had entered the room to help, as did two additional nurses. Ten eyes focused on the cardiac monitor. The seizures slowed, then stopped. The monitor displayed the normal rhythm and echoed the reassuring regular beeps.
“We need to get to the Coronary Care Unit quickly!” said Bev.
As we wheeled the stretcher through the exam room door leading to the elevator, the patient resumed groggy consciousness.
“Damn, my chest really hurts!” He focused on me, paused, then said, “I’m going to look for you, buddy, when this is over.”
We wheeled him quickly through the ER, into the elevator, then into the Coronary Care Unit where expert hands took over.
Ben, Bev, and I sat quietly in our small, now-cluttered work area. Three untouched steaming cups of coffee and three large chocolate donuts rested in front of us. Ben’s warm smile was gone, his hair was rumpled, and his hands rested in his lap. Bev no longer smiled or frowned, and her left eye twitched constantly. My insides were empty, spent. Bev looked up first to Ben, then to me, and said, “Just walked outside. It’s dawn. The sun is rising. The moon has set. We should be OK now.”
Ben and I both sighed, but neither of us corrected her.
Ten days later, at the night shift start, Bev poked her alert face around the corner, both eyes arched but not twitching, and said, “Someone here to see you, Doc.”
A well dressed, balding, middle-aged businessman appeared around the corner, a serious expression on his face. Had he at last returned to even the score? A wide smile broke out on his face, and his hand extended to mine.
“Thank you, Doc, for a really good punch. I’m going home today!”
SPECIAL GIRLS DAY
The hospital doctor conference room at University of Michigan Hospital was a long, grey rectangle cluttered with patient medical charts and numerous paper laboratory slips. Electronic medical records and computers were decades away. A small conference table and a set of folding chairs occupied the room’s center. A single window peered out onto a spring courtyard, permitting a thin ray of sunlight to reflect off the wall. The chalkboard was full of patient lists divided by student and intern responsibilities; the probable working diagnosis was handwritten under each name. The room was quiet. The overhead lights were off.
I reclined in one of the folding chairs, feet propped up on the table, eyes closed. My short white coat and starched white pants were crumpled and stained with sweat, patient urine, blood, and pocket ink. My tie was loose and my face carried a two-day beard. It was 5 p.m. on Monday afternoon, the end of a marathon weekend of hospital call rotation. Leaving our apartment at 7 a.m. Friday morning, I kissed Jean goodbye and promised to be home Monday night at 6 p.m. She promised a special spaghetti dinner.
Stan, the medical chief resident, opened the conference room door quietly and slipped into a chair next to me. Stan had served two years in the military after graduating from Harvard Medical School and now was completing his internal medicine training. We all considered Stan a genius and a control freak. He had a buzz cut, his long white coat was spotless, trousers pressed, tie centered, face freshly shaven, and nails trimmed. He shook my chair gently.
“OK, Jack, wake up now, time to check out. The other interns are tied up. Let’s go through the cases. By the way, you look like shit. Have you been here all weekend?” he asked.
I stirred, blinked, and yawned. “Yeah, Stan, all weekend—Friday, Saturday, and Sunday nights. We had five code blues, twenty admissions, and forty-five patients to round on. The students were a big help.” I yawned again.
“Son of a bitch, Jack, you never got home at all, not even for dinner! My wife would have been pissed! Where are the students?” he asked.
“Home, I sent them all home exhausted. Nobody slept over two hours last night,” I replied.
Stan’s speech was always a surprise. No coarse word or vulgarity was beyond him. When he spoke from his perfect military face and neat uniform, it was as if he were occupied by a foul, trash-talking alien.
“Jesus, man, let’s go through the cases. I’ll brief the other interns. You’ve set some sort of fucking record here, Jack!”
After reviewing the admissions, discharges, deaths, and active cases, Stan lead me into the hall. “Go, Jack. Get the fuck out of here, and don’t think of us or the patients,” he demanded.
It was 5:40 p.m. and there was still dinner with Jean. As I turned the corner to leave the patient wards, a harried nurse stuck her head out of a patient room and yelled, “Code Blue! We need you in here now, Jack!”
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