Trapped (3 page)

The room burst out into short-lived laughter
, and then went into guilty silence. Cass’s dark eyes beamed with hatred toward Mike, and after a moment, he said, “Thank you, Dr. Cooper. You’re excused.”

Mike stared down at the smaller man. “Perhaps you want to meet with me later in private, Dr. Cass. I feel like we’re just getting to know each other.”

“You’re excused.”

Mike smiled.
Thank you, asshole. I don’t have time for your cruel conceits, or your shit.

Chapter Four

Lisa Cooke crammed the dilapidated 1992 Wagoneer full of her books and personal possessions. Once the Cooke’s family car, Sandy insisted that Lisa use the Jeep while she was away at school in Chico. Rudy bitched and moaned about the car, but since he could do nothing about it, Sandy prevailed.

“Goodbye, Dad,” she said to Rudy. He ignored her
, and turned up the volume on the Jerry Springer Show.

Lisa kissed and hugged her mother.

Sandy held Lisa’s shoulders between her strong hands, studied her daughter’s face, and then returned the embrace. Sandy clung to her daughter like a life preserver at sea, and then wept. After blowing her nose, she said, “I’m going to miss you.”

I’m not going to cry
,
Lisa promised herself.

She brushed the fallen leaves from her windshield
, and then drove down the long driveway.

When she looked into her rearview mirror, Sandy was standing at the front door
, watching after her. Overwhelmed with emotion, she, too, wept. When Lisa turned onto the main road and stepped on the accelerator, she lowered the windows, and bathed in the fresh air of her newfound freedom.

Lisa moved into an old Victorian house on Ivy Street, south of the Chico campus. Her roommates—three from the San Francisco Bay Area, and two from Southern California, had enrolled in the nursing program. They were away from home for the first time, and were trying too hard to prove their independence.

Lisa avoided, as much as possible, the frenzy of
freshman year by focusing on her studies. At the end of her second year, she knew that she’d make it. She worked part-time at the Enloe Medical Center gift shop, and volunteered there, working her way into the pediatric unit. Pediatrics, in some form, became her final objective.

Lisa was friendly with her roommates, but was close with only one, Phoebe Davis, whose family were displaced New Yorkers. They’d lived in San Francisco, but
, like many provincials from the Big Apple, anywhere else was Nowhere’s Land. Phoebe recalled her childhood…

Seth Davis, everyone called him Lefty, his wife, Adele, and their four children, lived in Bensonhurst, the Italian-Jewish section of Brooklyn best known as the setting for Jackie Gleason’s
The Honeymooners.
To hear Lefty talk about this area and its crushed-together row homes, it was paradise.

Phoebe was the youngest
, with three older brothers. She was thirteen the night Lefty came home and said, “We’re moving to San Francisco.”

To the Davis family, provincial
New Yorkers, he might as well have told them that they were moving to the moon.

Adele spent the first seven years of Phoebe’s life trying to make her what she’d never be
, a perfect little girl.

“You should hear the mouth on that girl,” Adele complained to Lefty after dinner. “I’m embarrassed to repeat the words she used in front of old Mrs. Zimmerman.”

“I’ll talk to her,” Lefty said, “for the thousandth time.”

While in most ways, Phoebe was vintage Tomboy, she remained Daddy’s little girl, and worked it to perfection.

She read well at age three, and found school boring. When her teachers and the principal suggested that Phoebe might benefit from an evaluation for ADD or ADHD, Lefty told them in no uncertain terms what he thought of a system more committed to order than to education.

When Phoebe hit her terrible teens
, and discovered boys, Adele wondered if they’d accept a Jewish girl into a nunnery. In spite of her often obnoxious behavior and know-it-all attitude, she excelled in high school, and became an honor student and a National Merit Scholar.

During her junior year, Phoebe set out to lose her virginity. She chose Ronnie Hartwell, the senior class president
, and a certified jock.

