The Splendor of Ordinary Days (7 page)

Now, despite our abiding love and aching hearts, we stood on uncertain ground. Neither of us wanted to confirm or deny the possibility of our greater intimacy. It was a language we had not found and yet, I was certain, one we both desperately wanted to express. Perhaps we weren't so unlike the Mennonites, struggling to find harmony between the eager desires we felt and the ideals we held.

I waved ­good-­bye and headed into the darkness.

After arriving at Fleming Street, I took care of Rhett. I didn't know it at the time, but the night would be a short one.

The Storm

T
here was a stagnation in the air as I stood in the backyard waiting for Rhett to accommodate his finicky bladder. The night had a brooding and strangely malevolent feel: a grave silence save for the low droning hum of the AC unit. Rhett was painfully slow in taking care of business, seemingly more occupied with sniffing the air in a curious and cautious manner, as if sensing an imminent change.

“Come on, buddy. Some of us need to get some sleep,” I said in encouragement, fully confident that he, as well as most dogs, had a thorough command of the English language. Yet his ponderous investigation continued as he paused often and peered sharply into the gloom of the great trees that surrounded the yard. A few more of my encouraging comments finally did the trick, and I made my weary way toward the back porch, up the stairs, and into bed. But the telltale signs were there. Just beyond the far hills, a storm was plummeting toward the valley, preparing to sweep down the high slopes with a savage indifference.

Sometime after midnight, a series of strobing flashes illuminated the distant horizon. Within the mystery of deep sleep, behind my closed eyes, my subconscious was blindly registering this magnificent light show. A minute later, a singular brilliant flare, infinitely more powerful than the previous distant flickers, transformed the world outside my window into daylight. Somehow, in the slumber of half sleep, I held my breath, awaiting the inevitable crushing explosion. When it came a millisecond later, I woke with a start, clutching at my dream even as it dissolved.

The lightning strike had landed downtown scant blocks from my home. It was an early vanguard of the coming fury. For the moment, the drowsy and dispirited world outside was still strangely calm, an empty stage of lifeless shadows. The hot, stealthy breath of the southern wind was just about to make its volatile presence known.

In the dark of my room, I moved to the window and gazed at the incredible blazing night sky. There was a phantasmal eeriness and yet a magnificence that captivated me in a cataleptic trance, rendering me able to do little more than stare with rapt fascination. The far horizon was flashing brilliantly, an ­awe-­inspiring spectacle that was raw, powerful, and yet oddly transcendent.

In time, the great spectral moan of the wind increased. It howled down from the hills and hit the smooth plane of the valley floor in a roaring swell. No longer content with its serpentine glide around the trees, it now lashed bluntly against them with a ferocity and a madness. As if in a grand coordinated assault, the wind, the lightning, and the thunder exploded upon the landscape. The rain fell in sweeping sheets, and constant booms and flashes filled the night, providing fleeting snapshots of the relentless thrashing being given to the outside world.

The worst of the storm lasted twenty minutes. After that, it settled into a steady, pounding rain that eventually softened to a quiet dripping from the eaves and boughs. I had stood in the dark the entire time and now crawled back into my bed, only to find that I had company. Rhett, who normally slept on the floor, was cowered into a tight ball on the far corner. The big baby.

Exhaustion had overtaken me again, and there was an accommodating drowsiness brought about by the muffled sound of the rain on the roof above me. Still, I slept fitfully.

Shortly after four in the morning, my cell phone rang, waking me from a fragile sleep. It was Clarence, one of the Watervalley EMTs.

“Doc, need you to meet us at the clinic. We're coming in from a fire out on Covey Hollow Road. Got three firefighters with us; two with smoke inhalation, one with a severe burn on his right arm. ETA is about fifteen minutes.”

I asked Clarence to have dispatch activate the clinic staff for an emergency callout and told him I would head to the clinic immediately.

I switched on the light and rubbed my face. After the initial jolt of adrenaline that accompanied such conversations in the small hours, I always felt a certain residue of confusion. I opened my eyes wide, shook my head briskly in an effort to wake up, and refocused quickly. A few minutes later, I was out the door.

The rain had moved on, leaving the night air thick and muggy. The EMT van pulled into the clinic parking lot soon after my arrival.

