Alone No More (7 page)

Putting a Name to a Face

The morning shift was always Sabrina's favorite. There were many reasons why. She was typically able to get in a few minute early to talk with the night shift nurses on her floor, and get the skinny on everything that'd happened during their shift. No doctor orders ever really came in from the overnight either, so other than the hassle of checking all the logs, and doing an initial med pass, the mornings always seemed pretty great. Of course, things picked up as the day went on, but she also liked driving into the city to the hospital as the sun rose. Even if the dang thing was straight in her eyes half the drive. It was like waking up with the Earth.

Getting to where the hospital was in the city could sometimes be a hassle. There were large businesses all about, and after getting off the highway and onto the city streets just meant she had to fight through the five intersections to get to the multi floored parking garage the hospital had. Sabrina went directly to the fourth floor of the hospital when she left the concrete parking structure. She always parked on the uppermost levels, so the people visiting their family members could park low, near the lobby floor. If anything, she was courteous to the families, most of whom were already emotionally frayed just thinking about coming to the place where she worked.

The fourth floor of the hospital was the short stay floor, as well as the NICU. Hers wasn't the largest hospital, so each department wasn't always afforded all the space they would've liked. Patients who had just experienced surgery more robust than outpatient procedures and needed to stay a single overnight, or perhaps just a few hours went to her floor. She frequently spent very little time with patients before they moved along back to home, or to a different unit if they experienced some kind of setback. It was better that way, she felt. Less chance to get attached, and then let down if they fell more ill or died. She worked in the medical equivalent of fast food. Nothing too involved, and nothing long term. It was for the best though. Despite being forty years old, she'd only been a nurse for a year. With the economy shitting the bed she'd lost her longtime factory job, so she reinvented herself as a nurse. A few years of school later, she knew she loved it.

As Sabrina sat at the nurse's station, going over the overnight information, Catherine, the nurse she was replacing was talking absently about the night.

"Sabrina you could be up for a really bad day hun. I was watching the news almost all night long, and there are a lot of really crazy people out there. Europe is all in a tizzy, and I'd bet my mother's secret casserole recipe before lunchtime the ER is swimming in folks who are having panic attacks."

Sabrina looked up, her blue eyes picking out Catherine's through her brown bangs. "You are a paranoid lady Cathy. I think this will all blow over. I only caught a few bits of it on the morning show, and it's all the same. Bird flu all over again." Africa, Asia and Europe were all experiencing riots due to a strange series of infections that were causing people to become violent. It was almost like a strange form of human rabies, but Sabrina thought it was probably more like human paranoia. Things like these were always blown out of proportion by the media anyway.

"There weren't riots in London over bird flu Sabrina."

"And there won't be riots here in the city either. We'll probably have our string of ten little old ladies who think they've contracted hyperthyroidism, or sudden onset diabetes, five suspected cases of rabies via cat bite, and that one guy who gets something lodged in his asshole because he's a closet gay man and is too ashamed to tell anyone about it. Happens every time something weird is on the news."

Catherine snickered quietly, afraid she'd wake some of the sleeping patients in the bays across from the station. "Oh Sabrina, you're so funny. I can see why your husband and kid love you so much."

Sabrina smiled. "Well if you keep them laughing, they have a much harder time being disobedient."

"Now that's wisdom. You have a good shift no matter what. I'll see you tomorrow morning," Catherine said as she gathered her purse from under the counter.

"Of course. Safe drive home," Sabrina said, returning to her charts.

Her goodbye to Catherine was the second goodbye she'd said that day, and just like the first goodbye, it was the last time she'd ever see that person again. 

*****

Late in the morning, Sabrina was proven wrong. The emergency room had been busy the entire day. As the two nurses had jested about in the dawn of the day, there were the usual suspects. Elderly people who didn't know quite where to go with the strange events on the television, as well as the normal amount of sick and injured. Nothing too serious had happened all morning, right up until the major accident and shooting down the street.

