The Color of Heaven Series [02] The Color of Destiny

by Julianne MacLean

  She nodded at me, but I saw the panic in her eyes. She was pasty gray and perspiring. She gripped my hand tightly. Her palm was clammy.

  “Everything’s going to be fine,” I said, and gently rubbed her hair off her face. “Maybe it’s just a bad reaction to the pizza.”

  She nodded again, but we both knew it was more than that. She squeezed my hand and held it to her heart. “Thank you, Kate. I’m so sorry. I’m supposed to be taking care of you.”

  “You are taking care of me,” I said. “I don’t know what I would have done without you these past few months.”

  She winced with pain and shut her eyes. I felt a rush of fear. “Are you okay?” I asked. “Can I do anything?”

  “Just stay with me,” she managed to say.

  I didn’t understand how this could be happening. Angela was young, fit, and vibrant. She went to yoga class three times a week and had never mentioned anything about a heart condition.

  “Has this ever happened to you before?” I asked.

  “No, never.”

  Mia ran back into the room. “The ambulance is on its way.”

  Chapter Twenty-seven

  WHEN THE PARAMEDICS wheeled the gurney into Angela’s apartment, I wanted to bow at their feet and kiss their boots. Everything about them put me at ease. They wore uniforms like police officers, and wasted no time reaching Angela. They knelt on either side of her and calmly began asking questions about her symptoms.

  “What’s your name?” the dark-haired one asked.

  “Angela Worthington.”

  “My name is Scott, and I’m a paramedic. This is John. Can you tell me what’s wrong?”

  Angela described her chest pains, her difficulty breathing, and a pain in her left arm that she had not mentioned to Mia or me.

  “Have you ever had pain like this before?” Scott asked.

  “No, never.”

  “How long has it been going on? Did it start suddenly or creep up on you?”

  “The pain woke me about an hour ago.”

  While Scott took Angela’s pulse, John said, “I’m going to put this blood pressure cup on your arm, Angela, and then I’m going to attach some EKG leads to your chest so we can find out what’s going on.”

  Angela nodded while Mia and I stood out of the way, watching.

  I am quite sure that was the moment that sealed my fate, though I didn’t realize it at the time. I made no conscious decision that I wanted to be a paramedic. I couldn’t even see past the fact that I was eight months pregnant and might never finish high school. All I knew was that I worshipped those EMTs, and I was immensely grateful for their skills.

  Scott asked, “Can you scale the pain from one to ten? If ten is excruciating––”

  “Seven,” Angela said.

  The two paramedics locked eyes briefly, then continued their assessment.

  “Any family history?” Scott asked.

  “My uncle had a triple bypass four years ago. He was fifty-eight.”

  “How old are you?”

  “Thirty-two.”

  “Are you on any medications? Do you smoke?”

  “No.”

  “Are you on any other drugs? Cocaine, uppers, downers, speed, herbal medications?”

  “No.”

  “Are you sure?” Scott firmly asked. “We need to know everything, Angela, otherwise we can’t help you.”

  I knew they doubted her denial because she was so young. It hardly seemed possible that she could be at risk for a heart attack.

  “She’s not on drugs,” I answered in her defense.

  John, the stocky one, turned his head and looked up at me, as if for the first time. His gaze lingered on my belly for a few seconds, then he went back to work on Angela. He started an IV tube and put an oxygen mask on her.

  “It looks like she has ST elevations in lead two,” John said.

  Scott called the hospital. “We’ve got a thirty-two-year-old woman with a possible MI. Pain started an hour ago, radiating into the left arm. She’s diaphoretic. Some family history.” He paused. “No, it was an uncle. No drugs, no other risk factors.” Another pause. “Yeah, we have her on O2. Would like permission to give aspirin and nitroglycerin.”

  Scott nodded and snapped his fingers at John, who briefly removed the oxygen mask to slip a pill under Angela’s tongue.

