“Dang it,” Sammy exclaimed as she bent forward laying the candy bar on the center console. Before she had a chance to react, she heard the screech of tires and felt a violent jolt. Suddenly the car sat motionless in the road, almost perpendicular to the double yellow lines. A small curl of bluish, gray smoke rose from the hood of her car. The driver’s side door of the Plymouth was smashed inward and the window lay in pieces in Sammy’s lap.
Her rapid heartbeat and quickened breathing caused her to feel light headed. As she took off her seat belt, a sharp pain pierced her lower abdomen. She reached for the door handle, but it wouldn’t budge. Without any thought except escape, she began to climb through the broken window.
Her feet hit the pavement jolting her entire body. Her defense mechanisms were kicking in. “This must be a horrible dream,” she said aloud. As she stood looking at the two mangled cars, she couldn’t understand how it had all happened.
The driver of the other vehicle still sat motionless in his black Dodge pickup, his head propped against the door. With a shriek Sammy began running from the accident in the direction of help. A sudden pain in her lower left abdomen, forced her to clench her waist. At the bottom of the hill she spotted a car. Frantically she began waving her free arm above her head.
The driver of the car was a man with long dark brown hair and a full beard. As he approached the crest of the hill, the accident came into full view. Without a word to Sammy the passenger hopped out of the car and the driver skillfully turned the car around in the direction of the nearest phone. The passenger, a tall slender man with a ponytail, approached Sammy asking her if she was all right.
“Yeah I’m okay, but what about him,” she said with tears in her eyes as she pointed to the other vehicle where the man sat unconscious.
“Let’s not think about that right,” he calmly declared as he led Sammy to the side of the road opposite the accident.
As Sammy stood there waiting for help to arrive, she watched the stranger inspect both vehicles to be sure neither one was still running. The stranger, whose name was Roger, came and stood next to Sammy. A few drops of blood fell from her nose landing on the chest of her gray T-shirt.
A small cut on her nose had replaced her glasses. The force of the air bag had knocked them off her face. Everything around her seemed to be in slow motion. The ambulance arrived after what seemed like an hour. Several paramedics in blue uniforms scattered about the accident and began working.
As Sammy watched them attend to the man still trapped in his vehicle, she became upset wishing one of the paramedics might pay attention to her. The pain in her side grew increasingly and she began to sway in place. Before she knew it two youthful medics were strapping a c-collar around her neck and then immediately placed her on a backboard.
“What’s your name ma’am?” one of them called out.
“It’s Sammy,” she replied.
“Is that short for Samantha?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she replied, trying to smile.
“Just sit back and enjoy the ride, we’re going to take care of you,” he reassured
her. “All this stuff is just a precaution.”
Now as Sammy lay on a stretcher, the spider straps holding her firmly in place, she felt the pain in her legs and ache of her head.
“I’m so tired,” she said a loud not really to anyone.
“More than likely, you have a concussion,” replied the paramedic upon hearing Sammy’s complaint.
As Sammy closed her eyes, she felt the paramedics loading her into the ambulance. Once inside the ambulance and heading toward the hospital, the two paramedics began asking Sammy several questions as they administered her oxygen.
“What happened back there ma’am?”
“I only took my eyes off the road for a second, it was only a second,” Sammy explained. “I never saw him coming.”
“Just relax, I’m going to put an IV I your arm.”
With that Sammy felt a prick in the wrist of her left arm. The other paramedic, who sat to Sammy’s right, began examining her arms and legs for bruises or any broken bones. Next he took her blood pressure and checked her pulse. Sammy flinched as he peeled back her eyelids and shone his light pen into her pupils.
“Tell me Sammy, who do we need to contact?”
“Uh my parents,” Sammy replied. She’d been so caught up in the last fifteen minutes of chaos, she hadn’t thought about having to tell her parents. “My father’s going to be so
mad, ask for my mother,” she pleaded.
“Your father will understand, just try and relax, we’re almost to the hospital now.”
Inside the busy emergency room, Sammy kept her eyes closed. She heard lots of beeping machines and many voices, none of which she recognized. The pain in her head made her want to fall asleep. The man to her right on the other side of the curtain, continued to cough. She heard him tell the doctor that he smoked a pack and a half a day for forty years now and saw no reason to quit now. Besides, if he gave up smoking he’d having nothing to do. Sure, his hag of a wife had countless times tried to persuade him to quit, but what did she know. She hadn’t smoked a day in her life and yet she died of heart disease.
“Little did he know,” Sammy thought, “it was probably all that second hand smoke that did her in.” By the sound of only his voice, Sammy pictured a pair shaped man in his late sixties. He probably wore a button down flannel shirt, worn thin in the elbows, with tuffs of gray hair sticking out at the collar. His dark brown pants were pulled high around his waist and the belt buckle read Kenworth.
