Carissa's Law

by Misty Boyd

  “Ugh…” Sarah replied.

  “Come on,” Jim ordered. “Date time! You can go in your pajamas. I won’t tell anyone!”

  Sarah rolled out of bed and went into the bathroom. “I can’t go on a date in my pajamas. Give me a minute.”

  “If you insist, but hurry! My stomach needs a waffle in a bad way.”

  “I’m coming. Should we tell Carissa we’re leaving?” Sarah asked.

  “Nope! No kids ’til after breakfast,” Jim said. “You know how she hates to be bothered in the morning. Leave her alone. She can take care of herself.”

  “Okay. No kids! I’m gonna get a quick shower.”

  After Sarah’s shower, they left Carissa there alone.

  Jim and Sarah excitedly got into the car and sped away. “I’ve missed you,” Jim said, stealing glances at Sarah as he drove.

  “I’ve missed you, too,” Sarah responded, meeting eyes with him.

  “We’ve spent so much time helping Carissa recover, I barely remember what it’s like to have some time with just you.” Jim told her. “It’ll be nice to just be us for a minute, won’t it?”

  “It’s always nice to just be us. We don’t do it enough.” Sarah smiled at him.

  Chapter 44

  Isaac had gotten out of bed extra early on this Saturday. He had been eyeing an apartment complex nearer to school, and today he had an appointment to see if he could qualify to move in. It would make things easier all around if he could get his own apartment, and he was excited to start a new chapter. He pulled into the complex and found the leasing office right on time. It was 8:30 on the dot. He parked in the nearest open spot and went in.

  At the front desk, he found a middle-aged woman wearing a bright green business suit with her silver blonde hair in a tight bun.

  “Hello, ma’am. I’m Isaac Carter. I spoke to someone earlier this week on the phone. I’m looking to get a one-bedroom here, wheelchair-accessible.” Isaac held his hand out.

  “Oh, yes, sir.” She reached out to meet his handshake. “Let me just grab your file.” She sat down and reached into a drawer in her desk. “I’m Mary. I’m the one you spoke to. Have a seat.”

  Isaac took one of two brown leather chairs across from Mary.

  “Ah, here we go. Isaac Carter.” She pulled a group of papers out that were stapled together. “Now, you say you need a wheelchair-accessible apartment? Are you the disabled?”

  “No, ma’am. Other people will be visiting that need the accessibility.”

  “So, you yourself are not disabled?” She took out a notepad and wrote something Isaac couldn’t see.

  “No.” He started to wonder if this would be a problem.

  “Tell you what. Let me go talk to my supervisor about this. I’m not sure this is normally something we do, handing out the accessible units to able people, but let me run the situation by her and see what she says.” Mary got up from the desk, taking Isaac’s paperwork and her notepad with her.

  After a long wait, and explaining to a hefty Hispanic woman with glasses that he was primary caregiver for his disabled mother, Isaac left the leasing office of his new apartment complex with keys in hand. He was excited to call Carissa to tell her the good news, and almost as excited to start moving. His mom now had a fantastic nurse, and even someone to stay with her overnight for emergencies, since Isaac wouldn’t be there anymore.

  He got in his car and called Carissa’s cell. After four rings, the call went to voicemail. It was unusual that she didn’t answer, but it was early on a Saturday morning, and she did love her sleep. He considered stopping by… he was sure she wouldn’t mind… but decided to leave a brief voicemail and wait until she called back to spill the news instead.

  “Hey, sleepy head! Call me when you wake up. Don’t sleep too late. I love you,” and he hung up.

  He decided to call his mom next. “Ma, guess what?” he practically yelled into the phone when she picked up.

  “What, baby?” Betty asked.

  “I got that apartment I was looking at,” he told her. “I made the first month’s rent, and they gave me a key. I can start moving in as soon as I’m ready. They even gave me the accessible unit so you can come by any time you feel like it.”

  “That’s great! Now come get your stuff out of my house, boy. I’ve been waiting almost nineteen years for this,” she joked.

  But he knew this was probably the hardest thing she’d been through in her life. Her boy was grown up, getting his own place, and starting a life on his own.

