Blue Like Elvis (26 page)

C
hapter 38

The following
weeks rambled on. I was in such a funk, I found no interest in much of
anything. Sandra and Trevor were seeing more and more of each other whenever
they could. They were so cute together—Trevor, over 6’4”, and tiny Sandra, not
even 5’2” in heels. I was really happy for them, but I missed having Sandra
around at home. Of course, a resident’s schedule doesn’t leave much free time
for extensive dating, but somehow they worked it out. I loved seeing her so
happy.

But “happy” had
long since disappeared from my horizon.

In fact, as happy
as I was for them, their relationship seemed to mirror a sharp contrast to how
much I missed Tucker. We’d run into each other from time to time at work or at
church. It was always awkward, always strained. Once, during the worship
service, I glanced over and caught him staring at me. But when I attempted to
smile, he just looked away. It surprised me how much that hurt. I began
avoiding church whenever possible.

Donnie was getting
worse every day. I never missed a day’s visit, but it was getting so difficult
to be cheerful as I entered his room. Even harder to hide how scared I was for
him.

As July melted
into August, I still hadn’t heard from Jimmy. It had been more than a month
now. By this point, I was more angry than disappointed. The least he could do
was call. I checked in regularly with Mom and Dad. They hadn’t heard from him
either, but seemed much more understanding than I was.

“He just needs a
little more time to readjust,” Mom had said.

I just hoped he
hadn’t lost his shirt down in New Orleans. I was half-tempted to drive down
there some weekend and try to find him, but I nixed the idea. What would I do?
Just walk through the Quarter and hope to bump into him?

The office
atmosphere continued on a downhill slide as well. Chelsea and Rebecca had
already handed in their two-week notice to Mrs. B, having found jobs elsewhere.
The rest of the girls were busy scouting the paper for job opportunities. I
knew I should be doing the same, but I couldn’t make myself do it. Not yet.

As for Mrs. Baker,
we’d all noticed how much she had changed. The loss of her friend and pastor
had visibly affected her. I realized she wasn’t scheduling afternoons off to
play golf anymore. She kept mostly to herself, rarely coming into the back
office to visit with us in the afternoons like she’d always done. And her smile
was manufactured when needed. As if a great black cloud had descended over her
and wouldn’t go away.

I have to admit, I
felt like it was hanging over me, too. It wasn’t like me to stay down and blue
like this. But I just couldn’t shake it. I threw myself into my patients’
needs, visiting them more than I ever had. Most of them seemed to love the
extra attention—but not all.

I’d just knocked
on 910 and said hello to Daphne Lee Crockett. She’d been here for a week now
and was still waiting on results from all the tests they’d been running. I’d already
stopped by several times and run a couple of errands for her.

“You again?” She
let her newspaper fall onto her lap.

She sounded so
terse I assumed she was teasing. I was wrong.

“Young lady, if I
need something, I’ll call you. I don’t like to be constantly bothered, and I
certainly don’t need babysitting. So just scoot your little self right back out
that door and leave me be.”

“Uh . . .
oh, okay. I’m sorry. My apologies.” I ducked back out the door, wondering if
she’d hurl a pillow at me if I didn’t. I also wondered why everyone on the
planet seemed to be in the pits. I took a deep breath, straightened my uniform,
then tapped on 912 to check back in on Mr. Slidell.

“Oh, good. I was
just about to call. Could you hand me the bedpan, miss?”

Not my job!

Some days you
wonder why you even bother to get out of bed.

By mid August, I was
actually relieved whenever my turn rolled around to work in the ICU or ER. On
Saturday, August 13th, I was scheduled to work the 3:00 ER shift, which was
good. It meant I still had a big chunk of the day to myself before I went to
work. And since Saturday nights were always the busiest night of the week in
the ER, I knew the time would fly by.

