Read Another Dawn Online

Authors: Kathryn Cushman

Another Dawn (9 page)

Chapter 10

By Saturday morning, the rash had begun to spread down Dylan’s neck and trunk. His fever remained high and there seemed to be no end in sight. As I walked to the end of the driveway to bring in the morning paper, I debated calling Dylan’s doctor again, but decided that first I should do what every modern mother does when her child is sick—search the Internet for answers. First problem I had to face—I needed to find the Internet.

Once again, I cursed the fact that my father not only didn’t have a wireless connection, he didn’t even own a computer. I’d have to take my laptop and go into town. Unfortunately, I had no idea where.

I bent over to pick up the paper, remembering my encounter with the new owner yesterday. This was Patti Fox’s paper. I grasped the paper between my thumb and index finger, holding the whole thing at arm’s length, trying to avoid contact as much as possible. Yes, it was a childish thing to do, but I couldn’t seem to help myself.

“Hey there. Did your paper get wet or something?” Patti’s voice was coming from the sidewalk directly in front of our house.

I looked up to see her in jogging clothes and a high ponytail, stretching her left leg behind her. She obviously had just finished a run, but of course she hadn’t broken a sweat. I lowered my arm to my side and said, “No, I just thought I saw a bug.”

“Welcome to Tennessee. Home to some of the biggest and creepiest insects known to man.” She nodded toward the house. “How’s your dad and your son feeling?”

“Not so great, unfortunately, so I better get back inside.” But just then, I realized that Patti might have the information I needed. “Hey, do you by chance know where the closest WiFi hotspot is to here?”

“No smart phone, eh?” She smiled.

“Well—”

Just as I was considering throwing my paper at her pretentious blond head, she said, “Me neither. Hard to afford on a budget.”

For just a brief second I felt a smidgen of kinship with her. It lasted only long enough for me to remember the words she and her friends had written in shaving cream on my windshield in the summer after my junior year. Time to move on from here, so I redirected the topic. “I was thinking the library?” I took a step toward the house as I asked the question, wanting to send the message that this conversation was drawing to a close.

“There is WiFi at the library but their hours are limited. There’s a coffee shop on the square that has wireless but it’s always packed. I’ll tell you the best place to go, especially from this neighborhood, it’s Krystal.”

“The fast-food place?”

She nodded. “You got it. They’ve got free WiFi, and it’s only a couple of blocks from here.”

“WiFi at a burger joint?”

She laughed. “I think you’ll be surprised at what you find there. You walk in, and probably a third of the tables are full of laptops. It’s the small-town equivalent to a Starbucks, I suppose.”

“Well, thanks for the info. I better be going.” I took a few more steps toward the house.

“Okay. Don’t forget to check out the TalkBack blog while you’re online.”

“Sure thing.” I said this without even a hint of sincerity as I dove inside the front door.

I put the paper on the kitchen table in front of my father. “Dad, I’m going to drive over to Krystal for a little while.”

“Krystal? I didn’t think you ate fast food anymore.”

“I’m not going to eat. I’m going to take my laptop over there and use the Internet. It’s the closest place to your house where I can get an Internet connection.”

“Don’t seem right to me, to use their Internet and not buy any food from them.”

“I’ll buy a cup of coffee. Make you feel better?”

He shrugged. “Guess so. I’m thinking maybe you should buy some corn pups and fries for your son—” he cleared his throat and continued before I had time to shut him down—“and for your poor old father who has been cooped up in this house for far too long.”

“I won’t get any for Dylan, but I’ll bring you back some if you want. What would you like?”

“How about four corn pups and a large fry?”

“Four?”

His face took on a totally fake expression of innocence. “I’m really hungry.”

I knew what he was going to do. He was going to eat a couple of the miniature corn dogs, declare that he was full, and then give them to Dylan, all in the name of not wasting food. Any other time I would have argued with him, but right now, all the fight was knocked clean out of me. “Fine.”

I got in my rental car and drove to the fast-food restaurant I’d loved as a kid. The kind of place I’d learned too much about in recent years and decided to avoid at all costs with Dylan, hoping to teach him the benefits of a healthy lifestyle.

So I ordered my cup of decaf, then sat at a table against the windows. It amazed me to see how full this place was, and just as Patti had predicted, laptops were present in plentiful supply. A family with small children was at the table next to me, eating miniature square burgers and fries. On the other side, there was a large group of mostly senior citizens who had pulled several tables together. They were talking and laughing and having a grand time. It was hard to concentrate with all the noise.

When I finally settled into my Internet search, I got a plethora of responses. There was one site, though, that I found especially helpful. It described different scenarios in children where rashes appear and what might accompany them. There were hives, and eczema, and then there was a whole page devoted to viral rashes. Sure enough, just like the pediatrician had said, these were the most common suddenly appearing rashes. It even said if your child has a fever and then breaks out in a rash, it is probably one of these harmless viruses and there’s nothing to be concerned about; just treat him symptomatically.