At an intersection several blocks away an out of control truck had hit a handful of pedestrians. Something bad had happened in the aftermath of the accident, and there had been a police involved shooting. The ER had been notified by the police that multiple seriously injured patients would be inbound, but something went horribly wrong. As the hospital scrambled to get more staff to the ER to prepare for the glut of major injuries, word came in that the accident had escalated to more than just a shooting.

Apparently some of the injured people had attacked Samaritans as well as police officers that had arrived to help. The details were sketchy. Instead of four victims as initially advertised, the ambulances were transporting in nearly twelve, most in some fashion of critical condition. Sabrina was pulled from her quiet fourth floor to assist the ER crews when the number of victims on their way swelled from four, to fourteen.

She was pulled in person, under duress by the hospital's Nurse Manager, Phyllis. Phyllis was nearly out of breath, and looked frazzled. "Sabrina head down and find Doctor Barry. He's going to be working in room one oh four right near the lobby, and he'll be doing triage on the people arriving. Assist him as best you can."

Phyllis was a nice woman, but she was ruthless when it came to her job. Sabrina was only barely qualified to help in the ER under the best circumstances, so for her to ask for Sabrina to head down there must've meant the situation was dire. Sabrina thought of her son, and hoped he was safe at home with her husband, playing on the swing set in the backyard. It was a warm June day, and that seemed like a perfect vision to her.

 She hoped their small town was far quieter than the city.

*****

By the time Sabrina reached the hospital's emergency room, the department was in heavy disarray. She saw four of the six security guards the hospital employed all attempting to maintain a semblance of peace in the entranceway and waiting room, but the men looked strained. Cabot, the largest and most imposing of all the guards was kneeling down low in a hallway to explain something to a frustrated woman in a wheelchair who had her leg elevated. She wore a splint and judging by the grimace on her pretty face she was in some pain. You could never tell how much pain someone was in just by looking at them though. Some people were predisposed to complain and feel pain more acutely than others. Sabrina's son David was impervious to pain. Just last summer he broke a bone in his arm and didn't say anything to her or her husband for a few days because as he said, "it wasn't so bad."

The look on the young girl's face said anything but, "this wasn't so bad."

Doctor Barry was a young doctor. She thought he was maybe thirty five. His hair was pitch black and trimmed neatly right down to his skin giving him a very military look. It made sense too as Barry came to the hospital after a career in the military. He had served as some kind of high profile medic in the army, and after getting out he'd completed med school as quickly as could be. Barry was a trauma specialist. If anyone came into their ER with a gunshot or stab wound, there was no better man to see. Barry was lean, and handsome, and was the subject of more nurse gossip at the facility than any other eligible man. She was scared to be in the ER with so much going on, but she was pretty damned thankful to spend some time with him. Her husband didn’t need to know anything…

"Thanks Sabrina. I appreciate you coming down to help." Barry moved quickly and confidently. He arranged all manner of supplies on a series of trays and table in a waiting room near the ambulance entrance that was typically reserved for a single patient's intake assessment. He'd already prepared it to sit three, and had a series of beds in the hallway opposite ready to take those that didn't need urgent care immediately.

"Yeah Doctor, you're welcome," she said, failing to hide her apprehension about it all.

"Nervous aren't you?" Barry asked with a smile, his hands never stopping, prepping more and more supplies for the ambulances that were only a minute or two away.

Sabrina swallowed, "Yeah. I'm not really the kind of person who deals well with this kind of thing."

"This kind of thing? You did go to school to be a nurse? They did tell you that at some point in time you might need to step up and help save lives right?" The Doctor replied, still smiling. He was almost flirting with her.

Sabrina laughed at his jest, "Yes Doctor, I'm aware of all that. I guess my preference is to work with people who aren't in critical conditions. I like helping folks with an existing problem, on the upswing, not necessarily the ones who are coming in with who knows what going on. I think I'm also scared I'll make a mistake and get someone hurt."