We hastily helped the three injured men inside. During this hurried process, Clarence and Leonard gave me a brief report on the men's condition and what had happened. The volunteer firemen had been called out to a barn fire that was dangerously close to the adjacent farmhouse. The two men suffering from smoke inhalation were Chick McKissick, the local mechanic, and Maylen Cook, the local barber. The burn victim, unfamiliar to me, was a fellow in his ­mid-­twenties named Clayton Ross.

I spoke decisively. “Leonard, put the burn victim in room one. Is he having respiratory issues?”

“Don't think so, Doc.”

“All right. Get him settled and stay with him.” I turned to the other EMT. “Clarence, go with Maylen to room three. I'll take Chick to room two. He seems to have gotten the worst of it.”

My mind was racing, endeavoring to make orderly, methodic decisions. But it was a surreal moment. Seeing the exhausted, ­soot-­smudged faces of Chick and Maylen and witnessing their violent coughing and gasping brought front and center to me the hard reality of being a ­small-­town doctor.

These were not strangers in a metropolitan ER whom I would treat with earnest but detached professionalism. These men were
my
mechanic and
my
barber. They were friends; good, honest, uncomplicated men who lived modest lives, men who had willingly left their homes and gone into the grim misery of the storm to safeguard one of their neighbors.

After getting Chick settled, I pulled an oxygen tank to his room. He was short of breath, wheezing and hacking. His panicked face was a far cry from the normally lively and spontaneously happy fellow I knew. He was also experiencing confusion and nausea, both classic symptoms of smoke inhalation. Fortunately, my staff nurse, Ann Patterson, arrived just as Chick was inhaling two deep breaths of a bronchodilator. She helped me place a ­non-­rebreather mask and an O
2
saturation monitor on him. I instructed her to do the same for Maylen and to let me know the results.

Like a man who had just surfaced from almost drowning, Chick gasped deeply of the ­oxygen-­rich air. He was dirty, wet, and trembling uncontrollably as he held the oxygen mask with one hand. His other hand was drawn tightly to his chest in a twisted and unnatural way, shaking violently. I reached out and held it. “It's going to be all right, Chick.”

He looked at me through frightened eyes and responded with short, jerky nods, gripping my hand ever tighter. For me, it was a heartrending, sobering moment.

“Long, slow breaths, Chick. Long, slow breaths.”

Soon his oxygen saturation climbed to a safe level. By now, the rest of the staff, Cindy and Camilla, the two ­middle-­aged sisters who were the lab tech and the phlebotomist, had arrived.

“I want you to draw an ABG and CBC on each patient.” They nodded and set about the business of drawing blood for an arterial blood gas and a complete blood count, critical information that would help determine hemoglobin levels and lung functionality.

Ann reported that Maylen's oxygen levels were fine. I instructed her to collect vital signs on Maylen and Clayton while I took care of Chick. Slowly his respirations returned to normal and he sat calmly, but with a drained and anxious face. I examined him, thankfully noting that all his numbers were normal.

“Chick, you're going to be okay. I need to check on the other two, but I want to keep you here for observation.”

He responded in a hoarse whisper and with a grateful nod, his body still occasionally shuddering. “Thanks, Dr. B. If you think I'll be okay, that's good.” There were remnants of tears in his eyes, and he spoke with a tinge of apology. “It just . . . It just shook me up, that's all. Not being able to breathe and everything. Clayton gonna be okay?”

“I'm about to find out. Sit tight.”

I checked on Maylen, who was now showing no distress and expressing a desire to go home. His wife, Alice, had arrived and was in the room with him. I examined him and asked a few questions. Other than an occasional cough, he seemed fine. I asked him to wait for the blood test results. In his deadpan way, Maylen offered a low sound of acknowledgment.

I headed to Clayton's exam room.

From the report the EMTs had given me, part of the barn had collapsed in Clayton's direction. While turning to retreat from it, he had tripped and fallen, leaving his arm pinned momentarily under a burning pole. Before he could be pulled free, he had suffered ­second-­degree and nearly ­third-­degree burns on his right forearm and hand. The EMTs had triaged him with a simple sterile bandage.

By now, some of his family had arrived and were standing in the waiting room with hard, worried faces. They were talking in low voices and casting uneasy, troubled looks at one another. I nodded to them as I crossed to the exam room.

