Eye Contact Page 6

  “Try to relax now. I need to examine your belly,” I requested, not able to shake the odd feeling I was learning I always had when making any kind of contact with him. It was a bizarre vibe, a sensation unlike any other feeling I had ever experienced with a patient before.

  He remained still despite his body’s systemic reaction, obeying my requests. I looked at his abdomen, the dressing still intact, and slowly lifted the edge of the tape to reveal his incision. The staples were in place without any signs of infection surrounding the wound, only bruising in various colors and stages of healing.

  “Your incision looks perfect. I know it’s tender but I need to listen,” I cautioned before placing my stethoscope over the four quadrants of his abdomen, his muscles slightly contracting underneath my touch as I moved the chilly instrument around. I expected the hypoactive bowel sounds and retracted my bell as soon as I could. “I’m not going to remove the dressing on your chest right now, but we’ll leave this one off of your stomach. It needs to breathe a bit.”

  Right at that moment, the bubbly nurse reentered the room.

  “Still doing okay?” she inquired as she moved to empty his Foley catheter bag. “Need anything?”

  “I don’t think so. We’re all set in here. He’s definitely more responsive, and I’m very reassured by all of this. I’d like to see him extubated either tonight or tomorrow morning. Let’s clear that with cardiology first and move toward making that happen.”

  “Will do.”

  “Also, I removed his abdominal dressing. Leave it open to air, and it can get wet with his bed bath later.”

  “Great. I’ll take care of that this evening.”

  “I’m on all night so please page me if there’s any change,” I requested, really wanting to be there when he was extubated.

  ***

  It was just after 4 o’clock Saturday morning when I got the page with the ICU’s extension. I wiped the sleep out of my eyes and dialed the number.

  “This is Dr. Fine. Someone paged.”

  “Your patient is awake,” I heard from the other end of the line.

  “I’m sorry, what?”

  “Vaughn Bennett, in room seven—he’s waking up.”

  “I’ll be right up.”

  Chapter 8

  Andie

  Hundreds, maybe even thousands by now? I honestly had no idea exactly how many, but I had come across numerous people in my short medical career. They were either my patients or ones I’d had some level of involvement with. People of all walks of life at some point need medical care, every size, shape, race, gender, religion, every imaginable socioeconomic position, marital status, sexual preference, and political affiliation. People with crazy colors of hair in all kinds of wacky styles, people covered in tattoos or various body modifications, and all along the spectrum to the other end of overly clothed prude conservatives who were too modest to expose themselves to even a doctor or nurse—I’d seen it all.

  Of all of the people I’d ever encountered practicing medicine, no one had ever shaken me to my core like Vaughn Bennett had.

  I walked briskly from my call room to the elevators to go down to the ICU and was entering his room in no time. At least three nurses and a respiratory therapist were already in there, and from the talking and activity I could hear, it seemed like he was in some sort of a combative state. It wasn’t the most uncommon scene ever with a patient coming off of anesthesia or sedation and was usually expected to some degree for someone in the process of extubating himself.

  The male nurse noticed my entrance into the room and acknowledged my presence in the chaos. “Dr. Fine? Can you give us a hand?” With a quick glance around, I ascertained that one of the patient’s wrists was already secured to the side of the bed with a soft cuff strap restraint and they were attempting to fasten the other wrist to the bed frame, a process the patient was successfully fighting against.

  “Mr. Bennett?” I spoke up, trying to get his attention. He relaxed his left arm from its contracted state and turned his head to me. “Vaughn, is it? I’m Dr. Fine, your surgeon. Can you relax for me?”

  His entire body went still and his eyes were glued to mine. It was unnerving, yet I couldn’t look away. I took two more slow but intentional steps toward his bed, his gaze never wavering, boring into me.

  “You want that tube out, huh?” I asked him, using as calm a tone as I could despite my racing heart and rapid breathing. He gave a slight nod to answer me. “We can help you with that, but you’ve got to calm down and help us. We don’t want you to hurt yourself.” He blinked but followed me with his intense stare as I rounded his bed to go to his left side. Reaching for the wrist restraint, I slipped it out of the nurse’s grip and extended my left hand to grasp his.