  Suddenly, I felt a pain in my lower abdomen and clutched my stomach. “Oh no,” I said, looking down at the floor.

  Scott hung up and said to Angela, “We’re going to take you to the hospital now.” Then he approached me. “Are you okay?”

  “No,” I replied. “I think my water just broke.”

  Mia gripped my shoulder. “Oh, my God. Does this mean you’re going into labor?”

  “Where are your parents?” Scott asked, still blessedly calm in the midst of all this.

  “They live in Bar Harbor,” I replied. “Angela is my aunt. I’ve been staying with her for a while. This is my sister.”

  Scott studied Mia’s panic-stricken face. “Then I think you should both come with us to the hospital. You can ride in the ambulance.” He turned to help John lift Angela onto the gurney. “What’s your name?” he asked me.

  “Kate.”

  “Nice to meet you, Kate. Why don’t you go pack a few things, but hurry up. You have exactly one minute and then we’re out of here.”

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  “HOW IS SHE doing?” I asked Scott as the ambulance picked up speed.

  John was at the wheel. He had turned on the siren as soon as we were underway.

  “Why don’t we ask her?” Scott said. “How are you feeling, Angela?”

  She lay on the gurney, still wearing the oxygen mask, and gave a thumbs up.

  “Everything’s going to be fine,” Scott said. “There’s hardly any traffic, so we should reach the hospital in about ten minutes. How about you, Kate?” he said to me. “Are you feeling any contractions?”

  I shook my head. “No, nothing after that first time when my water broke. Is this normal?”

  “It’s nothing to be concerned about,” he replied. “They’ll take good care of you.”

  By ‘they,’ he meant the doctors and nurses on the obstetrical floor at the hospital.

  I wasn’t due for three weeks, and I wondered if my premature labor had been brought on by the stress of Angela’s heart attack.

  “How old are you, anyway, if you don’t mind my asking?”

  Scott constantly amazed me by how he could carry on a conversation while checking an IV or taking Angela’s blood pressure.

  “I’m sixteen,” I replied.

  “Is that why you’re not living with your parents?”

  “Yeah,” I said, “but this is only temporary until the baby is born. They didn’t kick me out or anything like that, but we live in a small town and felt it would be better this way.”

  “Are you putting the baby up for adoption?”

  “Why would you assume that?” I asked, wanting to hear Scott’s opinion on the matter, because I was still undecided about whether or not I should keep the baby.

  Scott shrugged non-committedly. “I just figured that must be the case if you’re having the baby here and not at home. Otherwise, why keep it a secret, if everyone’s going to know anyway?”

  It was a reasonable deduction, and just when I was about to tell him that I was leaning toward keeping my baby, Mia said, “I think you should keep it. It’s the right thing. I have a feeling about this baby. She’s going to be special.”

  “She? What makes you think it’s a girl?”

  She shrugged. “I don’t know. I just have this funny feeling. Either way, it doesn’t matter. I promise to help you. We’ll convince Mom and Dad together.”

  I had never loved her more than I did in that moment.

  Then suddenly, John hollered, “Shit!”

  He slammed on the brakes.

  It all happened very quickly after that. Mia and I tumbled over each other on t
he bench, then a sudden jarring impact shattered the quiet morning as the ambulance was rammed at a ninety-degree angle by what I later learned was a mid-sized moving truck.

  The sound of crunching metal and smashing glass was explosive in my ears. Mia slammed into me. I felt the crack of her skull against mine and the tangle of her flailing limbs as she rolled over me.

  When John first hit the brakes, Angela’s gurney shot forward against the driver’s compartment like a projectile, then she spun like a log on water as we flipped over sideways. Three times apparently. I have no memory of that. The last thing I remember is the concern I felt at the terrible pain in my belly when I was flung violently into a shelf of medical supplies.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  THE ACCIDENT OCCURRED at 5:58 in the morning. I was later told that on the evening news, it was reported that the driver of the moving truck had been up all night helping his girlfriend clear out of her apartment.

