Melanie heard the ambulance siren in the distance. The sound almost echoed in her head.
It all felt surreal.
The next moment, anger exploded in her chest. She wasn’t going to accept it! She wasn’t going to accept Mitch’s pronouncement!
She’d had to accept the death sentence the chaplain had given her over ten months ago, but she absolutely refused to accept this. She didn’t care if Mitch was a doctor, she wasn’t going accept what he’d just told her.
It wasn’t true!
“No! April, c’mon, baby, fight this.” Clutching the child to her, she lowered her face to the little girl’s ear. “You have to fight this for your mama and for Jimmy. You have to live for them, do you hear me?” Melanie sobbed. “You have to live!”
“Melanie,” Mitch began, attempting to get her to release April’s inert body and draw her away from the child. It broke his heart twice over to watch Melanie’s grief. “She’s gone.”
“No, she’s not!” Melanie cried fiercely, anger flashing in her eyes. “She’s not! I’m not going to let her go, do you hear me? I’m not!” Melanie cried passionately. Turning toward April, she told her, “I’m not letting you go! You come back to me, you hear?”
Mitch gently but firmly drew Melanie to her feet, wanting to put distance between her and the deceased family. At a complete loss how to help her bear up to this tragedy, he looked to Theresa for help.
“I’m so sorry, Melanie,” Theresa began compassionately as she tried to put her arms around the younger woman. “You need to let go now, dear. You need to—”
“Mama?”
Melanie swung around. She could just barely make out the weak little voice, the sound wedged between the tears and protestations of sorrow that were echoing around the horrifying scene.
“Mama,” April whimpered, “I hurt. I hurt.”
Barely audible sobs mixed in with the tiny voice. Tears of pain were rolling down the small, dirty cheeks. April’s eyes were shut, but a part of her was definitely alive, definitely present if not fully conscious.
“Mitch!” Melanie all but shrieked.
Stunned, Mitch fell back to his knees, quickly checking April’s vital signs as the sound of the approaching siren grew louder and louder.
“She’s alive,” Mitch cried in disbelief.
He looked up at Melanie, unable to explain what had just happened. A minute ago, there had been no heartbeat, no sound of breathing, no signs of life whatsoever.
And now, April was definitely back among the living.
She was trying to say something, her small heart fluttering wildly like the wings of a hovering hummingbird.
He’d been a doctor for several years now and in all that time he had never witnessed a miracle before. As a general rule, he didn’t believe in them.
And yet, he had no other name for it. How else could he explain that one moment, the little girl was gone, the next she was alive again?
Back up on his feet, he took Melanie’s hand and drew her to him. He moved out of the way as the ambulance attendants entered, pushing a gurney before them. The EMS who was apparently in charge, Eric, according to the name stitched on his badge, looked at Mitch. It was apparent by his expression that he and his team had only been notified of one victim, not three.
“I’ll send for two more ambulances,” the EMS told Mitch.
“No need,” Mitch informed him grimly. “There’s only one survivor.” He nodded toward April. “The little girl’s alive, the other two are gone.”
The driver stepped aside for a moment and grabbed his dispatch radio placing another necessary call.
As quickly and succinctly as possible, Mitch told the head EMS attendant what had happened and gave him all the vital signs he’d noted.
Eric nodded. “Okay, we’ll take her to County General.”
“No,” Mitch said, cutting in. He had no operating privileges at County General and he intended to be in the operating salon with April. “Take her to Bedford Memorial. It’s closer.”
“I know it’s closer,” Eric acknowledged. “But Doc, we’re contracted with County. We’re supposed to take accident victims to County General, especially if they’re from the shelter.”
The other attendant, who doubled as the driver, nodded, as if to back up what Eric had just said.
Mitch took out his wallet, extracted one of his business cards and handed it over to the head EMS attendant.
“I don’t have time to argue and neither does she. I’m associated with Bedford Memorial and she’s my patient. Take her there,” he ordered. “If anyone gives you any trouble, refer them to me,” he said.
The attendant looked down at the card, then slipped it into the breast pocket of his uniform. “You got it, Doc.”
Mitch exchanged glances with Melanie as the attendants gently lifted April, transferring her from the ground onto the gurney. As they secured her small body, the little girl was sobbing in pain, calling for her mother.
“Are you up to driving?” Mitch asked, still regarding Melanie.
She was having trouble getting her emotions under control. This had been a wild roller-coaster ride and it wasn’t over yet.
“Yes,” she managed to get out. “Why?”
“I’m going with April,” he began. He wanted Melanie to follow the ambulance either in his vehicle or her own.
Melanie was right beside the gurney as the attendants snapped the legs into position, raising the gurney off the ground.
“I want to come in the ambulance, too,” she protested. “April needs me,” she added.
The attendant settled the problem for them. “Not enough room for all of you. It’s going to be a tight squeeze with the doc here.”
She knew Mitch’s presence beside April was far more necessary than her own. Still, she felt numb and beside herself as she nodded.
“All right,” she agreed. “I’ll follow you to the hospital with your car.”
