From Single Mum to Lady

From the bed, Leo Parker whispered, ‘Delphine—what are you doing here?’

The girl took his hands. ‘Oh, babe, you’re OK. Thank God!’ She turned to Patrick and Jandy. ‘Can we go now? I’ll call a taxi.’

‘Mr Parker certainly can’t go,’ interrupted Patrick sternly. ‘You need to stay in overnight—we’ve got to get you balanced,’ he said to Leo. ‘You know that, don’t you, or you might find yourself in a coma again.’

Leo struggled to sit up. ‘I can’t stay here the night,’ he said, aghast. ‘I’ve got to be at the studio by lunchtime. What time is it now?’

‘Ten-thirty—you won’t have time to recover properly by then,’ said Jandy.

‘I will,’ said Leo, his voice slurring slightly. He swung his legs over the bed and started to get down. ‘I’m going to discharge myself—I’m perfectly all right.’

Patrick put his hand on the man’s shoulder. ‘You’ve got to give yourself time to recover—drink and diabetes don’t mix. And you’ve got a nasty gash on your head.’

Leo stared at them all and then, as if the reality of the situation fully hit him, put a hand over his face and groaned.

‘Oh, my God. If the press get hold of this…’ He looked up at them pleadingly. ‘If this gets into the papers, I’m sunk. I’m recording a show about alcohol abuse today. I can’t let it get out that I’ve had a bit too much of the sauce myself.’

‘Everything here is strictly confidential,’ Patrick promised.

Leo looked at him wryly. ‘Things have a funny way of getting out into the public domain, you know.’

‘Then let’s go now, Leo, darling, before anyone knows. I’ve booked us into the hotel together,’ said Delphine eagerly, laying a possessive hand on his arm.

Leo sighed heavily. ‘Have you got two rooms?’

Delphine looked a little abashed. ‘Well—no. You said we could be together, babe…’

‘You silly mare! Do you think the press are dumb? My PA and I sharing a room doesn’t look good—have you forgotten I’m a family man to the public?’

Jandy flicked the briefest of glances towards Patrick over Delphine’s head, and his gaze held hers for a fraction of a second, before returning impassively to the scene before him.

‘I really wouldn’t advise you leaving the hospital yet,’ he said firmly.

‘Advise what you like—but don’t ruin my career. I’ll do what I damn well like. I can discharge myself if I want to.’

He was interrupted in mid-sentence by the sound of the curtains being viciously flung back, and a small plump woman stood before them, staring at Leo Parker with undisguised fury.

‘So you’ve done it again, have you?’ she said coldly. ‘Will you never learn, you old fool? And you can forget about discharging yourself as well.’

There was a short silence then Patrick said evenly, ‘Excuse me, but just who are you?’

The woman turned to him and said icily, ‘I’m Phyllis Parker, young man, Leo Parker’s wife, and I’m just about sick of him making such a Charlie of himself!’

‘Oh, God—Phyllis!’ Leo Parker flopped back on his pillows and closed his eyes. In the corner, Delphine began to cry.

Patrick and Jandy watched as Leo Parker was pushed down the corridor on the way to Medical, closely followed by his wife, still berating him. They disappeared into the lift and Patrick and Jandy went into Sister Borley’s office behind the central station.

He turned to Jandy and said sardonically, ‘I’ve never watched his programme before, but I’m going to make a point of seeing it and hearing his views on family life and the evils of drink.’

‘Same here,’ said Jandy, trying to keep a straight face.

‘I reckon Leo Parker’s going to have some explaining to do…’

His clear blue eyes laughed down at her, his grave face softened by humour, and Jandy answered his amusement with a grin, mutually diverted by the little scene that had just been played out. Patrick Sinclair could be quite engaging when he wanted to, she admitted.

Karen put down the phone she’d been speaking into. ‘That,’ she said with compressed lips, ‘was the Delford Gazette. It’s already got out that Leo Parker’s a patient here—and I’m not surprised after all the fuss!’

She went out of the room and wiped the whiteboard vigorously, venting her irritation by obliterating the annoying Mr Parker’s name now he had been taken to the medical ward. Jandy went to deal with a young girl with a staple stuck down her fingernail.

