Never Giving Up (Never #3) (24 page)

Porter took a leave from work for two weeks after Mattie was born, and those were two glorious weeks filled with both of us learning how to tread these new and rough waters of parenthood. Of course, all our families came to visit, but mostly it was just Porter, Mattie, and me trying to make it through another day. We had many tumultuous moments that involved crying, and many more beautiful moments, like coming across your gorgeous husband sleeping on the couch with your even more gorgeous baby girl asleep on his chest. The sight of Porter with Mattie nearly did me in every time.

But when Porter went back to work, it was a whole new ballgame for us girls. We had to adjust all over again to doing things on our own and sometimes Mattie wasn’t fully cooperative. The first time I ventured out to the grocery store, just Mattie and me, I only came home with one third of what I needed because right in the middle of the store Mattie decided to get hungry and I didn’t have the patience or experience to nurse her while I shopped. So we went home without our groceries, Mattie screaming the entire way.

Even though Porter worked more than a full day, he would always come home and help me. This was both incredibly helpful but also not surprising in the least. He had always been one to go the extra mile; he never did anything half way. So, when he would come home and simply take Mattie from me and tell me to go to bed, I always would, and I always told him ‘thank you.’

I rolled over in bed one morning, hoping to see Porter’s sleeping face, but was a little disappointed when I realized he wasn’t there. I’d missed him again. He left for work so early and refused to wake me if I was sleeping, claiming that I needed sleep more than he needed a goodbye kiss. Some days I wouldn’t argue with him—I’d take sleep over anything. But today, I missed him and wanted him in our bed.

I was appeased, however, by the sight of Mattie, softly snoring on his side of the bed. Laying in a fort of sorts Porter must have built around her, trying to keep her from rolling off the bed and prevent me from rolling onto her.

I watched her sleep for a moment, captivated by how much I loved her. After a few moments my hand reached out to gently brush her cheek and I was immediately caught by the heat radiating off of her. I sat up quickly and then placed the back of my hand on her forehead and again, gasped at how warm she was. But she wasn’t just warm. She was hot.

“Mattie, sweetheart, what’s the matter?” I asked softly as I lifted her and brought her forehead to my mouth, pressing my lips against her skin only to affirm that, yes, indeed, she was hot. Too hot. She stirred a little, as if I was bothering her, but she didn’t wake up fully. I put her back down on the bed and as I undressed her, the idea being to cool her off, I tried to figure out what one was supposed to do with a three-week-old baby who had a fever.

She was just in her diaper now and I placed her back in her bed fort. I reached for my cell phone and immediately dialed the number for her pediatrician. When the receptionist answered, I explained the situation and she put me on with a nurse who I then explained the situation to again. All the while my hand kept going back to Mattie’s forehead or arm or belly, wishing the fever away. Hoping that I’d feel her again and it would be gone, that I had been wrong all along.

The nurse listened to me and then asked some questions about when she’d eaten last and other baby things. I answered her and then my nerves took over when she finally gave me some instructions.

“The doctor is full this morning with appointments, but your baby needs to be seen soon. Can you take her to an urgent care facility?”

“You think it’s urgent?”

“Yes, sweetie. When babies that young get fevers, it’s urgent.”

“Ok, yes, I can do that.” I said the words, which for all intents and purposes were confident, but I sounded anything but. I sounded scared and worried, because I was. “Where should I take her?”

The nurse gave me directions to the nearest urgent care clinic and once I’d hung up the phone I did my best to dress without having a panic attack. I packed a bag for Mattie, although I could never have told you what was inside that bag. I pulled on some clothes, most of which I believe were clean, but I couldn’t have told you which top I was wearing. My objective was to get my baby to the clinic.

Once we were in the car and headed to our destination, I pushed the button on the console that allowed me to make a call to Porter as I drove. He answered and I immediately heard the familiar sounds of construction: lots of banging and buzzing, sounds of men talking and shouting over equipment.

“Hey, Babe. How’s it going?” He answered, sounding completely worry-free, which he was, but I called to end that.

“Mattie’s sick,” I blurted out, nearly crying as I said the words.

“What?” He asked, as if he hadn’t heard me.

“The baby,” I said louder. “She’s sick.”

“What do you mean sick?” He asked, sounding a little more worried than he had before.

“Sick enough that the nurse at her pediatrician’s office told me to take her to urgent care.”

“What’s wrong with her?” He asked impatiently.

“I don’t know, Porter!” I yelled and then began to cry. I tried not to lose control of my emotions, but I didn’t have any more answers than he did, and I hated not knowing what was wrong with her.

“Ok, Baby, calm down. It’s ok. Everything’s going to be fine. Where are you taking her? I’ll meet you.”

I gave him the information and directions to the clinic and apologized for snapping at him. He told me I didn’t need to apologize to him for anything and that just made me cry even harder.

When I arrived at the clinic, I parked hastily, grabbed her car seat out of the backseat and quickly walked inside. A woman with long brown hair saw me enter and met me halfway into the building.

“Is this Mattie Masters?” The woman asked me.

“Yes,” I answered, trying not to cry in front of a stranger.

“Come back with me. The nurse called and told us to expect her, so we’ve got a room all ready.”

“Thank you,” I managed. I followed her and she led me to an examination room.

“Why don’t you take her out and get her undressed.”

I started taking her out of the car seat and undressing her, a little concerned when she hardly stirred.

“How’d she get that bump on her head?”

“It was a sub-dermal hematoma. It happened during birth. The doctors all said it would go away.” She listened to me, but just nodded. I placed Mattie on the white paper which covered the examination table, the crinkling and crackling sound it made seemed loud and intrusive in the quiet room.

