Winners (3 page)

“What does that mean? And what kind of spinal injury? Is she paralyzed?” Bill looked like a cornered bull as he said the words, and Ben Steinberg realized he needed to handle him with kid gloves. The resident had warned him of that, but he could see now the level of Bill’s anxiety for his daughter. He seemed like he was going to lose control any minute. He couldn’t bear what was happening to her.

“We don’t know any of that yet, which is why I’d like a neurosurgeon to evaluate her. My partner is one of the best there is. I called her a few minutes ago, and she’s coming in. We need a little more time to stabilize Lily anyway. We need to get her warmer and her blood pressure up before she could tolerate surgery.”

“I haven’t agreed to surgery,” Bill reminded him. “And I asked you if she’s paralyzed.” His eyes blazed into Ben’s.

“It’s hard to assess with her unconscious, but there appears to be limited function of her legs. We need to determine the degree of the injury before we can give you a reliable answer. We just don’t know the full extent of her injuries yet.”

“When is the neurosurgeon coming in, and why the hell isn’t she here yet?” He was impatient for everything—for answers, but mostly for help for Lily.

“She should be here in fifteen or twenty minutes. I just called her,” Dr. Steinberg said calmly. He sympathized with Bill’s concern about his daughter, and he had a soothing manner, but nothing was going to satisfy Bill now except the news that Lily was out of danger, and no one could tell him that, not even a neurosurgeon. She had had a very serious accident, and there was no way of telling yet if she would survive it.

“May I see my daughter?” Bill asked, with agony in his eyes, and the orthopedic surgeon nodded. He hated to have her father see her in the condition she was in, but he didn’t have the heart to deny him. And maybe it would help him understand her fragile state. She was hanging on to life by a thin thread.

Bill followed them wordlessly into the trauma unit. Lily had been moved into the trauma ICU, and there were two nurses and a doctor with her, checking her vital signs, and doing a neurological assessment before the surgeon arrived and would need the information. Lily was still covered by several electric warming blankets, her long dark hair was in a surgical cap, and her face looked ghostly. She had a breathing tube taped in her mouth, and a machine was helping her breathe. She had IVs in both arms, and monitors attached to her limbs gave them the information they needed, and would sound an alarm if her heart stopped or she stopped breathing.

Bill was even more shaken the moment he saw her. There wasn’t an inch of her that he could hold or kiss, all he could do was watch her, and gently touch her good arm with his finger. The other arm was in a cast, and a nasty bruise had begun to show on one side of her face, where she had fallen. Bill just stood there crying quietly, and a few minutes later a nurse led him from the room. There was nowhere for him to stand without getting in their way, and as much as he wanted to be with her, he didn’t want to interfere with what they were doing. He had no illusions about how dire her situation was. He sat down in the waiting room again, and the nurse offered to get him a cup of coffee or something to eat. He just shook his head and laid it back against the couch and closed his eyes. After seeing her, it was almost impossible to believe she would live. And for the first time in fourteen years, he prayed.

Chapter 3

Jessie Matthews had been running all afternoon. Her days off were always like that, but it was inevitable with four young kids, and she loved it. Her oldest son, Chris, was eighteen now and allegedly more independent. He had a driver’s license and a car, but he still needed help with everything. He still consulted his parents on minor and major decisions, needed help with term papers and school projects, emptied the fridge, and forgot to do dishes. Jessie did his laundry, and he asked her for romantic advice. And he loved playing basketball with his dad when he had time. Both his parents were busy. His mother was a neurosurgeon, and his father, Tim, was an anesthesiologist. They usually took turns with their schedules, except for emergencies, which happened often, and then they were both out at the same time. Chris stayed with his younger siblings and drove them around whenever he had to. He was going to college in the fall and hoping to get into either UC Boulder or the University of Denver, for the skiing. He could hardly wait to go. And Adam, his eleven-year-old brother, said he couldn’t wait for him to leave too. It seemed sometimes like they had been arguing with each other since the day Adam was born, or very shortly thereafter, although they were seven years apart.

Heather was fifteen, and a sophomore at the same school Chris attended. She and Chris got along fairly decently, except when she said he was acting like a jerk or a pig or refused to drive her somewhere because he wanted to see his girlfriend. But they’d been doing better since she’d been in high school, which was a relief to their parents.