It was a fairly routine afternoon—a sprained ankle, a scalded arm and a child with a hacking cough who should have been taken to see his G.P., according to Mr Vernon, and not brought to A and E, cluttering up the department.

Karen sat down at her desk with a sigh of relief. ‘Right,’ she said comfortably. ‘At last! Time for a breather. It could be a chance for us to catch up on all the patient assessment forms and maybe—’

The sudden jarring sound of the trauma bleep split the air. ‘Trauma call, trauma call, trauma team to A and E Resus. ETA three minutes…trauma call…’

Karen swore softly to herself. ‘Wouldn’t you know it? I spoke too soon.’

The relaxed atmosphere changed and there was an air of tension as everyone available gathered round the central station, prepared to spring into action.

Tim Vernon came out of a cubicle, swinging his stethoscope impatiently as if he couldn’t wait to get going, and Max Fuller, the porter, started pushing trolleys down the passage and out of the way of the entrance. Karen’s voice was authoritative and clipped, her look of motherly cosiness changed to brisk efficiency as she spoke on the phone to the ambulancemen.

‘OK, everyone—an RTA on the main Delford road. My information is that there’s an injured female hit by a motorcycle, lacerations to her face and in great pain. A cyclist with obvious fracture of right leg, and a pillion passenger with a very low BP and head injury, possible status 3. ETA any minute now.’ She put down the phone and turned to the staff. ‘Patrick, you take the injured female with lacerations on her face in Theatre One and the status 3 patient will go into the big theatre.’

‘I’ll take the status 3 patient,’ said Dr Vernon. ‘Bob—you come with me.’

‘That’s three patients for urgent X-rays. John Cooper can take the suspect broken leg with Tilly. Max—make sure we’ve got enough oxygen cylinders and dripstands in that big theatre. Jandy, can you be on hand to help where necessary?’

Jandy felt the familiar ripple of adrenalin kicking through her body as they waited for the ambulances to arrive. It was peculiar to Casualty—that tremor of excitement mixed with apprehension in dealing with absolutely any injury or illness thrown at them, and often time was not on their side. Split-second decisions had to be made and the staff in the department were the first line of defence.

Tilly nibbled at her nails nervously. ‘It’s nerveracking, not knowing what you’ll get. I hate these horrible accidents. I’m frightened I’ll faint or something.’

Jandy placed a reassuring hand on Tilly’s arm—the young nurse had only been in the department a few weeks and it was a very fast learning curve for all the students.

‘It’s always a bit scary—knowing that how we deal with patients here can determine the outcome of their eventual recovery. And every case is different,’ she admitted. ‘But once we’re in the thick of it, there’s no time to think. You put everything else out of your head.’

Patrick stood near the door, looking down the drive where the ambulances would come from. He turned and smiled at the young nurse. ‘But this is what it’s all about, isn’t it? Being able to turn your hand to anything. In the end it becomes instinctive. It’s exciting!’

He grinned at Jandy, eyes dancing with anticipation, confidently looking forward to the challenge of the unknown. Everyone’s idea of the perfect doctor, she thought wryly, his hospital greens seeming to emphasise his athletic physique. She was uneasily aware that she was just a little too conscious of Patrick’s attraction and that devastating easy smile of his, but he was just an ordinary married guy, wasn’t he? Not her type at all. She bit her lip. This man was getting too much under her skin.

She glanced at Bob Thoms—what a contrast! His brow was furrowed with anxiety as usual. He was a good doctor, painstaking and thorough, but always racked by worries that his best might not be good enough—what a pity she couldn’t find someone like him attractive. Bob was free and single with no hint of arrogance or over-confidence about him—but incredibly dull!

She forced herself to concentrate on the moment, to push out of her mind the distracting fact that Patrick was standing close to her. Then the flashing blue lights of the ambulances appeared as they came up the drive, and gradually the whine of the sirens died down as they reached the entrance. In a few minutes the doors swished open and three trolleys were being pushed through into the wide passage. A plump woman clutching a large handbag was running beside one of the trolleys, tears streaming down her face. Jandy took her arm gently but firmly and steered her to the side of the passage.

‘Come with me for a minute,’ she said gently. ‘Just let the doctors see to the patient…Are you a relative?’

