each day that passed, the crisis seemed a little dimmer and Parr's threats more remote. She knew she had Wettig on her side, and Mark as well. With their help, maybe — just maybe — she'd keep her job. She didn't want to give Parr any reason to question her performance as a doctor, so she'd been especially meticulous at work, had checked and re-checked every lab result, every physical finding. And she'd been careful to steer clear of Nina Voss's hospital room. Another angry encounter with Victor Voss was the last thing she needed.
But now NinaVoss was running a fever andAbby was the resident on the spot. She couldn't avoid this: she had a job to do.
She pulled on her tennis shoes and left the on-call room.
Late at night, a hospital is a surreal place. Hallways stretch empty, the lights are too bright, and through tired eyes, all those white walls seem to curve and sway like moving tunnels. She was weaving through one of those tunnels now, her body still numb, her brain still struggling to function. Only her heart had fully responded to the crisis: it was pounding.
She turned a corner, into the SICU.
The lights were dimmed for the night — modern technology's concession to the diurnal needs of human patients. In the gloom of the nurses' station, the electrical patterns of sixteen patients' hearts traced across sixteen screens. A glance at Screen 15 confirmed that Mrs Voss's pulse was running fast. A rate of 100.
The monitor nurse picked up the ringing telephone, then said: 'Dr. Levi's on the line. He wants to talk to the on-call resident.'
'I'll take it,' said Abby, reaching for the receiver. 'Hello, Dr. Levi? This is Abby DiMatteo.'
There was a silence. 'You're on call tonight?' he said, and she heard a distinct note of dismay in his voice. She understood at once the reason for it. Abby was the last person he wanted to lay hands on Nina Voss. But tonight there was no alternative; she was the senior resident on call.
She said: 'I was just about to examine MrsVoss. She's running a fever.'
'Yes, they told me about it.' Again there was a pause.
She plunged into that void, determined to keep their conversation purely professional. I'll do the usual fever workup,' she said. 'I'll examine her. Order a CBC and cultures, urine, and chest x-ray. As soon as I have the results I'll call you back.'
'All right,' he finally said. I'll be waiting for your call.'
Abby donned an isolation gown and stepped into Nina Voss's cubicle. A single lamp had been left on, and it shone dimly above the bed. Under that soft cone of light, NinaVoss's hair was a silvery streak across the pillow. Her eyelids were shut, her hands crossed over her body in a strange semblance of holy repose. The princess in the sepulchre, thought Abby.
She moved to the side of the bed and said softly: 'Mrs Voss?' Nina opened her eyes. Slowly her gaze focused on Abby. 'Yes?' Tm Dr. DiMatteo,' said Abby. 'I'm one of the surgical residents.' She saw the flicker of recognition in the other woman's eyes. She knows my name, thoughtAbby. She knows who I am. The graverobber. The body thief.
Nina Voss said nothing, merely looked at her with those fathomless eyes.
'You have a fever,' explained Abby. 'We need to find out why. How are you feeling, Mrs Voss?'
'I'm… tired. That's all,' whispered Nina. 'Just tired.'
'I'll have to check your incision.' Abby turned up the lights and gently peeled the bandages off the chest wound. The incision looked clean, no redness, no swelling. She pulled out her stethoscope and moved on to the rest of the fever workup. She heard the normal rush of air in and out of the lungs. Felt the abdomen. Peered into the ears, nose, and throat. She found nothing alarming, nothing that would cause a fever. Through it all, Nina remained silent, her gaze following Abby's every move.
At last Abby straightened and said: 'Everything seems to be fine, But there must be a reason for the fever. We'll be getting a chest x-ray and collecting three different blood samples for cultures.' She smiled apologetically. 'I'm afraid you're not going to get much sleep tonight.'
Nina shook her head. 'I don't sleep much, anyway. All the dreams.
So many dreams…'
'Bad dreams?'
Nina took in a breath, slowly let it out. 'About the boy.'
'Which boy, Mrs Voss?'
'This boy.' Softly she touched her hand to her chest. 'They told me it was a boy's. I don't even know his name. Or how he died. All I know is, this was a boy's.' She looked at Abby. 'It was. Wasn't it?' Abby nodded. 'That's what I heard in the operating room.'
'You were there?'
'I assisted Dr. Hodell.'
A small smile formed on Nina's lips. 'Strange. That you should be there, after…' Her voice faded.
Neither one of them spoke for a moment, Abby silenced by guilt, Nina Voss by… what? The irony of this meeting? Abby dimmed the lights. Once again the cubicle took on its sepulchral gloom.
'MrsVoss,' said Abby. 'What happened a few days ago. The other heart, the first heart…' She looked away, unable to meet the other woman's gaze. 'There was a boy. Seventeen. Boys that age, they want cars or girlfriends. But this boy, all he wanted was to go home. Nothing else, just to go home.' She sighed. 'In the end, I couldn't let it happen.! didn't know you, MrsVoss. You weren't the one lying in that bed. He was. And I had to make a choice.' She blinked, felt tears wet her lashes. 'He lived?'
'Yes. He lived.'
Nina nodded. Again she touched her own chest. She seemed to be conferring with her heart. Listening, communicating. She said, 'This boy. This boy's alive, too. I'm so aware of his heart. Every beat. Some people believe that the heart is where the soul lives. Maybe that's what his parents believe. I think about them, too. And how hard it must be. I never had a son. I never had a child.' She closed her hand into a fist, pressed it against the bandages. 'Don't you think it would be a comfort, to know that some part of him is still alive? If it was my son, I'd want to know. I'd want to know.' She was crying now, the tears a sparkling trickle down her temple.
Abby reached for the woman's hand and was startled by the force of Nina's grasp, the skin feverish, the fingers tight with need. Nina was looking up at her, a gaze that seemed to shine with its own strange fire. If I had known you then, thought Abby, if I had watched you dying in one bed, and Josh O' Day in another, which one of you would I have chosen?
I don't know.
Above the bed, a line skipped across the green glow of the oscilloscope. The heart of an unknown boy, beating a hundred times a minute, pumping fevered blood through a stranger's veins.
Abby, holding Nina's hand, could feel the throb of a pulse. A slow, steady pulse.
Not Nina's, but her own.
It took twenty minutes for the x-ray tech to arrive and shoot the portable chest film, and another fifteen minutes before Abby had the developed x-ray in hand. She clipped it to the SICU viewing box and examined it for signs of pneumonia. She saw none.
It was 3 a.m. She called Aaron Levi's house.
Aaron's wife answered, her voice husky with sleep. 'Hello?'
'Elaine, this is Abby DiMatteo. I'm sorry to bother you at this hour. May I speak with Aaron?'
'He left for the hospital.'
'How long ago?'
'Uh… it was just after the second phone call. Isn't he there?'
'I haven't seen him,' said Abby.
There was a silence on the other end of the line. 'He left home an hour ago,' said Elaine. 'He should be there.'
'I'll page his beeper. Don't worry about it, Elaine.' Abby hung up, then dialled Aaron's beeper and waited for the phone to ring.
By three-fifteen, he still hadn't answered.
'Dr. D.?' said Sheila, NinaVoss's nurse. 'The last blood culture's been drawn. Is there anything else you want to order?'
What have I missed? thought Abby. She leaned forward against the desk and massaged her temples,
