by Barbara Ebel
“Why don’t you call them tomorrow about the dogs residing there, so that we have an idea beforehand?”
“I will. I’ll text you what I find out.”
They both chuckled and then Annabel said, “After all, life shouldn’t stop just because we’re in medical school. We should not deprive ourselves of man’s best friend.”
“Precisely.”
After moving plates around, Annabel slid the textbook back over. “We need to cover a lot more ground.”
After the waitress removed their plates, and after an hour, Annabel and Bob adequately covered the subject matter highlighted in the first box they had read. She turned another page. “Cortisol is a big contributing factor,” she said. “Here’s another chart with all of the hormone’s effects. I better understand and remember all of this tonight as well.” She glanced at her wristwatch and Bob yawned.
“I will leave you to it, then,” he said. “I’ll walk you back to your place.”
Bob held her backpack, they said good night to Pete, and nodded at the last remaining table of customers. The street lights lit up the uneven narrow sidewalks as they ambled down to her apartment. The leaves had not burst out of the tree buds yet and the air smacked of soon-to-be warmth and fragrance from new flowers.
“I hope you didn’t overdo being out tonight,” she said before they arrived. She glanced back; she was tall at five-foot-eight, but Bob squared off at six foot. “Are you still taking your antibiotic?”
“I am. A doxycycline twice a day, and the doctor’s office scheduled me for a follow-up appointment in a few days.”
“If you can’t do those dog chores tomorrow, we can always postpone our plan.”
“No way. Don’t stay up too late either.”
“I’ll try not to. By 7 a.m. tomorrow, I’ll be checking on my assigned patients, ready to give my Nurse Ratched reports on them in case she asks. To tell you the truth, I don’t think she cares about what I have to say.” They stopped on the path to the three-story common door. “Sorry. I’m trying not to be critical of her after what you said.”
“Nurse Ratched?”
“Ling Watson, my chief resident.”
Bob maintained a questioning stare.
“You know. The fictional character in One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest.”
“No. I don’t know.”
“Bob Palmer, like Gone with the Wind, which I’m in the process of watching with Dustin. I guess you and I need to watch the movie version of that book. Both movies now seem pertinent to an OB/GYN rotation, particularly this one.”
Bob’s heart skipped a beat and his eyes sparkled. “There’s a first time for everything. We haven’t watched a movie together before. Why don’t we stream the Cuckoo movie after we get our dog?”
“We have a deal. After all, the rate of medical student and physician burnout is at an all-time high. The new mantra and pertinent advice is to separate out time for ourselves. If we are not healthy and happy, how can we pass on effective care to our patients?”
Bob widened his grin and nodded. “I’ll text you tomorrow.”
He twirled around and took off to his car and Annabel entered the ground floor of her house. Besides needing to know the material she’d been assigned to read, she wanted to leave a decent impression tomorrow on Ling Watson and Caleb Gash. As she scrambled up the staircase two steps at a time, she figured her evening would go on later than she would like.
CHAPTER 8
Mary Chandler startled when the door swung open and the night shift nurse entered. She rubbed her eyes. The room had darkened and the RN flicked on the overhead light.
“Hello there,” the nurse said as she bustled over to the white board on the wall. She crossed off the previous nurse’s name, Sherry.
“This is me,” she said as she wrote “Night nurse … Dorothy Clark.” She was a lot younger than Sherry and wore makeup fit for acting in a romance movie. After moving the tray table to the side, she scrutinized Mary’s belly. “Hope that baby doesn’t come soon. You’re not as big as most for your twenty-nine-week gestation. I bet you ate like a bird all along.”
“What’s your excuse for eating that way?”
“Pardon me?”
Mary pulled the crumpled sheet further up on her chest. All she wanted to do was close her eyes again and not talk to some nurse who didn’t look old enough to have experience.
Dorothy went straight to the IV pumps. One liter bag was labelled as Magnesium Sulfate and the other was straight Lactated Ringer’s. The infusion rates were perfect, as ordered, so she traced the tubing to Mary’s hand and made sure the cannula site had not infiltrated and that it was taped down appropriately. She read the last vital signs from the chart and those were adequate as well. Her patient’s oxygen saturation was in the high nineties and an adequate waveform pranced across the pulse oximeter monitor.
“Those residents have a handle on your preeclampsia,” she said. “How are you feeling?”
“Sleepy.”
“I’ll leave you alone and check on you later.”
Happy to see the RN leave, Mary tilted herself more to her side and rubbed her abdomen. “Don’t believe her,” she whispered down to her belly. “You will be big enough and strong enough, and, no matter what, you’ll be my little angel. By the way, your name is Emma or Emmett. That is settled. Certainly if you are a boy, I won’t be naming you after your father.”
She rested her hand and thought back to less than a year ago when she was a senior in high school. Her best friend set her up for a date with her boyfriend Tom’s best friend, Freddie. They double dated, went to a movie, and went to dance afterwards.
Mary had practically swooned over Freddie’s charm and rugged looks. In addition, he was three years older than her, and out in the real world working with subcontractors building a home. Although he still lived with his parents, he made real money, paid for everything on their date, and even owned his own car.
