Tony Scott - Along Came COVID - Love and Loss in the 2020 Pandemic

“I hope she likes puzzles and board games.”

“You might want to find a class on how to dress Barbie and Ken.”

“You Tube.” Josh felt warm inside. “I don’t care what she likes. I will like it too.”

“Me too,” she muttered snuggling up to him. “I can’t wait until I can feel her move.”

“We need a crib.”

“Where is she going to sleep?”

Josh looked around as if he were home in the bedroom. “In our bedroom at first. Then later in the study. There’s room for the roll-top in the living room.”

“It would show off better there.”

Josh snickered. “Like we’ll be having guests. At the rate the virus is going, we might be stuck here for a long time.”

“I’m OK with that,” she said, giving him the melting look he loved. “Mostly it is how we are living now. Who has time for guests? And after Cori comes, we will be even more time-constrained.”

“I can’t wait.”

Josh awoke, laying on his right side, feeling hot and sweaty. He felt Faith breathing fire on his shoulder, her burning hot body tightly spooning. Before he could turn to look at her, she shivered, and his gut wrenched.

“I’m freezing,” she whispered.

“You’re hot as fire!” he said. “Let me get you a couple Tylenol.”

He was back in a flash. She took the Tylenol, drank a little of the water, and he tucked her in with the comforter and the blanket from the bed folded in half.

He laid back down, hoping to get some sleep before a call day. In two hours, he awoke to her shivering again. Since he had only given her two regular strength Tylenol, he gave her two more.

“Thank you,” she whispered. He looked at her eyes, red and watery.

He settled back to bed only to awaken to her groaning. “I have to go to the bathroom, but I’m so stiff it hurts to move.”

He looked at the bedside clock. Five thirty. Almost time to get up. She came back from the bathroom, sweaty. “Good, maybe your fever has broken.” He gave her more Tylenol, offered her a dry nightgown, and tucked her in using towels.

Before he knew it, it was seven fifteen, when rounds should already have started. He had never been late before. The thought quickly vanished as she shivered and moaned.

He found Gatorade in the refrigerator but had to coax her to drink it.

“My arms and legs hurt so bad,” she said. “It’s almost painful to breathe.”

Compelled to reveal his fear, he muttered, “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”

“COVID?” she answered.

He nodded. She didn’t protest. She didn’t feel as hot, so he left her under her piles of covers and took a shower.

Health officials were asking patients to call before coming to the emergency department, so Josh made the call. After numerous trips there to evaluate patients who might need obstetric or gynecologic admission, he had several numbers in his cell phone. He dialed the one to the charting station.

“Emergency Department, Ian.” Both Faith and Josh knew Ian well.

“Ian, Josh Menkowicz.”

“Josh, what’s up?”

“Faith is sick.”

“Uh-oh.”

“Yeah. She had chills early this morning, and now has muscle aches. I don’t have a thermometer, but she was burning hot after midnight. She got better with three doses of Tylenol, but now she says the muscle aches are severe. She has psoriatic arthritis on Humira. Do I need to bring her? Oh, and she’s sixteen weeks pregnant.”

“Would you guys admit her?” Ian asked.

“Only if she needs oxygen.”

“Yeah, bring her. Text me when you’re here.”

“Faith,” Josh whispered, touching her shoulder to arouse her. “I need to take you to the ED so we can test you for COVID and measure your pulse ox.”

She looked at him for a few seconds as if he had offered anchovy ice cream, then popped her head up to look at the clock. “Is it already after eight? I’m so sore.”

Josh found sweatpants, matching sweatshirt, bra, socks, and tennis shoes and helped her put them on. She struggled with each item, and he encouraged her to drink Gatorade in between garments.

“You like orange,” he encouraged, hoping she would drink more.

“I can’t tell what flavor it is.”

He helped her totter to the bathroom. She brushed her teeth, while he combed her hair, and tied up a ponytail.

“Jeez, who is that?” she asked the mirror.

He offered more liquids, “I can’t do that stuff.” She stuck her tongue out.

Crouched over with her arms folded in front of her, he led her shivering to the front door. Even though it wasn’t cold outside, he grabbed a jacket and put it over her.

The flight of steps was arduous, requiring two stops to complete, and he could tell the bright sunshine was miserable for her. His car was nearby, and he prodded her into the passenger seat. She leaned back against the headrest and closed her eyes. He drove through morning traffic to the emergency entrance.

Inside, she was quickly placed in a room, and someone in full PPE took her temperature, blood pressure, and pulse. A pulse ox probe was placed on her finger, a swab went in her throat, and another swab deep in her nose.

“That was ugly.”

The nurse agreed. “Isn’t it? Sorry.”

In record time, Ian, in PPE, came to talk to her. “You have a high fever. We’ll test you for influenza, strep, and coronavirus. Your pulse ox is marginal. In light of the pregnancy, I think you should use a low dose of oxygen.”

“OK,” Faith whispered. “Where’s Josh?”

“We don’t want him to come in. We’ll test him and put him in PPE later.”

A respiratory therapy tech entered the room, also in PPE, and attached little tubes in Faith’s nose, hooked it to the wall, and started the flow of oxygen. The tech had no more than left when Ann entered the room.

“Good morning,” Ann said. “I heard you feel like death warmed over.”

“I do.”

“We’ll pump you full of Tylenol, find you a room, and take good care of you.”

“And Cori.”

“Cori?” Ann smiled. “Good name.”

Josh headed for the small conference room where he planted himself in a chair. His heart was pounding. The impact of the last few hours now landed on his shoulders, and he took stock of what had happened and the implications.

He dialed Natalie. “Hi, Josh. What’s up?”

“Faith is sick,” he wheezed. “After midnight she woke me up and had a high fever. She was burning up. I gave her some Tylenol, but in a few hours she was hot again. I gave her more Tylenol and Gatorade. By this morning, she was stiff and achy, and said she couldn’t taste her Gatorade. We brought her to the hospital, and she’s on oxygen.”

“Oh, Josh,” Nat blubbered. “Is she going to die?”

“I hope not. The good news is that she isn’t progressing the way the three patients we had who died, but the bad news is that she is on Humira and she’s pregnant.”

“What does the Humira have to do with it?”

“It is an immunosuppressant, so it might make her body not fight as hard.”

“Is pregnancy bad with COVID?”

“Yes. Pregnant patients are more susceptible to severe disease.”

“But I thought her age group rarely had trouble.”

“Yes. But she’s pregnant and on Humira.”

“So, what happens next?”

“We wait and see. We don’t have any treatments that work, we don’t know enough about the virus to actually know what to do, and unlike other diseases we don’t have a way to know where this leads.”

“This is bad news, Josh,” she said.

“Can you tell your parents?”

“Yes. They aren’t here right now, but I can call Dad.”

“You can call me back if you want to. Faith has her phone. I’m warning you, though, she sounds terrible when she talks, and she coughs a lot.”