“Can I get a glass of water?” My throat felt parched. I gripped the bed’s side rail and sank into a chair.
Aaron asked the nurse with us to bring water, and as soon as she stepped out, he asked if something had happened.
“No,” I lied, “I just don’t think I’ve drunk enough. I’m still not used to this brutal heat.”
“In a few days, you won’t feel it,” he tried to reassure me, like everyone else.
“I’ve heard that already. I’m still waiting. Tell me – what’s she getting?” I asked after a few swallows of cold water and some deep breaths.
“Everything we’ve got. Mainly steroids, in industrial quantities. There’s nothing more to give.”
Lily was also left on steroids alone – another rogue thought darted through my head.
“And the final diagnosis?” I asked.
“Her family brought in physicians from Jerusalem Med-Center – names I’ve only seen in the journals. They examined, probed, and ordered tests, but had nothing to add. Everything’s shut down in her. Have you heard of vasculitis?”
I thought I might faint. I nodded a few times.
“If, God forbid, she deteriorates, don’t call the on-call senior. The family knows,” he concluded. He must have sensed something was bothering me – that something tied me to this patient in particular – or maybe he just figured I was anxious about the night.
Before I left the room, I threw her one last glance, turned, and moved on, pretending I’d left it behind me.
By eleven p.m. I’d seen a few routine cases, no tougher than the ones in the morning army clinic. None had referrals. The rhythm of work made me forget the patient in Internal. Around eleven, the curtains around the beds were pulled back and the ER was empty again. No one had been admitted. I managed to discharge them all home.
“Are you the new doctor?” asked the night nurse who’d just come on.
“Yes – Michael,” I said.
“Gali,” she replied. “I was just with the critical patient – she’s calm.”
“I have to go see her.”
I couldn’t resist the inner pull to look in on her again.
On the way, I thought about Lily, who must have gone to bed. I realized I hadn’t spoken with her since I got to the hospital. She knew I was on call and hadn’t phoned. It was close to midnight, and I didn’t want to wake her.
Will she look like this in a year or two? A dark thought flashed through my mind. I pictured the scenario my friends had sketched before my wedding as about to come true – this time in full, raw reality.
I did the math again: last September, she’d been given two years. Almost a year had passed, so one year remained. Just one year – God! It was unthinkable. It can’t happen. Not to my Lily. We’re together forever – and we will prevail.
Over the past year, you could hardly tell Lily had any healthproblems. She behaved completely normally. True, on the stairs I sometimes helped her – but only when I was there.
Those were her only symptoms. We didn’t go for morning runs or long walks, but we lived like any couple, with no real limitations.
The monitor above the patient’s bed showed exactly what I’d seen at the start of the shift. The IV was dripping properly, her breathing was spontaneous, so the machine she was connected to barely engaged. I held her wrist to feel the pulse – weak, but regular.
She looked very still. Her eyes were closed, with an ointment smeared over them to prevent sticking and infection. Her blood pressure and temperature were normal. There was nothing for me to do there, so I returned to the ER.
“I’m heading downstairs to try to sleep. Call me the moment anyone arrives,” I told Gali.
“Are you sure? Some doctors ask not to be woken unless a few patients pile up.”
“I know – but please wake me as soon as anyone walks in.”
“Yes, sir!” she said with a smile and a mock salute. Her husband was a senior NCO, and she knew I’d come from that world too.
I went down to the room set up for sleeping. When I got into bed, I realized it was the first normal bed I’d gotten into in four nights.
