Angels on the Night Shift

by Robert D. Lesslie, M. D.

  There was a faint knock on the door and I turned around.

  Lori Davidson stuck her head in the room and said, “Have you got a minute, Ms. Granger? And you too, Dr. Lesslie?”

  I looked back at Virginia and then down at my watch. I had been here for a while.

  “The ER’s quiet right now,” Lori said, noticing me glancing past her shoulder. “This will just take a second.”

  “Sure, Lori,” Virginia told her. Then motioning to one of the chairs, “Have a seat.”

  Lori walked over and took one of the chairs. Once again, I sat down and folded my hands.

  “What is it?” Virginia asked.

  “It may be nothing,” she began quietly, clearly troubled. She was not an alarmist, and not one to cause a stir when there was no need for one. She had some good reason for concern.

  She reached into the pocket of her jacket and took out three medicine vials. Their tops had been broken off and they were empty.

  She leaned forward and put them down on the desk. Virginia reached over, picked up one of the vials, and studied its label.

  “Vistaril,” she said flatly, then waited for Lori to explain.

  “Yes, it’s Vistaril. And I found them behind a glove box on one of the shelves in the GYN room.”

  She didn’t say anything more, but just looked at her head nurse.

  “What in the world would they be doing back there?” Virginia asked. I was wondering the same thing, and then I remembered the medicine vials that had fallen on the counter the other day in cardiac.

  “It might be a simple mistake,” Lori replied. “Someone not thinking. But we don’t use much Vistaril with our GYN patients, and with the vials I found in cardiac—”

  “The what?” Virginia interrupted her.

  Lori told us about the used vials of Vistaril she had found in the cardiac room.

  “I don’t remember anything like this ever happening in our ER,” the young nurse said quietly.

  This was troubling. Vistaril wasn’t a significant “drug of abuse,” yet we had seen far stranger things happen. And where there was smoke, there was usually fire. It was possible that someone in the department had a problem and was somehow abusing this drug. Something was going on, and whatever it was, we needed to figure it out.

  I had been looking intently at Lori, and now my eyes moved over to the desk in front of me and down to the personnel file lying there. When I looked up, Virginia’s eyes were fixed on mine.

  4

  The Other Side

  Thursday, 3:30 a.m. Amy Connors sat in her chair at the nurses’ station, organizing the patients’ charts from the past evening. We had seen a bunch of people, and the stack in front of her was thick. But she had been doing this for a while, and seemingly without effort she filed each record in its proper place.

  Jeff Ryan and I sat on each side of her, drinking coffee, catching our breaths, and silently watching her. We had emptied the department and were waiting for whatever might find its way through the doors.

  Then Jeff said, “Doc, you know, I just love watchin’ people work.”

  Without looking up, Amy replied, “Aren’t you supposed to be doin’ something? Or at least be somewhere else?”

  “Nope,” he answered, leaning back further in his chair and smiling over at me. “I’m supposed to be right here watchin’ you.”

  The two had worked together for more than ten years and were good friends. They were both in their late thirties, and at first, I had thought it a bit of an odd relationship. Jeff Ryan was a big, strong, quiet man. He didn’t have a lot to say, but when he did, it was usually something important. A lot of people were intimidated by his size and by the seriousness with which he approached his work. With Amy it was different, and with her he seemed to let his hair down. He talked with her more than with anyone else in the department.

  That part was understandable. Amy Connors was wide open, gregarious, completely unassuming. You knew where you stood with her, and if she thought you didn’t—well, she would quickly explain it. Maybe what they say about opposites is true after all. Whatever the reason for their friendship, it was always comfortable working with the two of them.

  Amy shifted her chair, facing more toward me now, with her back toward Jeff. Without a word, she just kept filing.

  “I’m just watchin’ too, Amy,” I told her, nodding my head.

  She jerked up and looked straight at me.

  “What the…Why do I have to put up with both of you tonight? What have I done?”

