Appalachian Intrigue

by Archie Meyers

  Marie’s nursing supervisor approached her and asked her about Bishop. “Marie, I don’t know if you are aware of it, but Dr. Bishop has got some problems with the hospital administrator, and he has been telling people that he is involved in a very serious relationship with you. Is that true?”

  “It was never anywhere near serious from my standpoint. We had a bizarre confrontation in front of my apartment recently, and I’ve already told him that I don’t want to see him again. He is the last person in the world I would be serious about.”

  “Okay, I just wanted to make sure you were aware of his problems and to warn you to be careful. A lot of young physicians have difficulty with the stress of the long hours and constant pressure of a metropolitan hospital.”

  Marie found out just how serious his problems had become when she was asked to meet with the staff psychiatrist.

  “Marie, the normal doctor-patient relationship would keep me from discussing one of my patients with you, but there are circumstances that take precedence over that relationship. One such situation arose during my recent interview with Dr. Bill Bishop.”

  “What did he say?”

  “During the session, he became highly agitated and blamed you for some problems he’s having at the hospital.”

  The psychiatrist was referring to his notes, and Marie started to say something, but he held up his hand to stop her.

  “He said he was involved in an intimate relationship with you, and that you were planning to be married before he caught you running around on him. He went on to say that he couldn’t concentrate on his work for worrying about what you were doing when you weren’t with him.”

  Marie was incredulous and was speechlessly shaking her head when the doctor said, “Wait a minute, that’s not all. Near the end of the session he was almost crying and said he should have killed you. He said some other things and called you some words that weren’t very nice, but that was the crux of the threat.”

  When Marie regained her composure, she said, “Doctor, I think he’s gone off the deep end. We dated casually for a few months, marriage was never mentioned, and we certainly didn’t have an intimate relationship. Furthermore, he would be the last person I would want to marry. I made no commitments to him, and what he caught me doing was having dinner at a restaurant with an old high-school friend. I’ve already told him I wouldn’t ever go out with him again because of his bizarre behavior. I think he’s nuts, but do you think his threat might be credible?”

  “Well, ‘nuts’ probably wouldn’t be my clinical diagnosis, but it may be more descriptive than what I will ultimately put in my report. Marie, there really isn’t any way to determine if he might try to carry through on a threat like this; however, you need to be very careful, and I strongly suggest that you have absolutely no further contact with him.”

  Bishop’s erratic behavior continued at the hospital, and he was finally terminated. Marie moved on to start RN4U and had not seen him since. She did later hear from a friend at the hospital that he was working in a public health clinic in Birmingham. Although she could never be sure, there had been several times when she felt someone might be following her.

  Since leaving the hospital, Marie’s social life had definitely taken a backseat to her new business. When she could get away from the office, she spent her time selling the services of RN4U by calling on potential clients. That did sometimes involve having dinner with a potential client or referral source, but she never considered those meetings as dates.

  Chapter 6

  The hospital room of a trauma victim is an unusual venue for a party, but one was in full swing in Dex’s room. He had substantially recovered from the effects of the anesthesia, and medication was controlling the pain in his leg. The last one to join the impromptu party was Gigi, who had driven down from River City. She was relieved to see Dex wave and smile at her when she walked in the room and then she stopped abruptly when she saw Marie. Hoagie may have had trouble recognizing Marie, but Gigi immediately knew that this was the grown-up version of the girl who had been like a second grandchild to her.

  “Oh, Marie, just look at you, all tall and beautiful, but I’ll bet you still like peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.”

  When Marie was growing up next door, she ate almost as many meals at Gigi’s house as she did at home, and Gigi remembered that had been her favorite snack.

  Marie laughed as she hugged Gigi, and said, “You’re right, and no one has ever made them better than you.”

  Marie’s move to Atlanta had left a void in Gigi’s life. She had been the daughter and granddaughter she always wanted but never had, and after Marie moved, Gigi had missed her almost as much as Dex.

  After a few minutes, Hoagie said, “I hate to rush off, but it looks like the quarterback is going to live, and I’ve got a paper to research and write before class on Monday.”

  Marie stayed a little longer but wanted to give Gigi and Dex some time alone. She said, “I was doing some paperwork while watching the game. I left it piled on my kitchen table when I left for the hospital. I need to get back and finish it, but I will come back in the morning.”

  “Marie, I’ve got to leave tonight because I have to take care of the nursery at church tomorrow morning. Will you check on Dex while he’s in the hospital and let me know if I need to come back?”

  “Gigi, I’ll check on him every day, and I’ll keep you posted. I know most of the staff at the hospital, and I will make sure they take good care of him.”

  As soon as Marie walked out the door, Gigi turned to Dex with an expression that wordlessly asked the question he was expecting.

  “I swear, Gigi, until about an hour ago I hadn’t seen or talked to her since she left River City.” Then he added with a grin, “But today may change that.”

