by Urban, Ami
Without even thinking, I rushed to him, throwing my arms around his neck and burying my face in his masculine scent. And I just stayed like that, feeling his heart beat against my chest. He squeezed me, almost harder than I could handle. As if he hadn’t seen me in years.
“Jesus. You have no idea how happy I am to see you.” His voice was the same, albeit with a slight nasal tinge. It was indeed a man’s voice, but a touch higher and more playful.
Brendon’s deeper, more throaty tone interrupted our hug. “Good to have ya back, Dyüd. The suboxone we gave you should take the edge off the coming down party.”
I pulled away as he nodded. “Please…please don’t ever do that again.” My gaze begged him to agree.
He reached up the hand with an IV in the back and smoothed the hair away from my face. “Cross my heart. Hope to die.” Streaks of barely visible dried tears ran down his cheeks.
“Don’t hope that, either.”
He chuckled. “Okay. I promise.”
Brendon cleared his throat. “Now that we’ve got that saw, what do you say we take care of that knee once and for all?”
Jack didn’t let go of my hand. “Sounds like a plan.”
“Sweet, sweet, sweet. Be-are-be.” He was gone.
“What happened?”
Jack looked up at me, then motioned for me to sit. The hospital bed groaned under an additional adult’s weight. He seemed to ponder something for quite some time before shrugging his shoulders and puffing out a sad laugh.
“I guess I’m a drug addict.”
I squeezed my eyes shut, feeling as though I’d just ascended the world’s tallest roller coaster and it was about hurl me over the edge. I knew this would happen. Why did I agree to it?
“It’s my fault.” I barely heard my own words.
“No.” He took my face in his cupped hands, forcing me to meet his gaze. “You didn’t. I did. I let it get this bad. I convinced Brendon to give me more. I…lied when I told you I’d taken thirty.”
Swallowing hard to combat the fresh threat of tears, I put a hand on his chest. “That wasn’t you.”
He went quiet at my statement, staring hard at the wall across from us. “You’re not wrong.”
“Opiates can affect people in different ways.”
“No.” He shook his head. “I mean, it legitimately wasn’t me inside my own head.”
I cocked my head to the side, closing my eyes to try and understand.
“Silas was in my head.”
Him again?
“He was, like…controlling my body and invading my head.”
“What kinds of things would he say?”
I watched his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed. “He…was looking at you and…he wanted to…do things to you that I’d never in a million years think about.”
That was inaccurate. The voice in his head was a manifestation of his deep thoughts. There was nothing supernatural going on. The opiates had simply broken his subconscious apart and ran it on autopilot. But, I refrained from assessing him out loud. That wasn’t what he wanted in that moment.
“Lisa, I…” He struggled for the next words, his eyes glistening, but he rubbed a hand over his face. “I hallucinated murdering you.” A single tear escaped anyway, falling down one cheek. “You stabbed me with a needle. I felt it. I… I laid on your dead body. It felt so…real…”
I see. How could I tell him what he’d experienced wasn’t something to be concerned about? Sure, perhaps it wasn’t a concern for me. I knew he wouldn’t ever hurt me. But when you don’t seem to have control over your own body, I understand how that could be frightening.
“Is he still there?” I asked, actually curious.
But Jack shook his head. “Not right now.” He looked at me, a nervous energy about him. “But I’m afraid he’ll come back. I don’t want him to come back, Lisa.”
“Everything’s alright.” I wrapped my arms around him, pulling him into the most comforting hug I could. “We’ll get you into surgery soon. And we’ll try to flush your system. But the next few weeks may be very difficult for you.”
“I don’t care.” His tone turned dark. “I’d hang from a window by my fingernails for a month, so I’d never hear his voice again.”
***
“Give us a kiss, Babe.” Jack beckoned to me from his spot on the operating table. The anesthesia was beginning to take effect. No doubt his legs were feeling heavy and his head a bit like a wide-open field.
I leaned forward and kissed him on the mouth. He hummed as I pulled away.
“Where’s mine? He said us!” Brendon tapped one cheek.