Afterward she
had said, “Thanks, Ronnie, that was great.”

“Great?”

“Yes, it was fun. I needed to get rid of the pressure to maintain my virginity.” She hesitated, smiled, and then said, “And, I enjoyed seeing an intact one.”

“Intact what?”

“You know. Your thing…your dick…your cock.”

When he reddened, Phoebe burst out in laughter. “It’s a bit late for the bashful routine, don’t you think?”

Once her parents recognized Phoebe’s intelligence,
and that she could do whatever she wanted, Lefty lobbied for her to train in computer science, and Adele wanted her to teach, careers that they both loved. Phoebe identified with the bright and independent health care professionals on
ER
and other prime time medical dramas. She thought of becoming a physician, but opted instead on a more hands-on approach to helping people, nursing.

If there was such a thing as an east coast personality, Phoebe had it. She was smart, painfully honest, and often abrasive. At first, Phoebe’s caustic wit and biting comments offended Lisa, but she soon came to see her new friend as a prickly pear, spiny outside, but soft and sweet at the core.

Lisa dated freshmen and sophomores, but discovered more of an affinity
for upperclassmen and graduate students. Her one long-term relationship, four months, was with Harvey Stern, a neurology resident at the hospital.

“I don’t know what you see in that guy,” Phoebe said
, “he’s a putz.”

“A putz?” Lisa asked.

“You know, a schmuck.”

“Well
, Phoebe,” Lisa,” said, “in spite of your charming characterization, I like him.”

Harvey Stern was
, in all ways, the polar opposite of Lisa’s father. He was easygoing, considerate, and entertaining.

“Does he turn you on?” Phoebe asked
. “Do you have trouble keeping your hands off the man? If not, then you’re wasting your time, sweetie.”

Lisa knew
that life was unlikely to imitate her favorite romance novels, but as much as she tried, she saw that Phoebe knew her better than she knew herself. This relationship with the bland Harvey Stern would never give Lisa what she needed the most, passion.

Lisa and Phoebe filled their free time with Yoga, Pilates, and book clubs. Phoebe was into kickboxing, but Lisa found it too violent. She’d seen enough violence in her life.

Phoebe dragged
Lisa to lectures on personal growth and spirituality, and she was constantly after Lisa to join her in the evenings at the dance clubs.

“Astrology, Phoebe,” Lisa said
, “you must be kidding.”

“Who would have believed,” Phoebe said,
as she rifled through reams of papers and charts. “Some of this stuff is right on. Don’t worry, sweetie, I’ll grow out of it.”

Nevada City was too close to Chico to excuse not going home from time to time. After each visit, Lisa’s mother’s image faded like a photo kept in the sun too long. Rudy, in every way, except for his mouth, was diminished. From the very moment she arrived, she counted the days until her departure.

“Why don’t you come and spend a week or so with me in Chico, Mom?” Lisa asked. “We have plenty of room.”

“Oh, I couldn’t do that. Who’d take care of your father?”

“Please, Mother, think about it. I’ll pay for someone to come in and take care of him.” Lisa said, and then grasped Sandy’s hands
. “You deserve a break, you know.”

“I’ll think about it,” Sandy
said.

Lisa knew
she’d never do it.

After graduation, Phoebe took an ICU position at Brier Hospital in Berkeley.

With Lisa’s high grades, and her contacts at Enloe Medical Center, they offered her a position on the pediatric ward following graduation. Lowest on the totem pole, she worked the night shift, but found sleeping in the daytime nearly impossible. Working nights, however, allowed her to take additional courses that went toward her ultimate goal, neonatal intensive care. Eventually, when she put the course work behind, Lisa would find an NICU position in Chico, or somewhere else.

Lisa had her head down on the table in the nurse’s lounge.

This night shift is going to kill me.

The intercom buzzed, and the ward clerk said, “Dr. Whitney is on his way up with a new admission. Your turn.”

