Well then, seeing as this has been well received so far I should make some comments to give a little context.
My family has a fairly extensive medical background. The paramedic from the last chapter, the one that helped Elsa? Yeah, that's modeled after my dad who is still a EMT/Paramedic today. When you see me recounting Jack's injuries in this chapter, I literally went to him and said "Hey dad, I'm writing this story, this is what happened, what injuries would he have?" My mom and about 1/3 of my family are nurses, so I know how hospitals work from some personal knowledge. Now, this isn't to say this is how ALL hospitals work, this is just how my little slice of the world has panned out. The names that you will see, aside from the obvious ones (you'll see what I mean) are mostly people that I know, or have known (working in doctor offices will do that to you). So that's where my research for this story will come in.
Some notes about the car accident itself. Jack and Elsa's car was going about 45 mph, the drunk driver was going around 50 mph and hit Jack and Elsa's car on the driver's side at about the driver's side wheel well area. My father assured me that he has been on many ambulance runs over the years with drunk drivers where they have been going faster than that and walked away with little more than a scratch, so it's not a foreign idea that I put forward.
Any questions, feel free to ask in the comments or PM me!
~Aria
Elsa stood silently by Jack's side for a long moment, more tears threatening to break over her eyes as she looked down at him as a nurse bustled around his head. She felt the doctor's hand on her shoulder and reluctantly released his hand, turning to look up at him.
"We have him sedated, so he isn't in pain. They are going to work on moving him to his room in the ICU right now," the doctor said, gesturing to the beige scrubbed men coming into the room with a large hospital bed, another nurse leading the way. "Let us let them move him, I'll take you up there in a little bit. It will take some time, I'll tell you what all we did in the mean time."
She nodded, stepping forward again and bending to press a kiss to Jack's bare fingers, squeezing them as the machine helping him breathe wheezed and puffed on his other side. Elsa took a shaky breath and slowly followed the doctor from the room, pulling the gown, mask and gloves off and into the metal bin he indicated. He shed his own gown, standing in blue scrubs of his own with a name tag turned around, a blue "MD" tag hanging from the bottom.
He held the door open for her to the waiting room, smiling as she hurried out to join her sister who glanced up with an anxious look.
"He's sedated," Elsa said, turning to look back at the doctor. "I don't know much more than that."
The doctor nodded.
"There is a small room over here where we can talk privately," he said, his long stride leading ahead of them down a hall a few steps before gesturing to an open door. A bronze plate on the door was labeled "Quiet Room."
"Thank you, Doctor..." Anna said, trailing off as she tried to read his name badge.
The doctor smiled, following them into the room as Kristoff hurried in behind them with several bags and purses in his arms. The police had come to the hospital several hours after Jack had gone into surgery and found Elsa, returning her purse that they had found in their ruined car and gotten some information her. She had passed on Anna's cell number, asking them to call her if they needed more information in the next few days, not sure she would be in a state to give much information.
"Sorry, I should have introduced myself. I am Dr. Polnockiewicz," he said, his accent becoming deeper and more fluid as his last name rolled off his tongue.
"What?" Kristoff said, looking up from his hunched position as he was setting things down beside a chair. Anna and Elsa were settling down onto a small couch, holding hands.
Dr. Polnockiewicz chuckled.
"I get that a lot," he admitted. "Call me Dr. North, it's what Polnoc means in Polish."
"You're Polish?" Anna asked.
"My grandfather was, grandmother and mother were Russian. But, that is for another time I think," Dr. North said, smiling softly at Elsa.
Elsa took in a deep breath and nodded. Dr. North, who was still standing, turned and walked to the door, pulling it slightly to detach it from the magnets holding it open. As the door slowly closed, he turned and walked back into the room, choosing a seat to face the small group. Anna still held Elsa's hand, her other hand rubbing Elsa's arm in a comforting gesture.
"Alrighty," Dr. North began, leaning down on his knees and bringing his hands together. "As I said before, Mrs. Frost, your husband has a lot of injuries but he is out of the danger zone. We have him classified in serious but stable condition, he is on a ventilator to help him breathe. When he came in, he had a collapsed lung which was fixed but the ventilator will also help his body concentrate on healing all of the other things."
Elsa dug in her pocket, looking for her wad of tissues. Dr. North paused, leaning back to grab the box from the windowsill and passed it over to her. She took it with a murmur of thanks, pulling several out of the box before setting the rest down beside her.
"He has a concussion, whiplash, as well as neck and spinal strain on his vertebrae. There are lacerations of varying degrees on his face, arms and abdominal areas from the glass shattering. We had to remove his spleen, so before he leaves the hospital he will need to have a brief talk with the dietary department but that is a ways down the road. His spleen had a major laceration and partial rupture to it, we decided it would be easier on him to just remove it."