  I laughed, then looking down I noticed a colorful, shiny brochure beside her stack of papers. On the cover was a GM Silverado truck, the big one, with an extended cab.

  “What’s this?” I asked her, pointing to the brochure.

  “None of your business,” she snapped impishly, turning over the brochure. “We just bought a new truck and I was goin’ to take you guys outside and let you see it, but you can forget that!”

  Clara Adams walked up just in time to hear this last exchange. She was a recent graduate from the nursing program in Columbia and had been working in the ER for a few weeks. I was afraid she might be too young and naïve to handle these two.

  “What’s going on?” she asked.

  “We’re just making sure Amy gets her work done,” I told her. “And she seems to be taking it personally. Have a seat while you can,” I added, motioning to one of the empty chairs on the other side of Jeff. “And tell us how you like working the night shift.”

  Clara walked around the counter and sat down. Jeff scooted his chair back, giving her more room. She was still in her mid-twenties—pretty, bright, and really animated. Her enthusiasm was contagious, except maybe for Jeff. He leaned back in his chair again, folded his arms across his chest, and slowly began rocking back and forth.

  “It’s been great!” she answered, smiling and leaning forward in her chair. “The night-shift staff people have been really helpful, and I’ve been able to sleep during the day. I wondered a little about that, but it’s been fine. And the patients that come in during the middle of the night have been…” She stopped mid-sentence, a perplexed look on her face. She seemed to be struggling for just the right word. “Well, they’ve been very interesting.”

  Jeff continued to rock in his chair and didn’t say anything. Amy had finished her filing and leaned back in her chair, folding her hands behind her head.

  “Whatcha mean by that?” she asked the young nurse.

  Clara took a deep breath and looked over at the secretary. Then she quickly glanced at Jeff and then at me.

  “Well, it just seems that the people who come in during the middle of the night are really sick, or they are…they are…”

  “Peculiar.” Jeff finished the sentence for her.

  “Yes. I suppose that’s as good a word as any,” she said, smiling and nodding her head. “They do seem to be a little…peculiar. I mean, they have some really odd problems, and some different personalities. You almost want to take some of them home with you.”

  “Now you’re the one who’s peculiar,” Jeff said, his face expressionless.

  “Well, if anybody should know peculiar, that would be you,” Amy said, looking over at him.

  As if she hadn’t heard this, Clara took a deep breath and said, “Just the other night, I was taking care of a man in cardiac. He was having a heart attack and Dr. Kennick was taking care of him. One time when she went out of the room, the man looked up at me and asked if I believed in heaven. Now that made me stop what I was doing and pay attention.”

  Jeff stopped rocking and cocked his head in Clara’s direction.

  “Of course I told him I did,” she went on. “And I said, ‘What about you?’” She paused and looked over at me. “I hope it was alright to do that.”

  I nodded my head without saying anything.

  “Well, he told me that he did too, and then he started telling me about his wife, and how just before she died, she told him that she could see a light. And she
said that the light was something good, and not frightening. And she asked him if he could see it. Then he asked me what I thought about all of that.”

  “What did you tell him?” Amy asked her, listening intently.

  “Before I could say anything, Dr. Kennick came back in the room, and we never had a chance to talk about it anymore. I wanted to find out more of what his wife had been talking about, but we didn’t have the chance.”

  Clara grew quiet and we all just sat there.

  “Peculiar,” Jeff said, finally breaking the silence.

  “No it’s not peculiar,” Amy scolded him. “If you believe in heaven, then you’d think there might be some sign…some sort of evidence or experience or something like that. You hear all the time about people who have passed over and come back. There was a special on TV not too long ago about that. But I don’t know what to make of it, not havin’ experienced it myself. What do you think, Dr. Lesslie?”

