Hot Single Docs: Giving In To Temptation: NYC Angels: Making the Surgeon Smile / NYC Angels: An Explosive Reunion / St Piran's: The Wedding of The Year. Lynne Marshall
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portion, and for today it would mostly be post-operative care—basic and important for pain control and maintaining strong vital signs. She’d guard against any post-op complications, such as bleeding or infection, to the best of her ability. Tomorrow the reality of being a teenager with a leg amputation would require help from each and every member of that specially organized medical team.
“Here, Charley.” Polly handed a washcloth lathered with soap to her shattered-pelvis patient. “You wash your face, neck and chest. I’ll help with your back when you’re ready.”
She believed in letting patients do as much for themselves as possible. Fortunately, Charley had one good arm, and with the overhead frame with trapeze he could lift himself enough to allow her to change the sheets and replace the sheepskin beneath his hips.
She kept a doubled sheet over his waist to give him privacy as they progressed with his bed bath. “Do you miss school?”
He gave a wry laugh. “I miss my friends.”
“How are you going to keep up with your studies while you recover?”
He scrubbed his smooth face and chest with the cloth. “They’re going to send out a tutor or something. School’s almost out for summer break anyway. What really sucks is I was supposed to start driver’s training next month.”
“Do people even drive cars in New York?”
“I live in Riverdale.”
Polly didn’t have a clue where Riverdale was but assumed it was a suburb of the city. She’d never, ever want to attempt driving in New York, where being a pedestrian was risky enough.
She washed his back and changed the linen, keeping casual and friendly banter going. “Have you got a girlfriend?”
“Nah. We broke up.”
Uh-oh, here she went again, venturing into personal information that might cause pain. Would she ever learn her lesson? At least he hadn’t bitten her head off like Dr. Griffin had. “I’m sorry to hear that.”
“It’s okay. All she ever wanted was for me to buy her stuff, anyway.”
Whew. “Sometimes teenage girls can be very superficial.”
“Dude, tell me about it.”
Polly gathered the soiled linen she’d heaped onto the floor and shoved it into the dirty-linen hamper just as the door swung open. “Well, look here, perfect timing. Lunch!”
The tall, bronze and buff dietary worker brought in Charley’s lunch tray and placed it on the bedside table. Polly washed her hands and checked to make sure they’d delivered the right diet, with extra protein and calories for the growing and healing boy, then left him alone to eat with the TV on while she got his noontime medicine.
When she returned from her own lunch-break the ward clerk informed her that Annabelle was on her way up from Recovery. Polly rushed to the private room to make sure everything was in order then quickly checked up on Charley, who was fine and playing a video game. She explained she’d be busy for a while but made sure his call light and urinal were within reach in case he needed them.
Just as she exited the room she saw the orderly pull a gurney out of the elevator. At the other end was Dr. Griffin in OR scrubs. It was the first time she’d seen him that day and, taken by surprise, her stomach did a little clutch and jump. Would he still be furious with her?
Focused solely on the task, Dr. Griffin helped get Annabelle into her room. Polly jumped in. “I’ll get this, Dr. Griffin.”
He let her take the end of the gurney but followed her into the room. She’d pulled down the covers on the hospital bed and had already padded the bed with a layer of thin bath blanket, an absorbent pad and had topped both with a draw sheet in preparation for her patient. She checked to make sure the IV was in place and had plenty of fluid left in the IV bag. Annabelle was in a deep dream state, most of her right leg was missing and the stump was bandaged thickly and thoroughly.
“Careful,” Dr. Griffin warned the orderly as he lowered the side rail on the gurney and prepared to transfer the patient to the bed.
Polly rushed to the other side of the bed, got on her knees on the mattress and leaned over to grab the pull-sheet underneath Annabelle toward her. To her surprise, Dr. Griffin came around to her side of the bed and helped out.
“On the count of three,” Polly said, as the orderly prepared to pass the patient over from the gurney while they all tugged her onto the mattress. After she counted, they made a quick and smooth transfer. The patient moaned briefly and her eyes fluttered open, but she quickly went back to sleep.
As the orderly left the room Dr. Griffin gave a rundown of Annabelle’s vital signs, a job the recovery nurse usually did over the phone, giving Polly the impression of how important the operation and follow-up care were to this orthopedic surgeon.
He ran down the list of antibiotics and pain-medication orders as Polly listened and adjusted the pillow under Annabelle’s head. Next she placed the amputated stump on a pillow, checked the dressing for signs of bleeding or drainage, circling a quarter-sized area with her marker and noting the time, then made sure the Jackson-Pratt drain was in place and with proper suction before pulling up the covers.
Dr. Griffin ran his hand lightly over his patient’s forehead, gently removing her OR cap and releasing a blanket of thick and shining brown hair. Such a tender gesture for an angry man.
“I’ll check back later,” he said, giving Annabelle one last, earnest glance before leaving the room. Polly almost expected him to kiss the girl’s forehead from that sincere, loving parent-type look in his eyes.
How could she stay mad at a man like that?
“I’ll take good care of her, Doctor,” she whispered.
He looked over his shoulder and gave an appreciative nod.
Seeing him in his scrubs, OR cap in place, untied mask hanging around his neck, she realized how fit he was, and that his shoulders and arms were thick with muscle. Where he might look stocky in his doctor’s coat, he really wasn’t. He was just big and solid. For a man she suspected to be pushing forty, he was in terrific shape, and she allowed herself a second glance as he walked away.
“Hey, Doc G., you haven’t signed my cast yet!” Charley called out from the next room.
“I’ll sign all three, Charley, my boy,” Dr. Griffin replied in a cheerful manner, changing his direction and somber attitude on a dime.
How could a man who was so great with kids be so lacking in people skills? It just didn’t make sense.
Soon lost in the care of her newly received patient, and also checking periodically on Charley, the afternoon flew by. Before Polly knew it she was giving report to the next shift and preparing to go home. But she couldn’t leave yet. Not before she apologized to Dr. Griffin. She’d promised herself she’d make amends today, and she always kept her promises.
Now that he was back from the OR, she knew where to find him and marched far down the hall toward his office as a new batch of butterflies lined up for duty in her stomach. Refusing to be timid this time, she tapped with firm knuckles on the glass of his office door.
“Come in.”
Mustering every last nerve she owned, she entered far more assuredly than she had the previous evening, noting the irony in seeing a huge jar of colorful balloons on the desk of a generally grumpy man.
“Is everything okay with Annabelle?”
“She’s doing very well, considering.” Polly scratched the nervous tickle above her lip. “I medicated her for pain just before I ended my shift.” She glanced around the room, with requisite diplomas and awards lining the gray-painted walls yet not revealing anything personal about the man, and took a long slow breath. “What I came for. Well, what I mean is I came here to, you know, after last night and how I upset you, I, uh, I just wanted to stop in and...well...”