There was a list of a few viruses which could be identified by the particular kind of rash—chicken pox, Fifth disease, coxsackie—none of which matched what Dylan had. Roseola had some similarities, three days of fever before the rash, for instance, but it specifically stated that the fever usually broke when the rash started. Well, we’d had two days of rash and no end of fever in sight. But still, it was similar enough to assure me that Dylan indeed did have some sort of virus, and I promised myself to quit worrying about it. This new resolution lasted for all of fifteen minutes.

When I arrived home, bag of greasy food in tow, I took one look at my son and immediately started worrying again. I took his temperature and it was still a hundred and three in spite of a dose of Tylenol a couple of hours ago, and his rash had moved all down his body. This could not be a regular virus. Something was wrong. Really wrong.

Since it was Saturday and all regular medical offices were closed, I loaded him into the rental car and drove him to the local walk-in medical clinic. The building was brand-new—something we rarely saw in seaside California—with gray tile in the entranceway, a tasteful berber carpet in the waiting room, and granite counters at the reception desk. It all smelled of fresh paint, carpet glue, and disinfectant.

Thankfully, there was only one other person in the waiting room—an overweight middle-aged woman with a rhinestone-studded shirt and earrings the size of Texas. She nodded toward Dylan. “He doesn’t look like he’s feeling so good.”

I rubbed his back. “Not at all. It’s been a rough week.”

“Bless his heart.” She shook her head and continued to look at Dylan, his head resting on my shoulder. “Bless his sweet little heart. I remember when mine were that age. It was so hard when they got sick. I always wished I could be sick in their place.”

“I know what you mean.”

Just then a nurse came to the door. “Mrs. Steepleton?”

The woman used her hands against the chair arms to struggle to a standing position, but then turned and pointed at Dylan. “That young man there looks like he’s feeling a bit worse than I am. Why don’t you take him back first? My sore knees can wait a few more minutes.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course.” The woman dropped back into her seat.

“Thank you,” I said as I scooped Dylan up in my arms. “Thank you so much.”

“Don’t mention it, honey. You just get that little one well.”

The nurse coaxed Dylan out of a death grip on my neck long enough to take his weight and temperature and told us the doctor would be right in. Less than a minute later, I heard the chart rustling outside the exam room and the door opened soon after.

Dr. Crawford was young. In fact, he looked younger than me, which was impossible. He wouldn’t have had time to complete college and med school and be practicing. Would he?

He shone a flashlight in Dylan’s eyes and with a gloved hand pulled down the bottom lid. “Looks like he has a bit of viral conjunctivitis.” He put a tip on the flashlight and looked into Dylan’s ears. “Ears are perfect.” He ejected the tip into the trash. “Take a few deep breaths for me, Dylan.”

Dylan took a slow, deep breath, then another, and another, while the doctor moved his stethoscope all around Dylan’s chest and back. “Lungs are clear.”

“What does that mean?”

He shook his head. “Probably viral. There are a couple of things we need to consider with a rash and high fever. Has Dylan been bitten by a tick recently that you know of?”

I shook my head. “Never.”

“Rocky Mountain spotted fever is endemic to this area. It comes from a tick bite and causes a rash and high fever. However, the rash usually occurs on the wrists and ankles, and Dylan doesn’t really have any rash in those places.”

“So you don’t think that’s what it is?”

“No. I also don’t think it’s the other possibility, scarlet fever, but why don’t we do a rapid strep test and just see if it shows anything?”

“Okay.”

He brought in what looked like a long Q-tip. “Now, Dylan, when I say ‘go,’ you open your mouth real wide for me and stick out your tongue. Okay?”

“ ’Kay.”

“Go.”

Dylan threw back his head, opened his mouth, and stuck his tongue way out. The large Q-tip went inside his mouth and kept going. He started gagging, and the doctor pulled it out and looked at me. “Just give me a few minutes.”

“Okay.” And Dylan and I were left alone in the exam room.

“That hurt, Mama. Why did you let him do that?”

“He had to, honey, to see if he could find out what is wrong with you.”

“I don’t like that doctor. Dr. Conrad never pokes things in my throat.”

“You’ve never had a rash like this when Dr. Conrad was around.”

“She wouldn’t poke me anyway.” He folded his arms across his chest in a show of complete indignation. “The doctors here aren’t very nice.”

“I’m sorry, kiddo.” I kissed the top of his head and rocked back and forth as best I could in a straight-backed chair. “So sorry.” I began to hum softly, no real tune, just a comforting sort of sound.

Dr. Crawford came back into the room. “The test came back negative. I suspect this is a virus that will be self-limiting. Here’s my card. Please do call the clinic if he gets worse, or if he’s not better by Monday.”

