Miracles in the ER (9 page)

“When did this happen, Toby?” I pointed to his hospital name tag.

“I started at the General a couple of days ago, Dr. Lesslie. Finished my training at York Tech and wanted to work here.”

I nodded and studied his eyes. This was a different Toby Bridges—a changed Toby Bridges.

He smiled and said, “You’re probably wondering about what happened after that last DUI. Two years in Columbia, then out on probation. Good behavior. Can you imagine that?”

He chuckled and his eyes remained fixed on mine.

I nodded again, but didn’t say anything.

“It was Reverend Stevenson,” he said quietly.

“What do you mean?”

“That night EMS brought me in, after the accident. He was back in the room with me and a little girl. I remember you checking me over and taking off the cervical collar. After you left the room, he walked over to my stretcher and just stood there, looking down at me. Didn’t say a word—just stood there. I closed my eyes, and all of a sudden I felt his hand on my forehead. He just kept it there, and I remember thinking how big it was, and how warm. And somehow, it felt good. He didn’t say anything, just kept his hand on me for a couple of minutes. Then he was gone.”

He paused, shifted a little, but didn’t take his eyes off mine.

“When I was in jail, I had a lot of time to think about that night and about Reverend Stevenson. Something changed in me, and I knew things had to be different. I can’t explain it, but something changed. Now here I am.” His face broke into a huge smile and he patted the front of his jacket. “Can you imagine that?”

Toby Bridges turned and walked out of the department.

It was hard to believe, but I
could
imagine that.

My Place

“This little girl looks pretty sick.”

Lori slid the chart of room 2 in front of me and pointed to a note in the space marked “Medications.”

Meds for HIV.

“Are you sure?” I glanced at the chart. The child was only five years old—young for this diagnosis.

Lori nodded. “According to her mother, she’s doing great, up until a few days ago. She was exposed to the flu a week ago and now has fever and cough. Respirations are thirty and her lungs are congested.”

“Thanks.” I picked up the clipboard and scanned the front sheet.

Autumn Wells. 5 yr old F. Cough, fever, pneumonia.

Autumn’s mother had provided this information to the secretary. If she was right about the pneumonia, that could be a real problem in a child with HIV.

The curtain of room 2 slid to one side and I stepped in, pulling it closed behind me.

“Autumn, I’m Dr. Lesslie.”

She was sitting alone on the stretcher, wearing a tiny hospital gown and struggling for breath. She looked up at me with huge, brown eyes. A beautiful smile spread across her face, which was framed by curly, auburn hair. Autumn was one of those children who instantly capture your heart.

She glanced to the corner of the room and my eyes followed.

A young woman—I assumed her mother—was sitting in a chair. In her lap was another little girl who looked to be the same age as Autumn, but maybe a little younger. She was beautiful as well, but with blue eyes and blond hair. She smiled at me, then tucked her head against her mother’s shoulder.

“This is Summer,” the woman said. “She’s a little shy.”

“Hmm…” I looked back at the girl on the stretcher and again to the child in the woman’s lap. “Autumn, Summer…”

“I know,” the mother said. “And my name is Dakota. Dakota Wells.”

“Interesting names.” I put Autumn’s clipboard on the stretcher, took the stethoscope from around my neck, and sat down beside the sick child.

“My father was a ranch hand in North Dakota—that’s how I got my name. Just glad my parents weren’t living in Idaho.”

I chuckled and gently stroked the little girl’s hair.

“Tell me about Autumn. When did she start getting sick?”

Dakota repeated what she had told Lori. Autumn had come down with what appeared to be a mild case of the flu, but a day or so ago it had become something worse. She was spiking temps up to 104 and her cough was getting deeper.

“She didn’t sleep at all last night,” her mother explained. “And we were getting worried. Then today, with the shortness of breath…Her pediatrician couldn’t see her until tomorrow, so we decided to bring her here.”

I finished my exam and made some notes on her chart.

“We’ll need to get a chest X-ray and some blood work, but I think you’re right, Ms. Wells. It looks like Autumn has pneumonia. She’ll need to come in the hospital, considering how hard she’s working to breathe and that she has HIV. That’s going to put her at—”

“At more risk of complications,” she interrupted. “I know. That’s another reason why we’re here. But she’s done fine with her medications and has never had any problems. She’s never had to be in the hospital.”

I stood up and looked at the little girl. “Let’s just hope it’s a routine pneumonia and nothing more. But whatever it is, we’ll make sure she gets better.”

Autumn looked up and flashed another smile at me.

I had one hand on the curtain and was about to pull it open when I stopped and turned around.

“Tell me about Autumn and Summer—about their names.”

The little blond looked up at the sound of her name and glanced at me then her mother. This time she didn’t tuck her head.

