Medically Speaking

Chapter 22

Days when I'm on call are always a crap shoot. I know that the odds are that I'm going to be called in, but it's like turning the crank on a jack-in-the-box. I don't know when it's going to happen so doing anything other than lazing around my house, ready to jump into scrubs at a moment's notice is a game of risk. A risk that involves nearly going into cardiac arrest every time my phone buzzes.

Sometimes I'm brave and try to treat it like a day off because it almost feels worse when I'm not called in and I haven't done the multitude of things I could have been doing because my brain couldn't handle the stress of having to drop a project halfway through. Other times it's more like today, where I'm watching true crime shows with my cats in my pajamas when Danny informs me that I'm going to have to actually work for this paycheck.

Which is why I come strolling into work a little after 11 in the morning, pulling my hair up into a ponytail using the warped reflection off the elevator doors as a mirror. Rachelle's son had another asthma attack at school, his third major one in a week. The one before today nearly had her going nuclear on the kid's school. Apparently, the PE coach decided she knew better than the kid with the asthma, the mother who happens to be a nurse, and the kid's doctor because she tried to make him walk off an asthma attack in the grass he's allergic to.

If that had been my kid, they would have had to scrape what was left of her off the walls.

I don't mind coming in for stuff like this. When it's scheduling issues, it gets on my nerves. Fortunately, Scott Childress runs on a low nurse to patient ratio as it is. One nurse to three patients for most of the children's hospital and one to four or five on the adult side. It meant that we were rarely understaffed, even on days when the floor was more full than usual. But when it's things like this, a sick family member or even a nurse needing a mental health day, I don't mind it.

Might grumble and groan about it, but I really don't mind it.

I sense that something's off the moment I reach my floor. Not... wrong, not bad—just off. A disturbance in the force. Something not quite the way it usually is. And when I step through the locked doors, the first patient rooms I see tell me that I'm not wrong. There's a buzz of energy and patients standing or sitting in their open doors, grinning as they talk to each other and glance up the hall every few seconds like they're anticipating something.

Hitting the nurse's desk, I find that the nurses are standing around, just as enthusiastic. "What's going on?" I ask, wondering if there's a celebrity the kids actually recognize on sight visiting today. The athletes are great, but I think sometimes the kids' eyes glaze over because they simply don't know who they are, they're just excited someone has come to visit.

Before anyone can answer me, I hear a whirring sound like plastic wheels racing up the floor but it's too small to be someone racing with a bed. "What the—" My question is answered when I see a shock of long blond hair flying behind Luke's gleefully determined face. In his hands is the handle on one of the push wagons with Child Life spray painted on it in black, blocky letters. Sitting in the cart is a very excited Sophia, her eyes alight with the mischief of it all.

Not far behind him is Gabe, who is laughing but looks even more determined than Luke and is doing his best to catch up. He's got Chris in his wagon and Chris is cheering Gabe on with all that he's worth, his fingers gripping onto the sides like Gabe's about to turn this into a game of Mario Kart.

Knowing the two of them, it's entirely possible.

Heart thumping erratically, I turn my wide eyes to Danny who is doing nothing to stop the shenanigans. He just shrugs. "It got Chris off the Xbox," is the only explanation I'm given. There's a warm feeling in my chest at the sight. Sometimes, shenanigans are good. If it lifts up their spirits, makes being stuck here even a little bit more bearable, it's good. "They're going to make the full loop," Danny adds, and I don't waste time turning and heading to the other side of the ward to go stand in the teen hangout room.