“Thank you.” I walked from the waiting room angry at myself. Dr. Conrad had said this exact thing, my Internet search had agreed, and yet I had wasted the money for a doctor’s visit anyway.

I drove home berating myself. Yet still, when I looked in the rearview mirror and saw Dylan in the backseat, I knew how sick he was. How could I not err on the side of caution?

As we pulled into the driveway, Mrs. Fellows was just making her way up onto the front porch. She saw my car and turned to walk toward us. “Hi, Grace. How’s that boy of yours?”

“Still not very good, unfortunately. We’re just getting back from a trip to the doctor. He says it’s a virus that should pass. I hope it does.”

I opened the back door and reached in to unbuckle Dylan from his car seat. “Come on, darling.” I hefted him up onto my hip, admittedly a bit eased by the pediatrician’s assessment. Just a virus; it would pass. Dylan would be better soon.

“I brought some chicken and dumplings and some homemade cookies. Hopefully that will make him feel better.”

Dylan lifted his head from my shoulder to look at her. “Thanks for the cookies.” His head dropped against my shoulder again.

I looked toward Mrs. Fellows, waiting for her smiling response to my son’s good manners. Instead, I saw her put her hand over her mouth, just covering a gasp.

“Mrs. Fellows. Are you all right?”

She lowered her hand from her mouth and pointed at Dylan with it. “I declare, that’s something I never thought I’d live to see again.”

She had my full attention now. “What?”

“Measles. That child has the measles.”

Chapter 11

My hand was trembling as I looked at the business card I held and tried to push the correct numbers on the phone. The phone rang four times before someone finally answered. “Shoal Creek Walk-In Clinic. Can you hold, please?”

“Uh—” Muzak was coming through the line before I had the chance to attempt an answer. A thin film of sweat was forming on the palm of my right hand, so I changed the phone to my left hand and wiped the right on my shorts.

“This is Christi. May I help you?”

“Uh, yes. This is Grace Graham. I was just in there a few minutes ago with my son, Dylan.”

“Oh, right. The rash.”

“Yes.” The rest of what I needed to say was right there, waiting to come out. But I couldn’t bring myself to say the words. “Uh . . .”

“Did you have a question?” There was definite annoyance in her voice now.

“Well, it’s just that my neighbor . . . when I pulled into the driveway, my father’s next-door neighbor was outside. She’s older—eightyish I guess—and she saw Dylan and said she thinks he has the measles.”

“Measles?” I could almost hear the tolerant smile in her voice. “Don’t you worry one bit about that. With today’s vaccines, it’s almost impossible that he could have the measles.”

“Well, that’s maybe not totally true. You see, Dylan’s never received a vaccination.”

“Never?”

“No.”

“At all?”

“No.”

“For anything?”

“None.”

“Oh my.” She paused for just a moment. “Let me put you on hold and go talk to the doctor for a minute. Okay?”

Muzak filled the line again. It gave me time to try and remember my research on the MMR vaccine and the reasons that it wasn’t necessary to give. Measles was a fairly benign virus, as I recalled, and what Dylan was experiencing now was as bad as it got. At least I hoped that’s what I recalled.

Well, a week or so of fever and rash sure beat a lifetime of autism. I thought of Jasmine and Collin’s life and had no regrets for my choice. I knew there were plenty of parents who would disagree, but since they would have vaccinated their children, thereby making them safe from catching this, there shouldn’t be any problem.

For the first time since we arrived, I was grateful that we hadn’t seen Jana and Hannah since Monday. I was also now somewhat thankful that Jana did not share my concerns about vaccines. As much as I had lectured her about mindlessly allowing the doctors to put all sorts of microbes and foreign chemicals into her baby’s tiny body, now I admit I felt a bit of relief in knowing that Hannah was safe. I wouldn’t want to be responsible for making Hannah sick.

“Ms. Graham, this is Dr. Crawford.”

“Hello, Dr. Crawford. My neighbor saw my son and thinks . . .”

“Yes, I heard. With your son’s vaccination history, or rather lack of one, it is possible your neighbor could be right. The only way to confirm that—and we do need to confirm it—is to draw some blood from Dylan. The only place we have the proper medium is at the hospital. Can you take Dylan to the lab there? I’ll call them and tell them you’re coming.”

“O-okay.” My entire body had gone numb.

“Now listen, this is important. Measles is a highly contagious virus, we do
not
want you in the lobby with a bunch of other people if Dylan truly has been infected. I’ll make some calls so that they’ll be ready for you. Do not, under any circumstances, bring him into the building until you’ve heard back from me with instructions on what they’re going to do.”

He took my cell phone number and told me to start a full list of people Dylan had had contact with while contagious.

This was the first bright thought in this whole situation. Dylan hadn’t left the house since Monday afternoon. Although he had been running a fever then, he hadn’t gone near anyone. At least that was one problem we didn’t have.

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