And Jimmy was everyone’s joy, at six. He had been a “slip” on Jessie’s part, five years after Adam, but she and Tim were infinitely grateful for it now. He was the most affectionate child she’d ever seen, and he made everybody laugh. He loved his entire family. He was the sweetness and comic relief in the group. Tim had forgiven Jessie instantly for adding a fourth unexpected child to their already-strained finances, the moment he saw him. Jimmy was impossible to resist, and everyone who knew him loved him. His whole perspective on life was colored by the fact that he had never met anyone who didn’t like him. Strangers in line at the supermarket fell in love with him, and he made friends wherever he went. Even homeless guys on the street smiled at him, when Jimmy stopped to say hello and ask them how they were.

Tim was just waking up when Jessie came in with the groceries. She had used her day off to do a million errands, dropped Heather off to do some shopping she wanted to do, and took Adam for a haircut he didn’t want and was furious about. Now she still had two loads of laundry to do, and she had promised to cook dinner. She and Jimmy were unpacking the groceries, when Tim walked into the kitchen in his pajamas, with a yawn. He had been up all night with four surgeries back to back, and didn’t get home till ten
A.M.
He put on a pot of coffee, and helped her put the groceries in the fridge.

“Looks like you had a busy day.” He smiled at her over Jimmy’s head. It was the same smile that had made her heart race for all these years. They had married in medical school at twenty-four. And nineteen years and four kids later, they were still very much in love, and it showed. Adam rolled his eyes and looked disgusted whenever they kissed, and Chris and Heather looked embarrassed. Jimmy thought it was funny and had shown a picture of his parents kissing, at show and tell, that Jessie didn’t know he had taken. There was nothing improper about the picture, and his class thought it was funny. Tim and Jessie both knew it was rare for people to still be that in love with each other after nearly twenty years, but their kids thought it was normal.

“Sorry I didn’t give you a hand today,” Tim apologized as Jessie put away the empty bags, and Jimmy went upstairs. “I was dead to the world.”

“It’s fine, you had a rough night last night.” She could see that he was exhausted.

“It was a little dicey,” he admitted, as he poured himself a cup of coffee and sat down at the kitchen table. “I had a nasty compound fracture, an eighty-seven-year-old woman with a broken hip, a perforated appendix, and a woman who delivered twins at thirty-two weeks. We almost lost one of them, but the neonatal guys worked a miracle and saved him, and then the mom hemorrhaged and almost bled out, and they saved her too. And there were only two anesthesiologists on last night—two of the others were on vacation, and three were sick, so we couldn’t call anyone in. Crazy night.” It often was for him, but she knew he loved what he did.

“My phone must be out of order. I managed to get through a whole day without being called in for an emergency today. It was nice.” She smiled at him, and bent to kiss him where he sat as he put an arm around her waist. She still had the same slim figure she’d had when she met him, even after four kids. She had long blond hair she wore in a braid most of the time, big blue eyes, and a dusting of freckles, which made her look like a kid.

“What’s on the agenda for tonight? Any chance we can drop the troops off at their friends’ and steal a night of romance without Chris and Adam threatening to kill each other, or Heather needing a ride?” he asked hopefully, and she laughed.

“Not a chance. Heather’s going to the movies with friends, and I said I’d drop her off. I think Chris has a date. Adam is spending the night at Parker’s house, and we have to get him there. And I promised to take Jimmy bowling. You can come with us if you want. I’ve been promising him all week, and I didn’t have the heart to postpone it again.”

“Terrific,” he said with a rueful smile. “I was hoping you’d suggest we go bowling.” He pulled her onto his lap for a kiss just as her cell phone rang.