Barry nodded, handing her several medical instruments. "Look at how I have my things arranged and put those on your scrubs the same way. Nice flower pattern shirt by the way. Aren't those worn by pediatric nurses? Brings out the green in your eyes."

Sabrina blushed, "Well we've got several young kids on my floor right today, so I'm borrowing this from Deanna. Thought the little ones would like it." She slid all the tools into the small pockets and folds of her scrubs as he continued to talk.

"Let me give you very simple advice Sabrina, and if you can remember some of it, we'll get through this okay today, and we might even help some folks out in the process. First off, stay calm. Panic kills. Panic makes you do things too fast, and even though time is a factor here in the ER, you need to do things at a controlled speed. As long as you're under control, you'll be able to do the right things, right?" Barry asked her, his voice instilling her with a measure of confidence.

Sabrina felt encouraged. "Yeah, right."

"And remember, ABCDE and compression Sabrina. Just go down the check list, and if they are meant to be saved, then it will happen. I'll try to direct you as best I can, and you stay calm okay?"

"Deal." 

"You can do this Sabrina," Barry said as the wail of an ambulance's approach could be heard through the heavy ER sliding doors. The first of the victims was here.

Sabrina said a short prayer, and hoped that she could indeed do this.

*****

Very quickly indeed her confidence was thrown out the window.

One after another a series of ambulances pulled in and vomited out a crew of EMTs and blood soaked people that needed incredible levels of skilled medical treatment. She felt like a tornado had descended on her and the hospital, complete with death and destruction in every direction. She focused cleanly on the good young Doctor, and did her level best to follow his every instruction. There were many, many instructions.

The first four injured were whisked directly into the trauma rooms where they were put into direct emergency care. Immediately thereafter a man with massive chest trauma was wheeled directly into surgery. And from there, things went downhill.

"This is where we step up Sabrina. When the ER is full, we need to triage, okay? Decide who can be fixed and who can't, okay?" Doctor Barry was serious now, his voice flat. His tone authoritative.

All Sabrina could do was adjust her gear and nod. She hadn't even helped anyone yet and there were already large smears of blood on her scrubs. It seemed like blood was everywhere. She heard the voices of the next batch of EMTs, and it overwhelmed her.

"Large human bite wound at the neck, appears that the carotid is perforated, blood loss is severe-" and that voice trailed off, loudly and quickly giving Doctor Barry a litany of medical facts that frightened her.

"Blood pressure is dropping-"

"IVs are in and running. But he's lost a lot of blood-"

"Need plasma-"

"Intubate immediately, the airway can be made clear-"

"Gunshot is a flesh wound, send him to the lobby. He waits."

And more. It all sounded like death to her.

Seconds later another patient came in on foot, likely from the same ambulance. He was wrapped in a neutral gray blanket that was stained purple, brown and red from wet and drying blood. He had a lost and vacant look on his face as he stumbled past other people sitting in the ER waiting room. They looked at him with forlorn expressions. He was the nearest thing to normal to walk into the department since the scream of the first ambulance.

It was the closest thing Sabrina had seen to a typical patient in her world, and her mind leapt at the opportunity to help a slice of her mundane. She moved across the room with purpose, and slid an arm around the blanket covering the man like a shawl. "Follow me sir. I'm Sabrina, I'm a nurse here at the hospital. If it's alright with you I'm gonna take you into this room here so I can check out your wounds and injuries. What's your name?"

The man blinked a few times, his feet blindly putting one in front of the other as Sabrina steered him towards the room she was sharing with Doctor Barry. Finally, as they were about to sit in one of the smooth plastic chairs in the triage room, his mind put everything together. "Oh hey, I uh, my name is Matt. Someone bit me." The man named Matt dropped the edge of the blanket that was draped over his shoulder, revealing a massive bite wound on the outside of his arm near the tricep. It was a strange place to be bitten.