  Although Marie enjoyed seeing her old friends, the afternoon had also been very unsettling for her. She didn’t even remember driving to her apartment until she was pulling into the parking lot. She originally went to the hospital to simply check on an old friend, and her reaction after seeing him was entirely unexpected. It wasn’t the seriousness of his injury; as a nurse she had regularly seen much more serious trauma. It was the strong emotional reaction that was so disconcerting.

  Marie had many cherished childhood memories of Dex and all the good times they had, but after leaving River City, she got caught up in her new life and didn’t often think about him until she started seeing his name in the Atlanta newspaper after he signed with Georgia. After that, it would have been difficult not to follow his career. For the past four years, his name had been in the sports section of the Atlanta Journal Constitution almost daily.

  During the four years Dex was at Georgia, Marie thought about calling him many times. She had watched him play in several televised games and even sat in the stadium one time when he was playing at Grant Field in Atlanta. But she convinced herself that with the media exposure he was receiving, he probably wouldn’t be interested in hearing from the former girl next door. She never made the call.

  Marie was shaken by her reaction to seeing Dex, and she was trying to rationalize how she was feeling. She had always thought of herself as a sensible person. She didn’t fall in and out of love with the guys she dated and never had much of an emotional connection with any of them. She had seen friends shattered by failed romances and didn’t think she would ever be weak enough to let it happen to her. But now the possibility that she might have such strong feelings for her childhood friend terrified her. Suddenly she wasn’t quite so sure about her ability to maintain her common sense in this situation.

  Marie kept telling herself to slow down. Her thoughts were racing far ahead of reality. If Dex had not been injured, she probably would have never seen him again. But he did get injured, she had seen him, and as crazy it seemed, she sensed that in some unforeseen way the events of this day were going to have
a dramatic impact on her life.

  She had always thought it was amusing when her girlfriends talked about falling for someone when they first met; it certainly never happened to her. But seeing Dex after seven years was almost like a first meeting, and from the way he kept staring at her, she didn’t think her reaction was unilateral. Something emotional definitely happened between them at the hospital, but she didn’t know how to categorize it. Romantic reactions were far outside her realm of experience, but she knew what she was feeling wasn’t the reaction one would expect from merely seeing an old friend.

  The rational side of Marie’s brain kept reminding her that this was Dex, her former buddy, her next-door neighbor; she had known him all of her life, and she had never felt romantically attracted to him. But a sixth sense was waging war on rationality.

  After she gave up on the office paper work that she planned to do, Marie took a drawer out of her dresser and turned it upside down on her bed. It was the repository for all the clippings from Dex’s football career at Georgia. She would be humiliated if anyone, especially Dex, ever discovered that she had a drawer in her dresser that was level full of photos and articles chronicling his career. She didn’t even know why she had collected them. Was it just idle interest because she knew him? Could she have had a premonition that there would be a reunion some day?

  Marie had recently seen him in a television interview, dressed in street clothes, and remembered thinking, probably for the first time, that Dex was a good looking guy. In retrospect, she supposed he always was, but she had never thought about him in that way. With all the adulation he had received from fans, he could have easily become arrogant, but at the hospital he appeared to have been completely unaffected by his celebrity.

  Marie looked at the collection of newspaper photos for a long time before sliding them back in the drawer. She was still perplexed about her bizarre reaction to seeing him, but she had to admit that it wasn’t friendship that was messing with her mind.

  Marie had no intention of pursuing him like a groupie, but she did regret that she had never called him. She went to bed and tried to sleep, but as soon as she closed her eyes, her mind went into overdrive, replaying everything that had happened in the hospital room. She tossed and turned throughout the night and was wide awake long before the irritating buzz of the bedside alarm clock.

  While she was getting dressed the next morning, Marie turned on the television; the first thing she saw was footage of Dex being loaded into the ambulance. That was followed by a brief interview in the hospital waiting room with Dr. Adams. She had been sitting in the room when that video was made.

  The reporter started the interview by saying, “We are at Munson Orthopedic talking to the Georgia team physician about the injury in today’s game to quarterback Dex Martin. Dr. Adams, can you describe Dex’s injury?”

  “About all I can tell you is that he suffered a broken leg, is currently undergoing surgery to repair the fracture, and will probably be confined to the hospital for several days.”

  Marie turned off the television and continued dressing. It was Sunday; she didn’t have to go to the office, so she dressed casually and left for the hospital. As she drove, her mind wandered, and she couldn’t escape the thought that somehow the events that were occurring now were going to change her life.

  Dex was propped up in bed reading the morning paper when Marie walked into his room, and his leg was no longer elevated.

  “Hey, Marie, you just missed the surgeon. By the way, he says he knows you.”

  “Yeah, we worked together here in the hospital. I see he decided to no longer elevate your leg.”

  “I told him it was uncomfortable and he said it wasn’t necessary anymore. What is it with this diet of cream of wheat and canned fruit? It’s the worst junk I’ve ever tried to eat.”

  He had pushed the tray away from his bed, and since he was grumbling about the food, Marie knew he was feeling better.

