sorry,” Reese said. “We need you to be still and be quiet. We’re trying to hear your baby’s heart sounds … There it is,” she said as the Doppler emitted a rhythmic wow-wow-wow. “That’s the sound of your baby’s heart.”
Lena went limp on the table and laid her forearm over her eyes. “Yes,” she said. “I hear it. I can hear it. My mother says it’s a sin to have a baby before I’m married.”
Reese let the moment stretch out a few seconds longer. Then she said, “Mothers aren’t always right about everything.” She offered a brief conspiratorial smile. “Mine thinks she is, though. Let us take care of you, and when you’re feeling better, someone will talk to you about your options.”
She explained the lavage process and convinced the girl to cooperate by swallowing the gastric tube. The girl gagged and fought, but Reese kept up a soothing patter, the way Juanita used to when Reese was small and scared of the dark.
A short time later, Lena’s eyes were closed, and her hands lay slack on the sheeting. Mel gestured, and Reese followed him out to the corridor. “You did a good job in there,” he said. “She’ll be ready to turf out before you know it.”
Reese thought about the disturbed young woman, her frightened eyes and the strange, deep knowing that lived in her like an old, old soul. “Before you turf her, let’s get someone to talk to her about her choices. I’ll be the interpreter.”
“That’s a great idea,” Mel said. “I’ll call social services and OB/GYN.”
Moments like this gave Reese a feeling of satisfaction. An overachieving fourth-year at the end of a long rat race, she was full of plans, but full of questions, too. Her parents had their own plan for her—acceptance into an elite residency program, a path to join their carefully built practice. But sometimes, the wall of her armor cracked open to reveal a glimpse of something else—another dream, maybe. A different dream, not her parents’ goals.
At the end of the hallway, the double doors burst open and Jack Tillis, the chief of trauma, swept through. His lab coat wafted open like a set of wings. He was surrounded by his team of devoted acolytes—the residents, nurses, support staff, and technicians who made up the trauma team.
“What’ve you got?” Mel asked, perking up.
“Just had a red phone pre-alert. Major trauma, coming in by life flight,” another resident said. “ETA twenty minutes.”
Reese exchanged a glance with Mel. She felt a twist of anticipation in her gut. “Can I help?”
The resident nodded. “You don’t want to miss this one. Some kid had his arm ripped off in a farming accident.”
The helicopter descended from the sky like a huge metallic insect, its giant rotors beating the cornstalks flat against the dusty field. Kneeling on ground soaked by his nephew’s blood, Caleb instinctively leaned forward over the boy’s body, which lay on the rescue workers’ shiny yellow board. The shadows of his neighbors and the rescue workers fell over him, blocking out the morning sun. Above the violent rhythm of the chopper blades, he could hear crackling radios and shouts, but all his attention stayed focused on Jonah.
Only a short time earlier, Jonah had been racing across the field to help fill silo, something he had done dozens of times before. Now he lay broken and bleeding, his left arm and his boyish face slashed by the vicious metal teeth of the shredder. And despite the injuries, Jonah was sweetly, horrifyingly conscious.
White-faced, blue-lipped, his eyes dull with shock as his life drained away, the boy tried to speak through chattering teeth. “Cold,” he kept saying. “I’m ssso … cold.”
“I’m here, little man,” Caleb said, his voice a rasp of panic. “I’ll keep you warm.”
The rescue workers had immobilized the arm with an air bladder and enclosed his neck in a stiff collar. They covered him with every blanket they had, but it wasn’t enough to keep Jonah from shivering like a leaf in the wind. Then they prepared to load the stretcher into the helicopter.
“You cannot take him in that … that thing.” Caleb’s father stepped forward, thumping his hickory cane on the ground. “I won’t allow it.”
From the moment the county rescue crew had declared that Jonah’s only hope of survival was to be airlifted to a trauma center in Philadelphia, there had been a division in the community. Dr. Mose Shrock, who supervised the emergency services of the local hospital, had been contacted by phone. He’d confirmed the rescuers’ plan, and Caleb had approved the transport without hesitation.
Now his face felt carved in stone as he glared at his father. “They’re taking him,” he said simply. “I’ ll allow it.”
“Sir, you’ll have to step aside,” a man shouted, jostling in front of Asa. “We’re going to load him hot, while the chopper’s still going.”
“These people will take care of you,” Caleb said to his nephew, climbing to his feet. “I love you, Jonah, don’t ever forget I love you.”
“Uncle Caleb, don’t leave me.”
Despite the noise of the beating rotors, Caleb heard his nephew’s faint plea, piercing his heart.
The nurses and paramedics of the life flight lifted the board as the pilot did a walk around the helicopter, checking the landing area. Jonah was lost amid a pile of blankets and gear. His blood stained the ground everywhere.
“I’m going with him,” Caleb said loudly. “I have to go with him.”
A nurse in a utility vest looked at him, then over at Jonah.
“Please,” Caleb said. “He’s just a little boy.”
“It’s the pilot’s call. I’ll see what she says about the fly-along.”
Caleb turned and found himself face-to-face with his father. Asa held his hat clapped on his head to keep it from being blown away by the rotors. His straight-cut coat and broadfall trousers flapped in the wind. He stood flanked by the neighbors, forming a somber wall of fear and disapproval.
The last thing on Caleb’s mind was Amish Ordnung. Clearly it was uppermost in the minds of his father and the elders.
“If it’s God’s will that the boy is to survive,” Asa stated, “then he will do so without being lifted into the sky.”
Caleb didn’t trust God’s will, and he hadn’t in a long time. But he didn’t argue with his father. He hadn’t done that in a long time either.
Hannah rushed to his side. Her face was pale gray and awash with tears. “You have to go, Uncle Caleb. You have to.”
Alma Troyer stepped forward, her mouth set in a firm line. She cut a quick glance from Asa to Hannah. “You go, Caleb. I’ll keep Hannah with me while you’re away.”
The flight nurse touched his arm. “You’re in. The pilot said you can come.”
Caleb nodded and turned to his father. “I’ll call.” The Amish families shared a phone box in the middle of the village, its use limited to necessary business and emergencies. Without waiting for a reply, he turned on his heel and followed one of the EMS