  “We can leave this hand untied, okay? As long as you can show me you’re not going to grab for anything.” I gently rubbed my thumb over the top of his hand to try to reassure him and earn some trust. Turning my head away from his, I requested that the nurse administer a little medication in his IV to help him relax some more. The spoken request immediately garnered a response from him in the form of a firm squeeze of my hand that was still grasping his. He was shaking his head vehemently.

  “You don’t want something to help relax you?” I inquired, surprised by his reaction.

  He shook his head from side to side, his eyes continuing to penetrate mine.

  “Okay, I understand. We don’t have to give you any more drugs,” I said reassuringly, the relief on his face clear. “I do need to ask you and the nurses a few things to make sure it’s safe for us to take that tube out.” His expression was agreeable.

  Directing my attention to the nurses, I began trying to get a complete picture of his respiratory status to evaluate whether or not he met the criteria for extubation.

  “Who’s taking care of Mr. Bennett tonight?” I asked the room.

  An attractive young nurse, all of five feet tall and weighing no more than a hundred pounds soaking wet, spoke up and stepped forward. “I am. I was in another room when the monitor tech paged me saying his telemetry was reading sinus tach with artifact. By the time I got in here to fix it, he was so agitated he had already pulled out his IV and was going for the ET tube.” Her mousey voice was obviously annoyed at having walked into that scenario.

  Looking at the patient, I addressed his agitated state. “Were you upset because you were in pain?” He shook his head. “Some of these medications we’ve had you on can make you a little disoriented. Do you know where you are?” Instead of nodding, he darted his eyes around the room, looking frustrated at his inability to speak. I could tell he wanted to answer my questions but couldn’t.

  “It’s okay,” I said, hoping to comfort him. Reaching for my stethoscope, I discovered that it wasn’t around my neck. I must have forgotten to grab it when I rushed upstairs from my call room. “Can I borrow a stethoscope?” I asked the nurses, and one was handed to me instantly. I listened, directing him to inhale a deep breath when I needed him to, the commands followed perfectly. His lungs were clear.

  “Has he been on CPAP all night?” I questioned, the nurse confirming and chiming in with information she knew I would need to know, including his PaO2 and FIO2, NIF score, and vital signs trend.

  “I know you can squeeze my hand since you did a minute ago. How’s your strength in the other hand?” I challenged while putting two fingers in his grasp. He squeezed them with decent tone and strength, just as I’d anticipated. I moved to lift the light weight blanket off of his legs.

  “It may be difficult on your right leg with the fracture but can you wiggle your toes?” Toes quickly wiggled on both feet, and I smiled at him. “Great. You did a great job. We’re going to take that tube out of your throat now.” A few people left the room quietly, determining that the situation was under control and they were no longer needed. Bennett’s eyes were steadily on mine, deep and severe. I tried to maintain a calm voice as I instructed him on the plan, but I felt nothing resembli
ng calm. Something about him, about his intensity…it rendered me shaken.

  “Just to tell you what to expect, I’m going to have our respiratory therapist, Dave, here step over to the head of your bed. He’ll peel some of that tape away and deflate a tiny balloon that’s keeping the tube in place. Then we’ll ask you to give us a good cough. While you’re coughing, he will slide the tube up and out.”

  Bennett exhaled a breath of relief and closed his eyes for a moment with an expression of gratitude.

  “It’s going to feel a bit uncomfortable—the tube coming out. Try to remain calm,” I urged. He nodded, reaffirming his intention to cooperate. “Once the tube is out, you’ll likely cough a few times. It’s important that you try to breathe slow and steady breaths, almost like you’re breathing through a straw. You think you can do that for me?”

  He slowly blinked and nodded yes.

  The nurse made sure the pulse oximeter was secure on his finger and I gestured to Dave that we were ready. He instructed our patient to give him a big cough, which he attempted to do. With one smooth and deliberate pull, the tube was disconnected and removed from his throat.

