The Bride Wore Denim

by Lizbeth Selvig

  She let the child go and stood. A young woman with the same black hair as Megan, arrived at her side. It could only be the girl’s mom. She bent and whispered something in her daughter’s ear. The child nodded enthusiastically. “Thank you, Doc-toh Mia.”

  “You’re welcome. And thank you.”

  The young mother’s eyes met Mia’s, gratitude shining in their depths. “Thanks from me, too. This is a wonderful party. So much effort by the whole staff.”

  “I wish I’d had more to do with it.”

  “You just did a great deal.”

  Megan had already started on her way back to the audience. Mia watched her slow progress, forgetting about the crowd until a powerful shove against her upper arm nearly knocked her off her feet. She turned to Bitsy and saw Brooke—grinning through the white make-up.

  “What the heck? Clown attack. Go away you maniac.”

  A few kids in the front row twittered. Bitsy honked at her, but it was Brooke who leaned close to her ear. “That was awesome, Crockett,” she whispered. “It’s the kind of thing they need to see you do more of around here.”

  “They” referred to the medical staff. It was true she didn’t have the most warm-hearted reputation—but that was by design. She grabbed Bitsy’s ugly horn.

  “They can kiss my—” Honk. Honk.

  All the kids heard and saw was Davy Cwockett’s pincess stealing a clown’s horn. Bitsy capitalized, placing her hands on her knees and exaggerating an enormous laugh.

  “Hey! I think I have a new apprentice clown. What do you all say?”

  Bitsy pulled off her red nose and popped it on Mia’s. The kids screeched their approval.

  “I’m going to murder you,” Mia whispered, smiling pleasantly.

  “Our newest clown needs a name. Any ideas?”

  Princess! Clowny! Clown Doctor! Sillypants! Stefo-scope!

  Names flew from the young mouths like hailstones, pelting Mia with ridiculousness.

  “Stethoscope the Clown, I like it.” Bitsy laughed. “How about Mercy?”

  “Princess Goodheart.” That came quietly from Megan’s mother, standing against the side wall, certainty in her demeanor.

  “Oh, don’t you dare,” Mia hissed at her friend the clown.

  “Perfect!” Bitsy called, her falsetto ringing through the room. “Now, how about we get Princess Goodheart to help with a magic trick?”

  Mia’s sentimentality of moments before dissipated fully. This was why she couldn’t afford such soppy silliness, even over children. If she was going to turn to syrup at the first sign of a child with a walker and a patched eye, perhaps pediatrics wasn’t the place for her.

  On the other hand, Megan represented the very reason Mia wanted to add pediatric surgery to her resume. She had skill—a special gift according to teachers and some colleagues—and she could use it to help patients like Megan.

  “Pick a card, Princess Goodheart.” Bitsy nudged her arm.

  Mia sighed. She’d have thought a party featuring simple games, fine motor skill-building, and prizes would have been more worthwhile. The mindlessness of magicians and the potential for scaring children with clowns seemed riskier. Indeed there were a few uncomplicated, arcade-type games at little stations around the room, but the magic and clown aficionados had prevailed. Mia grunted and picked a six of clubs.

  “Don’t show me,” said Bitsy.

  “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

  “Now, put the card back in the deck. Who wants to wave their hand over the deck and say the magic words?” Bitsy asked.

  “Oh God, help! Oh, help, help please. Something’s happening to him!”

  Bitsy dropped the card deck. In the back of the room, next to a table full of food and treats, a woman stood over the crumpled body of a boy, twitching and flailing his arms. Mia heard his gasps for breath, ripped the ridiculous nose off her face, and pressed into the crowd of kids.

  “Keep them all back.” She gave the order to Brooke, right beside her and already shushing children in a calm Bitsy voice.

  The fact that she continued acting like a clown in the face of an emergency made Mia angry, but there was no time now to call her out for unprofessionalism. In the minute it took Mia to reach the child on the floor, five nurses had surrounded him, and the woman who’d called for help stood by, her face ashen.

  “Are you the boy’s mother?” Mia asked.

  “No. I was standing here when he started choking.”

  “Out of the way, please.” Mia shouldered her way between two nurses, spreading her arms to clear space. They’d turned the boy on his side. “Is he actually choking?”