Theresa put her hand on Melanie’s shoulder. “I’ll be right behind you,” she promised. It was clear that she didn’t want Melanie to be alone in the waiting area.
The sound of approaching sirens was heard again. Disoriented, Melanie looked at the director. But it was Mitch who answered her unspoken question.
“That would be the medical examiner,” he told her grimly, having noted the driver making a call earlier.
Just then, April, who had faded on them, regained consciousness. Her eyes fluttered open this time.
“Mama?” she cried, looking at Mitch. It was obvious that she was unable to focus.
Mitch didn’t want to tell the little girl what had happened, didn’t want to risk what that might do to her fragile condition if she knew that both her mother and her brother were dead.
Instead, he lightly touched April’s hand, leaned over the child and told her, “April, it’s Dr. Mitch. We’re taking you to the hospital. We’re going to make you all better.”
“Okay,” she said, her voice so weak that he had to lean in closer, directly over her lips in order to hear her.
“Doc,” the driver politely prodded him, “we’ve got to get going.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Mitch said, nodding.
He walked directly behind the gurney as the two EMS attendants steered it over toward the ambulance. Mitch stepped back as the two attendants loaded April’s gurney onto the back.
The moment the gurney was secured within the ambulance, Mitch quickly climbed in after it.
“Mama?” she whispered, the forlorn note ripping into his heart.
He wrapped his fingers around April’s small hand. “Hold on to my hand, April. Everything’s going to be all right.”
“Okay,” she whispered in a trusting voice that threatened to bring tears to his eyes.
He looked up and his eyes met Melanie’s just as the attendant closed the doors.
Within ten seconds, the ambulance was leaving the parking lot.
And the medical examiner’s black van was pul
ling in.
Chapter Twelve
Waiting was utter hell.
Every second that dragged by was etched in pure agony.
The longer the operation took, the more Melanie felt as if she was going to leap out of her skin. She needed to have someone come out of the operating room—and soon—to give her an update.
True to her word, Theresa had remained with her, doing what she could to attempt to distract her, at least to some degree.
But mainly what the older woman was trying to do was build upon the sliver of hope Melanie had been clinging to.
The surgical waiting area was fairly empty this late in the evening. Only those whose relatives or friends had been brought in through the emergency room to undergo unscheduled surgery due to some sort of accident—one woman had brought in her sister with a ruptured appendix, another man had run into his family room from the patio only to discover that the plate glass sliding door was not open—were in the room, sitting on less than comfortable orange upholstered plastic chairs.
Everyone was waiting for some news coming from the operating rooms.
Tension was thick within the waiting area, but Melanie hardly took notice of the other people, and while Theresa politely engaged with them in the sparse conversation when it was aimed in their direction, Melanie couldn’t gather her thoughts together enough to carry on any semblance of dialogue.
“What’s taking them so long?” she asked Theresa, finally putting her agitation into words. “Shouldn’t they be finished operating on April by now?”
“You want fast, or do you want good, dear?” Theresa asked her sympathetically.
Melanie sighed. Theresa was right. Some things couldn’t be rushed. But that didn’t mean she had to be happy about it.
“Good,” she answered, never taking her eyes off the swinging double doors. “I want good.” Three hours ago, April had been wheeled through those doors with Mitch and two nurses in attendance.
That was the last time that she’d heard anything.
When Theresa rose to her feet, she looked at the older woman quizzically. “Are you going home?”
The infinitesimal part of her that wasn’t preoccupied with what was happening behind the operating salon’s doors felt a twinge of guilt at having the other woman stay with her in the hospital like this. After all, Theresa did have a family and a life to get back to. She didn’t.
“No, I’m just going to see if I can find out any information about April.” With that, Theresa went to the ER admission clerk’s desk.
The desk was located too far away for Melanie to catch any of the exchange between the two women. Melanie found herself holding her breath until Theresa walked back to her.
Taking the seat next to Melanie again, she told her, “They’re still operating on April.”
“Why’s it taking so long?” Melanie asked. April was small for her age. The doctors in the operating room had had enough time to rebuild her from scratch, Melanie thought irrationally.
Why wasn’t Mitch coming out to tell her that everything was all right?
Maybe he can’t, the voice in her head taunted her. Fear gripped her heart.
“There was more internal damage than they initially thought,” Theresa explained. She patted Melanie’s hand. “But April’s still hanging in there. You do the same, dear,” she told Melanie, putting her arm around the younger woman’s shoulders.
* * *
It was another two hours before Mitch finally came out of the operating room and into the waiting area. Melanie instantly shot up to her feet, eager and afraid at the same time.
Mitch looked exhausted and drained as he untied the upper portion of his surgical mask. It hung limply around his neck like a symbol of the fight he’d just fought.
“She’s in recovery,” he told Melanie and Theresa. The latter took hold of Melanie’s hand, as if to infuse her with strength as they listened to Mitch’s update. “Her condition is critical, but stable.”
The words seemed to just bounce off her head, without penetrating.
“What does that mean?” Melanie cried.
