Libby sat on the passenger sideof Michael’s truck, staring sightlessly at the landscape passing by in a blur, thinking how she was used to dealing with victims after the paramedics had already done their jobs. And although she had gone on many ambulance runs during her training, it had been a while since she’d had to do triage at the scene of an accident.
And dammit, she didn’t have anything to work with.
“What were they thinking, to let a child up on the roof of a house?” she asked for the fifth time. “And I don’t have any equipment. You’re sure they called the ambulance?”
Michael reached over and covered her wringing hands. “Your knowledge is what’s needed. And the ambulance has been called, but it’s forty miles away, coming from the other end of the lake.”
“My knowledge means squat without equipment. What were they thinking?” she repeated.
Michael squeezed her hands and then had to downshift and concentrate on taking the corner without killing them both. He was driving fast but not recklessly.
“Kids grow up quick here, lass,” he said as he shifted and accelerated the truck out of the curve. “We can’t afford to keep them sheltered, or they’ll get into even more trouble as teenagers.” He looked over and smiled. “It’s not wise to wait until a boy’s grown to put a chain saw in his hand for the first time. Or set him on a snowmobile or let him shoot a rifle. We begin young, when we have the advantage of supervision.”
Libby started wringing her hands again. “Ha—has Robbie used a chain saw?” she whispered, fighting back the picture that rose in her mind. “And shot a rifle?”
“Aye, Libby. Under my supervision.”
“But he’s not even nine.”
“If he’s big enough to lift a tool, he needs to know how it works in an emergency.”
“A gun’s not a tool.”
Michael gave her a bit longer, more assessing look, as if he were trying to judge her mood. “But it is a tool, lass,” he softly countered. “Which is why I’ve seen that Robbie knows the business end of a gun. When he was only three, I froze a gallon jug of water and shot it. He was properly horrified when it exploded, to realize what would happen to a person.”
Libby was properly horrified now.
“Libby,” Michael said with an impatient sigh, “Robbie visits friends now that he’s in school. And just about every house in this area has a hunting rifle in it. I need to be sure he understands what could happen if his friend wants to impress him by showing off his daddy’s gun.”
“He should just run like hell and find an adult.”
“He will,” Michael assured her. “Believe me, that was my first rule. We’re here,” he said, pulling into a driveway.
Libby was out of the truck before Michael could shut it off, running to the gathering of people at the side of the house.
Worried, helpless, and relieved stares greeted her, along with Mrs. Brewer, holding her two-year-old daughter, tears running down both of their cheeks.
“Please. Help him,” she whispered hoarsely. “Al-Alan’s hurt bad. I-I think his back is broken.”
Libby immediately put on her reassuring doctor’s face and smiled at Mrs. Brewer. “I’ll do what I can,” she promised, turning away and going over to the small group of people kneeling and standing beside the fallen man.
She quickly scanned the area for a second victim but saw only Alan Brewer. “I was told there were two,” she said to the small crowd. “Where’s the boy?”
“He’s here,” somebody offered, moving to reveal the child. He was sitting up, leaning against a woman, holding his arm cradled against his chest, his face smudged with dirt and tears. Other than a possible broken arm, he appeared okay.
Libby knelt beside Alan Brewer, thankful to see he was conscious. “Alan,” she said, holding his head still when he tried to look toward her. “Tell me where you hurt.”
“His back,” an unseen voice said from among the onlookers.
“I want Alan to tell me. Where does it hurt, Alan?”
“My back,” he repeated gutturally.
“But where on your back? Up by your shoulders or lower, nearer your waist?”
“Low,” he hissed. “And my… my left shoulder,” he growled, closing his eyes.
Libby could see that his left shoulder was dislocated, but it was his back that worried her the most.
“He tried to catch Darren when he slipped,” somebody said, kneeling on the other side of Alan. “But the ladder gave way, and he twisted as they fell in order to protect Darren.
His son landed on top of him.”
Libby assumed Darren was the boy with the broken arm.
“We haven’t moved him,” somebody else said. “That’s the way he landed.”
Libby thanked God for that small miracle, absently nodding. She could see that Alan Brewer was in a lot of pain and starting to show signs of shock. Dammit, where was the ambulance?
Her training was useless without equipment to stabilize him, without IVs, a backboard, and a neck brace. Hell, she didn’t even have a stethoscope to listen for internal bleeding.
Libby cupped Alan’s face and leaned close enough to whisper in his ear. “Just take slow, easy breaths,” she told him softly. “Focus only on me. Listen to what I’m saying.”
“Darren,” he said with a harsh growl.
“He’s fine,” Libby told him, still whispering in his ear.
“He’s sitting up and is fine. Listen to me, Alan. I want you to concentrate on my hands.
Can you feel my hands on your face?”
“Y-yes.”
“They’re going to feel warm. Concentrate on the heat. Let the warmth travel through your body, all the way down your back.”
Libby closed her own eyes, focusing all of her energy on Alan Brewer. Color immediately lit her mind’s eye, a swirling, turbulent mass of black and red and churning blue. Her heart started to beat with pounding throbs, and Libby realized it was Alan’s heartbeat she felt. Pain assaulted her in waves. Tension racked her senses.
“Let me in, Alan,” she whispered. “I can help you.”
The colors swirled in angry chaos, howling through his body and into hers. Alan’s fierce emotions kept lashing out at her, blocking her from reaching his injury. For nearly five minutes, Libby tried to get him to let her in, whispering words of encouragement, entreating him to open his mind. And each time, the colors swirled, and his injury danced just out of her reach.
Strong, warm, powerful, and familiar hands took hold of her trembling shoulders, and Libby renewed her effort. But no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t reach Alan’s broken vertebra.
A siren sounded in the distance and slowly drew closer, until it finally came to a sudden halt behind her. Voices penetrated the fog of her mind, and Libby sat back on her knees and let go of Alan’s face.
Michael lifted her to her feet, wrapped his arms around her body, and hugged her.
“Your equipment’s here, lass,” he whispered as he tucked her head under his chin and tightened his arms, as if trying to still her trembling body with his own.
The paramedics, loaded down with equipment, rushed in. And for a full two minutes, Libby became an onlooker—until her training overrode her shock. She pulled away from Michael, knelt down beside Alan, and started issuing orders to the paramedics. But she stopped the minute she realized they were staring at her.
“She’s a trauma doctor,” Michael said with quiet authority, moving to kneel beside her.
And from that moment on, she was, using her years of training to guide the two men and one woman as they all worked as a team to stabilize Alan Brewer. An IV was started; he was carefully placed on a backboard and immobilized, then loaded onto the gurney and placed in the ambulance. Libby spoke on the radio to an attending physician in Bangor and was told a helicopter already had been dispatched.
She gave a few more orders to the paramedics, grabbed one of the medical kits, went over to young Darren Brewer, and knelt in front of him. She smiled and brushed a tear off his dirty cheek. “I’m Doc Libby, Darren. Remember me from the Christmas tree shop this morning?”