by Kay Hadashi
After three minutes, the man began to settle his thrashing, but his breathing continued to be strained.
“Get ready to intubate. Somebody call anesthesia and respiratory therapy. Start another IV. And we’ll need to transfer him to the ICU once he’s stable.”
Melanie went to the head of the bed, taking the laryngoscope and tube from the nurse. Watching the monitors and listening to his laboring lungs once more, Melanie decided it was time to put a breathing tube into the patient’s airway.
“I need to intubate. Dose with succinylcholine.”
When she saw the patient’s body respond to the new medication by stopping its movements, and his breathing slow to a stop, Melanie slipped the blade of her lighted scope into his airway and lifted. Peering in, she slid the plastic tube into his throat and pulled the scope out. She held out her free hand. “Ambu-bag.”
After several quick breaths through the tube, she used tape to secure the tube in place. It was then when the anesthesiologist and respiratory therapist showed up. When the RT started working to secure the tube and set up his mechanical ventilator, Melanie reported off to the same anesthesiologist she had been working with that morning.
“Didn’t we work on this fellow in the OR yesterday?” Dr. Everingham asked. “I remember his teeth.”
“Gall bladder,” she said. “But he’s shown signs of infection and his pain has been poorly managed. I’ve been reluctant to send him home. Apparently he’s been using a lot more drugs than the pot he told us about.”
He checked the tube, listened to the patient’s lungs, and gave another med. When she finally had the chance, Melanie wrote orders for the patient’s ICU care and called for a hospitalist in helping with the man’s obvious drug overdose at the hands of his so-called friend that left only minutes earlier.
She went with the parade of doctors and nurses when the patient was transferred to the ICU.
“It’ll be a while before he’s settled,” Dr. Everingham said. He was the anesthesiologist she had been working with that morning, one known for being picky about patients. That gave Melanie the chance to call the OR and explain about the schedule delay, and also allowed her the chance to go see Dottie.
Learning Dottie had been taken back to her room, she went there. Pop was sitting with her. Her neurologist, Dr. Hennessey, was there already bluntly explaining she had a brain tumor and it needed to come out.
It was either the mention of surgery or Melanie’s arrival, but Dottie burst into tears. Pop patted her hand.
“Is that true, Melanie?” Dottie asked.
She handed Dottie a box of tissues. “Let me have a word with Doctor Hennessey first.”
Once she had him out in the hall and the room door closed, she set her hooks on him.
“Miss the class on bedside manner, Dick?”
“No, I didn’t, Doctor Kato. I do know, however, it is best to be up front and honest with patients, no matter how hard the news might be about their condition.”
“Honest is one thing, but there’s no reason to be cruel.”
He held the films up to the light. “Look at her brain, at that tumor, and tell me not to be cruel.”
She snatched the film from his hand and gave it a quick look. The gray area of the tumor was easily seen. “You know, if you would’ve worked her up properly when she was first admitted instead of turning her care over to an incompetent social worker, she could’ve had her surgery by now. As it is, you’ve delayed important treatment to a seriously ill patient, Dick, and in the process, risked her life.”
“First of all, my name to you and everyone else is not Richard but Doctor Hennessey.”
“I’m not calling you Dick because your first name is Richard.”
He sneered. “And that social worker you believe is incompetent has worked in my office for twenty years.”
“Doing something for a long time doesn’t make her good, it just makes her old.”
“She also happens to be my wife.”
With that, Hennessey turned on his heel and strode off down the hall, taking the scan films with him. Coming in the opposite direction was Josh. “What’s he in a huff about?”
“Nothing. Just two doctors making friends with each other.”
“How’s Mom? Dad called and told me to come right away.”
“Yeah, well, there’s bad news.”
“She’s okay, right? She didn’t…”
“She’s okay. We got the results of the MRI. It isn’t good. She has a tumor that needs to come out.”
“A tumor? Cancer?”
“There’s no way of knowing until the pathology results are done, and surgery needs to be performed to accomplish that. How do you think your mother is going to take that news?”
“Not well,” he said.
“You think she’ll allow it?”
“Not much choice, is there?”
“Not really,” she said. “You want to talk to her or do you want me to?”
“I will. But first, go ahead and say it.”
“Say what?”
“Say you told us so. You’ve been nagging us for months to get checkups, and now you can say you told us so.”
“Except that tumor might not have been found on a general checkup. And I’m not saying anything like that, not now or ever.”
***
On Friday evening, Melanie was packing a few things for home. Her prison term of being on call for emergencies at the hospital would start early the next morning. All she wanted was to have dinner with her family and play with the kids. Just as she was turning out her office light, there was a knock at her door. It was Detective Nakatani.
“I can’t get those reports from Mister Carson,” he said.
Melanie rubbed her forehead. “I forgot all about those. Why won’t he turn them over to you?”
“He said he’ll only give them to an official hospital employee, which is you.”
“An employee? He thinks…never mind. Let’s go slay the dragon.”
It took ten minutes to travel across the medical center from her clinic to Andrew’s office in administration. They got there just in time, finding him with his coat on, leaving.