“My wife. Not yours.” Jack’s sleepy voice made me smile. He reached up one hand and tugged on my white doctor’s coat. When I looked down at him, his eyes fluttered closed, his grip loosening.
“Okay,” I said, still feeling just a bit giddy at seeing him again. “I think he’s out.”
“I think you’re right.” Brendon met my gaze above Jack. “Oh! I forgot to tell you. We can do a mosaicplasty. That way we don’t have to open two spots.”
I watched as Brendon went about his work with meticulous precision. And I listened as he filled the operating room with beautiful music. His own beautiful music. And once we were able to see inside Jack’s knee with our laparoscope, I felt relief flood through me. Sincere and heartwarming relief. Jack was finally going to be pain free.
“Woo-hoo. I don’t know how he walked on this for so long.” Brendon began debriding the inside of the knee, cleaning out the degenerated cartilage. There was quite a bit of it. Jack’s femur was almost touching the patellofemoral joint. There were small lesions where bits of bone had been eroded away. The poor, poor man. “Never skip leg day.”
“I don’t understand that reference.”
Brendon chuckled. “Of course not.” He looked up at me. “Obviously, this guy works out, right? Takes good care of himself.”
“Yes, that’s true.”
“Well, he hasn’t been able to really work on toning his legs while his knee’s been like this.”
“I see. Yes. All the weight of his upper body certainly hasn’t helped the degeneration.”
“Exactly.” He went back to work. “Never skip leg day.”
“I understand now.”
Our next step was to harvest cartilage from a non-weight bearing section of his knee. While Brendon did that, I created a few sockets for the circular plugs in the subchondral bone. The procedure went smoothly. We were done in just over two hours. And as we were wheeling Jack into recovery, Brendon smiled down at him, his surgical mask hanging from one ear.
“Welcome to your new, pain-free life, Jack Reynolds.”
File: dailyrounds6-20.avi
Duration: 5:00:12
Date: 6/20
[TRANSCRIPTION OF 00:00:00 – 03:55:24 REDACTED]
[Static] [Chatter] [Inaudible conversations] [Murmurs]
L.REYNOLDS:
Last item on the agenda today is that Jack has finally had his osteochondral procedure.
[Clapping]
L.REYNOLDS:
I’d like to thank our search party for dedicating their time and findings. I’d also like to thank Dr. Rutherford for his prompt response and quick work.
[Papers shuffle] [More clapping]
B.RUTHERFORD:
[Sings] Awkward!
[Laughter]
L.REYNOLDS:
Nurse Harper, I want to make sure you know when to administer the suboxone.
M.HARPER:
Oh, no one told me.
L.REYNOLDS:
[Pause] [Sigh] You’ll need to do it right after these rounds and every six hours thereafter.
[Cough] [Murmurs]
M.HARPER:
[Softly] Understood.
[Static] [Silence]
L.REYNOLDS:
Anything else?
[Silence] [Cough]
L.REYNOLDS:
Very well. End of meeting.
[Papers shu
ffling] [Cacophony of voices].
[Footsteps] [Door squeaking] [Muted thud]
[Static]
[Muted thud] [Footsteps] [Door squeaking]
S.LANGFORD:
Hey, Baby. Got what you needed.
M.HARPER:
[Sigh] Oh, my God, thanks so much. Dr. Reynolds looked like she wanted to eat me alive.
S.LANGFORD:
I figured something was going on when you spelled everything wrong in your text.
M.HARPER:
[Laughs] Yeah, that was pretty bad. I was trying to hit the right buttons under the table. [Pause] So, this is the suboxone?
S.LANGFORD:
Yep. And here’s your supply key.
M.HARPER:
My hero.
[Muted thud] [Footsteps] [Door squeaking]
[Tape ends after 1 hour, 2 minutes and 8 seconds of silence]
[END TRANSCRIPT]
From the desk of Dr. Lisa Reynolds – June 20
All I could think as my feet carried me down the corridor to ICU was that it was all my fault. A few moments prior, a code blue had been called over the intercom. Both mine and Brendon’s phones went off. My husband was in trouble.
