by TWCS Authors
“Impossible,” he whispered. I felt the barest of touches skate across my bare arm, making my skin tingle in its wake. Anger warred with need, logic fought with my heart’s desire. In the end, though, the truth was all that mattered. And I couldn’t give myself to someone knowing that they’d chosen another behind my back.
I faced him full on. “I just don’t want to find myself in a situation like I have before. And to be honest, I just don’t think I can be with someone who lies to me.”
“Lies to you?” Mitch appeared truly startled. His eyes searched mine for answers, maybe to determine how much I knew.
“Chris, he’s waiting,” Carrie said brusquely, poking her head inside once more.
“I’m coming,” I replied and turned to leave Mitch to stew in his own contemplations.
“Wait, what are you talking about?” he called after me, but I took a deep breath and continued on my way, hoping I’d get my shift over with as soon as possible.
“Dr. Peterson, sorry to keep you waiting.”
“No problem, Chris,” he said with a curt smile. He’d just finished examining little Kelsey McQueen.
“Well, Ms. McQueen, I believe Kelsey may have a coin stuck in her airway. That’s what is making that whistling sound.”
“Oh, no!” The poor mother was in near hysterics.
“It’s okay right now, but we will have to work quickly in case it advances. What I’m going to do is give her a sedative and oxygen through a small tube we will place in her nose. I’ll use an ultrasound to guide a small instrument into her windpipe to retrieve the coin, okay?” Dr. Peterson was never the one to sugarcoat anything, and if he was correct in his assessment—well, if we were correct—then we needed to remove that coin before we had a more serious issue.
“O-okay,” Kelsey’s mother said.
“She’s in good hands,” Carrie said as I began to prepare for the procedure. Rob entered the room with a pediatric set up, along with two other respiratory therapists in order to help ensure Kelsey was properly oxygenated. Carrie escorted the mother out of the room so we could set up a sterile field as quickly as possible. As we worked, I glanced out the door at Ms. McQueen, watching the tears pour down her face as Carrie held her hand, trying her best to reassure her. It was probably a futile attempt. I know if it were me, I’d want my baby’s father with me, to hold onto while our child was treated. But there was no father in the picture because he’d chosen to be elsewhere, away from the responsibility of a wife and child. He left her, and she had to make it on her own, surviving each day by the skin of her teeth.
Lies and deception kept the world turning, for with each untold truth there seemed to spark another avenue of torture.
Love . . .
It seemed like just a fantasy. Not one person around me was lucky in love. Coworkers, family members, even patients appeared to struggle with it. Yet, it looked so easy on television and in movies. Fairytales and romance novels used the unattainable, yet highly predictable, idea of true love as the most rewarding triumph life had to offer. Maybe that was the greatest lie of all, for love didn’t seem to last through a decade intact, and the merest of challenges had each person involved second-guessing until they had both sabotaged the relationship to the point of destruction.
Perhaps I’d done that with Mitch—questioning his motives without confronting him. Truth was, I didn’t want to hear the explanation. I’d seen what I’d seen, and there was no mistaking it. So his options were clear—lie to me or confirm the truth and rip my heart out. Either way, I’d lose. Life’s greatest lie uncloaked revealed a raw wound filled with pain and despair. After years of struggle and perseverance, survivors triumphed through it all only to spend life alone and jaded.
I, for one, wanted to keep away from it all.
“How are you feeling, Mr. Carson?”
I’d walked to bed F for a much needed cool-down. Kelsey had done beautifully and had been admitted to the children’s ward for observation. Three more hours and my shift would be over. I counted the seconds.
“A little silly now,” Ike replied with a sheepish smile. “Doc says my tests were fine and the pain has gone away. I’ve caused this whole uproar over a case of indigestion.”
“It’s okay. Better to be safe than sorry.”
“My poor wife is trying to convince the kids not to come to the hospital. I feel like such a damn drama queen.” He glanced over to where she was speaking on a cell phone just outside his room.
