CHAPTER 11: How To Save A Life

Dr Jacobs rushed into Bills room. Upon hearing the heart rate monitors cry for help she directed the nurse to get the defibrillator.

“Charge it to 250!”

“Come on baby almost there!”

“CLEAR!”

Bill’s chest heaved into the air as electricity shot into his body – he fell limply back down to the bed just as fast as he rose.

“No pulse.” said the nurse.

“Go to 300! Hurry we don’t have much time.”

The nurse quickly turned the dial up to 300.

“Charging!” said the nurse.

“Okay, it’s ready! Go!”

“CLEAR!”

Bill’s chest heaved into the air again and he landed back in the bed with the same intensity as before, only this time the heart rate monitors came to back to life.

“We got a pulse!”

“Watch his vitals, make sure he stays stable.”

Dr Jacobs put the paddles down. “Now who can tell me what happened here?”

Edna spoke up, “It was a demon.”

Both Dr Jacobs and the nurse looked at each other with their eyebrows raised.

Dr Jacobs spoke first.

“What on earth are you talking about Edna?”

“I was sitting here in the chair and when I looked up a demon was in here fiddling with Bill’s IV…and then he vanished.”

Dr Jacobs was beginning to think Edna might need to be checked into the hospital as well.

“Are you telling me someone was in Bill’s room that shouldn’t have been in here?”

“Yes, it was a demonic creature. Awful, nasty thing it was.”

“Umm…Nurse can I see you out in the hallway for a minute?”

“Sure.” replied the nurse. “Edna will you excuse us for a minute?”

Without waiting for Edna to respond the nurse went out into the hall to talk to Dr Jacobs.

“I don’t know what Edna saw and quite frankly I don’t care, but if there’s a chance that someone had put something into Bills IV then we need to check it out.”

The nurse nodded in agreement.

“Can you get a sample of Bills blood and run it to the labs for testing?”

“I’ll do that right away Dr Jacobs.”

Dr Jacobs walked back into Bills room and checked his vitals. His blood pressure was high and his pulse was still quicker than normal.

“Edna, he appears to be stable now, but we are going to run some tests on him and see what we can find.”

The nurse entered the room carrying a blood vial and needle. She stuck the needle in Bills arm and steam came out.

“Odd.” she thought.

His blood came out slowly and appeared to be hot.

“I’ve never seen anything like this before.” she thought to herself. “I better get this to the lab right away.”

———

Fred, let’s go to the hospital and see if Bill is really there.”

“Oh not this again Tiffany.”

He sighed.

“Look Tiffany, I don’t know how you did what you did and I still don’t have any idea what happened and quite frankly I don’t really care — I just want to go back to normal now. No more kidnappings to magical islands by people that are in comas, and please; no more nights in jail cells.”

“Fred, please come with me. I know you’re exhausted but this will help me out a lot.”

Fred looked at Tiffany. She was giving him the “look”.

“Fine Tiffany, you know I can’t resist that look. We’ll go, but I want to shower first.”

“Thanks so much honey!”

———

“I’ve never seen anything like this before.”

The lab technician placed a droplet of blood on a microscope slide to examine it. It was bubbling and steaming as it went under the light. After about 20 seconds, the blood evaporated and dried to the slide.

“You better call Dr Jacobs in here immediately.”

The lab assistant went to the pager. “Dr Jacobs to lab 301, please. Dr Jacobs to lab 301. It’s urgent.”

A few minutes later Dr Jacobs came running through the door.

“What is it?”

“Dr Jacobs, you’re not going to believe this come see for yourself.”

The lab technician gathered another drop of blood of what was still remaining in the vial and put it on a slide. Within 20 seconds it had evaporated.

“Wow, that’s strange!”

“I’ve never seen anything like it Doctor.”

“I wonder if that’s happening inside Bills body right now.”

Dr Jacobs looked at the vial and it was about half full now.

“Did you use all that blood already?”

“No Dr Jacobs, it’s just evaporating.”

“How long have you had that vile for?”

“About ten minutes.”

“At that rate of evaporation how long would it take for a human lose all of it’s blood.”

“Well, off the top of my head I would say about an hour.”

“Oh my god!” Dr Jacobs looked at the clock. It had been about 45 minutes since they revived Bill. “What blood type is he?”

“His blood type is O+ doctor.”