  “He’s not. It looks like he’s reacting to something he ate,” a male nurse replied.

  She knelt and rolled the child to his back and froze. “Rory?”

  “A patient of yours?” the nurse asked.

  “The son of a friend.” Mia had missed his arrival. She forced back her shock and set a mental wall around her sudden emotions. “Is there anything on his chart?”

  She’d known Rory Beltane and his mother for three years and didn’t remember ever hearing about an allergy this life-threatening.

  “I don’t believe there were any allergies listed,” the nurse said. “We’re checking his information now. He’s a foster kid.”

  “Yes, I know,” she replied with defensive sharpness. “His mother is incapacitated and temporarily can’t care for him. Is the foster mother here?”

  “No. At work.” The male nurse said. “Poor kid. He was just starting to feel better after having his appendix out. This isn’t fair.”

  She had no time to tell him exactly how unfair Rory Beltane’s life had been recently. “I need a blood pressure cuff stat. Get him on IV epinephrine, methylpred, and Benadryl, plus IV fluids wide open.”

  “Right away, Doctor.” Nurses scattered.

  The male nurse calmly read from a chart. “Excuse me, nurse, are you getting me that cuff?”

  “It’s on the way,” he said, and smiled. “Just checking his chart for you. No notations about allergies. I’ll go get the gurney.”

  Mia blew out her breath. She couldn’t fault him for being cool under pressure. Another nurse, this one an older woman with a tone as curt as Mia’s, knelt on Rory’s far side holding his wrist. “Heart rate is one-forty.”

  Mia held her stethoscope to the boy’s chest. His lips looked slightly swollen. His breathing labored from his tiny chest.

  “Here, Dr. Crockett. They’re bringing a gurney and the electronic monitor, but this was at the nurse’s station if you’d like to start with it.”

  Mia grabbed the pediatric-sized cuff, its bulb pump reminding her of Brooke’s obnoxious horn. With efficient speed, she wrapped the gray material around Rory’s arm, placed her stethoscope beneath it, and took the reading.

  She’d always been struck by what a stunning child he was. His mother was black and his father white, and his skin was the perfect blend, like the color of a beautiful sand beach after a rain. His head was adorned with a thick shock of dark curly hair, and when they were open, his eyes were a laughing, precocious liquid brown.

  “Seventy-five over fifty. Don’t like that,” she said.

  The male nurse appeared with a gurney bed. “I can lift him if you’re ready. We have the IV catheter and epinephrine ready.”

  “Go,” Mia ordered.

  Moments later Rory had been placed gently on the gurney, and three nurses, like choreographed dancers, had the IV in place, all the meds Mia had ordered running, and were rolling him toward the elevators to get him to intensive care.

  “We’ve called Dr. Wilson, the pediatric hospitalist on duty this week who’s seen Rory a couple of times. He’ll meet you downstairs,” said the male nurse, who’d just begun to be her favorite.

  She frowned. “It wasn’t necessary to bring him in yet. I think we have this well in hand. We need fewer bodies not more.”

  “I’ll let him know.”

  The epinephrine began to
work slowly but surely, and most of the staff, at Mia’s instruction, returned to the party to help the remaining kids. The older nurse and the male nurse remained.

  They reached the ICU in mere minutes, and twenty minutes after he’d first passed out, Rory opened his eyes, gasping as the adrenaline coursed through him and staring wild-eyed as if he didn’t believe air was reaching his lungs. They’d caught his reaction quickly. Thank God.

  “Slow breaths, Rory.” Mia placed her hand on his. “Don’t be afraid. You have plenty of air now, I promise. Lots of medicine is helping it get better and better. Breath out, nice and slow. I’m going to listen to your heart again, okay?”

  Mia found his heart rate slowing. A new automatic blood pressure cuff buzzed and Rory winced as the cuff squeezed. Tears beaded in his eyes. Mia stared at the monitor, while the same male nurse calmed the boy again.

  “That’s a little better,” Mia said. “But, I think we need to keep you away from the party for a while. That was scary, huh?”

  “Dr. Mia?” He finally recognized her.

  “Hi,” she said. “This is a surprise, isn’t it?”

  “You saved me.” He whispered in a thick, hoarse rasp. “Nobody ever saves me.”

