“Uh-huh. And your literal job is to be calm when everyone else is freaking out. Trauma surgeons do not panic under pressure.”
My Jane Doe groans, her brows pinching and a pained whimper rolling along her throat.
“Hey. Hi.” I drag her to a stop and scoot around the bed. “Are you waking up?”
She battles through pain. Confusion. I take her wristin one hand, my fingers pressed to her speeding pulse, and I check my watch on the other. “Can you hear me, ma’am? My name is Doctor Oliver Darling, and you’re in the hospital. You’ve had an accident.”
She moans, curling into the bed.
“Can you open your eyes? Can you tell me your name?” I tilt my head to the side and study her crinkling bow lips. Her chin, doll-like in its proportions. Her petite, slightly upturned nose, marred by the line of dried blood staining the skin above her top lip. “Ma’am? I’m Doctor Darling, but most folks call me Ollie. Can you open your eyes for me?”
Her pulse grows faster against my fingertips. Sprinting. Thundering.
“You’re safe, okay? You’re in the hospital. You were hit by a car, but the little old lady who hit you is about a hundred years old and hates everyone equally, so don’t take it personally.” I lean a little closer, lifting my lips into a kind smile she doesn’t see anyway. “Ma’am? Can you open your eyes? I want to know your name before we go further.”
“Doctor Darling?” My intern charges ahead and pops the CT room door open. “I’m ready for her.”
“Ma’am?” I brush the tip of my finger over her palm, searching for a reaction. A twitch. Anything. Then I move to her knee. Her un-shoed foot. “Open your eyes. I’d really prefer to be on a first-name basis before we head in there.”
“Doctor Darling?” My intern presses. “Is time not of the essence?”
“Always.” I drag my fingertips over her mottled neck, then the soft skin just beneath her jaw. “But if she’s coming around, I’d like to know who she is. Miss?” I inch a little closer, softening my voice. “I know you’re in there. You’re making me look bad right now.”
Her eyes wheel around behind her eyelids, and a pained groan crawls along her throat.
“I’m gonna give you till the count of three to be an equal participant in all this mess. Then I have to push on. I know you can hear me.” I brush the tip of my finger over her eyelid. “Can you feel that? Can you feel where I’m touching you? Open up and show me you can do it.”
“That’s three, Doctor Darling.”
“Ma’am?”
Little by little, excruciatingly slowly, she peels her eyes open and hits me with a pair of browns… but they’re also gold. But they’re also speckled with reds and greens and hell knows what else. Brown eyes are just brown eyes in most cases. Butherbrown eyes are something else entirely.
“Hi.” Pride bubbles in my blood, like we’ve been working on this for eons, and not mere seconds. “My name is Ollie, and I’m happy as hell to see you awake. That’s a good sign.”
She swallows and stares. Silent and a little terrified. Her bow lips stayclosed, but her nostrils flare with the same viciousness as her speeding pulse.
“You’re in the hospital,” I repeat for the third time.Fourth? “You’ve been in an accident, but you’re safe now. I’m taking you in for a scan so we can look inside your head. You hit it pretty hard, I reckon.”
Tears well in her eyes, gathering in the corners.
“Do you have a headache? I bet it’s pretty loud in there at the moment, huh?” I lower my voice, anything to not make the pain worse. “Can you tell me your name? You arrived with no ID, and it always makes me feel weird calling a patient Jane until we know better.”
Her tears spill over, dribbling along her temples and down to disappear in long, black hair matted with blood and whatever debris she picked up from the road. Twigs. Snow. A bit of gravel. “Ma’am?”
Her pulse skitters under my fingers, visible against her throat. Then she closes her eyes again and drops into unconsciousness.
“Guess not.” I gently set her hand back on the bed and rush around to the end. Kicking the brakes, I start her forward again. “I know she’s bleeding, I know she’s in pain.” I wheel her straight past my intern and into a massive, gray-walled room. “I know your textbooks tell you to take care of her lacs and clean her up, but I’m not doing a damn thing until I get a look inside her head. Brain bleed trumps sutures and a bubble bath any day of the week.” I wheel her to the CT platform and jog around so I can drag her across. “We’re gonna have to log her in as Jane. We’ll figure out the rest later.”
ROUND TWO
OLLIE
“Oliver!” About twelve hours after my Jane Doe rolled through the doors of the ER, Barbara bustles in with her entourage of old folks dying for a morsel of town gossip. With fussing hands, gray skin, and messy hair, the elderly woman stops in front of me and threatens my toes with the end of her cane. “How is she, Oliver?” Her chest expands and shrinks beneath her jacket, her breath racing along her throat as a soft pink blush warms her cheeks. Folding her neck back, she searches my eyes. “Please tell me how she is.”
“Ya know, I would… but there’s a law about that.” I take her free hand and rub the cold limb between my palms. It’s common knowledge that Barbara is the nosiest, nastiest, most gossip-hungry annoyance in this town. But she’s older than Adam, and Ireallydon’t want her dropping dead while I’m on shift, so I warm her hand and soften my rejection with a kind smile. “You know I can’t tell you.”
“But did she…” Her jaw wobbles, and with it, her jowls swing. “She’s okay, right? Because I didn’t mean to hit her, I swear. I didn’t?—”