That first night, he rushed to her side of the vehicle, opened the door, and walked her to the front door of her parents’ house. He kissed her, kissed her again, and whispered in her ear, “Can’t wait for next time.”
Of course she’d been kissed and had dabbled in heavy petting before that night, but she was still a virgin.
On the second date, the two couples again double dated. They ate at a restaurant where the guys drank regional beer and the girls splurged on pina colada’s with alcohol-soaked cherries. Over another drink instead of dessert, they all decided to go over to Tom’s apartment. In retrospect, maybe the guys had decided that already.
-----
When the four young adults landed at Tom’s place, Mary browsed around and salivated to one day have her own place. Before that, however, she hoped that her dates with Freddie continued and he would soon be out of his parents’ house as well.
“How about another drink?” Tom asked the group. He opened the refrigerator and pulled out a six-pack of beer.
“No more for me,” Mary said. “The rum is still swirling around in my head.”
“See you two later, then,” Tom said. “Or not. Just lock the door behind you, Freddie, when you both leave.” He slipped his hand into his girlfriend’s palm and led her through the kitchen door and into his bedroom.
Freddie leaned against the counter and opened a beer. “Let’s turn on his television. We don’t have to watch anything if we don’t want.” He tapped her forearm to follow him.
In the living room, Mary noted the bedroom door closed while Freddie turned on the television. There was no couch. Only two slim leather recliners. He grabbed the two throw pillows from each chair and positioned them on the floor. Holding his beer, he lowered himself down and patted the carpet. “What should we put on?”
Mary shrugged her shoulders, but Freddie already switched to a sports channel. A male tennis player smashed his serve and his opponent didn’t stand a chance at a return. “I already know the outcome of this match.” He moved the beer bottle to the
coffee table and scooted closer to her. “This was taped earlier in a different time zone.”
Their beginning gentle kisses put Mary in the mood for more. Soon the moistness in her mouth tasted like a combination of pina colada and beer. Freddie began unbuttoning his shirt and soon had it behind him. His hands went under her sweater and he hoisted it over her head. He kissed her neck and rubbed away at her breasts like he was kneading dough. She considered that perhaps she would be better off with her top back on.
Now her thoughts wandered all over the place. He was already undoing the button on his blue jeans and unzipping his fly. She wanted to kiss some more, but he was moving way too fast. After wrestling his pants off, he crumbled them on top of his shoes. He tore off his underwear and tossed them by the flat-screen TV.
Freddie eased Mary flat on the floor and nestled one of the pillows under her head. She glanced at his penis, swollen and hard, but before she could touch it, he began wiggling her out of her casual pants.
“Freddie, I’m a virgin. I’m not on birth control. I don’t think…”
“I know. Don’t worry. I’ll pull out.”
She kept her thighs together. She didn’t know about this. This wasn’t good.
Freddie’s weight was on top of her, his organ harder than it looked. He wiggled his way between her legs. She felt like a detached participant as he pushed his way forward. There was no pleasure when she felt a thrust in her vagina like a door had been forced open.
“There it goes,” he mumbled next to her ear.
Another three shoves of discomfort, he pulled away. His hand wrapped around his penis, he trotted off to the bathroom. She slowly sat up in a daze. Between her legs, the light from the television revealed to her a light bloody discharge. She went to the kitchen to scout around for a tissue. By the time Freddie was back in the room, she was buttoning her blouse over her bra. He dressed while eyeing the tennis match.
-----
Mary didn’t have to worry any more about bloody vaginal discharges of any kind because her period never came later in the month, causing her to panic. Against her best judgment, she confided in her best friend, but that only made her feel worse. After all, the four young adults had not double dated again. Freddie had not so much as called her.
In partial denial of her situation, she missed her period again the next month. That was when despair and depression followed her like an evil shadow. Instead of being mortified by going to a doctor’s office, she bought a “one-step pregnancy test.” Sitting hunched over on the edge of the bathtub, her heart froze when she read the positive result.
That night, she confronted her mother with the news, and her mother broke the news to her father. Her dad yelled at her the most. “What were you doing having sex at your age? Who’s the father? We taught you better,” etc., etc.
Her parents were “right to lifers” and, following in her parents footsteps, she pretty much was one herself. She didn’t know which option would be worse - aborting a baby or keeping it at her age and circumstances.
Telling Freddie was another story. Since she never heard from him, she went to his parents’ house, where she found his mother to be hospitable. “I went out with your son,” she said at the door, “and he hasn’t returned my calls. I need to tell him something.”
The woman rubbed her hands together. “Come in, young lady. I was just making a sandwich.”
Mary stepped into the hallway, the smell of oven-baked cookies filling her nostrils. She nervously put her weight on one foot and then the other. What would Freddie say and do about her pregnancy, if anything at all?
“Well,” the woman said, “I surmise you only want to talk to my son. Good luck. You seem like a nice girl, so my advice to you is to date someone else. He has growing up to do and I would hate for you to get hurt.”
Mary took a deep breath. What an honest mother. Too bad it was too late to follow her advice. “Is he here?” she stammered.