  He was drunk, and he died instantly when he flew through the windshield.

  I woke twelve days later to the monotonous beep of a heart monitor. When I was finally able to grasp that this was not a normal awakening, I struggled to open my eyes, but my body didn’t seem able to respond to my wishes. I was confused by this, but it was nothing compared to the throbbing pain in my head and a slow realization...

  I was lying in a hospital bed, because I had been injured in an ambulance accident.

  “Kate? Can you hear me? I think she’s awake. Lester, go and get someone.”

  Though my mind was in a fog and the pain in my head made it difficult to think clearly, I could at least recognize my mother’s voice. I then became cognizant of the fact that my left arm was in a cast.

  All at once, memories rushed at me like blinding flashes of light.

  I was riding in the ambulance. There was a loud crash. I saw Angela’s gurney fly through the air.

  With growing panic, I began to breathe heavily. “My baby... Is my baby okay?”

  My father hurried into the room with a nurse. She checked my vitals. I couldn’t understand why no one would answer my question.

  “My baby...” I said. “Mia... Where’s Mia?”

  “Try to stay calm,” Dad said. “We need to make sure you’re okay.”

  “Everything looks good,” the nurse told him. “I’m going to call the doctor.”

  My mother began to weep.

  I could barely find the strength to move, but somehow I managed to slide my hand up onto my belly.

  It was flat.

  My father leaned over the bed. “I’m sorry, Kate,” he said. “It was a very bad accident. No one survived but you. You’re lucky to be alive.”

  But I didn’t feel lucky at all. I felt as if my father had just pushed me off the roof of a tall city skyscraper. I was plummeting fast, trapped in some sort of horrific dimension of disbelief. I thought I might be dreaming. It couldn’t be true. Yet I knew it was, because my stomach was flat and there was a scar, low on my abdomen, which meant my womb was empty. I was no longer carrying a child inside of me. My body had been jostled about violently and I was ravaged and broken.

  My baby was dead.

  And Mia, Angela... All dead.

  Yet here I was. Alive.

  The rescue team had called it a miracle, because both paramedics died on the scene, as did as Angela, Mia, and my unborn child.

  I was the only survivor.

  But why me?

  Into the Future

  Chapter Thirty

  February 17, 2007

  DO YOU REMEMBER the woman from the frozen lake? The one who had no vitals when we transported her to the hospital? Her name was Sophie. She had been dead for more than forty minutes before they revived her, and I couldn’t seem to get her out of my head.

  “Did that woman from the lake ever come out of her coma?” I asked Bill as we headed out on a call.

  “I asked about her yesterday,” he replied. “They said she still hasn’t woken up. She’ll probably be a vegetable.”

  I gazed out the window as we sped past a playground. “Slow down. There are kids around here.”

  “You’re always telling me to slow down, but can I remind you that this is an emergency vehicle? We’re supposed to speed.”

  “You know how I feel about that,” I replied.

  Bill and I had been partners for six months before I told him what happened to me almost twenty years earlier. Like most people, he was surprised I decided to become a paramedic after something like that. I’ve often wondered about that myself, and I have no answer to give, except to say that this is what I was born to do.

  We raced through an intersection and nearly collided with two cop cars that fishtailed around the corner ahead of us. I instinctively gripped the door handle to hang on.

  When we arrived at the scene – which was an apartment building parking lot in a rough section of town – the cops were clearing people out of the way. Bill and I hurried to get the stretcher out and wheeled it toward a man who was lying face down on the pavement next to a rusted-out white van.

  A woman was on her knees beside him, screaming hysterically. “Hurry!” she shouted at us. “He’s shot!”

  One of the cops helped pull her to her feet. “Move back, ma’am. You have to give them some room.”

  I knelt down and saw a blood stain at the man’s right shoulder blade. “Turn him over,” I said to Bill.

