DR. CHERI

CHAPTER TEN

Gareth went to see a patient in I.C.U. at JesseClarke's private hospital. Zeta, the young nurse moved aside for him to have a look at the patient, a young female. Horror swept over him at the sight of her lying there like a gutted corpse. He gave her a long assessing look and gave a sigh. "History status and current measures?"

"She was stuck in the car wreck for about an hour. She's been incubated and on a bag-valve mask with 100 per cent oxygen since removal. On the last recording her pulse was 123 with irregular ectopics, BP91 over 60 and oxygen saturation 90 per cent."

"Thank you Julian." Gareth examined the patient further. He shook his head. "This is touch and go. Julian, I need some x-rays on her." Julian turned to Michelle, the senior I.C.U. nurse. She later returned with the x-rays. Gareth examined the x-rays. "Julian, look at this." He gazed at it as Gareth indicated. "Here is a pulveration of the naso-orbito-ethmoid bones. The posterior table of the frontal bone is also pulverized."

"But not the anterior one."

"Yes." As he examined the x-rays he felt thankful that it wasn't Cheri on that I.C.U. bed.

Cheri was released from hospital even before Gareth could realize it. He got himself a new Bug in the place of the one Cheri had written off and had it parked underneath the willow tree in the front yard. Cheri stood behind him and folded her arms around him as he stared out of the window.

"Hey...What's on your mind?"

"I've lost a patient today. A seventeen year old girl that died after a horrific car accident caused by a drunk driver."

"I'm sorry."

He turned towards her. "I'm just glad you survived."

She smiled. "I'm tougher than you think..."

"I know that already. You didn't have an easy childhood."

"Who told you that?"

"Dr. Clarke."

"Yeah...What really happened to your father?"

Gareth cupped his hands over her shoulders. "He was also killed in an accident caused by a drunk driver."

"I'm sorry."

"They should lock those people up and throw away the key. They devastate other people's lives in the process. And we doctors have to try our best to make things better. But we're also human beings with emotions. We also get disheartened and feel discouraged if we lose our patients."

"And when things don't go as their families expect them to go we have to hear how inadequate we are."

"For goodness sake Cheri. We are not machines. We also make mistakes. If they want miracles they should ask God for miracles. We aren't God."

She sat down on the couch in the living room. "Is that why you would rather be a medical doctor than a surgeon."

"Yes." He sat down next to her. "I think people outside the medical profession perceive doctors differently than we perceive ourselves."

Gareth and Cheri had a twin ten months later. They called the boy Neil, meaning champion and the girl Danica, meaning morning star. Gareth was a good father to his two twins. He sat looking at Cheri as she sat in the rocking chair rocking them both to sleep, took his baby girl from his wife, and gently put her in her cradle. They were perfect in every way. They boy looked after Cheri and the girl after Gareth with her raven black hair. He saw it as a miracle that they both lived through horrendous tribulations to have two perfect little children in their home. His purpose in life was clear to him. He wasn't a miracle worker, and neither was Cheri. But they were both there to save lives. That's what doctors do after all.

THE END