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Sometimes, he just needs to sit down and relive the moment. Fifteen minutes is all it takes, just enough to punish himself. It's his penance. It has to be done.
"Art?" His daughter could have been anything. She had a neurosurgeon for a father for goodness sake. She just had to rebel against him. He had paid good money to see her become a doctor but Joana had been lying to him all the while.
"I knew you wouldn't understand. Mum does... Dad, I can't even stand the sight of blood."
"You get used to it, trust me."
"But I'm already in my third year."
"You know what, come home and we'll talk about this."
"I'm already on my way. You can't make me change my mind, dad."
"We'll see about that."
He cut the call and tossed the phone into the seat. How long has Betty been hiding the fact that their daughter was studying art and not medicine in Harvard. He almost stepped out of the car to ask her but he was already running late. He'd have to confront her later. He turned the ignition and drove away.
The usual five minutes commute to work lasted thirty minutes. The universe must have wanted to make a statement that morning. Now, why in the world was he stuck in rush hour traffic at five in the morning. It took him another ten minutes to find a parking spot and all the while, his pager was going off like crazy. The cold wind bit into his skin when he stepped out from the warmth of his car. He zipped up his jacket and walked into the emergency unit.
"Morning Freda. Why did you wake me this early?" He asked the nurse at the station.
"'Cos you are on call?"
"Well..."
"Mrs. Thompson gave us a scare this morning..."
"She's due for surgery tomorrow, right?"
"Yes, but Doctor Barnes is seeing to her at the moment."
"Nice. I am going back home."
"No going home for you, doc." She stood from her chair, "There was a road accident on the campus drive. Paramedics just brought in two kids. The one there," She pointed to a young man, seated in the waiting area. He had his head to the wall and was staring blindly into the ceiling. There was a Band-Aid on his chin."he's doing fine but the girl is being prepped for surgery right now. Doesn't look good. Looks like she's bleeding into her brain. Gotta get in there."
"I was doing just that. Why are all you Stanford nurses so bossy?" He joked as he walked away.
"Don't let them hear you say that." Freda shouted after him.
She was right. The girl didn't look good. When he got there, her blond hair, though dark at its roots was being shaved off. There was a huge gush close to her forehead. Bruises covered her swollen face. Her eyes were taped shut.
"CT shows a huge haematoma in her brain. We are going to have to decompress." Immediately he said that, the ECG started to beep. "Shit!" Her pulse was dropping too fast.
"Get another vein and push some normal saline, please." The ECG continued beeping. "What's taking so long?"
"Looks like all her veins have collapsed." A nurse said.
He glared at the anaesthesiologist who immediately picked a cannula and moved to the patient's left. He dabbed a sterile gauze into the disinfectant. When the cold liquid touched her scalp, she started to flatline. They tried to restart her heart. But after the second try he called her time of death after all, what kind of life will she have if they save it. There was no way she could recover from that massive stroke.
He stepped out of the theatre after washing his hands. Now for the awfullest part of his job, he had to break the bad news to her family. The gentleman was still in the waiting are staring blindly at the white roofing.
"Sir?" He hated what he was about to do.
"Doctor." The young man jumped from the seat and crossed his arms, looking into his face for answers. He found them. "No." It was inaudible. He put a hand on the man's shoulder.
"I'm sorry but..."
He looked to his right when a cold blast of air filled the unit. Someone had just bust into the emergency room. It took him a second to realise that he wasn't imagining Betty coming towards him. Everything slowed down then. He still doesn't recall all the details but he went back to the theatre and stared at the stillness of his daughter. Next thing he knew, he had the defibrillators in his hands, and tears in his eyes. Three nurses had to drag him out of the theatre.
"She's coming home from Harvard, right?" He hoped against hope.
"Ken, no. She was in Stanford." Betty replied.
"What? O God, no..."
Betty held him in his arms but he felt nothing. He still felt nothing when he buried her two weeks later.