“Can you get me some O+ blood from the donation vault and bring it to Bills room as fast as possible!”

“Yes, I’ll go right now.”

Dr Jacobs ran back out the doors heading toward Bills room hoping she was not too late.

When she arrived in his room his pulse was already in the 30s.

“Edna, we are going to need to perform a blood transfusion on your son immediately. Whatever he has in his system is causing his blood to evaporate.”

The lab technician came running through the door. “Dr Jacobs! There are no O+ containers left in the vault.”

“What do you mean none left?”

The technician was gasping to catch his breath. “Stolen, all of them…they’re all gone.”

“WHAT?!?!”

“We need a donor – NOW!”

“My son and I have the same blood type. If he needs blood, I will give him mine.”

Dr Jacobs looked over at Edna. “Okay…I guess that will work.”

Dr Jacobs turned to the technician. “Hurry and get Edna setup for the transfusion, we don’t have much time.”

Within just a few minutes Edna was already hooked up and her blood was flowing into Bills body.

Everyone sat and watched in silence hoping this would work. They were anxiously watching the heart rate monitor to see if Bills vitals would improve. There was still no explanation as to why Bills blood would just evaporate. They were hoping that only the blood in his system was affected by whatever condition was threatening Bills life and that new blood would save his life.

It would be a couple of hours yet before the results were in. Bill would need nearly half of Edna’s blood just to have a chance. Both of them would be extremely weak if this worked.

“Dr Jacobs to room 205 please. Dr Jacobs to room 205.” shouted the intercom system.

“I have to go, but I’ll check back in as soon as I can…Call me if you need anything.”

Dr Jacobs left the room leaving the nurse to watch over Edna and Bill. Both of them were now hooked up to their own heart rate monitoring systems to keep watch on their vitals.

———

“Which hospital was he at again?”

“I believe they said St Mary’s.”

“Well, that’s going to take us at least 15 minutes so put some music on or something.”

Tiffany turned their Sirius radio to BPM, channel 51.

“FUCK YEAH!”

Tiffany jumped in her seat, startled by Fred’s yelling.

Around the World by Daft Punk was on and it was Fred’s favorite song.

Fred started to bust a move while driving.

“Fred, I hate when you do that while you’re driving; it’s embarrassing, unsafe, and it looks like you’re having a seizure.”

He started doing the sprinkler and driving with his knee.

“What’s so embarrassing about this Tiffany?”

Then he went into the robot.

Tiffany was not impressed. Fred grabbed her arm and started using them to dance for her.

“Come on babe, dance with me in the car just like we used to when we met.”

“Fred I really don’t want to.”

As she said that the song was building up, went quiet, and then the beat dropped back in as the sound exploded throughout the car.

“Ahh, what the hell!” she started doing the cabbage patch dance making big circles with her arms.

“Hell yeah Tiffany…rock it girlfriend!”

Dancing together they became fully immersed in what they were doing. When Fred turned to look at the road he was halfway over the centerline. He stopped dancing and put the vehicle back into the right lane.

“Wow, that was close.”

Tiffany looked in the passenger mirror at the text “Objects in mirror are closer than they appear” to see a police car right behind them with its lights flashing wildly.

“Too close Fred. Look behind us.”

Fred looked up in his mirror and saw the police car.

“Son of a bitch.”

He slowed down and began pulling off to the side of the road.

———

“How’s he doing?”

“He seems to be stabilizing Dr Jacobs.”

“How long has it been?”

“He’s been receiving blood now for almost two hours.”

“Okay. When his vitals are somewhat normal go ahead and stop the transfusion and let them both rest.”

“Will do.”

“Let me through!” screamed someone from the hallway.

Dr Jacobs ran out into the hall. She saw a woman being held by two security guards.

“Let me through I said, I need to see my friend Bill!”

“Bill Sanderson?” asked Dr Jacobs.

“Yes, he’s a friend of mine.”

Judging by the look in her eyes, she was not going to leave until she got her way.

“I’m sorry, but he’s not in good shape right now you’ll have to come back later during normal visiting hours.”

The woman stopped struggling. “Fine, unhand me, I’ll come back later.”

The security guards looked at each other and let go since she stopped struggling.”

She fell to the ground. She stood up and dusted herself off. Then she gave them each a stern look and turned around to leave. Just as fast as she turned around she turned back again and started in a full run toward Bills room.

