as Conor nodded to the X-ray tech.
The thrashing would have to wait.
As would thinking about that baby.
* * *
The hours disappeared in a haze of anguish and despair. Children came through ED, some staying longer than others before moving on to Theatre, or, for the lucky ones, to the children’s ward with plaster casts or multitudes of stitches.
Finally, ‘We’re all done.’ Mac appeared from the adjoining resus unit, looking like he’d been living a nightmare for hours. Which he had. They all had.
It was over. Air leaked from Conor like a puncture as the tension that had been with him from the moment Michael had told them what they were in for softened. ‘I didn’t know they could fit so many children on one bus.’ The exhaustion that’d been beating him up earlier in the afternoon returned at full throttle. ‘Glad that’s done.’ Except there were parents throughout the hospital dealing with their worst nightmares.
Parents. Closing his eyes, he rubbed them with his thumbs, and was confronted with an image of Mam letting herself in through the front door, shoulders drooped, knees buckling. Those laughing eyes he’d looked for on waking every morning of his four short years had been dulled with pain and anguish. Her arms had shaken as she’d clung to him. He hadn’t recognised her voice as she’d croaked, ‘Sebastian and Daddy are in heaven, my love.’ And there had begun the rest of his life.
‘I’ve never dealt with anything like it.’ Mac rolled his neck left then right.
‘What?’
‘Go home, Conor. Get a beer in you and hit the sack.’
Looking around, Conor couldn’t find Tamara. He stumbled. ‘Where is everyone?’
Tam, did you cope? Really? Behind that mask, are you okay?
Mac was muttering, ‘I sent day shift home half an hour ago. They were shattered after already working a shift, and I figured my team could handle the remainder of cases. Not that they’re in much better shape.’
‘It’s going to be a long night for them.’ What was left of it.
Mac gave him a rueful smile. ‘You sure knew how to cope with the situation.’
‘For all the wrong reasons, unfortunately.’ The wall clock read nine twenty. He wouldn’t have been surprised if it was after midnight. As it was, he’d be back on duty all too soon. With that thought his mind filled with the urgent need to get out of there while he could still walk. ‘I’m gone.’
Home. A shower. Bed.
Tamara.
Now that you’re coming down from the high we’ve all been on for endless hours, are you looking all peaky and worried again?
She’d be beyond exhausted now that she had pregnancy to contend with as well.
I hope you’re all right. That my baby is doing okay.
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