Three month ago, Betty left the computer on and went to sleep. She does that often these days. She forgets things. She forgets to clean the house...or herself. She forgets to eat. She forgets to live.
Ken had gone to shut it off. He passed my hands over the trackpad and there she was, alive as ever with a wide smile across her face, her nose wrinkled just like the corner of her blue eyes. Her hair had been dyed and they lit up her eyes so perfectly. She was standing next to an artwork.
The image was captioned, art is my heart's beat. It was Joana's last photo on Facebook.
There was nothing he could do to stop the flood. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry." He repeated as we wept on the floor, his face buried in his hands.
"Maybe it will help if you talked about it." The resident psychologist at the hospital interrupts his expiation.
"There is nothing you could say." Ken stands from the couch right around the time Freda sets his pager off.
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Freda had a certain odd look on her face. It was a mixture of her brave face and sympathy gaze. She usually reserved those for her patients.
"What?" He asked even though he didn't really want to know.
"There's been an accident" She said cautiously.
"And?" He was getting impatient.
"Maybe it's best you go see this for yourself."
"O-kay?" He walked away from the nurses' station.
"Bed five." She stood and went with him.
"I don't need you to babysit me." He snapped. She kept walking. When he saw who was in the bed, he understood why.
"Like I said, I don't need you, Freda." He saw her hide the hurt on her face before she retreated.
Ken stood behind the cardiac table and flipped through the blue folder splayed on it. "Hi, I am Doctor Martinez. Can you walk me through..."
"How do you do it?"
"What?" Ken turned the folder. "Raymond, right?
"How do you do it? You know, live with yourself..." he said through clenched teeth, "Tell me! How do you live with yourself knowing you killed your child and your grandchild?"
Ken grasped the cardiac table."She was pregnant?"
"Right, you didn't even know Joe was pregnant!" Raymond spat.
The white walls began to spin.
"Can you, ah..." He couldn't find his bearing. "Can you give me a second?" Ken groped around to find the door.
Immediately Freda saw him lurch into the hallway, she came to him.
"Just breathe." She repeated over and over again as she led him into her chair. He put his head on the desk. What was happening to him?
"Maybe you should take the day off."
"It's fine." He swallowed the bile which was rising in his throat, "I'm fine. Can you get me some water?"
Before he said the last word, Freda was already getting a plastic cup. She filled and handed it to him.
"Here."
"Thank you." He emptied the cup. "I am sorry about earlier."
She put a hand on his shoulder.
"It's okay."
She said it as though everything was going to be okay. He shook his head.
"No, it's not."
He stood and went back inside. He looked at Raymond's CT and read his notes.
"We'll have to detain you for a while. I'll order an MRI just to be sure." He scribbled into his folder. "And Raymond, wear a helmet next time. She'll want that."
He walked away, heading towards his office. Suddenly, the hospital felt small. Its sterile scent of death felt all too overpowering. He went to his car instead.
He drove around for a while and ended up at her grave -- a single sunflower in his hand.
"I failed you twice over kid." He placed the flower on her headstone and carressed the cold rock.
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"You should come to church with me." Freda was insistent. For days now she was demanding that he went to church with her.
"Leave it to religion to exploit the weak." He retorted then massaged the migraine that was pulsing at his temple.
"Do I look weak to you?" Her eyes narrowed.
Of course not but he was...weak. He was now stealing pethidine to help him deal with his pain. He wasn't quite addicted yet, but that was just a matter of time.
"Knock it off, Freda. This is the last time I want to hear about this."
She stood there a moment longer before stomping out of his office. Ken sighed. Knowing Freda, it was just a matter of time before she dragged him by ear to the damn church. He sighed again. He missed the days when doctors were demi-gods in the eyes of nurses.
"Dr. Martinez you are needed at the ER." The PA announced.