Before I went to
work, I cleaned the house then decided to work on my pitiful tan. I stretched
out on a lounge chair in our backyard and felt the heat against my skin while I
listened to Stevie Wonder, the Eagles, Jimmy Buffet, and Fleetwood Mac on my
radio. But the music didn’t help. My mind kept traipsing off in directions I
didn’t want to follow, so I eventually gave up, showered, and went to work.

But when I arrived
at the ER just before 3:00, I caught a brief glimpse of Tucker down the hall.
Just
my luck. He must be working the same shift.
Thankfully, he wasn’t in the ER
for long and exited without seeing me. I hated this game we seemed to be
playing. Or was it just me? Maybe he’d long forgotten what we had . . .
or what we
almost
had.

I did my best to
avoid him, which was fairly easy since anesthesiologists don’t normally hang
out in the ER unless they’re called in for a particular problem. I’d managed to
evade any face-to-face interaction right up until 10:30 that evening. That’s
when the ER receptionist asked if I would help an elderly woman back to see her
husband in Trauma 2. I helped her to his room and made sure she was okay. Then,
as I was making my way back to the waiting area, I spotted Tucker. I’m not sure
why he was back in the ER again, but there he was—leaning against the wall, his
right knee hiked up with his foot anchored against the wall behind him. It’s
how he always stood whenever we talked in the hall. Just a silly nuance, something
I’d always found endearing. But this time, a very attractive nurse stood close
to him, obviously sharing a joke. I didn’t recognize her, but I could tell this
wasn’t a doctor/nurse consultation. This was much more personal.

I know it’s absurd,
but I felt like someone punched me in the stomach. I had no logical reason to
react that way. We weren’t in a relationship. He could talk to whomever he pleased.

Before another
thought crossed my mind, the bay doors just beyond where Tucker and his friend
were standing slammed open. Paramedics rushed in with a bloodied patient on a
stretcher, shouting as they rounded the corner toward Trauma Room 1.

“Pedestrian hit by
a truck. Multiple injuries. Contusions, abrasions, BP’s falling, 72/40. Pulse
120. He’s had two morphine and two liters saline.”

The doctors and
nurses went to work, guiding them into the examination room, Tucker and his
friend joining them.

As I started to
return to my post, I heard someone shout my name.

“Shelby!”

I turned,
surprised to see Tucker rushing toward me, his face etched with concern. “It’s
Jimmy.”

“What?” The air
whooshed from my lungs. “That’s not possible. He’s—”

He gently grabbed
my arm and nudged me toward a row of chairs lining the wall. “It’s him, Shelby.
It’s Jimmy. Let me go back and see what’s going on. I’ll let you know. Just don’t
leave.”

 I nodded, unable
to speak.

I lowered myself
into a chair, my mind swirling with questions.
How could that be Jimmy? He’s
supposed to be in New Orleans, right? If he’d come back to Memphis, he would
have called. I don’t understand . . .

Twenty minutes
later I would understand—much more than I wanted to. Tucker came back down the
hall toward me.

“Shelby, come with
me. We need to talk.”

Oh God.

Of all places, he
led me into the prayer room. He placed his hand on my back, moving me toward
the back row where we both sat down.

“Tucker, you’re
scaring me. What’s happened? Is Jimmy okay?”

“He’s in bad shape,
but I think he’ll make it—”

“You
think
?
What’s that supposed to mean?”

“They said he was
walking down the middle of Union Avenue—”

“What?”

“A delivery truck
had just turned the corner and didn’t see him. Plowed him down. It looks like
he’s got some broken ribs, a ruptured spleen, and a serious head injury from
hitting the pavement so hard.”

My shoulders began
to shake as I completely lost it. I heard myself crying as if from across the
room. “Oh, Jimmy . . . oh God!”

Tucker wrapped his
arm over my shoulder, his head resting atop mine. “Shelby, listen to me.”

I kept sobbing. I
felt like I might get sick.