  For the first time Mia truly looked at the nurse who still stood with her. His eyes reflected the stunned surprise she felt.

  “Of course I saved you,” she said. “Anybody would save you, Rory. You probably haven’t needed saving very often, that’s all.”

  “Once. I ate some peanut butter when my mom wasn’t at home. I couldn’t breathe but Mrs. Anderson next door didn’t believe me. ” His voice strengthened as he spoke. “I can’t eat peanut butter.”

  “What did you eat today? Do you remember? Right before you couldn’t breathe?”

  He shook his head vehemently. “A cupcake. A chocolate one. I can eat chocolate.”

  “Anything else?”

  “I had one little Three Musketeer. Bitsy gave it to me. She said the nurses said it was okay to have one because my stomach feels better.”

  Bitsy again.

  “And you don’t remember any other food?” Mia asked.

  “I didn’t eat nothing else. I swear.”

  “It’s all right. It really is. All I care about is finding what made you sick. Look, I’m going to go back to your floor for a few minutes and talk to some more nurses—”

  “No! Stay here.” He stretched out his arm, his fingers spread beseechingly.

  “All right.” She let him grab her hand and looked at him quizzically. “But you’re fine now.”

  “No.”

  He was so certain of his answer. Mia couldn’t bear to ignore his wish, although it made no logical sense. At that moment a white-coated man with a Lincoln-esque figure appeared in the doorway.

  “My, my, what’s going on here? Is that you Rory?”

  Rory clung to Mia’s hand and didn’t answer. Mia looked over the newcomer, not recognizing him, although his badge identified him as Frederick Wilson, MD.

  His eyes brushed over Mia, and he dismissed her with a quick “Good afternoon.” No questions, no request for an update from her, the medical expert already on the case. She bristled but stayed quietly beside Rory, squeezing his hand.

  “How’s our man?” Dr. Wilson asked. You doing okay, Champ?” He oozed the schmoozy bedside manner Mia found obsequious, and the child who’d been talkative up to now merely stared at the ceiling.

  Dr. Wilson chuckled. “That’s our Rory. Not great talk show material, but he plays a mean game of chess from what I hear. A silent, brilliant kind of man. I’m Fred Wilson.” He held out a hand. “You must be one of the techs or NAs?”

  She stared at him in disbelief. A nursing assistant? Who was this idiot? She looked down and remembered her badge was in her pocket. She fished it out and shoved it at him. “I’m Dr. Amelia Crockett, and I’ve been handling Rory’s case since the incident about half an hour ago.

  “Crockett. Crockett.” He stared off as if accessing information in space somewhere. “The young general surgeon who’s working toward a second certification in pediatric surgery. Sorry, I’ve been here two weeks and have tried to brush up on all the staff resumes. I’m the new chief of staff up in peds. From Johns Hopkins.”

  She had heard his name and that he was a mover and shaker.

  “Dr. Wilson,” she acknowledged.

  “So, since you’re a surgeon and not familiar with Rory’s whole case, maybe I’ll trouble you to get me up to speed on the anaphylaxis, and then I’ll take over so you can get back to what I’m sure is a busy schedule.” Dr. Wilson crossed his arms and smiled.

  She glared at him again. He may as well have called her just a surgeon. And to presume she hadn’t familiarized herself with Rory’s case before prescribing any course of action . . .

  “I’m sorry, Dr. Wilson,” she said. “But with all due respect, I happen to know this child personally, and I’m also well aware of the details of his case. I, too, can read a patient history. I believe I can follow up on this episode and make the report in his chart for you, his regular pediatrician, and the other docs on staff who will treat him.”

  “It really isn’t necessary,” he replied, and his smile left his eyes.

  Unprofessional as it was, she disliked him on the spot, as if she’d met him somewhere else and hadn’t liked him then either.

  “I was here to help with the Halloween party,” she said. “My afternoon is free and clear.”

  “That explains much. So that isn’t your normal, everyday head ornamentation?”

  For a moment she met his gaze, perplexed. Oh crap. Her hand flew to her head, and in mortification she pulled off the tiara still stuck there with its little side combs.

  “I didn’t mean you needed to take it off. It was fetching.” Dr. Wilson said. He winked with a condescending kind of flirtatiousness—as if he were testing her.