  I was deep in thought, listening to the conversation and wondering about this phenomenon myself. All of my years in the ER had convinced me that life is a mystery and is truly fleeting. And I believe that our existence after we “cross the bar” will be beyond anything we can imagine. After all, as my wife frequently reminds me, once we are absent from this body we will be present with the Lord. Yet that moment of passage from this world to the next is another mystery. We have some rough blueprints maybe, but there are no videos or recordings, no soundtracks or DVDs. And that’s probably the way it should be—a mystery.

  “Dr. Lesslie,” Amy persisted, interrupting my thoughts. “What do you think about this?”

  They were all looking at me, and I sat up a little straighter and cleared my throat.

  “Well, these near-death experiences are fascinating,” I began. “And I’m not sure that until the ‘final trumpet’ blows, any of us will have the right answer. But there are some interesting stories out there, and some that are hard to argue with.”

  “Can’t prove ’em though, can you?” Jeff interjected. “I mean, there’s just no solid evidence about any of this, the lights and all.”

  I looked at him and said, “I really don’t know what to make of most of it. But I can tell you about one instance I know of, and that still seems real to me, even after more than fifteen years. Maybe more so because of those years.”

  “What do you mean ‘more so’?” Amy asked.

  “Well, like I said, this happened fifteen, twenty years ago,” I began. “Right here in this ER. Johnny Gee was working in the ER that day, and he told me—”

  “See!” Jeff interrupted. “You got this secondhand. I thought this was going to be something you experienced,” he said doubtfully.

  “Just listen, Jeff,” I replied patiently. “You’ll see.”

  2:30 p.m. It was a spring afternoon, one day in the middle of the week. Johnny Gee was the ER doctor on duty and was standing at the nurses’ station, reviewing the run report of EMS 2. The paramedics on the unit that day were Rob Freeman and Greg Hartley. They had just brought in a teenage boy who had tried to drive his four-wheeler through a pine tree. No major injuries, though, and he should be fine. Just a routine call and transport.

  The whole day had been routine—nothing out of the ordinary. And that had been fine with Rob and Greg. They had been working together for a lot of years, and were both now in their early fifties.

  Hartley was the more serious of the two. He was a deeply spiritual man, always calm and patient in the face of even the worst catastrophe, and never afraid to share his faith. Yet, as St. Francis of Assisi would say, he preached the gospel “without words.”

  Rob Freeman, on the other hand, was a free spirit, though less so now that he was getting a little older and had two grandchildren. But still, he didn’t take many things very seriously. Certainly his job, but in spite of all their years together as EMS partners, Greg had never been able to draw Rob into a serious conversation about his beliefs. He just wasn’t interested. That didn’t make him a bad person to be around. In fact, he was one of the people best liked by the ER staff—always laughing and joking, and always ready to lend a hand wherever it was needed.

  They made an interesting pair, and were two of our favorites.

  On this particular day though, they had something important on their minds. It was already past two o’clock and they hadn’t had a chance to get anything for lunch. There had been a series of minor calls all morning long, and now for the first time, they didn’t have anything pending.

  “See you guys in a little while,” Gee said as the two were walking out of the building.

  “Hope it’s not before we get something to eat,” Rob called back to him, stopping in the ambulance entrance and rubbing his less than svelte belly.

  “Come on, Rob,” Greg said to his partner. “I’m hungry.”

  The two men walked out under the portico of the ambulance entrance and toward their unit. Greg went around to the driver’s side and jumped in, while Rob walked to the passenger side. As if choreographed after all their years together, they settled into their cushioned but well-worn chairs, buckled their seat belts, and adjusted their side mirrors. Greg cranked up the reluctant diesel engine, and they lumbered out through the parking lot and onto Herlong Avenue.

  “Where you want to get lunch?” Greg asked his partner. He was checking his side mirror, making sure no one was behind him as he got ready to move into a turn lane and onto Ebenezer Road.

  Looking ahead again, he repeated, “Rob, what do you want for lunch?”

  It was a simple question, one about food, which was something Rob Freeman was always interested in.