  He wouldn’t let her down, no matter what.

  Chapter 45

  Jim and Sarah sat in a booth, enjoying breakfast at their usual get-away spot. It had been too long, with Carissa’s surgery and everything else, since they’d had time for just the two of them.

  “I’ve missed this,” Jim said, cutting off a piece of his waffle.

  “Me, too,” Sarah replied. “Hopefully, Carissa will be out of the woods medically for a while, and we can do more of it. I do enjoy a good private waffle with you.”

  “Speaking of the kid, what’s going on with this law thing she keeps talking about?” Jim asked. “You’re around to catch more of it than I am. I can hardly keep up.”

  “Well, apparently she has a lot of support from the spina bifida community, but she hasn’t heard back from the lady who’s supposed to tell her how to get everything in motion.” Sarah took a long, satisfying drink of her coffee. “She’s still waiting. I think it’s been a week or more. I hope this woman didn’t just drop her. She’ll be so disappointed.”

  “Wow, I hope she hears back soon, with school starting back,” Jim said, a touch of worry in his voice. “I don’t see how she’ll have time to be so involved with it and still go back to school, and she IS going back to school.”

  “Yeah, between this and school and Isaac, I don’t know how she’ll keep her head above water if she doesn’t get this stuff out of the way soon.” Sarah echoed Jim’s anxious look.

  They finished up breakfast and debated taking a ride down to Galveston to the beach.

  “Carissa said she and Isaac went the other night, and he carried her down to the water,” Sarah said. “Seems like they’re getting pretty serious.”

  “Hopefully not too serious,” he said, only half-joking. “I heard he’s getting his own place soon. I hope they don’t get themselves into too much trouble with no adult supervision.”

  “Yeah, let’s hope not. We’ve taught her, but who knows what’ll happen when temptation comes. Speaking of that, I’m sure Isaac is chomping at the bit to come over. Let’s skip the beach and beat him there,” Sarah said.

  They went back to the car and started toward home. When they got there, Carissa still wasn’t awake. There was no sign of coffee or any other breakfast making.

  “Good grief, Jim,” Sarah exclaimed. “She’s still in bed. Teenagers! This is ridiculous. I’m going to wake her up. She can’t just lay in bed all day. I don’t care if it is Saturday,” Sarah headed toward Carissa’s room to wake her.

  Jim plopped in front of the television to let his waffle settle. Currently, it was piercing what he was sure was a lung.

  “Jim, call 911!” he heard Sarah scream from the other room. “She won’t wake up!”

  Jim jumped off the couch and ran into Carissa’s bedroom, where he found his wife hovering over his unconscious daughter. He felt his knees go weak. All this time they’d been gone. How long had she been like this?

  “Is she breathing?” he choked out.

  “Yes, but it’s shallow! Call 911!”

  Jim fumbled his phone out of his pocket. He was shaking so hard he could barely dial the number.

  “Yes, my daughter is in bed unconscious! I don’t know how long! She has spina bifida and hydrocephalus! Please hurry! Yes, she’s breathing! I don’t know! Just come!” he shouted into the phone.

  The ambulance seemed to take forever. Carissa couldn’t be roused, no matter what Jim or Sarah did. They tried shaking her, screa
ming, pouring cold water on her, and she just laid there through all of it.

  “Oh, please, God, we can’t lose her!” Sarah cried out.

  There was a knock at the front door. Jim ran to get it. It was the paramedics. He let them in and led them to Carissa’s bedroom. It was like something out of a movie. Jim was sure he left his body as he watched these men put lines into Carissa’s body and an oxygen mask over her face. They transferred her to the ambulance gurney and had her in the back of the ambulance in less than three minutes. Jim and Sarah both climbed in after her.

  “We can only take one of you,” one of the paramedics said.

  “We’re both going in this ambulance,” Jim countered with more authority than he knew he had in him.

  The paramedic didn’t argue. He just shut the door, and the driver turned the siren on. The ambulance shrieked all the way to the hospital while Jim and Sarah gave the best medical history they could.