The security guards were caught off guard. She got through them and ran passed Dr Jacobs.

Tiffany ran through the door and stopped in her tracks as she saw Bill hooked up to all kinds of equipment. She noticed Bills mother Edna hooked up as well.

Dr Jacobs came running into the room.

“What do you think you’re doing young lady?”

“What’s wrong with him Doctor?”

The two security guards came bursting through the door and tackled her to the floor. She hit the floor hard.

“Let me go!” she screamed.

“Ma’am please place your hands behind your back, you are under arrest.”

A heart rate monitor cried for help as it flatlined.

Dr Jacobs looked up at Bills monitor. It was still normal.

“Oh no! Nurse get in here with the defibrillator.”

Edna’s heart rate monitor had flat lined.

Dr Jacobs quickly unhooked her from Bill. The nurse came in with the defibrillator and they attempted to resuscitate her.

Bill stirred in his bed and slowly opened his eyes.

“Mom…”

He couldn’t see clearly. It took a brief minute for his eyes to adjust.

“Mom…is that you?”

He sat up in a panic.

“What’s happened to her?”

The blood rushed to his head from sitting up too fast. He blacked out and collapsed back in his bed.

———

“What did I tell you before we left?”

Fred walked up to his wife’s holding cell where she had spent the night for breaking into the hospital and fleeing from security guards.

“Well?”

“Well what Fred?

“Was he there or not?”

“Yes he was there. While I was there something awful happened to his mother but they took me out of the room before I could see if she was okay.”

“Are you satisfied then that Bill didn’t kidnap you?”

“I don’t know. Something’s just not right about this. It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Sense or not Tiffany. You’re going crazy lately. For christ’s sake, we just got out of jail and here you are again.”

Tiffany didn’t say anything.

Fred sighed.

“If I bail you out of this cell…can you promise me you won’t end up back in here again?”

“What do you mean “IF” Fred? Are you trying to be funny? Cause I’m not laughing.”

“No Tiffany, I meant if. I think that you seriously have lost it. You might be better off here for a few more nights.”

“Fred…that’s not funny at all. You better bail me out…I will be so mad at you if you leave me in here.”

“Alright…alright Tiffany, settle down. But seriously, this has to stop. We are going home and moving on from this got it?”

She could tell Fred was serious by looking into his eyes.

“No more police, no more kidnappings, and no more jail. Take it or leave it Tiffany.”

“Fine.”

“Fine what?”

“Fine I won’t pursue this any further…now would you get me out of here? You’re not the only one tired of being in here. I slept like shit last night.”

“Okay Sheriff, I’ll pay her bail.”

“Okay Fred, come over by the counter then. There’s some paperwork you’ll need to fill out.”

———

“Are you okay?”

Bill was sitting in a chair in his hospital room with his head in his hands sobbing. He looked up at Dr Jacobs, tears filled his eyes.

“It’s my fault she died isn’t it?”

“Bill, don’t think like that. It was just too much blood for her heart to handle. We all knew the risk she was taking, but she did it to save you. It’s not your fault. These things happen.”

“But if I had just drove home instead of walked…”

“Bill, the coma has nothing to do with this.”

“It doesn’t?”

“Absolutely not! Someone snuck into your room last night and tampered with your IV. Whatever they did was causing your blood to evaporate.”

“Why would someone do that?”

“I don’t know Bill but we’re going to find out. We have the police investigating and hopefully they find out who did it and we can get some answers. Whoever it was is responsible for your mothers death.”

He sat back in his chair, sighed, and tried to relax.

“Maybe you’re right. I’m just so exhausted.”

“You’ve been in a coma for awhile Bill which means you haven’t used your legs or lungs in awhile. You’ll recover in no time but you should try to take it easy for a few days.”

“When do you think I can go home? Valerie must be worried about me. Has she been here much Doctor?”

“Bill…there’s something else you should know.”

Doctor Jacobs reached out and put her hand on top of Bills. Bill jumped from the touch. He leaned forward to listen closely to what she was about to say.

“Bill…Valerie is dead.”

Bill jumped out of his chair.

“YOU’RE LYING!”

“I wish I was Bill. She died on the way to the hospital the first night you came in.”

“I DON’T BELIEVE YOU!”

Bill ran out of the room and took off running down the hall.

“Where are you going?” she shouted down the hall after him – but he was already gone around the corner.