“Ok, let’s see what’s going on with this little girl.” The nurse gently rolled Mattie to her side and pressed a stethoscope against her back, listening intently. I was afraid to breathe, afraid to move, afraid to blink even. She moved away after listening to a few different spots and put the stethoscope away, pulling out a different device I didn’t recognize. She went to place it on Mattie’s head and my hand shot out.

“Wait,” I said loudly, halting the nurse. “What does that do?”

The nurse laid a hand over mine and gave me a few reassuring pats.

“I’m sorry to have frightened you. This is just a thermometer. I’m going to take her temperature.” I watched as she rolled the thermometer over her forehead and ended up behind her ear. It was the strangest thermometer I’d ever seen.

“I’m sorry. I have never seen a thermometer like that. It just scared me a little. I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize, Sweetie. You’re the momma. She’s your baby. I’d be concerned if you
weren’t
worried about her.” She sighed when she looked at the tiny digital screen on the device. “Her temperature is higher than we’d like it though.” She turned to the computer in the room and typed in some information then turned back to me.

“The doctor will be here in just a few minutes.”

I nodded and picked Mattie back up, cradling her against my chest, slowly rocking her back and forth. She wasn’t upset, wasn’t crying, wasn’t fussing at all. But I needed the comfort. I needed to hold her and press her against me, wanted her to feel me, know that I was there with her. A few tears fell down my cheeks, but I tried to keep it together.

When the door opened again, a woman wearing a white doctor’s coat walked in and gave me a sympathetic smile.

“Hi, I’m Dr. Bailey. How is little miss Mattie doing today? Let’s take a look.” She reached for Mattie and took her from me, unwrapping the blanket from around her tiny body. I saw her press her fingers onto her skin and then pull them away. She did this a few times and then listened to her breathe just as the nurse had. After what seemed like a lifetime, she handed Mattie back to me.

“So, Mrs. Masters, here’s what I’d like to see happen: We’re going to have an ambulance take Mattie to the children’s hospital at OHSU up in Portland. She has some sort of infection and it’s important that we get her to the hospital as soon as possible.”

My world stopped spinning.

“An ambulance?”

“Yes.” She gestured towards the baby again and unwrapped the blanket from her. “You see how when I press on her skin, it turns white, but then when I pull away it takes a long time for the color to come back? That’s not good. And with a baby her size and age, any fever is cause for concern.”

“Will she be ok?”

“We need to get her to the hospital.” Her refusal to answer my question only made me worry more. “There is a special pediatric ambulance service and I am going to give them a call. While we wait, I think we should try to draw some blood from Mattie to start investigating where the infection is.”

“Take her blood?” My mind raced and even though I tried to keep up with everything happening around me, I couldn’t catch my breath. I couldn’t register what was happening. All I heard was infection and ambulance and Mattie. I squeezed her closer to me, afraid to let her go, afraid that once I handed her to someone else I might not get the chance to hold her again.

“We’ll take good care of her. I promise you that.” Dr. Bailey held her hands out, waiting for me to hand Mattie over, but I was frozen. “The ambulance will be here shortly. We don’t have much time. I’m so sorry, but this is important.” I looked up at her again, then back down to Mattie. I brought her tiny little body close to me again, pressed a kiss against her head, and then gave her to the doctor.

Dr. Bailey quickly took her and left the room, leaving the door open. I watched her leave and felt all the air leave my body. My hand came to my mouth and I felt a cry trying to escape, but nothing came—mouth open, tears welling in my eyes, lungs burning, but no sound.

How was any of this happening? She was perfectly healthy; we’d had no issues. My head started shaking and finally air seeped into my lungs. I gasped, panicking. I reached for my phone in my purse and called Porter.

“Hey,” he answered on the first ring. “I’m almost there. The traffic from the beach was ridiculous.”

I tried to answer him, to respond in some way, but nothing came from me aside from gasps of air.

“Ella, are you there?”

I let out a strangled sob.

“Oh, God, Ella what’s wrong?”

“Porter,” I whispered.

“Damn it, Ella! What’s going on? Is Mattie all right?” He sounded just as afraid and broken as I felt.

“They took her from me.”

“What do you mean?”

“They said they’re taking her by ambulance to OHSU and that they needed to take some blood from her. They took her from me.” Just then, I heard my baby cry from down the hall. It wasn’t a hungry cry or a sleepy cry—both of which I was familiar with. This cry was something else entirely. It was painful. Something inside of me snapped and I ran out of the room towards the sound of her screams. When I reached the room she was in, I stopped outside of it, looking through the window, allowing me to see something I would never wish on another mother.

My baby was lying on a table, surrounded by nurses and doctors, some of which were holding down her arms and her legs. One woman was holding what looked like a warm compress on her hands, while another woman was trying to find a vein in Mattie’s foot.

My mouth gaped open again, but this time the sobs came from me uninhibited, as I watched Mattie struggle against them. “Porter,” I cried. “Our baby.”

“I’m coming to you, just hang on.”

“No,” I said shaking my head. They’re taking her to OHSU. Meet us there.”

“Ella,” he said angrily, but I knew he wasn’t angry with me, he was angry because he wasn’t with me, wasn’t with Mattie.

“Porter, by the time you get here we’ll be gone. I need you to be at the hospital. Please.” I heard him sigh and then I heard what I thought was him hitting his hand against his steering wheel.

“I hate that hospital,” he said quietly. My heart broke a little for him then too.

“I know, Babe. I know. Please though, meet us there?”

“I’m on my way.”

“I love you.”

“I love you both. Keep me updated if anything happens.”

“I will. Drive safely.”

I hung up the phone and returned my attention to Mattie, still crying, still struggling against the nurses. She was a tiny little fighter at nearly three weeks old. One of the nurses looked up and saw me through the window. She said something to another nurse and then came out into the hallway.