“That means she’s hanging in there and with any luck, she’ll be upgraded to serious but stable.” He offered Melanie a weak smile. “Why don’t you have Mrs. Manetti take you home, Melanie? There’s nothing you can do here tonight.”
He was wrong there. “I can keep vigil,” Melanie told him stubbornly. “When April wakes up, she’s going to need to see a familiar face.”
“I’ll be by to look in on her,” Mitch assured her. One of the ER doctors had called in sick so, since he was already here, he had volunteered to take the shift. Melanie looked as if she’d been to hell and back and he wanted her to get her rest before she collapsed out here.
“But you can’t stay in her room with her. I can,” she told him.
He looked at Theresa. “Can you please talk some sense into her?” he requested.
To his surprise, Theresa didn’t side with him. “Sorry, Doctor, but she’s making perfect sense to me. If I were in her place, I’d be doing the same thing.” Turning toward Melanie, she said, “I can stay a little longer with you if you like.”
“No, that’s okay, really. You’ve done more than enough,” Melanie assured her. “Please go home.” Turning toward Mitch, she asked, “Do they have a room assigned to April yet?”
“You’ll have to check with the admission’s clerk for that,” he told her. And then he paused just before going back to the locker room. “I still think you should go home, too. April’s not going to regain consciousness until at least sometime tomorrow.”
“That’s okay. You thought she was dead and she wasn’t. Maybe she’ll come around sooner than you think as well.” She pressed her lips together, doing her best to keep tears of relief from falling. “Anything’s possible.”
“Yeah,” he said, looking over his shoulder toward the operating room. It had been an uphill battle in there, but he’d won. For now. “Anything is.”
* * *
“Here.”
The deep male voice penetrated the misty layer that had settled in and encompassed Melanie’s brain.
It took Melanie a couple of seconds to realize that as uncomfortable as it was—and it felt as if she was sitting in a gravel pit on top of unrefined rocks—she had somehow managed to fall asleep in the chair in Melanie’s room.
Hours earlier she had followed the orderlies bringing April and her hospital bed up in the service elevator after the little girl had finally been released from the recovery area. She couldn’t remember exactly what time that was, only that the moon was still up.
The sun was lighting up the hospital room now.
From then until now, she’d sat in the chair, just watching April. As in every room, there was a television set mounted on the wall opposite April’s bed. But Melanie just couldn’t get herself to turn it on. Her mind felt too scattered to pay any attention to some episodic adventure unfolding within the confines of forty-two minutes, sans commercials.
Melanie didn’t want any distractions getting in her way. She wanted her full focus to be on April so that when the little girl came to, she would be aware of it, not just notice it as an afterthought during a mindless commercial.
She had no idea when she had fallen asleep. All she knew was that her body hated her for it now because every single part of it felt stiff and achy, as if she’d just gone through a mammoth marathon involving all the sports meant to make her sweat.
Blinking, Melanie focused on the owner of the voice and what “here” referred to.
Belatedly, she realized that it was Mitch and he was holding out a paper cup with coffee in it.
“I figured you might need this right about now,” he told her, still holding the cup in front of her. “You take lots of cream in your coffee, don’t you?” he asked her.
She took the cup from him and just held it for a second, allowing the subdued heat to penetrate her palms. The warmth spread out to her limbs from there.
Mitch was wearing the same thing he’d worn earlier, before he’d changed into his scrubs. Hadn’t he gone home, either?
“How did you know?” she asked, nodding at the container of coffee.
In her experience, most men, when they got coffee for a woman they weren’t involved with, usually got her the same kind of coffee they drank. Mitch’s coffee was as black as an abyss. Hers was a caramel cream color.
“Just a hunch.” He looked over toward April. “I take it she hasn’t woken up yet.”
“No, she hasn’t.” She looked at him with a new measure of respect for his abilities. “Can you tell that just by looking at her?”
“No,” he corrected, “I can tell that because there are no reports of a wild-eyed blonde running into the hallway, yelling for a doctor.”
She took a sip, letting the coffee wind its way through her system. Somewhat fortified, she felt able to confront him with another question. “Is that what I am, a wild-eyed blonde?”
He thought of taking the description he’d used back, or paving over it somehow, but he had a feeling she valued honesty. So he was honest.
“Well, for a while there at the crosswalk, that was a pretty apt description of you.” He checked the monitors that were attached to the tiny body, gathering all of April’s basic vital statistics and measuring against the last ones. He added something to her IV solution before turning back to Melanie. “I told you she was going to sleep through the night,” he reminded her.
Melanie shrugged. “I just wanted to be here for her in case she woke up. The last thing she saw was her mother and brother being hit by that vehicle. That had to be pretty scary for a five-year-old.”
“Not too great for an adult, either,” he commented. For just the briefest second, there was a chink in his armor.
Melanie raised her eyes to his, curious. “Is that from experience?” she asked.
He thought of just shrugging off her question, saying that he was just talking in general, but maybe saying so, denying it ever happened would have been disrespectful of the one close friend he’d had.
“Yeah.”
Dr. Forget-Me-Not (Matchmaking Mamas) Page 12