‘I’m her mother…Mrs Thorpe…’ The woman clung to Jandy hysterically, hiccuping sobs shaking her, as the shock of the incident she’d just witnessed set in. ‘She…she’s having a baby. Please help her. She mustn’t lose this one—she’s had two miscarriages already.’

‘Come with me to the desk and let’s take her details. First, what’s her name?’

‘Brenda Evans…she’s twenty-five. She’s been longing for this baby…’

Mrs Thorpe’s voice started to rise in panic again and Jandy quickly said, ‘Tell me what happened…take it slowly.’

Gradually the woman started to calm down, and in the telling of the story her mind was forced to concentrate on something other than what was now happening to her daughter.

‘This motorbike…it came towards us with no warning. It was going that fast. I saw it coming, and I screamed to Brenda, but it hit her and sent her sprawling on the ground.’ Mrs Thorpe paused for a second to control her tears. ‘Will…will she lose the baby?’

With the skill born of much practice in calming worried relatives, Jandy led her to a chair and said comfortingly, ‘She’s in very good hands, Mrs Thorpe, and I know they will be monitoring her very closely—especially now they know her medical history. I’m going to get you a cup of tea and then I’ll go and find out just what’s happening to her. You try and calm down—she’ll need you to look after her when she goes home.’

A paramedic was wheeling Mrs Thorpe’s daughter briskly into one of the small theatres. ‘This is Brenda Evans,’ he said. ‘She’s in a lot of pain, but superficially at least she only seems to have lacerations. BP 100 over 70, pulse 120. Reasonably stable. She’s also seven and a half months pregnant.’

‘What happened?’ asked Patrick, bending over the supine figure on the trolley.

‘It looks like a motorcycle tried to take a corner at speed and hit this lady a glancing blow—she fell forward onto her face.’

Jandy had come into the cubicle to see what was happening so that she could update the patient’s mother on the latest information. She was watching the girl’s face—there was a large graze on her chin, covered with grit.

‘She’s very pale…’ she murmured to Patrick. ‘Obviously she’s in shock, but she’s blinking her eyes all the time. What’s causing that?’

He frowned and looked at Brenda’s face closely. ‘Rapid blinking is often a sign of a sharp pain. I wonder…Can you speak, Brenda?’

Brenda grimaced and mumbled something through stiff lips.

‘I reckon it’s something to do with her jaw—see how stiffly she’s holding it,’ Patrick said. ‘Moving it seems to cause her extreme discomfort.’

He ran his hands lightly over her face, watching her reactions carefully. Brenda sucked in her breath and groaned.

‘I’m sorry, Brenda,’ he said gently. ‘That’s all I’m going to do at the moment. We’ll give you something for the pain, don’t worry. You’ll be all right—just try and relax and don’t do anything that might move your jaw.’

He patted her arm, trying to reassure her and with his calm voice showing her that he was very much in charge. You got to know people’s skills quite quickly when you worked with them in Casualty, reflected Jandy. Patrick had a sure touch with patients, knowing that the familiar platitudes would soothe Brenda. He knew that physical and aural contact with a frightened patient could reduce the effects of shock.

It was one of Karen’s repeated adages to her team: ‘Remember that reassurance is one of the most powerful clinical tools you’ve got.’ When it came to medicine, Dr Sinclair was ticking quite a few boxes so far, admitted Jandy.

‘Can you arrange to have Brenda X-rayed ASAP?’ Patrick asked Jandy.

‘But she’s pregnant,’ she pointed out.

Patrick shook his head. ‘She’s going to need surgery on her jaw, I’m afraid, and we’ve got to know exactly what the damage is. The X-ray won’t be over the baby—fortunately she’s late on in her pregnancy.’

‘Do you think she’s broken her jaw?’

‘The first thing to hit the floor was her chin I reckon—like that!’ Patrick demonstrated this by smacking his fist into his other hand. ‘That’s where the cut is. I’ll bet what’s happened is that the force of the impact has snapped off her left condyle—the part of the bone that forms the hinge of the jaw.’

‘She hit her chin just at the wrong point, then.’

Patrick nodded. ‘Every time she moves her jaw, bone fragments are scraping across the tissue surrounding her ear.’

Jandy grimaced. ‘Poor woman—that’s seriously painful. What about pain relief?’