Clayton looked to be about ­twenty-­five. He was of modest height with a tough, boxy build and strong shoulders. His eyes were bloodshot from the smoke and lack of sleep. As I entered, he stiffened in ­straight-­backed attention and nodded with a measure of respect and reserve. Per my instructions, Ann had placed his arm on an elevated mayo table covered with a sterile drape. I introduced myself.

“Any trouble moving your fingers, Clayton?”

His answer was polite and crisp. “No, sir, don't think so.”

“Feeling much pain?”

“Not too bad, sir.”

His posture, manner, and frequent use of “sir” made his recent history all too obvious. “So, which branch of the service were you in?”

He smiled and seemed to relax. “Army, sir. Hundred and First Airborne. Fort Campbell. Discharged out a month ago.”

I nodded thoughtfully. “Any overseas duty?”

“Afghanistan, sir. Two tours.”

I pursed my lips and nodded respectfully. “Wow. That's impressive. Ever wounded?”

“Nothing except for a heart broken by a barmaid in Ramstein.”

I smiled lightly. “Well, isn't that the way of things? Two tours and not a scratch. One month back in Watervalley and here we are.”

“It happens, sir.”

“Okay, Clayton. Here's what I need to do. I'm going to remove this bandage, see what we've got, wash and clean up the wound, and then put a new dressing on. It's probably going to hurt. I can give you a local anesthetic or a bullet to bite. Your choice.”

He grinned. “Go, ahead, Doc. If it gets too bad, I'll let you know.”

Fortunately, the injury was not so severe as to need a skin graft. Clayton winced a few times, and I could tell that the pain was sharp, but he gritted his way through it.

“What kind of work are you doing now, Clayton?”

“Just helping my dad on the farm. I've put in several applications around town.”

“Well, you may need to do light duty to let this thing heal some. The biggest problem with burns is infection. If this gets infected, it'll upset my whole day, and no telling what it will do to yours. So, here's the plan. I want you to come back each day for me or Ann to put a new dressing on this until I say uncle.”

Clayton nodded in understanding, but I could tell that this plan didn't appeal to him. His shoulders and posture slumped. Camilla had stepped into the room to give me his lab results. They looked fine, but something was bothering me. I took out my pad and wrote a note for her.

“Camilla, if you've got enough blood left from the sample, have Cindy run this test for me too.” She looked at the paper and then at me before quietly leaving.

As I stepped into the hall, the slowly opening door of morning was beginning to show through the large waiting room windows. I grabbed the charts of both Maylen and Chick to review their lab tests. Fortunately, the results were good. I found both of them in Chick's exam room along with Clarence and Leonard.

To my delight, Chick seemed to be doing much better, the company of friends proving to be the best medicine. His wife, Delilah, had arrived as well. The men were engaged in a friendly banter about the events of the previous hours, replaying tense moments through a filter of wit and humor. Alice and Delilah stood by with tolerant grins that only thinly masked the mixture of relief and pride that they were no doubt feeling for their husbands. The tension of the last hour had vanished, and the lighthearted mood was a welcome relief.

Leonard was in the middle of a protracted story as I entered, and I motioned for him to continue. But within seconds, from behind the exam room door came heated voices in the hallway, followed by a yell that pierced the clinic walls.

“It shouldn't have happened, dammit. It's all their fault.”

The angry announcement served as a vacuum, draining away all the laughter and merriment. A hush fell over the small gathering. I immediately stepped into the hallway, where I found Clayton and an older man. He was slightly taller than his son, thickly built with a heavy jaw and a red face. Clayton was trying to leave, but the other man seemed bent on venting his temper. Upon seeing me, he turned, speaking sharply.

“How long will it take this to heal?”

I responded coolly. “Who are you, sir?”

“I'm his father, that's who. You didn't answer my question.”

I looked to Clayton for confirmation. He offered a low nod. I spoke calmly.

“It's a significant ­second-­degree burn, so it will likely take several weeks. It could have been a lot worse.”

My words seemed only to fuel the man's anger. “Well, pardon me, Doc, while I go whistle a damn happy tune.”

That was enough. This fellow wanted a shouting match, not a discussion. Clayton saw the look on my face and spoke first. “Let's go, Dad. We'll talk at home.” He placed his unhurt hand on his father's chest to push him away. The man yielded reluctantly, taking several steps backward under the pressing guidance of his son. There was no waver in his furious glare. Before turning to exit, he pointed his finger at me and spoke a last venomous declaration.