“Not so fast, Andrew. I want those incident reports,” she told him, blocking his exit path.
After looking at both of them, Andrew opened his office door again. “You won’t like it.”
“If it has something to do with you, I’m sure I won’t,” Melanie said, following closely on his heels into his private office. She hadn’t been there in years. “Oh, you’ve redecorated, and at hospital expense, I suppose?”
“It was money well spent. I deserved it.”
“The cancer center or the department of pediatrics deserved those funds far more than you do, Andrew. Where are the reports?”
He opened a locked desk drawer and pulled out a six-inch stack of papers, dropping them on the corner of his desk. “There you go. Two thousand, four hundred and eighty-one of them. That just goes back one year. Would you like more?”
“Should be enough for our purposes,” Nakatani said.
Andrew went back to his office door, turned off the lights again, and waited. “Don’t lose them, Kato.”
Melanie flew by him as fast as she could without running. “I won’t, Andrew.”
She made a beeline back to her office clinic, Nakatani trying to keep up.
“No love lost between the two of you,” he said, catching up at the elevator.
“I don’t have a compassionate Buddhist attitude when I’m around that…him.”
After locking the stack of incident reports in her office, she went home. Thérèse was in a particularly lively mood that evening, while Josh and Pop looked to be in mourning over the bad news about Dottie. Melanie found some websites for them to learn more about brain tumors. Just as they were settling in at the computer, Thérèse came in.
“Momma, Dino got broked.”
Melanie took the two pieces of rubber dinosaur, examining where t
he purple tail had been removed from the back end. “Sure did. How’d that happen?”
“I dunno.”
Melanie leaned down to whisper in her daughter’s ear. “Magic?”
“Kinda maybe. Sorry.”
Melanie looked at her watch. “You know what? I bet if we hurried, you, Chance, and me could get to the toy store in town before they closed.”
“Big one toy store at the mall?”
“Yep.”
Thérèse thrust her arms in the air. “Yay! Mall kind toy store!”
The highway traffic was light for early evening, allowing Melanie to hurry to get to the toy store before it closed.
“You know you’re not going to get a new toy every time an old one breaks, right?”
“I know it.” The girl was busy trying to get the tail back on to the dinosaur. “Can I get a new Dino?”
“If you want. Or maybe somebody else. We’ll have to look at everybody on the shelves to see who wants to come home with us.”
“Can Chance get a new friend, too?”
Melanie parked at the mall. “I think that’s a good idea.”
Once she had the baby in his backpack carrier and loaded onto her back, she took Thérèse by the hand and went into the large mall. The only people there were teenagers on dates.
“Momma, what was Daddy and Grandpop looking at on the puter?”
“Just reading about some things about your grandmother.”
“She’s still sick kind way, huh?”
“Sure is. Maybe even sicker than we thought. That means whenever you see her, you need to be really nice and gentle, okay?”
“Is Grandmother gonna…” The girl winced. “Is she gonna be like those people in the boat?”
“No, I don’t think so. Hopefully not for a long time. But she’s going to have a very long and important surgery tomorrow.”
“Just like my turtles?” the girl asked. She’d had her tonsils taken out a few months before and had called them turtles.
“Just like that but way more important.”
“Gonna be okay again?”
“That’s the plan. Maybe even better than before.”
“Can we go see her?” the girl asked, clutching at Melanie’s hand a little tighter.
“We would’ve, but it was too late this evening. I think she wants to get some rest tonight. But tomorrow morning, you and Daddy and Grandpop will go in and see her, okay?”
“Okay.”
Melanie turned toward the toy store. “You be sure to remind them tomorrow.”
“You gonna do her surgey?”
“Somebody else. I’ll be doing surgery on other people tomorrow, but I promise to go visit her as soon as she’s finished.”
Getting to the toy store, Thérèse put both hands up on the door and tried using her weight to push it open. Melanie helped get the door open. As soon as she was in, Thérèse bolted for the stuffed animal aisle.
While Melanie browsed through things for Chance, the store’s assistant manager came over to admire the baby. She was an old high school classmate of Melanie.
“I haven’t seen your name in the newspaper lately, Melanie. You didn’t quit being mayor, did you?”
“If it were only so easy. Hey, Estella, where would I find teddy bears? Are they all in one place or organized by brand name?”
“Pretty much by brand. We have a new brand that makes only teddy bears, though.”
“Fuzzy brown ones about a foot tall and wearing a bowtie?”
Estella led Melanie to a large display of stuffed bears. “All different kinds. Is it for Chance?”
“Maybe.” Melanie poked through the bears heaped up. “Any of these guys have bowties?”
“I’ve never seen any like that. We do have little accessory things for kids, if you want to see those.”
Melanie pulled one bear out from the mix. Except for the plaid bowtie, it was a twin to the one that was delivered to her office two weeks before, and found in the rowboat with the dead couple. Instead of keeping it, Melanie took a picture of the bear with her phone, front and back. “Where are those accessories?”
