Earlier this month
Fourteen days until Halloween
Corinne
There’s blood on the wall.
It stands out starkly, a crimson slash of color streaked against white sterility. It’s easy to train my eyes on it, easy to focus on that one spot rather than the bloody mess beneath my hands.
People like to think that death is peaceful, that it’s calm, that it’s beautiful. But from my experience, it’s not. It’s bloody, it’s hectic, it’s full of shrieking machines and fluorescent lights and chaos. It’s not pretty.
“Dr. Cabot! It’s been six minutes.”
Lucy looks up at me amid the blood-spattered chaos, elbow-deep in intestines, and with what appears to be brain matter on her brow. Her dark eyes are resigned because she’s been a nurse long enough to know what we have to do.
So do I.
It’s the story of my life.
I pause and the defibrillating paddles in my hands suddenly weigh a million pounds apiece. The fluorescent lights are bright and blinding, washing out everything around me but for the blood and the blue curtain circling the gurney. This moment swirls and stands still amid the hospital smells and beeps, and I think of an ancient story from Greek myth.
The Fates—three old women who spin the thread of life, measure the string and then decide when someone will die by cutting it. In this moment, I’m one of them.
My next decision will determine a life.
I’m one of the Fates and I’m measuring the thread and I’m cutting it.
Snip.
I take a breath and stare down at the broken boy in front of me, the one whose life I’m snipping away.
In my head, I know that none of this is my fault. It wasn’t my fault that he decided to drag-race down the Dan Ryan and endanger a hundred lives other than his own. It wasn’t my fault that he chose to slam five beers in five minutes beforehand. It’s not my fault that he’s only eighteen and his mother is anxiously waiting on the other side of the double doors, waiting for me to save her son.
It’s not my fault that I can’t.
He stares at me now, but his blue eyes are vacuous and unseeing. They’ve been that way for six long minutes. His blond hair is plastered to his face with blood, and it’s splattered across his Live For Today T-shirt. The back of his skull is smashed in because he wasn’t wearing his seat belt, and jagged bone erupts from his hair like bright white arrowheads. Safety glass isn’t kind when a human body hurtles through it.
This boy had his whole life in front of him, and because of one stupid decision, it’s done. He won’t be living for tomorrow... Today was all he had.
He’s gone, and it’s time for me to wield the scissors.
Snip.
“Time of death, 5:57 p.m.,” I say tiredly.
I set the paddles down and take a breath. The boy’s bloody hand dangles over the side of the gurney, so I pick it up and place it on his chest. His fingers are naturally curled inward. I straighten them, my gloved fingers lingering on his before I move my hand to close his eyelids.
I feel relief when he isn’t staring at me anymore.
“Go to the other one,” Lucy tells me. “I’ll talk to his mother.”
I nod, because that’s the right thing to do, because I’m one of only two doctors in the ER right now, and the other boy is waiting for me, and he’s not beyond help like this one.
As a physician, I’ve had to learn how to compartmentalize my emotions, to turn them off at my whim and shift gears, to go from one scenario to the next to the next, all without missing a beat. It’s a skill that I learned long ago, beginning in that god-awful house on that bloody night.
I slide the curtain to another room open, and the boy inside is scared, his eyes wide and frightened and alive. He’s tall and thin and gangly, although his cheeks still have baby fat, softening the curve of the jaw that will someday be manly.
“Am I going to die?” he asks me, and his voice is so young. He’s a little boy in a man’s body, and his hands are shaking.
“Not today,” I tell him, shining my penlight into his eyes. “What’s your name?” He’s got blood smeared on his cheek, and I wonder briefly if it is his or his friend’s.
“Tyler.”
“Well, Tyler, where do you hurt?”
He shows me, both with his words and with unspoken gestures, and I take note. He’s beaten up for sure, but not mortally wounded, although we’ll definitely check for internal bleeding just to be sure.
“Is Jason okay?” he asks quietly, and his hand taps the side of the gurney nervously, tap tap tap.
I hesitate.
Tyler sees the grim answer on my face, and I don’t have to say a word.
“Jesus.” He gulps for air and I grip his arm.
“You’ve got a concussion,” I tell him. “I’m sending you for a CAT scan. Your collarbone is broken. I can see it poking through your shirt. Based on your level of pelvic pain, I think your hip crest is fractured. We’ll get you x-rayed. I don’t think you’ve got internal bleeding, but because of the rate of impact, I’m sending you for a sonogram just to be on the safe side.”
He nods and his hand clutches his hip. “It hurts.”
“I’m sure it does,” I agree. “It will take a while to recover from a fractured hip. You’ll have physical therapy, too.” I pause. “Apparently, you boys were doing a hundred miles per hour down the Dan Ryan, and not only that, but you were filming yourselves. What were you thinking?”
He closes his eyes and drops back against the bloody sheet. “We weren’t.”
“You were lucky,” I tell him. “You’re going to be okay.”
“Jason’s not,” he all but whimpers.
I shake my head and my gut contracts. “No. He’s not. I’m very sorry.”