  Bennett’s eyes grew wider and he coughed repeatedly, his airway irritated from the foreign object’s presence. He gasped for air and I reminded him, “Slow down. Get control of your breaths, nice and slow, through a straw, or like you’re blowing out candles.” He responded beautifully, doing exactly as I said.

  Dave proceeded to place a nasal cannula into his nostrils to deliver some supplemental oxygen, earning me an annoyed look from the patient. I offered an apologetic smile and we all just stood for a moment, allowing him to catch his breath and settle down.

  After taking a few moments to get his composure, Vaughn Bennett opened his mouth to speak. He cleared his throat again, squeezing his eyes tightly closed as if in pain, and looked into my eyes. He mined into me with that look, a palpable connection present as if no one else was in the room. His expression, already powerful, was further heightened by the low, raspy sound of his voice.

  “Thank you,” he said, and my skin erupted in goose bumps.

  The corners of his lips turned up slightly into a grateful smile and I thought, Oh shit.

  Chapter 9

  Vaughn

  My God.

  She was beautiful.

  When I’d heard her voice before, it sounded so far away and ethereal, I was sure she was an angel—but there she was, in my room, all too real. The eyes that had consumed my daydreams and nightmares for years may very well have been right in front of my face.

  For years, I could remember that day in shattered pieces, flashes of brief moments, only seconds at a time and often in disjointed parts, as if pieces of the puzzle were missing. The recollection sometimes knocked the breath out of me all over again. The only vivid part of the memory was her eyes, every freckle in her irises seared into my mind. The brilliant color, the varying stripes of tissue, every shadow and dimension burned into me. For years the image had haunted me…tortured me. I’d spent countless hours trying, searching, only to get discouraged and give up. No matter what I attempted to distract myself with, the memory of her wouldn’t release its hold…and now there it was, staring me directly in the face, in person again.

  I thought I was going to have to kill someone or myself to get that damn tube out of my throat. The hazy stupor I’d been trapped in for who knew how long had finally begun to lift enough for me to recognize I was in a hospital—the last place I wanted to be. I remembered the accident, or most of it, until it all faded to black. I could blame it on that champagne-colored SUV and try to tell myself they were driving out of control and cut me off, but that would all be a lie. I was the one who was driving erratically, weaving in and out of traffic on my bike like I was invincible. Stupid. I should have known better. I was just so out of my mind that night after seeing yet again how well Matt was doing, at least according to his social media posts. Such a charmed life with a beautiful girlfriend, great apartment on the south bank with a river view, and let’s not forget his amazing job with a marketing firm, one he never would’ve been able to land with a criminal record. Jacob and Esau, the real-life edition—the shadier brother relaxing his moral compass whenever it was convenient to earn good fortune.

  But hey, that’s what brothers do, right? At least, that’s what Esau did.

  I shouldn’t have even let him affect me like that. I should have been focused on making the most of what I had and finding a way to get past all of that history.

  I needed to relish the fact that I was there, alive…and I’d finally found her.

  “Mr. Bennett, do you know where you are?”

  I nodded my head up and down.

  “Can you try to talk?” she requested. “Your throat will be sore and your voice hoarse for a while, but if you can try to speak, I need to know that you—”

  “The hospital,” I choked out with effort. “I was in an accident…on my bike.”

  “Yes. That’s right.”

  The nurse ambled around the room, pushing buttons on the monitors and turning off my IV pump that apparently was dripping all over the floor since I had ripped it out of my arm. I hadn’t meant to go all spider monkey on my tubes, but it happened so fast. Before I could successfully get that breathing tube out, there were four people on me, tying down my hands. That huge ogre of a male nurse who looked like he hadn’t missed a day at the gym in the last five years almost had me…until she walked in.

  The doctor pulled the heavy visitor’s chair closer to the bed to take a seat, the sound of it scraping against the floor reminding me how badly my head was pounding.

  “Do you know what day it is?” she inquired kindly.

  “Not sure. Maybe Friday?” A complete guess.