The man’s sudden coughing brought Sammy out of her daydream. She heard the curtain being pulled back. Sammy managed to open her eyes enough to see a nurse motioning for someone to com in. Sammy lifted her head slightly. It was her parents. Her mother came quickly to her side.
“Oh my, I’m glad you’re alright,” her mother said with a sigh of relief.
Her father stood, just inside the curtain. He did not move any closer or say anything. Sammy didn’t understand why. But perhaps it was because he didn’t which to see his only daughter in such a debilitated state. The curtain was pushed back once again and a uniformed officer entered. He spoke softly to Sammy about the accident. As she answered he wrote notes on a small tablet. Sammy was unsure why the officer was there. He hadn’t even introduced himself or stated his purpose. Filing a police report was her only guess.
After the officer left, several nurses and a doctor entered the room. One nurse stood at the foot of Sammy’s hospital bed with scissors in one hand. As Sammy closed her eyes, she felt the cold stainless steal again her knee. When Sammy managed to open her eyes again, she was wearing a gown and a nurse was wheeling her down the hall.
“Sammy, the doctor has ordered a CAT scan for you and we’ll also need a blood sample.”
Sammy did not answer, instead she closed her eyes and wondered how long she’d been in this place. Where were her parents and what had they done with her clothes? As she now lay and wait for the CAT scan, her mind drifted. When would she return to school and what were all her friends going to think once they found out she’d been in an accident. Who would replace her on the soccer team for Monday’s game. Suddenly her stomach muscles tightened and she sat up quickly. The vomit came forcefully out of her mouth. The nurse brought a small plastic basin to Sammy’s side, but ended up dropping its contents to the floor anyway. Sammy sat back and again closed her eyes.
“Sammy, they’re ready for you in the CAT scan room.”
As the nurse wheeled Sammy into the room, she explained the procedure.
“Because your red blood cell count is so high we want to check your spleen and pancreas for any damage. First we have to give you a contrast agent, to help us take a closer
look at your organs.”
“Okay,” was Sammy’s only reply. She felt too weak and tired to say anything else. The pain in her abdomen was making her head spin.
The radiologist made sure Sammy was positioned correctly on the table and then he left the room. Over the intercom the radiologist told Sammy to lie still and hold her breath. Sammy lay there, unable to open her eyes, wanting only to be back in her car cruising down the road. The whole accident had happened so quickly and it kept replaying in her head. Had she killed the other man? Maybe he was only knocked unconscious. Tears of guilt ran down her cheeks and rolled into her ears.
“Hold your breath. Lie still,” came the radiologist’s voice over the intercom. “We’re nearly finished Sammy.”
In hospital room 348, Sammy lay stiff on her back. The pain in her abdomen caused her to moan and grab her waist.
“Oh my gosh, dead?” He’s dead?” a woman’s frantic voice came from somewhere down the hall. “They better take her license away. She killed my husband.”
Sammy gasped for air, as a lump formed in her throat. Her stomach began to cramp up as tears welled up in her eyes.
“I never saw him,” Sammy screamed aloud. Just then Sammy’s doctor came quickly through the door.
“Well Sammy, after further analysis of the CAT scan images, it looks as though you sustained massive trauma to your spleen. It may rupture at any time. We’ve located a
donor and we’ll be performing emergency surgery shortly. Sammy everything is going to be fine.”
Sammy’s hands began to tremble. “My spleen, where’s that located?” The doctor had already left the room and two nurses began to wheel Sammy to the prep room. Once inside the anesthesiologist placed a mask over Sammy’s face.
“Mind if I say a little prayer for you,” he asked sheepishly.
“Sure whatever,” Sammy replied.
As she closed her eyes the last words she heard from the anesthesiologist were,
“Dear Buddha…”
Sammy’s parents sat uneasily in Emergency Waiting Room B. The walls were pained beige with an ivy border running along the top section of the wall. The dim lighting made it difficult for Sammy’s father to read the latest issue of Sports Illustrated. Instead he flipped through the pages glancing uninterestedly at the photos. Sammy’s mother sat filing her nails, but her shaking hands wouldn’t allow her to make any progress on the jagged nails. A woman across the waiting room sat sobbing loudly. A youthful man in a gray suit and tie with fluffy blonde hair sat next to her. He held one of her wrinkled hands clasped between his.
“I just can’t believe it,” the woman said between sobs. “I remember the day he bought that pickup. Lasted him thirteen years.”
“You’ve still got me,” pleaded the blonde haired man.
“yes, but what will I do without a husband to wake up beside and you without a father,” she replied as she lifted her head to look at the man.
“Well at least a part of him will be alive in another. His death was not in vain.”
Suddenly Sammy’s mother gasped as she placed a hand over her mouth. The woman from across the waiting room looked up as she wiped tears from her red swollen eyes.
