Kit Crumb: Body Parts

Wondering if the annual maintenance hadn’t turned into something more than points, plugs, and an oil change, she paused, considering the consequences of attempting a shower.

“Half an hour into our shift and not a single call, what the hell?” Claire muttered under her breath. She stripped and was just adjusting the water temperature when the scanner crackled to life. “God, I knew it.”

“1180, accident reported by cell phone, 1067 request unit 88 in vicinity of Drake’s Drive, respond.”

Claire grabbed her underwear, making the towel into a toga and ran into dispatch. After the general call response, she flipped to Rye’s frequency.

“Rye, pick up,” Claire said. “What’s your 1020?”

Rye unclipped the hand-held mike from the dashboard. “ETA ten minutes to HQ.”

“Better make that five minutes. Big 1180 on Drake’s Drive. Out.”

A short, feisty woman, Claire was ready to do whatever it took to get the job done. To become an Emergency Medical Technician, an accomplishment of which she was fiercely proud, she’d had to deal with a childhood phobia and compete in a male dominated profession.

Claire and her husband, Rye Anderson, were co-owners of the Mad Dash Search and Rescue Ambulance Service. Rye was a bull of a man, six foot three inches tall with a thick mustache that covered his entire upper lip. It matched his eyebrows, which overshadowed his deep green eyes. Claire loved the way he was always ready with a laugh at the slightest hint of something funny.

Rye could hear the subtle edginess brought on by adrenaline in his wife’s voice. They both loved the freedom of owning their own business, and the excitement of being EMTs that went along with the satisfaction of helping people.

Claire whirled around in the captain’s chair and ran out of the dispatch room, dropping the towel as she entered the utility closet. She stepped into her bra and panties, then into the orange and gray jumpsuit, grimacing as she brought the zipper up and over her chest.

She often complained to Rye that the jumpsuit was designed for a man. He never complained.

She tied her long, chestnut brown hair into a ponytail. Looking around at the small room and the walls that seemed to be crowding her, she shivered, shook it off, then located and grabbed one of the jump kits. Checking to be sure it contained everything they needed to work away from the ambulance, she headed for the front door.

Rye had popped on all the lights but only two of the sirens. With the new sound systems in most cars, drivers were more likely to see flashing emergency lights than hear a siren. He crept the ambulance through the busy intersection of Ripkey and Burnt, then hit nearly sixty for the final miles of the four-lane Lawrence Expressway that would take him to Snoop Drive, his home and Mad Dash headquarters.

The driveway in front of the converted old Victorian was a gentle u-shape that cut to within four feet of the front stoop, where Claire was waiting. The ambulance had barely slowed before she grabbed the door handle, tossed in the jump kit, and vaulted into the passenger seat,

Fastening her harness she said, “Drake’s Drive, half-mile before Smokey Lane turnoff, take the expressway directly to Exit 19.” She then flipped on four sets of toggle switches setting off all the sirens.

“What’s the call?” Rye asked, keeping his eyes on the traffic.

She consulted her call sheet. “Motorcycle down, somebody called it in with a cell phone. No details.”

“So we’ll be solo?”

“I relayed the call, but we’ll definitely be first on the scene,” Claire yelled over the sound of the sirens.

The scanner lit up like a Christmas tree, screaming an accident alert on a dozen channels. Rye reached over and cut the volume so he could stay focused on the changing traffic patterns. Vehicles were slowing. “Get me out of here.”

Claire played co-pilot, enjoying the occasion to issue directions rather than dodge cars that didn’t respond to sirens and lights.

“Left!” Claire said, pointing.

Rye scanned the road ahead for a turn lane, there wasn’t one. “Where?”

Claire’s index finger stabbed the air like a jackhammer. “There, turn now!”

Trusting his partner completely, Rye cut left across two lanes of on-coming traffic, bracing himself as the ambulance jumped the curb and headed into an open field.

“Where now?” Rye’s voice stuttered as the two-ton vehicle bounced over uneven ground.

“Left, there. See that oak? Drake’s Drive opens up just the other side.” As Rye cut left across the field Claire reached for a handhold on the dash and missed.

When they finally came to a stop on the shoulder of the road Rye was amazed that everything in the back of the ambulance hadn’t shaken loose. He grabbed the backboard; Claire grabbed the jump kit.

He spotted the squirming figure of Rusty Kidding through the crowd and began to run, Claire right on his heels. They had to weave and elbow their way through the gawkers to reach him.

She knelt next to Rusty, sliding the jump kit toward Rye who had settled at the victim’s feet.

“Hey buddy can you hear me? What’s your name?”

The man attempted to rise up on one arm, but fell back. “Rusty,” the man answered slowly.

She smiled at him as Rye began cutting away the pant leg from ankle to knee.

“Sorry about the leathers, Rusty,” Claire said, but he was now unconscious. She slipped a C-collar around his neck and a blood pressure cuff around his upper arm, while Rye set his leg where the tibia and fibula were broken. She stared at the cuff in disbelief, re-adjusted it on his upper arm and began pumping the bulb again. She stabbed at his neck for a pulse.

“We’re losing him!” she cried, as she sliced through the leather jacket.

Rye looked up from his splinting to see a blood-soaked shirt as Claire tore away Rusty’s jacket and began palpating.

“We’ve got a bleeder. Lung collapsed, heart compressed,” Claire said as she attempted to re-inflate his lung without success. One rib poked out through his side and when she moved it, blood bubbled out. The pressure pad couldn’t stem the flow. She tried a series of pressure points and still the blood gushed. She watched in frustration as the man’s blood pressure plummeted. Unable to stop his bleeding at the scene, they finally loaded him into the ambulance.

Claire drove while Rye rode in the back. If he could slow the blood loss there might be a chance once they reached the hospital. Fifteen minutes later, Rusty Kidding was DOA at Medford General Hospital.

Claire jumped from the cab and ran to the back of the ambulance. She flung open the double doors and looked first at Rusty’s inert body then at Rye who simply shook his head.

“It would have been a miracle if he’d survived.”

Together they pulled the corpse from the ambulance. It was covered from head to toe with a blanket and strapped onto the gurney.

“I’ll take him in,” Claire said.

Rye held onto his end of the gurney for a minute. “Are you sure you’re OK with this?”

“Yeah fine, the paperwork’s all yours.”

Rye stayed in the ambulance jotting down notes they’d use later in their report while Claire rolled the gurney up the ramp leading to the front of the hospital. A hundred yards from the entrance the path turned off heading down toward the morgue.

Normal procedure was for her to be met by two morgue assistants, so she was surprised when a doctor came up to her holding a clipboard. She extended her hand. “Hello, I’m Claire Anderson, Mad Dash Ambulance.”

The doctor smiled shaking her hand. “Glad to meet you, Claire, I’ll take it from here.” He laid the clipboard on the end of the gurney, pulled a pen from his pocket and handed it to Claire. Taking the pen, she signed off on Rusty, then looked up still puzzled at the doctor’s presence.