Mending The Single Dad's Heart. Susanne Hampton
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onto the ER team looking after her.’
‘Let me tell them,’ he said, trying to pull away from the nurses again. ‘I just want to say I’m sorry to her.’
‘That won’t be happening. Please remain still; I need to check your eyes.’ Jessica’s words were firm and to the point as she held his chin and shone the light into the young man’s left eye and then the right one.
‘My eyes are fine. They’re not bleedin’ or nothing.’
‘Cody, as I said before, some injuries are not obvious so there won’t necessarily be bleeding, but a mild head injury can still be sustained from a car accident. You may have suffered whiplash and it can result in impaired vision or other problems and symptoms are varied. Do you have trouble focusing your eyes when switching your gaze between near and far objects?’
‘Nah, I’m good,’ he replied. ‘I can read the exit sign and her name thing.’ He pointed to the nurse’s identification tag.
‘Do you feel nauseous, as if you are going to vomit when you look around?’
‘Nah, I’m all good, I told you already. It’s me girlfriend I’m worried about.’
‘No, Cody. That is not an option,’ she continued. ‘Even if you are fine, you need to understand that if you were to rush over there to help her, you would in fact be doing just the opposite. You could get in the way of the medical team and put your girlfriend at risk.’
‘I don’t wanna do nothing but help her.’
‘Then, as the nurse said, you can help her by giving us her name and age.’
‘Ginny Randolf. She’s seventeen.’
‘Thank you,’ Jessica said as she continued the examination and noted his response to the light stimulation was within normal limits.
‘I’ll pass on her details and come right back,’ the younger nurse said as she headed over to the other patient.
‘And how old are you?’ Jessica enquired while checking the young man’s pupils for dilation.
‘I’m sixteen.’
‘Okay, Cody, we are going to have to take some blood samples and check your alcohol level. Have you been drinking?’
‘No. I’m on my probationary licence. That’s not why we crashed. Is that what you think happened? Do you think I was drink-driving?’ His voice was shrill and once again Jessica needed to placate him.
‘I’m not assuming anything.’ Her voice was low and calm as she met his eyes. ‘This is routine and not because I suspect anything, Cody. It’s just that with any motor vehicle accident a blood test for alcohol and other drugs is mandatory.’
‘I can’t drink on a probationary licence. I’m an apprentice chippy. I’m not looking to lose my job with a baby on the way. Ginny’s nine weeks pregnant.’
Jessica and the nurse immediately looked at each other and, without a word exchanged, the second nurse disappeared to pass on the crucial information. Pregnancy would certainly complicate the situation if there were suspected internal injuries and the chance of miscarriage was a concern.
‘We found out a few weeks ago.’
He rested back down on his elbows, not taking his eyes off the opposite bay but seemingly finally accepting the need to comply—and the fact a towering male nurse had just approached to assist would not allow him to do otherwise.
‘We were arguing about when she would tell her parents. They don’t like me. I wanted her to hold off a bit longer so they didn’t try to force her to get rid of the baby. She told me she was gonna tell them tonight and I got scared and distracted and I didn’t see the merging lane. We went off the road and hit the fence.’
A nurse suddenly pulled a curtain around the young man’s girlfriend.
‘What’s happening? Why are they doing that? Is she okay?’ Cody’s questions came flying at Jessica and the nurse as he sat bolt upright again.
‘Your girlfriend is in good hands,’ Jessica told him. ‘And, thanks to you, the team know there’s another tiny life growing inside of her so they will be doing everything possible to treat them both.’
‘Please can you go and check? I need to know what’s happening. I’m freaking out here. She’s gotta be okay.’
Jessica reluctantly agreed. She wasn’t even officially on staff yet so not keen to overstep protocols further than she already had but she knew Cody’s anxious state was escalating by the minute with the curtain obscuring his view and it wouldn’t end well if he raced over there. The young man was physically fine and the other nurses had returned to monitor his observations so she headed over to enquire about the status of his partner—the mother of his unborn child.
With each step she took, she prayed fate would not change the course of their young lives.
She quietly and tentatively parted the curtain and peered inside the bay to see the back of the doctor undertaking an ultrasound examination of the young woman. He had been informed of her pregnancy and was obviously prioritising the baby. It all seemed calm so she didn’t feel the need to interrupt.
‘The baby is fine; there’s a strong heartbeat and no obvious signs of distress, Ginny,’ she heard him say. ‘I’m sorry you can’t see the screen that I am looking at right now. I can share those images later with you. But for the time being we need to keep you flat until we can properly assess the damage to your neck and back. I believe it is muscular as you do not have any of the symptoms I would expect to see with a spinal injury. I need to send you for an MRI—it’s not an X-ray so it’s perfectly safe for your baby and it will allow us to assess any neck, spinal or ankle injuries. You and your baby are both paramount to anything we do.’
Jessica agreed with his treatment plan and she thought he had a lovely bedside manner and comforting voice. Deep, masculine but still warm. It sounded familiar but she knew that couldn’t be the case. She didn’t know anyone in town.
She raised her hand to close the curtain and caught sight of his profile and all but gasped. Her heart took a leap as she recognised him. She did know him. But the last time she’d seen him he wasn’t wearing a white consultant’s coat. Instead he was wearing the wet imprint of her carry-on luggage on his shoe.
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