“How many kids do you have?”
“Five—all boys—and they’re just like me. Smooth talkers, incredibly good looking, and huge pains in the ass.” We both laughed. “It’s a good thing they all married quality women, just like their mother.”
“How long have you been married?”
“Thirty-two years.”
“Wow,” I said, a bit shocked. The jaded part of me wanted to make a smart-ass comment, but I refrained. “Congratulations. You make it look so easy.”
“Well, it hasn’t always been.”
“Still, what you have is rare nowadays.”
“We’ve had our issues, and we both have hurt each other a time or two . . . or a gazillion, in my case.” Ike gave me a guilty wink.
“Yet, you made it. Seems that kind of love is going extinct.”
“No, what’s endangered are people who will be patient and fight for the things that are important. If something seems like it’s not working, people are quick to throw it away and start over, instead of waiting it out and putting in the hard work.”
“Hmm. Never thought of it that way before.”
“That’s because delayed gratification is non-existent for your generation—and, oh my goodness, I sound like my father. When did that happen?”
I laughed. “I’m sure it happened a time or two with your kids.”
“Nah, I was the cool dad. Just ask them.”
“I wish I had someone in my life to tell me like it is.” And I truly meant that. Right now I could really use some sage advice, or some affirmation that I was doing the right thing by keeping Mitch at arm’s length.
“Where’s your Pop?”
“With his fourth wife. He has enough going on in his own life to not be any help in mine.” I shrugged.
“Sounds like it. And your mom?”
“Died last summer. Breast cancer.” Her loss left a vast hole in my heart.
“I’m sorry to hear that.” Ike gave me a moment or two to make sure I had my emotions under control. “Any brothers or sisters?”
“Just me.” I felt the loneliness more now than I had in a very long time. Part of that was due to Mitch and how close we’d become.
“Well, then,” Ike said, sitting up a bit on the hugely uncomfortable hospital gurney. “Let me bestow enough wisdom upon you to last a lifetime.”
I chuckled and pulled a stool closer to his bed. “Go ahead. I can use all the help I can get.”
“Okay. My first piece of advice is trust him.”
I stared at him blankly. “W-what?”
“Trust him.”
Ike’s warm voice and kind eyes made me relax just enough to understand what he meant. “That man, the one you were talking with over there . . . He loves you.” Ike gestured toward the nurses’ station
“What? No. How would you know that?” He couldn’t. He’d never told me he did, and besides, if he did love me, then why did I catch him with someone else?
“Sweetheart, I’m a man who’s been madly in love with the same woman for over thirty-two years. I recognize it in others. Trust me.”
“Trust you?” I asked, incredulous. I felt anger rearing its ugly head.
“And him.” Ike smiled once more.
“Thank you, Mr. Carson, for the advice and the laughs, but I don’t think you know what you’re talking about in this case.” I stood up and turned to leave.
“My dear, whatever reservations you have, put them aside. Talk to him. Hear him out.”
“Ignore my eyes? Wh
at I saw?” I couldn’t! Not again.
“Did you see him in the buff with another woman?”
I cringed. “Well, no . . .” Not him, anyway. Seeing John had been bad enough.
“Kissing someone else?”
“I caught him in a lie.”
“And did you talk to him about it? Get his take on the matter?”
“He’d just lie some more, and then I’d end up looking like a fool,” I said, fighting against angry tears.
“So, you’re willing to let something go based on the what-ifs?” Ike’s tone was firm but kind, yet his question set my hackles rising.
“Catching someone in a lie is not based on what-ifs.”
“Okay . . .” Ike paused for a few moments to let things settle. “What if it was a misunderstanding?”
“It wasn’t.” I closed my eyes against the doubt of my convictions starting to rumble through my mind.
“How do you know that?”
“How do you know he won’t be lying to me? I can’t take that chance and be the gullible idiot again.” I threw my hands in the air, desperate to know the answers.
