a patient. He’s a good doctor is Ross, not too up himself to ask a nurse for advice, and when he rang we’d have a chat. He’d ask what the gossip was, who was seeing who, who was pregnant, who was leaving, that type of thing. We didn’t just talk about you, Shelly.’
Suitably chastised, Shelly wished the ground would swallow her up whole.
‘I’m sorry,’ she mumbled. ‘I was just taken back that he knew so much about everything.’
‘That’s Ross for you.’ Melissa shrugged. ‘You know he loves all the gossip.’
‘Sure.’ Fiddling with the oxygen tubes, Shelly kept her voice even. ‘Go on, then, get the kettle on, I’ll finish up in here.’
Once alone, Shelly sank onto the camp bed she had made up for the baby’s mother. Sitting perched on the end, she buried her burning cheeks in her hand, trying for the life of her to fathom why Ross keeping in touch with Melissa had upset her. Why was she feeling like a jealous schoolgirl all of a sudden?
‘Blast,’ she muttered, then flicked her eyes open to check the coast was still clear. As if Ross would be that interested in her marriage problems. As if Melissa was going to rush to fill him in on the latest saga.
She really wasn’t that important.
It had just been a casual chat, a snippet of gossip Melissa had imparted to a bored doctor stuck in the middle of nowhere, eager for a chat, happy to while away the lonely hours on call with an old friend. She should have been relieved, relieved that Melissa hadn’t embarrassed her, that she hadn’t bent his ear about the divorce with a nudge and a wink and a load of innuendo.
But…
The green-eyed monster was rearing its ugly head again.
Why hadn’t Ross rung her? Why had he kept in touch with Melissa over the last few years?
And why did it matter so much?
‘Damn,’ Shelly said more strongly, the words whistling through her gritted teeth as she forced herself to take a deep steadying breath as realisation finally hit.
The hairdresser’s, the perfume, the long overdue meeting with her razor hadn’t been a coincidence. Hadn’t even been a vague attempt to show an old friend she hadn’t completely let herself go.
Of all the stupid things to go and do…
Of all the ridiculous, ludicrous things she had done in her time, this one certainly took the biscuit.
Developing a king-size crush on a certain Ross Bodey was the last thing Shelly needed to deal with. Her cheeks scorched with embarrassment at the thought of him finding out, that the dependable, organised Shelly, his on-duty friend and confidante, had succumbed like legions of others to his blue-eyed charm.
He was miles out of her league, young free and single, not just a world away but an entire galaxy from Shelly’s routine existence, and it would serve her well to remember the fact.
Ross Bodey was way out of bounds.
CHAPTER TWO
PULLING up a chair at the nurses’ station, Shelly smiled at a now much happier Nicola.
‘She’s great, isn’t she?’ Nicola said, happily munching into a huge slab of walnut cake.
‘Told you. Melissa’s bark is far worse than her bite. Once the day staff are gone she relaxes—and feeds us,’ Shelly added, helping herself to a generous slice.
‘Save some for me!’ Ross perched on the edge of the desk, depositing a mountain of files and X-rays as he did so.
‘How’s the baby in Emergency?’
‘Heading this way,’ Ross sighed. ‘He’s pretty sick but he’s holding his own at the moment. The children’s hospital has got an ICU cot but not a general one, whereas we’ve got a general but no ICU. I can’t believe I’d managed to forget the constant battle with the bed state.’ He rolled his eyes. ‘Looks like we’re in for a long night. Hopefully Melissa will go easy on me, I didn’t really have any choice but to admit him. Emergency’s steaming down there, it’s no place for a sick baby.’
‘I agree.’ Melissa, coming up behind Ross, caused him to jump. ‘I don’t mind being busy, Ross, it’s just the general thoughtlessness that annoys me. Annie should have had him up here hours ago. Instead, we’ve got a sick baby to assess and an overwrought mum to deal with in the middle of the night. A little bit of foresight wouldn’t have gone amiss.’
Ross nodded his head in agreement. ‘Right, what have you got for me? I’d better clear the pile before Kane gets here. Who knows when I’ll find time otherwise?’
‘Just a couple of IV orders that need updating, and I think Shelly wants some antibiotics written up for cot five—his blood culture results are back.’
Ross nodded. ‘Yeah, the lab just paged me.’ One hand tapped away on the computer as he brought up the results. ‘This is the life,’ he sighed. ‘Pathologists on call, X-Ray just a stone’s throw away.’
‘I thought you said it was civilised where you were,’ Shelly teased, desperately trying to resume normal services despite her internal bombshell.
‘It was. The clinic I worked in at Tennagarrah was comparable to a luxury caravan. All the basics were there but you weren’t exactly spoilt for choice and you had to work for everything. This in comparison is a five-star hotel.’ With an exaggerated whoop of delight he jumped down and opened the drug fridge. ‘And just look at the mini-bar, where do I start? Bactrim, flucloxacillin, gentamicin, vancomycin. What can I get you, Sister?’
Shelly peered at the monitor in front of her, reading the blood results and the antibiotic sensitivities. ‘Well, a large dose of flucloxacillin would hit the spot.’
‘Coming right up.
‘Anything else I can get you?’ Ross asked, carrying on the joke as he pulled the vial of antibiotic out of the fridge. ‘Have you had a look at the room service menu yet?’
> ‘This will do just fine.’ Picking up her cake, Shelly effectively ended the playful conversation. Images of five-star hotels and bubbling spas and four-poster beds weren’t exactly doing wonders for her blood pressure, and the sight of the porter wheeling in the gurney carrying the baby provided a very welcome diversion.
‘Kane Anderson,’ the emergency nurse informed them as Shelly pulled down the cot side and greeted Kane’s mum with a warm smile. ‘He’s been down in Emergency so long he’s part of the furniture now. This is his mum, Angela.’
‘Hi, Angela, we’re just going to get Kane into the cot and then I’ll get the handover from Emergency. Once that’s done I’ll come and settle you both in.’ Gently she lifted the infant over, handling him deftly and with minimum fuss so as to avoid any unnecessary exertion.
Although the handover was important and the emergency nurse was obviously in a rush to get back to her department, Shelly took a moment or two to explain how the oxygen tent worked, realising how alarming it must look to Angela.
‘This monitor tells us the oxygen concentration in the tent, it’s very safe.’
‘He can’t suffocate?’ Angela checked.
‘Definitely not,’ Shelly said firmly. ‘If the level drops in the tent the alarm goes off, and this little probe I’ve attached to his foot tells us Kane’s own oxygen levels. I’ll be back in a couple of moments. I’m just outside but if you’re worried at all just bang on the window or call.’
‘She’s being a bit difficult,’ the emergency nurse started.
‘No doubt because she’s worried and exhausted,’ Shelly said quickly, refusing to get drawn into a discussion on the mother’s emotional state, preferring to make her own observations. ‘And eighteen hours in Emergency wouldn’t exactly have helped matters. What’s the story with the baby?’
The story wasn’t very good. Three days of a worsening cough and struggling to feed, two different types of antibiotics from the local GP and a long wait in Emergency. ‘His respiration rate is still very high and his heart rate’s elevated. He’s very grizzly, which isn’t helping his breathing, and he just won’t settle.’
The Baby Emergency Page 3