The Nanny

Chapter 16

Five times Onika had called Beyoncé's phone and every single one had gone straight to voicemail. On the sixth time, Onika finally left a voicemail. "Beyoncé Knowles, I know you're mad at me, but not picking up my children from their afternoon soccer camp is not acceptable! Why would you do this to me? To them?" Onika hesitated, trying to calm herself before she became angry and hysterical. "Please call me when you get this message."

Quickly Onika shoved her phone into her pocket and jingled her car keys nervously in her left hand.

As she passed a nurse's station, she couldn't help but overhear the chatter, which Onika normally just dismissed as mindless gossip.

"...had no choice but to sedate her..."

"...kept yelling about something to do with children..."

Something in Onika's head screamed at her to stop and linger for details, but she had no choice but to keep going, since she needed to pick up Michael and Anyla immediately. She made a mental note to find out later, as the chatter this time piqued her curiosity.

Faintly another voice floated down the corridor as she headed toward the hospital staff exit.

"...then going on about some woman named Onika..."

Onika's heart leapt into her throat.

Beyoncé.

The likelihood of this same young woman brought into the emergency room being her Beyoncé had seemed low at the first comments, but the last one she'd just overheard she simply couldn't ignore.

Midstep Onika paused, torn between leaving immediately to pick up her children and backpedaling toward the ER to check if, in fact, this same patient was Beyoncé.

Her children weren't in danger. Beyoncé, however, might be injured, or worse.

In a split second Onika turned on her heel and rushed back down the corridor in the direction she'd come.

*****

Finely manicured hands slapped down onto the counter of the desk at the Emergency Room nurse's station. Onika had become frantic for news in the few minutes it'd taken her to get to the ER.

The young nurse looked up, slightly started. "Doctor Ma-"

"The young woman who was brought in," Onika immediately interrupted. "The one the nurses had to sedate?"

Onika could feel her hands begin to shake.

"Is her name Beyoncé?" Onika asked quietly, eyes widened with fear. "Beyoncé Knowles?"

"I-I'm not sure," the nurse stuttered. "I'd have to check for you?"

"Where did they take her? Is she in a room? Surgery? Radiology?"

Eyes widened nervously at the interrogation. "Doctor Maraj, I don't know! If you just give me a moment, I can-"

"Forget it, I'll find out myself!" Onika replied, an edge to her voice. As she stepped quickly away from the nurse's station, she whipped around and nearly snapped, "A good nurse always knows where every patient in his or her assigned ward is at all times. Always!"

Turning back around, Onika quickly made her way into the Emergency Room itself, hot in pursuit of one of her colleagues.

"Doctor Foster!" Onika cried out to the doctor at the end of the row of curtained off rooms. "Gillian!" she called again, quickly approaching.

A mid-neck length, sandy blonde haired woman whipped her head around at the sound of her name. "Onika, hello!"

"The young woman recently brought in," Onika replied in lieu of a greeting.