Brendon and I rounded the corner to his room, speeding past a very flustered Harper. The wheels of the heart monitor clattered over the door jamb. Jack seemed calm at first glance. But upon closer inspection, I could tell something was wrong. Bedsheets were balled in each fist and his eyes were wide, darting around the room. When he saw me, registration flashed through him. He reached one hand off the bed toward me, but I hurriedly asked him to stay still while Brendon attached the heart monitor to him.
Immediately the high-pitched scream of a flatline filled the room. Stupid piece of junk. Brendon pounded on it. That seemed to work.
“What did you give him?” I snapped at Harper.
She shrunk back, then hesitantly held out one shaky hand. I snatched the dram from her and rolled it around in my palm. The label did not say suboxone.
“You gave him Penicillin!”
“What?!” Harper’s hands flew to her cheeks. “No… No! I didn’t! I—"
“His pulse is way too high.” Brendon rushed toward the bed, an epinephrine shot in hand. Thank God he was quick.
“In the thigh.” I pointed him toward the right spot. The needle went in smoothly. We waited while Jack gasped for air. After what seemed like an eternity, the monitor behind us began to emit an emergency sound.
“His O2 is dropping.” That kicked me into gear. The epinephrine wasn’t working. I barked orders at Brendon to get me a syringe of adrenaline.
“I’ll get it,” Harper said.
“No!” I stopped her. Hurt bloomed behind her gaze, but I didn’t care. I turned back to my husband. “Jack, hold on!” I held his hand tight in mine. Brendon came back with the adrenaline. I jammed it straight into Jack’s thigh.
The heart monitor flatlined once again. I turned and pounded the thing once more. But this time, the beat did not start again. Frustrated, I turned back to my husband whose face was turning blue. His eyes rolled into the back of his head as his body went limp.
“We need to intubate him!”
Brendon nodded and grabbed the intubation equipment. He placed the metal piece in Jack’s mouth. After fumbling for a second too long, I asked, “What’s wrong?”
A furrow creased into Brendon’s brow. “It’s too swollen. I won’t be able to get the tube in.”
“Let me.” I pushed him aside, letting go of Jack’s hand. But he was right. We could try and force the tube down, but it’d likely cause dental and esophageal damage. And a tracheotomy was out of the question.
“Starting CPR!” I pushed Brendon out of the way again and began compressions of Jack’s chest. I didn’t care if the two others in the room were just staring at me. I wasn’t going to let my husband die. Not for something so silly. So easily curable.
When I breathed into his mouth, I felt resistance. Why wasn’t the adrenaline working? Was the reaction that severe? I kept going anyway. I felt the muted crack of one of his ribs.
He wasn’t going to die. I wasn’t going to let him. “Get me another shot of epinephrine!”
No one answered me for a few seconds.
“Come on!” I gave Jack another breath.
Then I felt a hand on my arm. I looked up into the concerned dark eyes of my partner. “He’s gone.”
“No! The machine’s broken!” I kept going until Brendon forced me to look at him.
“If you love him, let him go.”
I suddenly felt very heavy. My arms stopped working, flopping down to my sides. Numbness washed over me in a wave. The loud, incessant wail of the monitor went dull. The edges of my vision tunneled. I looked at my husband. He wasn’t breathing. I checked both the pulse in his neck and wrist. I got nothing.
Nothing. Not a thing. There’s nothing...left. I...don’t know how to... No. It can’t happen this way. It’s not fair. Why...? No. It can’t be. This is a nightmare. It’s definitely not real.
“No.” I heard the words, but they didn’t sound like mine. “Not you. Anyone but you.”
The bed frame creaked. Brendon was next to me all of a sudden, his hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry.”
“No. You can’t be sorry because Jack can’t be gone. He’s not gone. This is just a dream. No.” I spun around to face Harper. “You!”
She shrunk back, pushing herself against the wall.
“This is your fault!”
“Lisa—”
“Your charts are never completed, you constantly bring me the wrong drams and you’ve just murdered a perfectly healthy patient! Get out. Now! You’re fired!”
