Ken Douglas: Death Glitch

She counted to thirty, guessing that would be enough time for the woman to shed her scrubs and get into the shower. Then she gave herself a count to fifteen, before stepping out of the stairway and crossing to the locker room. Inside, she heard the shower running and she found the woman’s locker open.

Izzy pulled out a pair of scrubs, stepped into them. She spotted a couple pair of grey Nikes, one pair well worn, one pair obviously new. She grabbed a pair of socks, put them on, then slid her feet into the new pair. Her new body demanded the new shoes, but unfortunately they were a little tight. Beggars can’t be choosers, she thought as she laced them up. In less than a minute after she’d entered the locker room, she left it and was back in the hall, heading this time for the elevator, which would take her to the ground floor and freedom.

She decided to leave the hospital through the emergency room exit, but when she got there she saw attendings, interns and nurses galore, standing at the ready. Something bad had happened and they were waiting to try and right some of the wrongs.

“ What happened?” Izzy heard a young nurse ask.

“ Gangbanger shot into a car full of people, caused a major accident at the Spaghetti Bowl,” a much older nurse answered.

She couldn’t leave with them standing there, not dressed the way she was. And she couldn’t turn her back and walk away either. She was wearing scrubs and though she had no name tag around her neck, she looked like a doctor. All she could do was stand and wait till the casualties arrived, then make her way out of the hospital during the confusion.

She heard sirens. Any minute the ER was going to be a beehive of activity. She couldn’t stand around unnoticed. She’d be required to do something. She looked around, headed for the restrooms. She’d hide out in the women’s till it was safe for her to make her exit.

Inside the restroom, she picked a stall, went in, closed the door, sat on the toilet to wait and her mind went straight to the fact that not only was she not dead, but she wasn’t old anymore. This was impossible. How could such a thing have happened? God, aliens, a youth ray turned on her by some genius scientist? Whatever, it couldn’t last, could it?

She closed her eyes, watched psychedelic images swirl around on the inside of her eyelids. Reds and greens and blues like she’d never seen before. Was she on drugs? Was this whole thing an hallucination? Whatever it was, she had to figure it out.

And she had to get ahold of Amy and warn her about Lila Booth. Maybe she already had, but maybe Amy hadn’t been at that ball last night.

Was it only last night? Or had she been in some kind of suspended animation? No, it wasn’t that. She’d been in the hospital morgue, that she knew for sure. And there was only one reason she’d’ve been there with a toe tag. She’d been dead.

Thinking about it was giving her a headache. She had to do something. It was time to go. She got off the toilet. She’d be home soon, then she could figure it all out.

When she left the restroom, she was confronted with orderly chaos. Everybody seemed to be busy saving lives, doing what doctors and nurses did in an emergency. She started for the exit.

“ Where’s Dr. Shaffer!” the young intern Izzy had seen earlier shouted. “If he doesn’t get here quick we’re gonna lose this one.”

“ What is it?” an older doctor, one Izzy didn’t know, one who looked like he had a foot in the grave, said.

“ Look at this X-ray, she’s got a bullet in her heart.” She was sweating bullets. “It’s beyond me.”

“ Me too,” the old guy said.

“ Shaffer’s halfway between here and Carson City,” a woman in black said, black skirt, black blouse. “He’s twenty minutes away.”

“ Shit,” Izzy muttered. Then, “I’m a heart surgeon, maybe I can help.” She moved passed them. The patient was a young woman, she was on her side, nude from the waist up. There was an entrance would in her back, no exit would. “Let me see that.” She snatched the CXR out of the intern’s hands, looked at the chest X-ray. “Double shit.”

“ Who are you?” the older doctor, named Irwin Shaw, according to his nametag, said.

“ I’m going to need an OR,” Izzy said. “OR 3 would be good.” She gave the older guy a look. “You any good?”

“ Who’s asking?” His hands were shaking.

“ You shouldn’t be here.” She recognized the symptoms. He was a drunk in need of a drink. “I don’t want you anywhere near my OR.”

“ How about you?” She turned to the intern. “Who are you and have you ever assisted in open heart surgery?”

“ Kathy Wells, and yes, I’ve assisted Dr. Shaffer several times.”

“ If you’re good enough for Aaron, you’re good enough for me,” Izzy said.

“ Wait a minute!” Shaw said.

“ I don’t have a minute.” Izzy turned to the woman in black. “You must be Aaron’s right hand woman, Belinda Quinn, right?”

“ Yes.”

“ Fine, get me a perfusionist, an anesthesiologist, the best two surgical nurses you can muster up and get them all into OR 3.”

“ I don’t know, Dr. Shaffer will be here in twenty minutes.”

“ And this young woman will have been ten minutes dead.” Izzy turned to the intern. “We’re going now.” Back to Quinn. “Do your job.” To an orderly who was watching. “Let’s move her on up.” She clapped her hands. “Now, do it now!”

“ Yes, ma’am.” The orderly went to the gurney.

“ Dr. Shaffer’s not answering his cell,” Shaw said.

“ I said move it, Belinda.” Izzy felt the walls closing in.

“ Okay, okay,” Quinn said.

“ There’s a bullet in my heart?”

“ What?” Izzy said. “She’s conscious?”

“ Where’s my daughter? Is she okay?”

“ She has a daughter?” Izzy said. “Where?”

“ Your little girl is fine.” Kathy Wells pointed and all heads turned to the other side of the glass wall. There was a little girl there, four or maybe five years old. She was alone.

“ For God’s sake, get her!” Izzy said. “Bring her here.” She turned to Shaw. “You do it!”

“ Who are you?” Shaw was getting to be a real pain.

“ Get the girl,” Quinn said. Then to Izzy, “Well, who are you?”

Izzy was stuck. She’d stuck herself in where she didn’t belong, but she hadn’t any choice. She had to say something, had to make it believable.

“ I’m Dr. Linda Eisenhower. My mother is Dr. Isadora Eisenhower,” she said, making up a fictional daughter. “I’m sure you’ve heard of her, because she practiced here for years.”

“ I came after she left,” Quinn said.

Shaw was approaching with the girl.

“ What are you doing here?” Quinn said.

“ I practice in London, at St. Thomas,” Izzy lied. “Aaron’s trying to recruit me. I was going to observe him today and talk after.”

“ Good enough for me.” Shaw was back with the girl.

“ So, you’re not licensed here?”

“ Mommy!” The child was frightened.

“ Is it true? Am I going to die if I don’t get an operation right away,” the woman on the gurney said.

“ Yes,” Izzy said.

“ Then do it.” She was very weak. It was a miracle she was conscious.

“ Blood pressure is 84 over 42, down from 95 over 55,” Kathy Wells said. “We have to do something!”

“ She’s passed out,” Shaw said.

“ Save my mom,” the child said.

“ We will,” Izzy said.

“ You can’t operate in this hospital,” Belinda Quinn said.

“ Heart rate is up from 110 to 120.”

“ Shit, we’re going now,” Izzy said. “We’ll worry about the legal after.”

“ Okay.” Quinn nodded to the orderly. “Take her up.”