I honestly am. I know people make mistakes. I know they have moments when they don’t think. I see it every day right here in this room. These walls have seen thousands of people at their lowest moments. Some of them, like Tyler, get lucky. Some of them, like Jason, do not.
“He’s been my best friend since kindergarten.” Tyler’s hands shake as he speaks. “We did Scouts together. We were both going away to Caltech next year. We were going to share a dorm.”
Were. Past tense.
Tyler’s eyes meet mine, and his are full of shock, of pain, of disbelief.
I don’t want to tell him that the real grief is yet to come, when the reality of death sets in, when the absence of his friend is so pronounced that it rips a giant hole in his life. I don’t need to tell him. He’ll discover it soon enough.
“I’m sorry for your loss,” I tell him sincerely, and there’s suddenly a lump in my throat because it never gets easier. I’ve been an ER doc for years now, and death is not something I’ve ever gotten used to.
It’s at this moment that shrill screaming rips apart the ER, a long wail filled with angst and torment. I know who it is without even checking.
It’s the poignant grief of a mother, the pain in the scream unmistakable. Jason’s mother’s sorrow is haunting and raw, and it echoes into my bones, where it vibrates my core.
The sound lodges in my heart, and for a minute, I allow myself to feel it, to know that in a way, I caused that pain. I couldn’t save that boy. That mother’s life is irrevocably changed. His father’s, his family’s, his friends’. The wife he might’ve someday had is gone, the kids, the life.
It’s not your fault, I tell myself, like I always do.
But that doesn’t change the fact that his life dangled in my hands on a string, and I had to cut it.
Snip.
“We’ll get you fixed up,” I tell this boy, the one who is alive. “Don’t drink and drive again.”
Tyler shakes his shaggy head. “I won’t. Can I see Jason?”
I shake my head. “You don’t want to right now. Trust me. Wait until he’s been cleaned up.”
And the mortician has patched his skull back together.
Tyler nods and closes his eyes, and Jason’s mom continues to wail in the background.
I tune it out, because this is my life, and if I don’t harden myself to it, I’ll go insane. I’ll become a whimpering basket case who rocks in a corner because I see this kind of thing every damned day. Chicago is full of accidents and crimes and sickness.
“Do you know where my phone is?” Tyler asks as I’m almost to the door. “It’s got the video on it. It’s the last time... I mean, it’s the last time Jason was alive. Maybe his mom will want to see it.”
His mother will want to see the exact moment her son crashed into a stone median at a hundred miles per hour and died? I seriously doubt it.
“I’m not sure where it is, or if it even survived the crash,” I tell him. “You’ll have to check with the police. They’ll be here later to question you, anyway.”
He gulps and I take my leave, relieved to escape his pain and fear. Sometimes I can’t help but allow those things to leach into me, and the emotions of desperation and grief are exhausting.
Lucy meets me at the nurses’ station, and she’s cleaned up now and wearing a fresh top. It has pumpkins on it. She thrusts a yogurt and an orange at me.
“You haven’t eaten all day.”
She’s right. I forgot. It happens a lot around here on busy days. When lives hang in the balance, who has time for eating?
“Thanks,” I tell her, taking the food gratefully. I hate yogurt, and the orange isn’t ripe yet, but it’s better than nothing.
“You’re going to get too skinny,” Lucy tells me, standing in the middle of ringing phones and overflowing stacks of charts. “And your husband probably likes your boobs the way they are. Also, he’s on line four. You forgot to call him back earlier.”
Damn it.
Jude called around noon. Almost six hours ago.
Son of a bitch.
I grab the phone.
“Babe, I’m sorry,” I tell him, without bothering with hello. “It got crazy here today. There was an accident on the Dan Ryan, two kids drag racing... It’s been one thing after another...”
“Corinne, it’s okay,” he interrupts, and his voice is warm and patient. Like always. I feel a pang of guilt, because he really is patient with this stuff, with my schedule.
“I couldn’t save one of them,” I tell him, and my voice is suddenly small, so very quiet.
“It wasn’t your fault,” my husband tells me seriously. “You know that.”
I imagine Jude’s eyes getting warmer with his words, the golden notes flickering amid the depths, almost like the moss in Lake Michigan on a sunny day. His eyes are like honey, various shades of golds and greens, all swirled into one color. That’s always been one of my favorite things about him.
“I know.” Because I do. I always try my best. I took an oath to heal and protect, and I take that very seriously.
Jude sighs.
“Somehow, I wonder about that. What time are you coming home? Should I wait dinner?”
I eye the orange and the yogurt next to me, and the patient board that is lit up like a Christmas tree.
“No,” I answer tiredly. “The board is full, and it’s only Brock and me here tonight. I can’t get away until later. But I’ll be home before bed.”
“You need some sleep tonight, Co,” Jude points out. “You’ve been running on fumes this week.”
“I know.” And God, do I know. I feel a hundred and five lately, instead of thirty-five. “I’m starting to look like the Crypt Keeper.”
Jude laughs, a sincere bark. “You are not. You’re beautiful and you know it.”
I examine myself in the silver coffeepot next to me. My reflection is distorted with the curve of the carafe, but I get the gist. My blond hair was neat this morning, but now the bun at the nape of my neck is falling apart. There are bags under my eyes, and Lucy is right. I’m going to look haggard soon if I don’t watch it.