He lifted my chin,
making me face him. “Listen to me. They need to operate on his spleen STAT. I
need you to get a hold of yourself and sign some papers for me. Can you do
that?”

I seemed to have
no control over my extremities. Everything was trembling. “But Tucker—”

“We can talk more
later. I promise. I’ve got to get upstairs to give him his anesthetics, so we
need to do this now. Right now.”

 He stood up,
helping me to my feet. I wasn’t sure I could stand on my own. “But Tucker—”

And then he
wrapped me in his arms. He rested his head on mine again, saying my name softly,
over and over. I gripped the front of his shirt so hard and buried my face
against his shoulder, my tears soaking his white lab coat.

“Shelby, I have to
go. Here—” He handed me his handkerchief. I would have laughed at the irony of
it if I hadn’t been crying so hard. “We’ve got to get those papers signed,
sweetheart. Come on.” He grabbed my hand leading me back out into the ER
hallway as I wiped my tears.

In less than a
minute he was gone. I signed the papers and turned just as he ran out the door
toward the OR.

In something I can
only describe as a dense, thick fog, I made my way back to the prayer room, stumbled
toward the front of the room . . . and collapsed.

Over the next hour
I talked to Mom and Dad twice, called Sandra and asked her to come, paced the
ER, prayed in the prayer room, and cried enough tears to fill the Atlantic. Mom
and Dad promised to be on the road to Memphis as soon as they could get
dressed. Sandra showed up and quickly came to my rescue, helping calm me down
and stop pacing. She was such a rock. I couldn’t have made it without her.
Trevor showed up a few minutes later and offered the kind of reassuring
presence only a doctor can. He had the access we didn’t to find out what was
happening up in the OR. He quickly escorted us upstairs to the surgical waiting
room then disappeared to find out what he could.

Through it all I
prayed constantly. Aloud. Under my breath. Silently. I prayed. Begging God to
spare Jimmy. To give him another chance. And I took a U-turn whenever my
thoughts tracked too close to the reason he was in that OR. I couldn’t handle
that right now.

After the longest
three hours of my life, the surgeon and Tucker pushed through the doors and
into the waiting room.

“He made it,” Dr.
Lewis said, his mask hanging from his neck. “Your brother did just fine, all
things considered. He’s not out of the woods yet and has a long road ahead of
him, but he’s stable. And that says a lot.”

I thanked him
profusely, wanting more details, but knowing those would come later from
Tucker.

“He’ll be in
recovery for a good while yet. I won’t release him to a private room until I’m
sure he’s a little more stabilized. But you can let go of that breath you’ve
been holding now, Miss Colter.”

I did just that
and shook his hand, thanking him again.

Tucker gave me a
side hug. “You doing okay?”

“Yeah, I think so.
Was it bad up there?”

Sandra and Trevor
closed ranks in our little circle as Tucker told us about the surgery. I didn’t
understand most of it, particularly in my emotionally drained state of mind. He
continued, and while I couldn’t comprehend what he was saying, his tone told me
what I needed to know. Jimmy would be okay.

“That’s a good
sign,” Trevor added. “Basically means he won’t suffer any long-term memory
loss. Though he might not remember the accident. Which might not be a bad
thing.”

“Tucker, do you
have any idea what happened?” I asked. “Did the paramedics explain how he was
hit?”

He looked
exhausted, raking his hand through his hair. When he looked up, I couldn’t read
the expression on his face. “Maybe you should wait and discuss this with the
police who worked the scene.”

“Why? Why can’t
you
tell me?”

“Shelby . . .
I just don’t think I should be the one to—”

“What aren’t you
telling me, Tucker?” I pushed. “Please—this is Jimmy we’re talking about!”

“Precisely,” he
said, in a much-lowered voice, “And as you’ll recall the last time we talked
about Jimmy was the end of us.”

“We’re gonna take
off,” Trevor said, giving me a hug. “You take care and we’ll talk soon.”