“Let go of the past.”
“What do you mean?”
“I have a feeling you were never taught how to decipher between fear and doubt when it comes to love and trusting with your whole heart.” Ike reached out a hand to me, taking my trembling one in his. “And I’m willing to bet you were hurt very badly in the past when you tried to do that very thing.”
“My father didn’t love my mother like you love your wife, Mr. Carson,” I said with an emotionally laden voice. Sitting back down on the stool beside him, I stopped hiding my tears from my patient-turned-counselor and friend.
“Ike,” he said, correcting my professional discourse.
I looked at him, and he gently wiped a tear falling down one of my cheeks. “Ike, she’d been utterly devoted to him, and he took her love for granted. Left her three weeks after she was diagnosed the first time. Said it was too much and he had way too much life left to live to be tied down to a sick and dying woman.” A warm hand encompassed mine. It was such a fatherly gesture.
“How old were you?”
“Eight years old, and my father leaving almost killed my mother. A broken heart almost did what the cancer finally did sixteen years later.” I couldn’t keep the bitterness from my tone.
“That must have been hard to watch.”
“At first, I was angry with my dad. Not understanding how he could walk away from us—walk away from her—while she was so sick.”
“And then you became mad at her?”
“Yes, for loving him so much she allowed him to destroy her spirit.” I felt guilty all over again.
“That wasn’t your mother’s fault.”
“She could’ve been stronger, more guarded.”
“We are not called to love our spouses with armor around our hearts.”
“What? I’m supposed to give my heart over to someone else completely without reservation? And when they don’t want it anymore, I’m supposed to survive that? I’ve tried that once and ended up with the broken heart.”
“I’m sorry that happened to you.”
“I am, too.” And I meant that. “I won’t let it happen again. I can’t.”
“And what if you could be happy with that young man?”
What if.
Thing was, I had been happy with Mitch. More so than I’d been in a very long time. Every moment I’d spent with him felt new and exciting. Every night we’d been together had me craving more and counting the seconds when we were apart. And I did imagine a future with him, one where we were as happy as Ike and Phyllis were. It had been possible. Could it still be?
Ike chortled. “See? The what-ifs will get you every time. Talk to him, Christine. What do you have to lose?”
“My pride?” I scoffed, holding on to the last ounce of stubbornness I had.
“Aw, but your pride is what is keeping you from a possible life with someone that can truly care about you.” Ike glanced behind me and his mouth quirked in a telling smile.
I looked to see Mitch standing there, watching me from just outside the room, his eyes dark and his expression wanting.
“Talk to him,” Ike told me with a final pat on my hand.
“I hope he wasn’t giving you a hard time,” Phyllis said as she returned to her husband’s bedside.
“No, just giving me some wise advice.”
She smiled knowingly. “Sticking his nose where it doesn’t belong?”
“Something like that.” I laughed.
Suddenly, the monitor above Ike’s bed began sounding an alarm. His systolic blood pressure dropped to sixty five.
“Ike? Are you feeling okay?”
“Uh, not really, no.” He’d become pale and diaphoretic.
“What’s happening? Is that his blood pressure?” His wife asked worriedly.
“Yes, Phyllis, it’s just a little low right now.”
Another alarm sounded. This time it was for a very high heart rate of 214 and climbing. I reassessed my patient. Ike had lost consciousness.
“Ike! Can you hear me, Ike?” I gave him a deep sternal rub but received no response.
“Need help?” Mitch walked into the room and immediately pulled on a pair of large gloves.
“Get a bag of saline and run it wide open,” I said quickly, wanting to get Ike’s blood pressure up as soon as possible. We needed a fresh set of labs to help diagnose what was happening, and I began collecting a specimen from the large bore IV in his right arm. I glanced at the nurses’ station to see a couple techs looking our way.
“Carrie, get Dr. Peterson in here right away.”
