Robin Cook - Contagion

Susanne was a firm believer in the adage If something can go wrong, it will go wrong. She felt this way particularly in relation to hospitals. Indeed, on her last admission, she’d been carted off to urology to face some frightful procedure before she’d finally been able to convince a reluctant technician to read the name on her wristband. They’d had the wrong patient.

On her present admission Susanne wasn’t sick. The previous night her labor had started with her second child. In addition to her back problem, her pelvis was distorted, making a normal vaginal delivery impossible. As with her first child, she had to have a cesarean section.

Since she’d just undergone abdominal surgery, her doctor insisted that she stay at least a few days. No amount of cajoling on Susanne’s part had been successful in convincing the doctor otherwise.

Susanne tried to relax by wondering what kind of child she’d just birthed. Would he be like his brother, Allen, who had been a wonderful baby? Allen had slept through the night almost from day one. He’d been a delight, and now that he was three and already exerting independence, Susanne was looking forward to a new baby. She thought of herself as a natural mother.

With a start, Susanne awoke. She’d surprised herself by nodding off. What had awakened her was a white-clad figure fiddling with the IV bottles that hung from a pole at the head of her bed.

“What are you doing?” Susanne asked. She felt paranoid about anybody doing anything she didn’t know about.

“Sorry to have awakened you, Mrs. Hard,” a nurse said. “I was just hanging up a new bottle of fluid. Yours is just about out.”

Susanne glanced at the IV snaking into the back of her hand. As an experienced hospital patient, she suggested that it was time for the IV to come out.

“Maybe I should check on that,” the nurse said. She then waltzed out of the room.

Tilting her head back, Susanne looked at the IV bottle to see what it was. It was upside down, so she couldn’t read the label.

She started to turn over, but a sharp pain reminded her of her recently sutured incision. She decided to stay on her back.

Gingerly she took a deep breath. She didn’t feel any discomfort until right at the end of inspiration.

Closing her eyes, Susanne tried again to calm down. She knew that she still had a significant amount of drugs “on board” from the anesthesia, so sleep should be easy. The trouble was, she didn’t know if she wanted to be asleep with so many people coming in and out of her room.

A very soft clank of plastic hitting plastic drifted out of the background noise of the hospital and caught Susanne’s attention. Her eyes blinked open. She saw an orderly off to the side by the bureau.

“Excuse me,” Susanne called.

The man turned around. He was a handsome fellow in a white coat over scrubs. From where he was standing, Susanne could not read his name tag. He appeared surprised to be addressed.

“I hope I didn’t disturb you, ma’am,” the young man said.

“Everybody is disturbing me,” Susanne said without malice. “It’s like Grand Central Station in here.”

“I’m terribly sorry,” the man said. “I can always return later if it would be more convenient.”

“What are you doing?” Susanne asked.

“Just filling your humidifier,” the man said.

“What do I have a humidifier for?” Susanne said. “I didn’t have one after my last cesarean.”

“The anesthesiologists frequently order them this time of year,” the man said. “Right after surgery, patients’ throats are often irritated from the endotracheal tube. It’s usually helpful to use a humidifier for the first day or even the first few hours. In what month did you have your last cesarean?”

“May,” Susanne said.

“That’s probably the reason you didn’t have one then,” the man said. “Would you like me to return?”

“Do what you have to do,” Susanne said.

No sooner had the man left than the original nurse returned. “You were right,” she said. “The orders were to pull the IV as soon as the bottle was through.”

Susanne merely nodded. She felt like asking the nurse if missing orders was something she did on a regular basis. Susanne sighed. She wanted out of there.

After the nurse had removed the IV, Susanne managed to calm herself enough to fall back asleep. But it didn’t last long. Someone was nudging her arm.

Susanne opened her eyes and looked into the face of another smiling nurse. In the foreground and between them was a five-cc syringe.

“I’ve got something for you,” the nurse said as if Susanne were a toddler and the syringe candy.

“What is it?” Susanne demanded. She instinctively pulled away.

“It’s the pain shot you requested,” the nurse said. “So roll over and I’ll give it to you.”

“I didn’t request a pain shot,” Susanne said.

“But of course you did,” the nurse said.

“But I didn’t,” Susanne said.

The nurse’s expression changed to exasperation like a cloud passing over the sun. “Well then, it’s doctor’s orders. You are supposed to have a pain shot every six hours.”

“But I don’t have much pain,” Susanne said. “Only when I move or breathe deeply.”

“There you are,” the nurse said. “You have to breathe deeply, otherwise you’ll get pneumonia. Come on now, be a good girl.”

Susanne thought for a moment. On the one hand she felt like being contrary. On the other hand she wanted to be taken care of and there was nothing inherently wrong with a pain shot. It might even make her sleep better.

“Okay,” Susanne said.

Gritting her teeth, she managed to roll to the side as the nurse bared her bottom.

“You know, Laurie’s right,” Chet McGovern said.

Chet and Jack were sitting in the narrow office they shared on the fifth floor of the medical examiner’s building. They both had their feet up on their respective gray metal desks. They’d finished their autopsies for the day, eaten lunch, and were now supposedly doing their paperwork.

“Of course she’s right,” Jack agreed.

“But if you know that, why do you provoke Calvin? It’s not rational. You’re not doing yourself any favors. It’s going to affect your promotion up through the system.”

“I don’t want to rise up in the system,” Jack said.

“Come again?” Chet asked. In the grand scheme of medicine, the concept of not wanting to get ahead was heresy.

Jack let his feet fall off the desk and thump onto the floor. He stood up, stretched, and yawned loudly. Jack was a stocky, six-foot man accustomed to serious physical activity. He found that standing at the autopsy table and sitting at a desk tended to cause his muscles to cramp, particularly his quadriceps.

“I’m happy being a low man on the totem pole,” Jack said, cracking his knuckles.

“You don’t want to become board certified?” Chet asked with surprise.

“Ah, of course I want to be board certified,” Jack said. “But that’s not the same issue. As far as I’m concerned, becoming board certified is a personal thing. What I don’t care about is having supervisory responsibility. I just want to do forensic pathology. To hell with bureaucracy and red tape.”

“Jesus,” Chet remarked, letting his own feet fall to the floor. “Every time I think I get to know you a little, you throw me a curveball. I mean, we’ve been sharing this office for almost five months. You’re still a mystery. I don’t even know where the hell you live.”

“I didn’t know you cared,” Jack teased.

“Come on,” Chet said. “You know what I mean.”