  “She’s got spina bifida and hydrocephalus. She just had tethered cord surgery about two months ago,” Jim yelled over the sound of the siren.

  “Has she been complaining of anything recently? Pain? Any illness that you know of?” the paramedic asked.

  “No. Nothing. No complaints, but she’s a pretty tough kid. She doesn’t complain much,” Sarah responded.

  They pulled into the emergency room entrance, and the paramedic shoved the doors of the ambulance open. He lowered the gurney carrying Carissa onto the concrete, and began pushing her into the hospital. Jim and Sarah hurried behind him.

  “Patient’s name is Carissa Schultz. Unconscious eighteen-year-old female, history of spina bifida, tethered cord, and hydrocephalus. Vital signs are normal except for slight bradycardia and altered state of awareness. These are her parents. They say she has had no complaints recently.”

  “You’re the parents?” the emergency room doctor asked Jim and Sarah.

  “Yes,” they answered in unison.

  “How long has she been like this?” he asked.

  “We don’t know. We found her in her bedroom after we got home from going out to breakfast this morning,” Sarah answered.

  The doctor looked at her searchingly. “And she was fine this morning before you left for breakfast?”

  Sarah shook her head guiltily. She hadn’t checked on Carissa.

  “We don’t know, doctor. We’re not sure when this started. She was fine when she went to bed last night,” Jim replied, now holding onto Sarah.

  “Okay, we’ll run some tests. Have a seat in the waiting room and we’ll come get you when we find something.”

  Jim and Sarah did as they were told, going out to the emergency waiting room.

  Sarah clutched his hand. “Jim, what’s wrong with her? Why didn’t we check on her? We should have checked on her!”

  “I don’t know,” he said, patting her hands to calm her. “I don’t know what’s wrong. The doctors will find it.”

  “My poor baby. How long was she alone like that? How long, Jim?”

  “Sarah, I don’t know. She was never alone because God was with her. We have to trust Him.” It was all Jim could think to say. He felt just as guilty for not checking on her as Sarah did. Why hadn’t they? It would have taken just a second.

  “We should call Isaac. Carissa would want him here,” Sarah said through tears.

  “Okay, I’ll do it. You stay right here, and I’ll call him from outside. Come get me if you hear anything.”

  Jim stepped outside to make the phone call to Isaac. Between rings, he tried to stifle the lump catching in his throat.

  “Hello?” Isaac answered.

  Jim took a breath. “Isaac.”

  “Oh, hey, Mr. Schultz, what’s up?”

  “Look, we, uh… Carissa… Isaac, you need to come to the hospital. Carissa is really sick. We’re not sure what’s going on yet. She’d want you here, though. Come on up.”

  “What? What do you mean, really sick? Is she okay? I’m coming,” Isaac replied, worry filling his voice.

  “I really don’t know, Isaac. We just found her… look, just come on up. We’ll talk when you get here.” Jim ended the call. He couldn’t bear to talk anymore, and he didn’t want to tell Isaac how serious it was over the phone.

  Chapter 46

  Isaac heard the line go dead. Panic set in. What was wrong with Carissa?

  He couldn’t even think. He got in his car and headed straight to the hospital, praying the whole way. He had called Carissa this morning. Why hadn’t she answered? Was she that sick?

  On the way to the hospital, every stop light seemed to take forever. He needed to get there. What was going on? What had Mr. Schultz not wanted to say?

  He was hiding something, Isaac was sure. How bad was this? “God, please help her!” he cried out, speeding as fast as he thought he could get away with.

  When he arrived, he saw Mr. and Mrs. Schultz in a corner of the waiting room, sitting down and holding onto one another.

  “What’s going on?” he called out, making his way toward them.

  “We found Carissa this morning, very sick. She was unconscious, and we couldn’t wake her up. The doctors are running tests, but we still don’t know anything. We’re just waiting,” Jim told him.

  “Unconscious? I just talked to her last night! She was fine.” Isaac felt like he’d been hit by a semi.

  “People with spina bifida have a lot of underlying conditions, Isaac,” Jim said in a strained tone. “Things can hit out of nowhere and go downhill fast. It could be any number of things that did this so quickly.”