“You’re partial,” I point out to my husband.
“Maybe. Just come home sometime today, okay?”
I agree and hang up, and before I can take even one bite of the yogurt, a nurse is calling for me from an exam room.
I yank at my stethoscope so that it doesn’t pull my hair as it drapes my neck and walk into exam room five.
“Whatta we got?” I ask the nurses, and I dive into work.
Concussion.
Chest pain.
Neck pain.
Bowel impaction.
At 8:00 p.m., Lucy pokes her head into the room I’m in.
“There was a bus accident,” she tells us. “A bus full of kids coming back from a basketball game. No fatalities, but...”
But I’m going to be here awhile.
Abdominal pain.
Kidney stone.
Ankle sprain.
One patient turns into another, from bus accident victims to the geriatric. As always, the clock ticks faster and faster when I’m on the floor, and by the time I take another breath and catch up on charting, it’s 11:00 p.m.
Damn it.
I do my charting quickly, scribbling in the pages until my sight blurs.
“You ready, Doc?” Lucy smiles tiredly at me as I grab my purse. She’s holding her own. “I’m heading out. We might as well go together, right?”
“Sure.”
We’re too tired to chat much in the elevator, and I’m so exhausted as I trudge across the parking garage that I feel like my legs won’t hold me up. It’s dark, and as usual, I keep close watch from my periphery. There is a parking attendant, but he circles the entire garage, and I seldom see the orange lights flashing on top of his car.
“God, I hate this garage,” Lucy mutters, her gaze flitting along the secluded shadows.
“Me, too,” I agree.
It would take only a second for someone to jump out, for someone to grab me.
“They should film horror movies here,” she adds. I chuckle but flinch away from the dark edges of the concrete. I keep moving, one foot in front of the other.
Lucy peers ahead of us. “What the hell?”
There’s new graffiti painted on the wall in front of my space.
CUNT.
The hateful word drips in neon-blue paint, dried now. In my opinion, that word is the worst thing in the world to call someone. Worse than bitch, worse than whore. I don’t know why. It just is.
I look over my shoulder quickly, scanning the entire dark garage. Shadows move, the wind whistles, but no one is there.
We’re alone.
This is just graffiti.
It’s not directed at me.
This is Chicago. Vandalism is to be expected.
Calm.
Calm.
Calm.
“That’s charming,” Lucy says wryly. “I’ll call someone tomorrow to have it cleaned, Dr. Cabot.”
“Corinne,” I correct her. “We’re outside of the ER now, Lucy.”
She smiles. I wouldn’t care if she called me by my first name always, but she’s a stickler for the rules.
“Where are you parked?” I ask her. She motions to a few rows away.
“Get in. I’ll drop you off.”
We get into my car, and we both lock our doors.
Thirty seconds later, she gets out at her car. “See you tomorrow.”
“’Night, Lucy. Drive safe.”
I’m so tired that I wish I wish I wish in this moment that I lived in a house closer to the hospital, instead of a suburb outside of town. I just want my bed. And my husband. I want to be away from the graffiti and the crime and the noise.
I nose out of the garage, into traffic and toward home.
The lights of the city turn into the tree-lined streets of the suburbs, and somehow I manage to hold my eyes open for the duration of the drive. I punch in our gate code, and the wrought-iron gates swing open, granting me entrance.
Our home is at the back, and it’s the only one in the neighborhood that doesn’t have jack-o’-lanterns or witches adorning the lawn.
That’s okay by me.
I don’t do Halloween.
The house standing in front of me reminds me of why I live here, though, and of why I work so hard.
It’s for normalcy, for happiness.
For this.
Jude and I work hard for this life, for the pleasures and comforts that we have. Our home is proof of that. It’s large and renovated and lush. It’s four thousand square feet of the American dream, nestled deep in an expansive subdivision away from the bustle and noise of the city. This is why I make the drive every day. This home is my quiet sanctuary, my respite from the chaos of my life.
I pull my car into the garage next to Jude’s Land Rover and walk quietly into the house. My husband left a light over the sink on for me, but other than that, the house is dark and so silent that the quiet almost seems to buzz.
I creep through the house and almost trip over our dog in the kitchen.
“I’m sorry, girl.” I bend and scratch Artie’s ears. Her fur has gotten wiry in her old age, white around her muzzle and eyes. She stares at me now, almost in accusation, because I’m coming home so late and disturbing her sleep. “I’m sorry,” I tell her again, as though she understands. She lays her head back down and watches me until I disappear into the master suite.
I brush my teeth, but that’s all I do. I strip off my germy scrubs, release what’s left of my bun and climb into bed naked, like I do every night. Jude stirs, sits halfway up and peers at the clock.
“Well, technically, you did make it home today,” he says, his voice husky with sleep, and the clock says eleven fifty-eight, so he’s right.
“I know. I’m sorry.”
“I know.”
He’s oblivious to my nudity, and I to his, and he lies back down. Before long, he’s snoring lightly, and even that doesn’t keep me awake. I fall into sleep, and I stay there for hours.