  She flicked an unobtrusive glance at his left hand. No band, but a bulky gold ring with a sizeable onyx set in the middle. She got the impression he was old school all the way, a little annoyed with female practitioners, and extremely cocky about his own abilities.

  “Rory is improving rapidly since the administration of Benadryl and epinephrine. We are uncertain of the allergen although, from what he’s told us, he has a sensitivity to peanut butter. As far as we know, he hasn’t eaten any nuts.”

  Dr. Wilson nodded, patting Rory periodically on the shoulder. Rory continued his silence.

  “Rory, do you mind if I do a little exam on your tummy?” Dr. Wilson asked.

  “Dr. Mia already did it.” He turned his head enough to look at her.

  Again he smiled, ignoring Mia. “I’m sure she did, but I’m a different kind of doctor, and I’d like to help her make sure you’re okay. Maybe if everyone left the room except you and me and Darren, it won’t be so embarrassing if I check you out? Dr. Crockett can go and make sure there’s nothing at the party that will hurt you again.”

  Darren, she noted absently. She hadn’t taken the time to look at his nametag.

  Rory shook his head and squeezed Mia’s hand again.

  “As you can see,” she said, curtly. “The child is still a little traumatized. Perhaps in this case you and I could switch roles? I’ll stay with my patient, and you’ll make a better sleuth?”

  Dr. Wilson’s mouth tightened, and he drew his shoulders back as if prepping for a confrontation. In that instant, the sense of recognition she’d had earlier flashed into unexpected clarity.

  Gabriel Harrison.

  Her stomach flipped crazily. Fiftyish Dr. Fred Wilson didn’t look a bit like the arrogant, self-important, patient advocate she’d met six weeks before at the VA medical center in her old home city of Jackson, Wyoming. In truth, nobody who wasn’t making seven figures as a big-screen heartthrob looked like Gabriel Harrison. The trouble was, just as Dr. Wilson knew he was good, Lieutenant—retired Lieutenant—Harrison knew he was gorgeous. Both men believed they had the only handle
on expertise and information.

  She’d met Harrison after a car accident in the middle of September had left her mother and one of her sisters seriously injured, and he’d been assigned as liaison between her family, her mother and sister, and the medical staff. He’d made himself charming—like a medicine show snake oil salesman—and her sisters, all five of them, now adored him. Her mother considered him her personal guardian angel. But he’d treated Mia like she’d gotten her degree from a Cracker Jack box.

  He was continuing the practice to this day in all their correspondence—which was frequent considering how he loved ignoring her requests for information.

  Mia was glad that at her planned trip home for Christmas, her mother and sister would be home and Gabriel Harrison, patient advocate, would be long gone from their lives. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t work quite so easily with Fred Wilson. She was stuck more-or-less permanently with him.

  “I want Dr. Mia to stay.”

  Rory’s fingers tightened on her hand, and the last vestiges of memories from Wyoming slipped away.

  “That settles it in my opinion. At my patient’s request, I will stay with him. Darren, would you be willing to accompany Dr. Wilson upstairs to ask some questions about the food? And maybe you’d be willing on your way to order Mr. Beltane here a glass of juice and maybe some ice?”

  “Yes,” Darren said. “Sure.”

  Fred Wilson, on the other hand, looked as if he might need the Heimlich maneuver. “If I might have a word with you outside, Dr. Crockett.”

  She met his gaze coolly. “Rory, I need to help Dr. Wilson with some things, but I’ll be right back. I promise.”

  “No.”

  “I promise, honey.” She smoothed the child’s hair back, and he finally nodded.

  Dr. Wilson patted Rory on the shoulder a final time. “I’ll see you tomorrow, young man. You may even get to go home. Bet you’d like that.”

  Rory gave an anemic shrug.

  She slipped out of the room with Fred Wilson behind her, took several steps away from the door, and spun to face him.

  “Would you care to explain what this is about?” she demanded.

  “Dr. Crockett, I have heard your reputation as the wonder child of this medical community,” Wilson said. “But in my department you have no seniority, and your fast track to the top is not impressive. No matter how good you are technically, nothing can take the place of years of experience. And just because you wear a stethoscope and have been in this physical location longer than I have, doesn’t mean you possess anywhere near the experience I do. You were insubordinate in front of the patient and my staff. I won’t have that.”