After bursting into tears, Harper covered her face in her hands and dashed out of my sight. Good riddance. She’d never work in another hospital again. The negligence!
Brendon’s palm was on the small of my back, gently pushing me toward the door and away from my now late husband. How could he? This was my husband. This was Jack. Jack wasn’t dead. No way.
All of a sudden, my vision was overtaken with solid red. No one could take me away from him. No one. So, I spun around, Brendon’s hands moving to my shoulders, and attempted to claw my way out of his grasp.
But he wouldn’t fucking let me go!
“Get away from me!” The words escaped me before I could tamp them down. And they were so loud. I tried flailing to get him to let go, but he only met my thrusts with parries of his own. It was almost as if he’d done this before.
“We need Dr. Clark!”
“No!” My scream met deaf auditory canals as he shouted.
Not Dr. Clark. We didn’t need him.
I kept fighting with Brendon and he kept holding me back. I could feel the thump of my heartbeat in my throat, ears and chest. It was deafening. It quickened, causing a drop in my blood pressure. Dots swam before my eyes. Sounds became hollow and tinny. Light began to fade. And soon I was in a blissfully unaware state.
***
D.N.R.
Never had I loathed those three letters more. That stupid initialism meant the end of my entire world. Jack’s life – his essence – had been taken.
But where did it go? Every fiber of my being believed God didn’t exist. Heaven and Hell didn’t exist. So where did it go? Where did he go?
The man in front of me – lying still on a cold metal table – was no more. His skin no longer registered the steel underneath it nor the sheet draped over him. What was once a jovial, handsome and intelligent soul was nothing. Every word he’d ever said meant nothing anymore. And I couldn’t bear to move off my hard stool in the morgue because I knew it was the last time I’d ever see him.
I studied the purple marking on his right deltoid. D.N.R. Normally, that’d mean Do Not Resuscitate. That’s what I recalled. But here, it meant Dead Not Rabid.
Dead.
I have no idea how long I sat there. But it wasn’t long enough. Because as I write this, I feel I am fo
rgetting his face. I’m forgetting his voice. I’m forgetting what it felt like when he touched me.
I tried my best to retain every single detail in his face. The subtle laugh lines at the corners of his mouth wouldn’t deepen anymore. The crow’s feet around his hazel eyes – now closed – would never see another smile on his thin lips. I found myself stroking his sandy hair with a slow hand.
My adrenal glands kicked into overdrive. My stomach felt as though it dropped a few inches, even though I knew that was just the adrenaline from stress. And yet, I couldn’t talk myself out of the fear like I’d been able to so many times before.
I barely registered the metallic scrape as the door to the morgue opened.
“Oh, Jesus Christ.” It was Dr. Clark. His words seemed exasperated. That was probably true. I wasn’t supposed to be down there. And Dr. Clark expressed as much.
“I know,” I said. Those were the only words that would escape.
“Well, get the fuck out.” The medical examiner’s steps came closer to me, but I didn’t look up from Jack’s body. I said nothing.
“Lady, I can’t have you just sitting there while I harvest the organs.”
At that, I finally met his gaze. He pushed a silver clipboard under his left arm. What did it say on that chart? Jack’s age, height, weight, build and…initial cause of death.
“I’d like to see the chart, please,” I said, extending my right arm to him. He took a step back, rolling his eyes at me.
“No. You’re not supposed to be down here.”
I glared at him. “This is my husband.”
“Was,” he replied as one corner of his mouth turned up in a sneer. “Now he’s a donor. And there’s a patient upstairs that needs a liver.”
The stool behind me clattered to the floor as I got to my feet. I ignored the loudness of it. “His organs aren’t going anywhere.”
Dr. Clark let out a sigh, pinching the bridge of his bulbous nose with a thumb and forefinger. What a stupid man. “His ID says he’s an organ donor.”
“And I’m his wife.” I felt blood rush into my face, making it hot. At my words, Dr. Clark rose an eyebrow.
“Does it look like I care?”
“You should!” I pointed a finger at him. “This is illegal.”