  “Dex, how would you like to take a little tour of the hospital?”

  “Is that your idea of a cruel joke?”

  She didn’t answer but smiled and walked out of the room. She returned a few minutes later pushing a wheelchair.

  “All right, let’s get moving. A few laps around the hospital may help your grumpy disposition. Let’s get out of the room for a little while.”

  “Are you sure this is okay? I thought I was going to have to stay flat on my back until they let me out of her.”

  “If you stay flat on your back, you’ll never get out of here. I’m not going to hurt you, so just be quiet and let the nurse handle this.”

  Marie helped Dex into the chair, adjusted the support under his leg, and rolled him into the hall. At the nurse’s station, she paused to introduce him to a nurse with whom she had worked.

  “Judy, this is an old friend, Dex Martin. He’s in room 503, so if you get a chance, check on him from time to time, but don’t believe anything he tells you about growing up next door to me.”

  “Hey, that sounds interesting. I’ll drop by to see you, Dex.”

  The tour wound through several floors of the hospital and eventually stopped on an outside patio where they sat and talked for a long time. They discussed old friends, former schoolmates, and the old neighborhood.

  “Tell me how you got into nursing?’

  “I interned one summer as a nurse’s aide while I was in high school, and I just fell in love with the whole concept. I went directly from high school to nursing school, finished in two years, and got my license as an RN.”

  “What about this nursing business you mentioned yesterday?”

  “With all the drugs you had yesterday, I’m surprised you even remember me mentioning that I had my own business. I really got into it by accident. I filled in for a friend on a private-duty assignment and discovered that I liked working for myself.”

  Marie went on to tell Dex all about how she started RN4U. He was still having difficulty adjusting to the fact that this beguiling young woman was not only his former tomboy buddy but was also now a full-fledged entrepreneur. After she answered all his questions about RN4U, he reluctantly talked a little about his career at Georgia and his plans to play professional football. Marie had some experience with his type of injury and suspected that the residual effects of the injury might alter his plans. She wisely did not share her thoughts with him because she knew that was a discussion he should have with his doctor.

  The discussion with the doctor came two days later, and by happenstance, Marie was there when it took place. To save time, she normally ate lunch at her desk, but on this day she went by the hospital at noon and took Dex a large chocolate milk shake. He was drinking the shake and they were talking when Dr. Adams, Dex’s coach, and the orthopedic surgeon walked into the room at the same time. Marie already knew the two doctors, and Dex introduced her to his coach.

  The surgeon said, “Marie, would you mind waiting outside for a few minutes?”

  She started toward the door, but Dex said, “Marie, wait a minute.” He seemed to sense what was coming and said, “Since all three of you came together I don’t think you’re going to be giving me any good news today. Marie is a nurse and a very good friend, and I want her to stay and hear what you have to say.”

  Dr. Adams nodded at the surgeon, and they all looked at Dex as the surgeon cleared his throat and spoke. “Mr. Martin, you’re right. We don’t have good news for you, but it’s not as bad as I was afraid it might be when I first examined you. By recognizing the extent of your injury and getting you here quickly, Dr. Adams probably kept you from being permanently crippled, if not worse. You had an open fracture of the tibia and fibula with vascular impairment. I took a lot of time with the debridement of the wound, but there can be no assurance that all of the contaminants from the playing field were successfully eliminated. You will have to be closely monitor
ed for any evidence of subsequent infection at the wound site. While you were still anesthetized I had to manipulate the severely misplaced bones back into alignment. The bones were then stabilized with screws and an external fixator and—”

  Everyone else in the room was nodding as if they understood everything the doctor was explaining, but Dex’s head was spinning. “Wait a minute, Dr. Adams. Slow down and let me make sure I understand what you’re telling me.”

  “Okay, sometimes we get a little carried away with the medical jargon. An open fracture is when a broken bone penetrates the skin. This creates an enhanced risk of severe infection. What I did was clean the wound as well as I could and then pulled the bones back into alignment. I placed a screw through the skin into the bone above and below the fracture site. Then I anchored the long rod you can see on your leg between the two screws to hold the bones into place until they can knit.

  “However, before I even addressed the fractures we had to have a vascular surgeon restore full blood flow to your leg below the fracture site. There are some major arteries and veins in that area that were damaged when the broken bone tore through the surrounding flesh. That was all repaired before I stabilized the fractures. It should all heal, and when it does we will remove the screws and rod.”

  Dex smiled for the first time and said, “So then I will be cleared to play again. I need to get cleared well before the NFL draft next spring.”

  “I can appreciate how much this means to you, but we’ve all discussed it, and it is our opinion that due to the severe nature of the injury, you would risk being permanently crippled if you were to suffer another trauma to your leg. If it was my decision, with that possibility, I could never clear you for any type of contact sport.”

  His coach spoke up and said, “Dex, you know how I feel about you, but we have always been honest with each other. Every pro scout in the country is going to know about the severity of your injury, and there isn’t going to be any team that would be willing to take that chance, even if you were willing to do so.”