  We rolled the victim onto his back. He looked to be in his mid-fifties, with long, thinning hair and a beard. There was another stain of blood on his chest. “The entry wound is here,” I said. I searched for a pulse. My gaze met Bill’s and I nodded. “He’s alive. Let’s get him on the stretcher.”

  Bill helped me lift him, and as soon as we started wheeling the victim toward the ambulance, another van pulled into the lot and a news team spilled out. The cameraman started filming us, while a female reporter plugged in a microphone and began interviewing witnesses.

  By that time, we had reached the ambulance and were sliding the stretcher into the back. I got in, and Bill shut the doors behind us. Seconds later Bill was back in the driver’s seat and we took off for the hospital, with lights flashing and siren blaring.

  This was my life now, and chaos felt as natural to me as breathing.

  Chapter Thirty-one

  A FULL TRAUMA team was waiting for us when we arrived. I quickly gave my report to the doctors as we wheeled the victim inside, explaining that the bullet had entered the right lateral chest and gone straight through. I stepped back when we reached the trauma room.

  A half hour later, after I finished filing my report, my shift ended. I was about to head home, but felt strangely compelled to take the elevator up to the seventh floor and ask about the woman from the lake, who I couldn’t seem to get out of my head.

  “How’s she doing?” I asked at the nurses’ station. “Any improvement?”

  “Afraid not,” the male clerk replied. “She’s had lots of visitors, though. There’s a guy who comes and plays guitar for her every night. Nice family.”

  I peered down the hall. “What room is she in?”

  “Second on the left. I think her sister’s in there now if you want to say hello. I’m sure she’d like to talk to you, since you’re the one who brought her sister back from the dead.”

  “It wasn’t really me,” I clarified. “It was the defibrillator that brought her back. I just warmed her up.”

  The clerk gave me a look as if to suggest I was being too modest, then gestured for me to go and pay a visit.

  I don’t know why I was so uneasy about it. I suppose I didn’t want to face the woman’s sister, who might want to ask me questions about what happened – or thank me, when I had just been doing my job.

  Besides, what was there to be thankful for? Life could be total shit sometimes. The woman had been down for at least forty minutes. Odds that she would ever recover, and live a normal life, were slim to nil.

  Nevertheless, as if by some i
rresistible force, I was drawn to that room.

  I knocked softly on the open door. When no one responded, I ventured inside to find the room vacant – except for the woman lying comatose on the bed.

  The heart monitor beeped a steady rhythm. Vases of flowers covered every available surface, and magazines were spread out on the windowsill. My gaze remained fixed on the woman, however, as I moved closer to where she lay.

  She looked far more alive than she had in the back of my ambulance, though she wasn’t exactly radiant at the moment. She was flat on her back with her hands folded across her abdomen, as if she were laid out for a funeral wake. Her lips were dry and cracked. Her complexion was the color of ash.

  I leaned over her and studied her face. “What a fighter you must be,” I softly said, “but really, what’s the point?”

  She offered no reply.

  “Are you even in there?” I asked. “Can you hear me?”

  “I think she’s in there,” a voice said from the doorway, and I jumped.

  Swinging around, I locked eyes with a slender blonde-haired woman who looked to be about my age. “I’m sorry,” I replied, mortified by the questions I had just asked. “I didn’t mean to intrude.”

  She glanced down at my uniform. “It’s fine. You must be the paramedic.”

  I nodded, and she walked toward me. “I’m Jen, Sophie’s sister.”

  “It’s nice to meet you.” We shook hands, and an awkward silence descended upon the room. “I’m sorry about what happened to her,” I said. “The roads were really bad that night.”

  Jen backed up to lean against the windowsill. “That’s what they tell me. But listen... thanks for what you did. For bringing her back. We’re very grateful.”

  Again, I waved a dismissive hand through the air. “All I did was warm her up in the ambulance. It was the trauma team that brought her back, here at the hospital. They’re the ones you should thank.”

  Jen shrugged, as if it was all the same to her. “What do you think her chances are?” she asked me.