‘After her X-ray give her ten milligrams of morphine and get her booked into Surgical—I’ll speak to the surgical registrar. We need someone from Maternity to look her over as well. We don’t want her having this baby yet.’

Jandy split open a pair of lanolin gloves and with exquisite gentleness swabbed the wound on Brenda’s chin. ‘Her mother’s really anxious about her,’ she said. ‘I think it would help if you explained Brenda’s injuries rather than me—you’re the expert.’

He laughed. ‘I’ll do my best.’

Patrick sat down next to Mrs Thorpe on one of the chairs in the corridor, leaning towards her as he described what he thought had happened, giving a short but lucid explanation. Gradually the tension left the woman’s face until she was actually giving a watery smile by the time he was called away to the phone.

‘Oh, he’s a lovely man that Dr Sinclair,’ said Mrs Thorpe when Jandy returned from trying to get a slot for Brenda’s X-ray. ‘I feel she’s in really good hands. Could I go and see Brenda now?’

Jandy smiled. ‘I’m sure it would do her good if you just sat by her and held her hand until they take her for X-rays. The calmer she’s kept, the better.’

‘I understand,’ said Mrs Thorpe. The tea and the chat to Patrick about her daughter had composed her and she was ready to cope again. She followed Jandy to the small theatre where her daughter was and sat by her bed, flicking a wondering eye at all the monitoring equipment around the bed.

‘Eh, it’s like a space capsule in here,’ she said. ‘I’ve never seen so many tubes and dials!’

She picked up her daughter’s hand and squeezed it. ‘You’ll be alright, love,’ she said softly. ‘I’ve had a chat to that Dr Sinclair—he’s doing his best for you, I know.’

Patrick popped his head round the curtain. ‘Has the X-ray been booked yet?’ he asked.

‘There’s a bit of a delay—one of the machines is being serviced and there’s a queue for the other,’ Jandy informed him.

He frowned. ‘For God’s sake—surely it’s usual to service the machines at a quieter time? How long are they going to be?’

‘About twenty minutes, I think.’

‘That’s ridiculous! This needs to be done immediately—surely there should be a procedure for urgent cases?’

Jandy sympathised with him. It was incredibly frustrating to have treatment blocked for the patient, but she also noticed the implied criticism of the hospital. Poor old Delford General wasn’t awash with funds for any more X-ray machines.

‘I’m sorry, there’s not much I can do about it. There’s only one machine at the moment for a lot of patients.’

‘I’m not accusing you of causing the hold-up,’ he said tersely. Then his tone softened. ‘I’m sorry—I’m not knocking Delford, believe me.’

He looked at her steadily then left the room, and she blushed at his accurate reading of her thoughts. Actually, she agreed with him that somewhere along the line there had been inefficiency. Perhaps she was being a little too prickly where Patrick was concerned!

Karen bustled up to Jandy, her pale blue tunic top straining slightly over her full figure, her face pink from exertion. Jandy often wondered why Karen was so plump as she seemed to run everywhere, and had an inexhaustible supply of energy.

‘Ah, there you are,’ she puffed. ‘I think we’re under control now. Dr Vernon’s booked the head injury into the neurological ward for obs, and Brenda Evans will be prepped for Theatre later.’ She shot a look at her watch. ‘Time for the handover soon and then home, sweet home, thank goodness!’ Her voice dropped. ‘By the way, I’m rather impressed by Patrick Sinclair—aren’t you? As I said before, he seems extremely capable!’

‘Yes,’ allowed Jandy cautiously.

He seemed extremely everything—wonderful with his patients and a good clinician. But she still had reservations about this self-assured man and his drop-dead handsome looks—she would see how he performed over the next few weeks! Men like him tended to be arrogant, everything dropping into their laps very easily, and she could see how he might break some poor girl’s heart if he was free. What a good job it was that he was a family man and a no-go area—she’d learned from her own experience that loving a married man was not an option.

CHAPTER THREE

‘I DON’T believe this,’ muttered Jandy, looking at the huge tailback of vehicles round the car park. For the third time that month the car-park barrier had jammed and from her experience it could take at least three quarters of an hour to sort out. Nothing for it but to get the bus and leave the car in the car park—she hated to keep Pippa waiting when she was due to pick up Abigail. It had been a gruelling week and she was tired—although her fears about working with the new registrar had been groundless.

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