Estella led her to a display of things kids could use in dress-up games, clip-on neckties, easily worn bowties, hair ribbons and clips, and holiday-themed items. There were two plaid bowties, and she was pretty sure in the same colors as the one that had been causing her so much trouble. She took a picture of those, also.
“Is there any way of finding out who might’ve bought one of those bears and one of these plaid bowties at the same time?”
“We sell so much stuff here, you know? Was it by cash or credit card?”
“I have no idea, but they both would’ve been bought together, and about two weeks ago. You guys don’t keep specific records like that?”
“You know what? I bet if I put those inventory numbers into our computer system, I might be able to find recent sales of them. It might take me a few minutes. What’s this all about?”
Melanie couldn’t spill the beans about a police investigation that involved the bear, but she could tell the rest of the story. “Oh, somebody dropped off a teddy bear at my office just like that one we looked at, and it was wearing one of these little bowties. It seemed weird, so I got rid of it. But ever since I’ve been curious who it was.”
From another part of the store came a crash.
“Uh oh,” Estella said.
They both hurried to where the crash came from.
“Thérèse?” Melanie said when she saw her daughter standing in the middle of stuffed animals strewn across the floor. Her fingertip was dangerously close to going into her mouth, a habit Melanie had been breaking in her daughter. In the other hand was a toy.
“Sorry, Momma.”
“Are you okay?” Estella asked, rushing to the girl.
“I okay. Sorry I make a mess.”
“Estella, why don’t you go check those inventory numbers. Thérèse and I need to have a long talk while cleaning up this mess,” Melanie said, crouching down to pick up toys. Once Estella had left, Melanie set her eyes on her daughter. “Used magic, huh?”
“Sorry, Momma.” Thérèse continued to clutch at one specific toy and a pout was beginning.
“This is why I don’t want you to use your magic.”
“I made big trouble, huh?”
“Well, nothing got broken, so I guess we’re okay.” She took the toy from her daughter’s hand, an animal of some sort outfitted like a Disney princess. “I’m not sure you should have a new toy, though.”
The girl’s pout quickly turned to wet eyes. “I sorry, Momma.”
“You know better than to use magic outside your bedroom.”
Tears began to run down the girl’s cheeks. “The princess is for Grandmother.”
“This is?” Melanie asked, looking at the doll.
The tip of the girl’s finger was now in her mouth. She nodded.
Melanie handed the toy back. “That’s very nice of you, Sweetie. I’m sure she’ll like it a lot.”
“I can gib it to her?”
“Sure can. What about all of her friends all over the place? What are we going to do with them?”
“Put’em back on the shelf?” Thérèse said.
“Or maybe take them with us?”
“Weally?”
“Not for home, though. Remember when we took toys to the hospital for the kids there? Want to do that again? Might be easier than putting all these guys away, huh?”
“Take’m tonight?”
“I think that would be best. I’m pretty sure if they went home with us, they might get lost in your room. You should pick one out for you, though.”
“I got enough stuffed friends, Momma.”
By the time they had the toys in a shopping cart, Estella came back, a printout sheet in her hand. “That was easier than I thought. You were right. A bear and a bowtie were bought at the same time about two and a half weeks ago.”
“Did they use cash or credit card?”<
br />
“Credit card. When I checked the name for it, it came back as being blocked.”
“What’s that mean?” Melanie asked. She was pushing the shopping cart filled with toys to a checkout station.
“Either they overextended their credit too many times or it was stolen.” Estella handed over the printout. You can see where several teddy bears were purchased that day but only one bowtie. But no name to go with them. Sorry.”
“Any idea who the clerk was that day?”
“It was me, but honestly, I have no idea who it might’ve been. That was right before Valentine’s Day, and all kinds of people come in here looking for cute gifts for lovers. Especially teddy bears. Those are super popular around Valentine’s Day.”
Melanie pushed the cart full of toys to the cash register and got out her wallet.
“Are these all for you?” Estella asked Thérèse. “You sure are a lucky girl getting so many toys.”
Thérèse acted shy for a change and tried backing away to behind Melanie’s hip.
“Tell who they’re for, Sweetie.”
“Kids at hospicable.”
“That’s not right. You know how to say it.”
“Kids at hopsittable?”
“Oh, the hospital,” Estella said, scanning stuffed animals.
“We figured it was easier to buy all these than for you to reshelve them,” Melanie said. Once the purchase was done, they took the toys out to the pickup and went back to the hospital. “You’re staying up pretty late tonight, little girl. You won’t be grouchy tomorrow morning when you go visit Grandmother?”
“Should be okay.”
The two of them carried the several bags into the pediatric wing, taking them to the nurses’ station. Once the toys were received and Thérèse was heaped with praise for her generosity, Melanie decided it wasn’t too late to visit Dottie.
“But gotta be really quiet in the hospital because we’re here so late, okay? No running or any noise at all or they’ll throw us out.”
When they went into Dottie’s room, the nurse was just giving her a sedative.
“Hi Grandmother,” Thérèse whispered. She handed over the toy princess. “This is for you.”
“That’s very nice. Thank you. Did you pick it out?”
She nodded. “Me and Momma.”