Don’t Forget to Remember Me

Special Smashwords Edition

The Remembrance Trilogy—Book 2

by

This book is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places and incidents are either the product of the
author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to
actual persons, living or dead, or to actual events or locales is
entirely coincidental.

Don’t Forget to Remember Me: The Remembrance
Trilogy—Book 2

Special Smashwords Edition

This eBook is licensed for your personal
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work of the author.

Copyright © 2012 Kahlen
Aymes
. All rights reserved, including the
right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form. No
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Cover Designed by Telemachus Press, LLC

Cover Art:

Copyright © iStock Photo/86534108/Man Running
Hands Through Hair

Copyright © ThinkStock Photo/200469760/Bride
and Groom Holding Hands, Close-Up, Rear View/Digital Vision

Published by Telemachus Press, LLC at
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ISBN: 978-1-938701-05-4 (eBook)

ISBN: 978-1-938701-06-1 (paperback)

Version 2012.08.02

Sincerest appreciation, as always,

to Kathryn Voskuil, Elizabeth Desmond, Sally
Hopkinson,

Ali Halbmaier, Jena Gomez & Samantha
Fisher

for all of your help and continued
support.

Without you, the blogs and novels would not
happen.

Words can not express my gratitude.

Thank you to the team at Telemachus
Press.

Your professionalism is appreciated.

And Olivia…

for putting up with me and my ever-present
laptop.

I love you.

In loving memory of my friend, taken far too
soon…

Gisela M. Gagliardi

We won’t forget to remember you…

The Remembrance Trilogy—Book 2

I was sitting in my own personal hell. I was
weeks away from becoming a doctor myself, yet my hands were tied as
Julia lay on a gurney in the next room. She was my whole world and
she could be dying while I was helpless of the outcome, unable to
do a Goddamn thing.

My mind was racing with questions. Were they
ordering blood gases? Was she in shock? How much blood had she lost
and did she need a transfusion? Could she breathe on her own? When
the hell were they going to do the scans that would determine the
extent of her internal and head injuries? I thought my head would
explode along with my lungs.

“What was she even doing in Boston?” I
didn’t even realize I’d said the words aloud.

“What
the fuck
is happening in there?!” I
yelled, as panic seized my voice and made it
unrecognizable.

Min, my friend and fellow med student, shook
her head sadly. “We don’t know yet. Dr. Brighton is heading up the
team. I know how much you respect him, so just let him do his job.
You can’t work on her, Ryan. You can’t be impartial about someone
you love this much. This is what’s best for Julia.”

Aaron put his arm around
me
to urge
me toward the waiting room, but
I shrugged him off impatiently. I felt claustrophobic; beginning to
hyperventilate.

“Can you just tell
me
something
? Go find out? They
need to get her to radiology. When the hell are they going to order
those tests?” I asked, turning back to Min. I was still trying to
figure out how I was going to get in there. If I were a resident,
I’d have just walked in, but not as a student. Even one who was
graduating with Cum Laude honors in just a few weeks.

She nodded and placed her hand on my
shoulder before disappearing through the doors of one of the trauma
rooms.

I
tried to
look in, but all I could see were a bunch of
doctors and nurses scrambling around the room at a frantic pace. My
heart stopped when I saw Julia’s arm hanging off the edge of the
table. Still as stone. Someone was intubating her and someone else
was cutting off her clothes. Jenna was hanging up
an
IV bag near one end of the table and then
inserting some medication into a port with a syringe, while Dr.
Brighton conducted an examination. My whole body felt like it would
explode into a million pieces, my skin crawling
so much
I wanted to rip it off.

“Let’s go to the waiting room,” my brother
said softly. “You know they can’t take her anywhere until she’s
stabilized. Can I get you some coffee?”

I shook my head and went
to gaze out the window, into the night and the lights of downtown.
“I can’t, Aaron. I can’t sit around in there and do nothing! My
God, what am I going to do?” My voice cracked and I cleared my
throat. “I have to
do
something! Tell me what you know about the accident, and
don’t bullshit me.”

“Uh, the cops who came in
with the paramedics said that the cab driver was trying to get on
Storrow Drive from Leverett Circle and it was plowed broadside on
the rear passenger’s side. The driver is here too, but he’s only
got minor injuries. The guy driving the other car was killed, dead
at the scene. The police said they found empty
booze
containers in his car and he was traveling at
least 50 miles per hour. We’re lucky Julia wasn’t thrown from the
car at that rate.”

I closed my eyes and put
my hand up to rub the back of my neck. I didn’t know what I was
feeling. I wanted to scream and cry at the unfairness of it all,
yet I was numb, frozen. My knees were weak and I fell into a chair
in the small waiting room. I dealt with
this
shit on a daily basis and it didn’t faze me in the slightest.
But this was my baby and I couldn’t handle it.

There was a woman playing
in the corner with a small child and I watched them build something
with Legos. I stared at them, wanting something, anything, to focus
on. My vision blurred and I felt a sob rise up in my chest, but
struggled to keep
it
from bursting forth.
I clasped my hands in front of me and hung my head in defeat. Aaron
was sitting next to me and placed a comforting hand on my
back.

What was she doing here?
I pulled her engagement ring off of my finger and rolled it
around in my hand with the bracelet.
Please, God. I’ll do
anything. Anything!

I drew in a shaky breath
and leaned back in the chair.
“Aaron, I
can’t just sit here.”

There was a commotion and the doors opened.
I jumped up and rushed toward them. Several doctors and nurses were
pushing the gurney out of the room along with an IV stand, a
ventilator, oxygen and EKG. I saw Dr. Brighton and Jenna with them
as I strained to get a look at Julia.

“Uhhh…” A groan ripped from my chest at the
site. “Dr. Brighton…please. Can I see her? Is she conscious?”

He turned sad brown eyes
on me and shook his head. “Ryan, I don’t have time to talk right
now.
We need
to do a chest X-ray, probably
a CT scan of her head and torso. I’m fairly sure she has
a bad fracture on the left side of her skull. The
blood is from a superficial laceration on her hairline which we’ve
got under control, but we don’t know if there is internal bleeding
yet. I can’t waste time talking now, son. I’m doing my best for
her, I promise, Ryan, but she is critical.”

I started shaking again as
I looked on and they wheeled her away from me. Her clothes had been
cut off of her and a white blanket placed over her,
leaving
bare skin visible below its edge.
Her hair was
matted with blood and she had so many machines connected to her and
over her face I couldn’t recognize her. “I want to see her.” I knew
it would be impossible. To save her life, time was
imperative.

“As soon as we get these tests and know
more, Ryan. There is no time to waste now.” Jenna came forward and
put her arms around my waist to give me a quick hug.

“Here is what I know,” she said as she
stepped back and looked up into my face. “We intubated, but she is
still struggling to breathe. We think she has a pneumothorax on the
left side, maybe some fractured ribs. Her left shoulder is
dislocated; she has lacerations and contusions to her face and
scalp and the left side of her body. She probably has a head injury
and some internal bleeding and, as you know, that is what the scans
should tell us. I have to go with her, but, I’ll let you know when
I know more details. I’m…so sorry, Ryan,” she said before she
turned and hurried down the hall after Julia and the rest of the
team, disappearing behind the double doors leading to
radiology.

Aaron’s arms came around
me, under my arms to catch me as my knees started to buckle.
This couldn’t be happening
. The dislocated shoulder and broken ribs weren’t life
threatening, but if she had a head injury or internal bleeding,
time was of the essence. Even the collapsed lung could be dealt
with, but all of it together…I could lose her. I fell into Aaron’s
arms and began gasping for breath and clutching at his
shoulders.