  Sarah nodded. “We just have to trust God and the doctors.”

  Isaac turned around in his seat and put his head in his hands. He couldn’t believe it. She was fine yesterday, and now no one knew what was wrong, only that it was bad enough that she was unconscious. He wanted to tell her about his new apartment. He wanted to hear about progress with her law. He wanted things to be normal. He just wanted Carissa back.

  They sat for a long time, hearing nothing, and then a nurse came out to talk to them. “Are you all with Ms. Schultz?”

  “Yes, I’m her mother,” Sarah replied.

  “Okay. Here’s what we’ve got.” The nurse was noncommittal, professional. “It looks like Carissa has a few things going on. First, she has a bladder infection, common with spina bifida. I’m sure you know that. We’ve started treatment for it, but that’s not the big issue here. The big issue seems to be that Carissa’s shunt failed. There’s a clog or a break somewhere in the tubing, and we need to repair it. She’ll need surgery right away.” She looked at Carissa’s parents. “We need your consent to operate.”

  “Absolutely. Where do I sign?” Sarah said, sounding like her breath had been sucked right out of her.

  The nurse took Sarah to a desk just inside the emergency room doors to fill out the paperwork. Jim and Isaac stayed behind.

  “What does all this mean?” Isaac asked, scared to hear the answer.

  “She needs brain surgery. There’s a tube going from her brain into her abdominal cavity, called a shunt, that draws spinal fluid off her brain,” Jim explained. “A normal brain does this on its own. Carissa’s never did, so when she was a baby, they put the shunt in to prevent brain damage. The shunt is clogged. She needs a new one. Things should be fine once she gets the new one, but it is brain surgery.”

  “Brain surgery… but she’ll be okay?”

  “She should be.” Jim didn’t sound very sure.

  Sarah walked back out into the waiting room and sat down. “All set,” she said.

  “Did you see her?” Isaac asked.

  “No. They’re already prepping for surgery. They say the fluid build-up is pretty bad. She needs to get it taken care of right now.”

  Isaac hung his head down. He wasn’t sure he was strong enough for this. In fact, he was sure he wasn’t. He loved her so much, but he hated everything about spina bifida.

  They waited in the emergency waiting room. Jim offered a few
times to buy drinks or snacks for everyone, but no one could eat. Isaac paced the room until he got dizzy. Sarah sat in her chair with her arms wrapped around her chest, kind of hugging herself for comfort.

  After about two hours, a man came out, dressed in familiar surgeon garb. He approached them and sat down to talk.

  “Carissa did well. She’s not awake yet, so it’s hard to tell if there will be any permanent damage from this. The fluid build-up was bad, and it’s hard to tell how long she was like that. We’ll know more in the next few hours as the anesthesia wears off. They’re getting her into a room on the third floor now, and I’ll let you know when you can go up and see her. Do you have any questions for me?”

  “No. Thank you, doctor,” Jim replied.

  Eventually, they were cleared to go up to the third floor to see Carissa. They were silent, lost in their own thoughts, on the way up. Sarah still wouldn’t let go of her chest. Isaac mostly looked at the floor in the elevator, and Jim tried to think of ways to comfort his family. This was hard. He wasn’t sure anything he said would be helpful, so he stayed quiet.

  They arrived in the room to find Carissa still sleeping. She looked comfortable at least, but Isaac thought she should be waking up more by now. He stood by her bedside and looked at all the bandages and wires, and he began to tear up. Seeing her like this broke his heart. He had seen his mother in the hospital, but he was little the last time she had had surgery. He didn’t remember it. Now he was scared for Carissa on a level he hadn’t experienced before. This was hard. He would have given anything in that moment for her to open her eyes and tell him about her law, or tell him about anything. He gently stroked the hand that didn’t have an IV coming out of it, and she stirred a little and opened her eyes, just a crack.

  “We have to stop meeting like this,” she mumbled, and grasped his hand.

  Isaac couldn’t hold back anymore. Tears filled his eyes and streamed down his face. “I love you so much. Please don’t ever scare me like that again.”