“When my husband and I were first married, we tried for a couple of years to get pregnant,” Dakota answered quietly. “There were several miscarriages and—we even had our nursery furnished and a name picked out. We were going to call her ‘Spring.’ ”

Summer, Autumn, Spring. I should have guessed.

“What if it was a boy?”

Dakota shook her head and smiled. “It was
always
going to be a girl. But it didn’t happen. After a few more years we gave up and decided to adopt. That’s when the Lord blessed us with Autumn.”

She paused and nodded at the little girl.

“We were living in Baltimore and learned about this service—or agency—for adopting children with…problems.”

The HIV.

I had been struggling with the source of Autumn’s infection, trying to figure out where it had come from. A child her age could have contracted it from a blood transfusion, but she had always been healthy, and there was no history of that. The other and much more likely source was from her infected birth mother.

The little girl in Dakota’s lap squirmed in her mother’s arms and I looked down. My hands clutched the chart I held, and I felt my face flame to a burning crimson.

Dakota looked at me, tilted her head, and her eyes followed my stare.

Her forearms were bare and I could clearly see the scars of needle tracks extending to both elbows.

She didn’t flinch or try to hide them. Her eyes met mine and she smiled.

“You’re right. I’ve had my own troubles, but those days are long past. Thankfully I don’t have HIV or hepatitis, and I know I’m fortunate. Not like Autumn’s…” She stopped and looked over at the stretcher. “Or Summer’s,” she whispered. “She’s positive too.”

I slumped into an empty chair and cradled the girl’s clipboard against my chest. This was a lot for me to handle—something I didn’t expect—something I had never experienced.

Dakota gently smoothed her daughter’s golden hair and our eyes met.

“She’s fine too. Never had any problems. We make sure they get the best medication possible and keep a close watch on them. But they’re completely normal, and happy. That’s the main thing. They’re happy.”

Autumn’s X-ray did reveal a right-sided pneumonia. But it had all the appearances of being something routine—not what you would expect with a person with active HIV. That was good news. She would still need to be admitted but probably for only a few days.

“She’s going to be fine,” I told her mother.

We talked about what to expect with Autumn’s treatment, and I asked Dakota when her husband would be coming to the hospital. If he was anything like his wife—and I was sure he must be—he was someone I wanted to meet.

“Dylan won’t be able to get here till later. He won’t get off work until after eight.”

“I’ll check on Autumn in the morning. Maybe I’ll get the chance to meet your husband.”

My hand was on the curtain again.

“Tell Miss B I said hello.”

The words stunned me, and I froze.

How did Dakota know “Miss B”—my wife, Barbara? Only the little children in her classes at church knew her by that name—and the special-needs campers at Camp Joy. Where had she…?

I turned and looked at her—a giant question mark painted on my face.

Dakota smiled and nodded.

“I was in her ‘Teens Under Fire’ program years ago—maybe seventeen or eighteen. She might remember my name—or the goofy, belligerent teenager who sat in the back of the room staring at the ceiling and chomping on chewing gum. I don’t know, though—there were probably lots of us like that.”

“Teens Under Fire”—TUF—was a program my wife had put together years ago and run for more than a decade. She’d been led to reach out to the troubled youth in our community and expose them to the realities of bad decisions—violence, substance abuse and addiction, prison, and sometimes death. It was a sobering afternoon for hundreds of teenagers, most on the verge of real trouble—some already there.

“I was one of those kids in
real
trouble.” Dakota shook her head and looked down at Summer. “I was making all the bad decisions Miss B was talking about. And I kept making them.”

She paused and looked down at her elbows.

“I was in Tennessee when I hit rock bottom. Knoxville, in jail—headed for something worse. One night, for some reason, I started thinking about your wife—Miss B—and some of the things she’d shared with us. The main thing I remembered was that she cared—really
cared—
about us in that room. Why else would she be spending her time that way? When I
woke up the next morning, I was still thinking about her and about that program, Teens Under Fire. I think I had been ‘under fire’ all my life and hadn’t known it. That’s when things started to change. I got out on probation, met Dylan, and my life has been a different journey ever since.”

She gave Summer a smothering hug.

“I remember Miss B saying God only made one of us—one of
me.
And that he had a job for me in this world that no one else could do, and a place for me that no one else could fill. Back then, those were just words—but I remembered.”

Dakota looked down at her daughter and then into my eyes.

“Tell Miss B I’ve found my place.”

Still other seed fell on good soil.

Miracles
OF
D
ELIVERANCE

I sought the L
ORD
, and he answered me;

He delivered me from all my fears.

P
SALM
34:4

You are my hiding place;

you will protect me from trouble

and surround me with songs of deliverance.

P
SALM
32:7