  There was still no response, and when Greg glanced over to the right, he slammed on the brakes of the ambulance, causing it to swerve in the middle of the street.

  Rob Freeman was sitting up in his seat, held in place by his seat belt. But his head was hanging down on his chest, rolling from side to side. His face was a dark blue, and he wasn’t breathing.

  Hartley yelled at him, reached over and shook him, and instantly knew he had a decision to make. Did he stop in the street, pull his partner out of the cab, and start doing CPR? Or did he head back to the ER, a little over a minute away?

  He didn’t hesitate. Switching on his lights and siren, he made a U-turn in the middle of Ebenezer, scattering startled drivers out of the narrow road, and sped back to the hospital. Repeatedly blasting his horn as he approached the ambulance entrance, he got the attention of some of the staff.

  Within another minute or so, Rob Freeman was on a stretcher in the cardiac room with Dr. Johnny Gee standing over him.

  “Flatline,” Angie Weathers told Gee. She was one of the nurses on duty this morning, and was trying to maintain her composure. Like everyone else in the department, the man dying in front of her was a friend, someone special.

  Gee went to work, barking orders, securing Freeman’s airway, and doing everything he was trained to do to save this man. What could have caused him to collapse so suddenly? He doesn’t have any history of heart disease and he doesn’t smoke. He doesn’t take any medications. It must be his heart. But what about a pulmonary embolus?

  Greg Hartley stood in the doorway of cardiac, trying to stay out of the way. He felt helpless, not wanting to watch this but unable to make himself leave.

  For over an hour they worked feverishly. Every once in a while, an irregular complex or two would appear on the monitor and then quickly disappear. And then once again there was that awful flatline.

  Everyone in the room knew it was time to stop. Johnny Gee, flushed and sweating, knew it too. He was about to call the code and pronounce the death of Rob Freeman, when suddenly the cardiac monitor erupted with activity. Freeman’s failing heart was making one last attempt to keep him alive. The irregular complexes were coming more frequently, and then they became less irregular. In another minute or two he had a normal rhythm of about a hundred, and he had a pulse!

  Gee stood back from the stretcher as Rob bega
n to breathe on his own through the endotracheal tube taped to the side of his face. The doctor looked over at Angie Weathers and they just stared at each other.

  Then Rob’s right hand went up in the air as he reached for his face and the aggravating tube. Angie quickly grabbed his hand and happily secured it to the side of the stretcher.

  An hour later, Rob Freeman was sitting up in his bed and talking. Amazingly, he seemed to be completely normal. Over the next few days, his cardiologists would determine that he had a rare and usually fatal electrical problem in his heart. He had successful surgery and never had any more trouble with it.

  “Wow, that’s a great story!” Amy interrupted me. “Maybe even a miracle. I’ve never met Rob Freeman but I’ve heard some of the guys talk about him. But it really doesn’t have anything to do with what we’re talkin’ about, does it?”

  “Well, just hold on, Amy,” I said patiently. “I’m not finished yet. The real miracle might be what happened next.”

  After all the excitement, Johnny Gee found himself alone in the cardiac room with Freeman. He was writing on Rob’s chart, hesitant to leave the room for fear that something might happen to undo what had just transpired.

  “Doc, I gotta tell you something,” Rob said quietly.

  Johnny looked over at the paramedic. “Sure, Rob. I’m right here.”

  Freeman cleared his throat, trying to collect his thoughts. He was obviously struggling with something—some difficult emotion.

  “I need to tell you what just happened,” he said finally.

  This surprised Johnny. He hadn’t left the room since Rob’s arrival in the ER, and he knew everything that had happened. He pulled over a stool, sat down, and waited patiently for his patient to continue.

  Freeman took a deep breath and began.

  “I’ve heard people talk about ‘near death’ experiences, but never paid them much attention. I always thought those people were crazy. But Doc…well, I know it’s true now. I just don’t know any other way to explain this.”