  “Close. It’s Saturday morning. You came into the ER last Sunday morning.”

  “Almost a week,” I stated after a brief pause, reaching up to run my hand over the thick stubble that had grown on my face in that time. “What happened to my stomach?”

  “You sustained a great deal of injuries in the accident. I had to rush you to surgery and open up your abdomen.”

  “You did?” She was beautiful, smart, talented—of course she would save lives for a living.

  “Yes, sir,” she confirmed with a hint of offense in her tone. I hadn’t meant to offend her. “I had to remove your spleen.”

  “My…spleen?”

  “You can survive just fine without it, don’t worry. Your immune system will be affected and you’ll need to be careful with infections and illnesses, but it will be manageable.” I didn’t really understand the depth of her explanation, but what was done was done, and I could figure it all out with time.

  “And my leg?”

  “A fractured fibula. You’ll be casted for a while but it’s a non-weight-bearing bone so your mobility will be decent after a couple weeks on crutches.” She relaxed back into her chair, crossing her right leg over her left. “Are you in a lot of pain?”

  “Some, but I don’t want any more drugs. I hate that shi—stuff. I don’t like the way it makes me feel.” The more I spoke, the more raw I realized my throat was.

  “I understand, but you’ll likely need something, even if only a low-dose narcotic every few hours. You have quite a few healing injuries in addition to the huge surgical wound down the center of your abdomen.”

  “My head is the only thing that hurts right now,” I confessed, closing my eyes for a moment to give myself a break from the light.

  The doctor rose from her chair, a click pen in hand, and brought her face close to mine, telling me to look at her right ear, but all I could focus on was how close she was to me and the clean scent of her perfume: flowers and clean laundry. She interrupted my moment to blind me with an evil spotlight of hell, my eyes immediately squinting closed to fight the painful assault.

  “Pain?” she teased, although her face wasn’t teasing. She was serious.

  “Hell yes, pain! My head is throbbi
ng, doc.”

  “Do you feel nauseated?”

  I wasn’t sure but I shook my head no to keep her from prodding at me with her blinding lights anymore.

  “We need to keep a close eye on you and your headaches. If you begin to feel nauseated at all, have any blurry vision, or if the light sensitivity gets any worse, I need to know.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I answered, receiving a strange look from her. Was she offended again?

  “I’ll let you get some rest. Try to take it easy, and no more fighting the nurses.”

  “I’ll be a good patient, promise.”

  “Seriously, Mr. Bennett—”

  “Vaughn. Call me Vaughn,” I interrupted.

  “Vaughn, you have a long road to recovery. You’re lucky to be alive.”

  “I don’t believe in luck.”

  She looked at me as if my comment unnerved her or made her uncomfortable.

  “I’ll let you get some rest then,” she announced after an awkward pause, turning to leave.

  “Hey, doc?” I called out. She turned and locked eyes with me again. “What’s your name?”

  “Dr. Fine,” she answered softly, shifting her weight nervously. “Andie Fine.”

  “Thank you again, Dr. Fine.” I loved the way her name sounded on my tongue.

  Chapter 10

  Vaughn

  The second she left my room, I felt the loss deep in my chest. My room wasn’t empty just yet as my nurse darted about resetting monitors and pumps and talking incessantly the entire time about my “plan of care” and all of my “goals” being met. I wanted to tell her where she could stick her goals. I only had one goal, and it was to reconnect with Dr. Fine.

  My nurse didn’t hesitate in barbing my arm with another IV needle, chastising me during the entire process about pulling the other one out. I apologized and assured her I wouldn’t repeat the offense. She reconnected my fluids and explained that she was hanging an IV antibiotic that was very important to my healing process. She also rambled on about how I needed to get up and get moving. The look on my face apparently matched my internal thoughts since she glanced over and immediately got defensive, telling me it was imperative that I get back on my feet as soon as possible. I mostly zoned out, her voice grating on my throbbing headache like nails on a chalkboard, but I managed to catch a few words here and there. Blood clot, embolism, physical therapy, ambulate, diet…wait, she said diet.