Cold sweats broke on his forehead. He looked around his office. The whitewashed walls were more stifling than usual. His eyes fell on the day old pizza responisble for his migraine. He should take it out. He should also get up and go to the ER but he couldn't. He sat still hoping that he would soon be forgotten.
"Dr. Ken Martinez," Freda yelled before bursting into his office, "We need you at the ER now. No wait, I think that patient has already been rushed to theatre. Please hurry!" Just as she burst in, she burst out in such a haste that Ken was compelled to go after her.
When he stepped into the corridor he saw her vanish into a crowd of people with various degrees of injury.
"Some idiot decided to run his car into a crowd of protestors." He heard one nurse say to a doctor as they rushed past him to the ER. It was going to be a long day.
He took his right and headed for the theatre.
The surgical assistant addressed him, "Our patient hit her head to the curb when the car hit her bicycle. She wasn't wearing a helmet. MRI shows..." He did not hear anything else. Sprawled on the operation table was his daughter -- blonde and bruised.
"Dr. Martinez, are you okay?"
"Uh, y-yes Justin. Go on." He went to stand at the side of the table.
"She came in with a vitals of..." Justin continued.
Ken shook his head slightly. He saw it now. It wasn't Joana.Of course it wasn't Joana. The more he tried to convince himself, the more his hands quivered until it became obvious to everyone in theatre that he wasn't fine.
"Call Dr. Barnes." He mumbled before stuttering out of the theatre. It was obviously the withdrawal setting in. He had a few ampoules of pethidine in his desk.
He threw off the theatre gown and clutched the walls to steady himself. After what felt like hours, he entered his office and broke an ampoule. He tried to steady his hands as he drew the clear liquid it into a needle. That was difficult enough. Now, he had to find a vein. He found one easily enough and jabbed the needle into his arm.
"Dr. Martinez?" He jumped at Freda's voice causing him to stick the needle deeper into his arm. Ken pressed his lips together to swallow back the scream that welled in his throat.
"God damn it, Freda!" He threw the needle at her feet. She did not recoil instead, she gave him the pitiable look he abhorred. She then walked out his office. He never felt more alone when she did. He let his back touch the wall as he slowly took his seat on the bare ground. Rock bottom was a cold cold place.
Freda soon returned with gauze and bandages. She dressed the bleeding needle stab and helped him up.
"We are going to church."
"But you are on duty." Ken replied weakly.
"Fred will take over."
Neither Freda nor Ken said another word till they got to the church which was a few minutes drive away from the hospital. There were only three other people there.
"I will leave you to pray and come back after a while."
"Is that how it's done?" He panicked. What would he say? "Won't you pray for me or something?"
"You can pray for yourself better than I can." Freda smiled and left him at the back of the church and joined the other three at the front. He sat on the stairs.
"Help me." Immediately he uttered the words, he broke down in tears. He hadn't had a good cry since he saw Joana's picture on the computer. After he wept his heart out, he felt a little better.
Freda soon came with the other three people and laid hands on him. Ever since he could remember it was only his mother who had ever prayed for him. As they lifted their hands off his back, he felt lighter.
"Thank you." He muttered during their ride back to the hospital.
"Don't mention, doc."
The day was indeed long. He went back in time to take over the surgery from Dr. Barnes. The patient lived and so did many others who were brought to the ER that day.
Some did die but others lived and that was life. He could either be stuck mourning the dead or move forward to comfort the living. He could go home and comfort his wife.
When he went home that night, he found her in Joana's room staring blindly at a blank canvas.
"Betty?" She started in fright at his call. He went and held her.
"Ken." She sobbed.
He patted her head."Remember when we were younger and wanted to be musicians?"She nodded against his chest. "Remember the song we wrote?"
"Rough seas make better sailors," She sang.
"Rougher still makes the best of the lot." He joined her.
"Storms come. Leave behind colours.
Calmer still we will be till it's passed." They sang in discordant harmony.
They held on tighter to each other. "Thank God we didn't become musicians." Betty smiled.
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