“I hate to tell you, no. I made him go rent a place himself. He’s too old to be a squatter in his parents’ house while earning the fat check he makes. Besides, the fact is that we don’t see eye to eye on anything and he leaves his stuff around like he has a maidservant picking up after him.”
Mary bit her lip while her sandals were now rooted to the door mat. All of a sudden, the aroma of the cookies in the back of the house wasn’t tempting.
“Damn if I know where he went,” Freddie’s mother continued. “He’ll call one of these days, our relationship will settle into a more adult tolerance of each other, and life will go on.”
Mary made a decision right then and there. Right now, she would keep Freddie out of the picture. She had enough to worry about besides hunting down the no-good guy who thrusted her into this position to start with.
-----
After replaying the last year in her mind, Mary fell asleep. After several hours, she awoke and had a sensation of claustrophobia from the hospital room. She jostled around in the bed and fumbled with the sheet. After pushing the white linen off her breasts, she checked the clock on the nightstand. It was almost midnight and she grappled with telling Dorothy Clark that her GI tract felt like mud churning around in a pig’s pen and she also felt warm. She pushed the call button.
The nurse came in along with the tech taking vital signs. “We’re killing two birds with one stone,” Dorothy said.
The tech took her temperature and then Mary extended her arm for the blood pressure cuff. The woman cycled the machine while Dorothy stood with her hands on her hips.
“It’s really hot in here,” Mary said, “and I feel sick to my stomach.”
“So you’re flushed and nauseated,” Dorothy paraphrased. “You don’t have a temperature and it’s not hot in here. I can bring you something for nausea.”
Mary and the tech made small talk and Dorothy came back with a round pill and a paper cup. Mary gulped down the medicine. “Thanks.”
“You’re welcome. And by the way … don’t consider yourself singled out or on death’s door because of these symptoms. They are to be expected.”
Mary swallowed that advice as the two women left. There was nothing to be concerned about and, in the morning, maybe her doctors would give her excellent news and she could go home to her place. She wanted to go back to work in another day or two, where she worked at the front desk of the local library. Her boss had been understanding of her situation earlier in the day and had let her leave early.
Optimistic thoughts began circulating in her head. Her baby would go to full term, she had the infant’s names picked out, and she would see her mother tomorrow. In her heart, she knew she would love her baby as much, or more, than she loved her mother. She let her eyelids close and she drifted off …
-----
A few hours later at the nurses’ station, Dorothy Clark wadded up an empty bag of potato chips and tossed it over the desk to the garbage basket. “I’ll never make a women’s basketball team,” she barked to the anesthesia resident on call.
“You hold down the court,” the resident said. “I just topped off an epidural and I’m going back to bed.”
Dorothy rose, stretched, and put the chip wrapper directly into the can. She decided to walk the hallway and check on patients. Those with laboring epidurals slept comfortably. Remembering Mary Chandler’s prior complaints, she poked her head into her room and observed the woman sleeping. So much for her patient’s prior flushing and nausea, she thought.
She then pushed a rolling medicine cart down the hallway and gave certain patients their medications. Lastly, she positioned herself back at the main desk. The rest of the shift flew by and, before long, Nurse Sherry was back for the day shift and the female medical student Annabel strolled in to begin her own rounds.
CHAPTER 9
Ready to start her second day, Annabel rode up the elevators to the OB/GYN floor. The man next to her coughed loudly and sent a spray into the air. One sign on the door read “Clean your Hands” and the other one
said “Cover your Cough.” She grimaced as the door opened and she hurried out.
As she turned right, she anticipated the questions that Ling Watson would throw her way this morning. She studied another two hours after Bob had left her last night and covered the subject of the neonate’s physiologic changes at birth as much as possible in the short time frame.
The wing was vastly different from the day before when poor Bonnie Barker suffered her postpartum hemorrhage. Peace and quiet ran down the hallways like a gentle stream on a calm day. She went straight to the lounge and tucked away her backpack. The night nurse was giving Sherry a report, so she left them alone. She bumped into Emmet when she left.
“Hey, doc,” he said.
“Hey yourself. Were any babies born overnight?”
“Not that I’m aware of. Deliveries come in waves.”
“Really?”
“For sure. I can tell those fancy researchers working on their projects about the effect of the moon and the tides on women giving birth. I’ve been working here for years and I swear on the Holy Bible that deliveries occur in waves. Just wait…”
“Wait for what?”
“A full moon.”
Annabel’s eyes widened. “I’m aware of old wives’ tales predicting a baby’s gender, but I have never heard about full moons being associated with a surge in births.”
“You have now. I’m telling ya.”
“Then I will take your word for it.”
Annabel pulled out her index cards on her patients and decided to round on Mary Chandler first. She hoped the young girl’s preeclampsia would be so under control that the residents would send her home today after her mother showed up. But what did she know? Maybe it would take a week. After all, she still had a lot to learn about the dreaded obstetric complication, particularly since she didn’t get to read about her patient last night.
Down the hallway, she glanced into Room Six. It was as peaceful inside as the hallway, so she assumed that her patient had slept well. She must be fast asleep, Annabel thought, because she lay slightly aligned on her side, facing the window, and didn’t stir.