“Dr. Matthews,” she said, as she pulled her mouth away from Tim’s. It was her official voice, but she was smiling at him, and she could see on her BlackBerry that it was Ben. They had shared an office for the past ten years, since Tim had convinced her to move to Tahoe after Adam was born. They had lived in Palo Alto before that, and she had just joined a group at Stanford Hospital, and leaving it had been a sacrifice for her. But she did it for Tim and her kids, even knowing that she wouldn’t have the same professional opportunities at Squaw Valley that she did at a teaching hospital like Stanford, but she liked their life here now. Tim was happy, and it was great for the kids. And her work was interesting even here. Her specialty was spinal cord injuries, and she had several challenging cases every year. She and Tim had both gone to medical school at Harvard and done their residencies at Stanford. And they both loved the healthy country life at Lake Tahoe. Tim was always happiest outdoors, more so than Jessie, who missed the city a little. But they went to San Francisco occasionally for a weekend.

Tim saw her frowning as she listened to Ben, and she glanced over at Tim with a look of surprise. “I heard the sirens, but I figured it was a car accident in the bad weather. I’ve been so busy, I haven’t turned the radio on all day.” And then she listened to him again, and asked a number of questions. Tim could tell it was a spinal cord case, and he could see an evening of bowling alone with his youngest son in his immediate future. She looked serious when she ended the call, after promising she’d get there as soon as she could. She stood up and looked at Tim then, with a shocked expression.

“A chairlift cable broke today. I don’t know how I missed hearing about that. Several deaths, a number of injuries. Ben has a seventeen-year-old girl with hypothermia and an SCI. He needs me to come in,” she said apologetically.

“I got that,” he said, as he stood up and kissed her.

“Will you take Jimmy bowling? I promised. I told them I’d make tacos tonight too. I bought a bunch of frozen pizzas if you don’t feel like cooking. I’m really sorry. I thought maybe I’d get away with a night off too.”

“I’ll manage. You think you’ll be operating tonight?”

“Sounds like it. Ben says they’re stabilizing her now, and still assessing her. If she’s stable, we’ll go in. If not, we may have to wait till tomorrow. It doesn’t sound too good. She fell off the chairlift at the high point. The instructor she was with was killed.”

“I wonder if they’ll call me in too,” Tim said, glancing at his own phone, but there were no messages, and he assumed some of the other anesthesiologists had come back on duty.

“I hope not. If they call you, Chris will have to drive Heather and Adam and babysit for Jimmy, which will screw up his date and he’ll be pissed.”

“I’ll do my best not to spoil his evening,” Tim said, as Jessie went upstairs to change. She was wearing torn jeans and an old sweater, and Ben had sounded anxious for her to come in as soon as she could to help with the evaluation. She was back downstairs five minutes later, with her hair brushed and in the braid, wearing a turtleneck sweater, black jeans, and boots, and she grabbed her heavy parka off the hook in the front hall. She looked a little more serious than she did in an old sweater and torn jeans, but she still looked very young for forty-three.

“I’ll call you as soon as I know what I’m doing, and if I’ll be there all night.” She kissed him on her way out, and a few minutes later she was in Tim’s Jeep, heading to the hospital. She left her van for him, since he’d need it to drive the kids. She noticed that the roads were icy, and she drove carefully on the way to the hospital. She was already thinking about the patient Ben had described to her, and the people who had been hurt in the chairlift accident. It was one of those things that could happen in a ski resort, although you prayed it never would. Just thinking of it made her shudder, and worry about her kids. All of them were avid skiers, especially Chris and Adam. What if it had been one of them on the chairlift today? She pushed the thought from her mind as the car started to skid and she got it back in control. She was used to driving on snow and ice, and she pulled into the hospital parking lot a few minutes later, parked Tim’s Jeep, and walked into the hospital. She went to her locker to change into her white coat with her name on the pocket, and she slipped it on over her sweater and jeans. She was in the trauma unit five minutes later, examining Lily and listening to Ben as she did. Lily was stable but still unconscious, and she agreed with his diagnosis of the case. He suspected a T10 spinal cord injury. If he was right, Lily would never walk again. Jessie wanted to operate on her that night to do all they could.

Ben went to the waiting room with her so they could explain it to Bill. He was sitting on the couch, with his head leaned back against the cushions and his legs stretched out. He looked as beaten as he felt. He opened his eyes as soon as they walked in, and Jessie met his eyes with a serious expression and introduced herself. Ben told him that she was the neurosurgeon they’d been waiting for. Bill did not look pleased when he saw how young she was.