She nodded and ran down the hall.
“Ike, honey, can you hear me?” Phyllis continued to rub his chest in an attempt to wake him.
“He’s going into V-tach!” Mitch yelled as the alarms squealed.
“Is there a pulse?” I unlocked the final syringe from the IV as Mike felt his neck.
“I don’t have a pulse, Chris.”
“Okay, start CPR.” Pulling the red lever at the bottom to the bed to lay it flat, I pressed the Code Blue button on the back wall to get more help.
“Oh, my God!” Phyllis cried as Mitch climbed on the gurney and began chest compressions. “Please, Lord.”
“What happened?” Dr. Peterson hurried into the room followed by two RTs and a couple interns.
“Sudden drop in BP, loss of consciousness, and then VT with no pulse,” I reported and then turned to Mitch on the CPR cycle. “Ready to switch?”
“Start Levophed and give one amp of epinephrine.”
“I’m on it!” Mitch said, switching roles with me in the next couple counts.
We worked diligently and precisely, like a choreographed dance. Each participant knew their role and performed it without second thought. When properly trained, adequate cardiopulmonary resuscitation was fast and brutal. I’d done it so many times and never had I looked away from my patient and toward the family. Never had I looked at their pained and worried expressions. This time I did.
As I pushed onto her husband’s sternum, Phyllis stood by, wrapped in Carrie’s embrace, and watched as her husband died before her. The man she’d dedicated her life to, the man who loved her utterly, lay wasting away from some unknown cause and there wasn’t a thing she could do about it.
“Hold CPR. Let’s check what we have,” Dr. Peterson said.
We all stopped and looked at the monitor. I climbed off the gurney, trying to catch my breath for just a moment as I prayed the thin green lines would reveal we’d brought him back.
“Still in V-tach,” Mitch replied. I felt for Ike’s neck
“No pulse.”
“Okay, charge the paddles to 250.”
“Charging. Ready? Everyone clear!”
“Ike, baby! Please don’t do this . . . I love you.”
I’ve told myself countless times to be safeguarded against thos
e things that threaten my status quo. My mother dying had taught me life was short, and no amount of pain we fight through in order to reach a happy ending guaranteed that things could change once the dust settled. She’d thought she’d beaten that horrible disease, thought she’d overcome her broken heart, yet when she lay on that bed dying, her one regret was the failure of her marriage.
Her failure.
I didn’t understand her logic. How did she fail? After all, he left her—abandoned her to face the hardest time of her life with no one but her scared little daughter to hold her hand. My mother felt she’d let herself down by allowing the destruction of her marriage. As I said, I didn’t understand it until now.
Ike had told me that the biggest problem people faced in relationships was that no one fought for what they wanted. Once something became broken, it was left in the wastelands, chalked up as something that just wasn’t meant to be. Perhaps my mother felt a little of this, wishing she’d fought harder for my dad. Maybe she hadn’t gone after him like she wanted to or possibly a part of her felt guilty for even wanting him to stay with her while she faced such an unknown future. Either way, she’d had regrets.
I didn’t want regrets.
“Hey.”
I turned from my locker and glanced at Mitch standing next to me, wearing the same tired expression I’d seen on my face in the mirror.
“Hey.”
“Long day, huh?”
“Yeah, you could say that.”
“How’s your patient?”
“I’ve heard he’s touch-and-go. They rushed him into the OR and it looks like they may have caught it in time, thanks to Dr. Peterson.” I placed my stethoscope inside my locker and grabbed my purse.
“Was he right?”
“Yeah, he had a dissecting aortic aneurysm.” I nodded, still amazed he had the skills to come up with such a rare diagnosis.
Mitch whistled. “Wow, he’s lucky to be alive.”
“Yeah.” Pulling the strap of my purse over my shoulder, I smiled sadly, thinking of Phyllis sitting in the family room, waiting for news about her husband’s survival. At least she had her boys with her now.