Lisa had been on the pediatric ward for three months. It had only taken a week for her to discover, by observation or reputation, which pediatricians were trouble. Sheldon Whitney was, by acclamation, pediatric enemy number one.

“Watch out for him,” Annie Katz, the pediatric head nurse said. “Let the charge nurse know if you see anything peculiar in his care of babies.”

“He seems nice enough,” Lisa said. “He’s been practicing for forty years, hasn’t he?”

“That may be a decade too long,” Annie said. “Watch out for him.”

Lisa worked with him on several cases
, and, except for a patrician and dismissive attitude, she’d seen no problems. His attitude matched his appearance. He was tall and thin with a full head of grey hair combed back. He dressed beautifully, and, even in the middle of the night, wore a jacket and tie.

When Lisa entered room 212, she had to force her way through a group of six or seven adults to get to the crib.

Jessica Kern, a two month old, screamed while her mother, Judy, tried to pacify her with soothing sounds and rocking. The father, David, stood by her shoulder.

“Please,” Lisa said,
“just the immediate family.” Turning to Judy, she added, “Please put the baby in the crib so I can examine her.”

“Where’s Shelly—I mean, Dr. Whitney?”

“He’s on his way.”

Lisa examined the baby carefully. Her pulse and respirations were increased
, and she had a temperature of 103.4 degrees. Her skin was flushed, and her cry, though dramatic, wasn’t particularly strong.

This is one sick kid
.

Lisa called the lab
, and had a set of routine blood drawn, including blood cultures for bacterial infection.

After the lab tech left the room, Whitney entered.

Judy grasped Whitney’s hand. “Oh, Shelly, I’m so glad you’re here.”

“Now, now, take it easy. I’ll
have a peek.”

Whitney looked up at Lisa.

She opened Jessica’s chart to the vital signs graphics, and handed it to the doctor.

“Babies get high fever at the drop of a hat, Judy. It’s probably a virus.”

To Lisa’s distress, Whitney did a rapid and too casual examination. He then picked up the chart, and walked to the nurse’s station.

Lisa followed. “I don’t like the looks of that baby,
Sir. What do you think?”

“How long have you been out of school, Ms. Cooke?”

“Three months.”

“I’ve been at this for a while. I’m not concerned.”

“We tried to order the chart from the baby’s birth, but the record room can’t find it.”

“No big deal. I was there, you know.”

“Yes, Sir. Maybe I am not used to such sick-looking babies, yet.”

“Let’s see what the lab and the cultures show
,” he said, closing the chart.

“Can’t we start treatment? She looks so bad to me.”

“Treatment for what? Young doctors throw antibiotics around like they’re water. That’s why we have so many problems with bacterial resistance.”

Whitney spent a few moments reassuring the parents
, and then he walked back to the nursing station where he completed his admitting orders. “I’ll be home. Call me if there are any problems.”

“Yes, Doctor,”
Lisa said.

When Lisa returned to the room, Judy was caressing Jessica’s head. “She feels so hot to me.”

Lisa stood on the opposite side of the crib. “That’s how it is with high fever in a baby so young. How was your delivery?”

“Everything was fine.”

“No problems with the baby?”

“Hell
, no. She was eight pounds, ten ounces, and she came out screaming. They did give her something…I’m not sure what it was. Maybe antibiotics.”

“Why antibiotics? Did she have an infection?”

“Not that I know of.”

Where is that damn chart?
Lisa asked herself.

Lisa returned to the nursing station
, and said to the ward clerk, “I need that baby’s birth chart.”

“I called medical records twice. They can’t find it.”

“What do you mean they can’t find it?” Lisa said, her voice rising. “They must keep a record of its location at all times.”

“It’s not where it should be. They’re looking.”

Medicine is full of aphorisms. Lisa recalled this one: “When three things go wrong, prepare for the worst.” They had a really sick baby, a marginal pediatrician, and now a missing chart.