Dr. North paused, looking at Elsa who nodded, tissues held under her nose as she listened.
"I will be working with Jack through this process, as well as his orthopedic doctor, you will meet him later. He had another surgery to attend to. Jack has multiple fractures throughout his body. Several ribs are either partially or completely fractured, the femur is fractured as well as the lower leg."
"Jesus," Kristoff whispered from his chair, his eyes wide as he listened to the list of injuries.
Elsa sobbed a little, bending forward in her seat.
"What is next?" Anna said, rubbing her hand over Elsa's back.
"Well," Dr. North began. "There is obviously a lot of bruising too, lots of body parts are banged up and bruised from all of this, so the body is trying to heal a little bit of everything at once. So, for now, we keep him sedated and we keep him on pain medication to keep him comfortable. I will be monitoring his labs and progress, we will be checking all of his outputs for infection. I will warn you, tomorrow and the next day is when the bruising will really become evident. It doesn't necessarily mean that he is getting worse, just means that the extent of some of the damage is showing."
Elsa took a long deep breath, Anna hugged her shoulders.
"But," Dr. North continued. "He has a very good outlook. His heart is still very strong, his vitals never wavered throughout the surgery and he is in good health. It's going to be a long road ahead of him, but he will be just fine."
"When do you think he will be able to wake up?" Kristoff asked.
Dr. North sighed.
"Next week? I can't give a definite time range until I see some lab work unfortunately. It's different from patient to patient. We keep patients sedated while they are on the ventilators, it's frightening to wake up and have the tubes down their throats. In a few days, we will try to see how he breathes on his own and we can re-evaluate from there."
Silence descended on the small room, punctuated by small sniffles from Elsa and the movement of the tissues under her nose and eyes. Dr. North leaned forward and carefully patted her knee, causing her to smile at him through her tears.
"I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm trying to be strong for him."
"You are doing a good job," he told her. "But you also need to be strong for your little one too. How far along are you?"
Elsa swallowed, leaning back a little bit.
"Four months yesterday, we had," she paused, swallowing hard again. "We had gone out tonight for things for the baby."
Dr. North smiled at her.
"I heard you gave our OB/GYN hell earlier for wanting to admit you to your own room."
Elsa blushed a little, shifting in her seat.
"I told her I was fine, just banged up a bit. I wanted to be down here when you were done with Jack."
He patted her knee again, standing up.
"You are quite the devoted one, Mrs. Frost. Just remember it's not just your husband you need to worry about in these next weeks, it's that little one as well. I will find out what room they are taking Mr. Frost to and send someone down to get you when he is settled. It will probably take a little time, so just settle in for now."
He walked out of the room, pulling up on the door pull and slipping out, the hospital's busy sounds leaking into the room before the door slowly slid back into place again. Kristoff exhaled deeply, leaning back in his chair and looking over at the sisters huddled together on the couch.
"Now what?" he asked softly.
Elsa looked up, biting her lip.
"I need to call his mom," she replied, looking at the faded floral wall print hung before her. "I don't know what I'm going to tell her."
"Diane?" Anna asked. "She and Pippa live up in Connecticut right?"
Elsa nodded.
"I was waiting to call until I knew more, she's going to want details."
She turned and glanced at her purse on the ground beside Kristoff, sighing. She wasn't sure she could relate everything that happened to her mother-in-law just yet, not while her own head was still reeling from the events herself.
"I'll call her," Kristoff said, smiling at her.
She blinked up at him.
"What?"
"I'll call her for you, you are barely holding yourself together right now. I know what is going on, I can tell her for you."
Elsa looked at him for a long moment before giving him a small smile and nodding.
"Thank you," she said.
He smiled at her, sliding her purse forward on the ground, picking it up and holding it out for her. She stuck her hand inside, moving around inside for a moment before extracting her phone, sighing a little in relief to see it wasn't broken before pressing the button to let the screen light up. Her thumb clicked around on the screen a few times, bringing up the contact for Diane Frost before she handed the phone back to Kristoff.
"Thank you," she said again as he took the phone from her, standing to step into the hall. He nodded, tapping the screen and holding the phone up to his ear.
"I need to call the embassy too," she said, looking at Anna. "Tell them I'm going to be gone for awhile, at least until Jack is conscious again. I'm not even entirely sure what hospital they took us to."
Anna smiled at her, squeezing her hand again.
"Johns Hopkins, the main campus, up in Baltimore. I had to call admitting for here and George Washington down in D.C. to find out where you were after you called me."
Elsa sighed.
"Sorry about that, my mind wasn't working very well."
Anna hugged her.
"I'll call the embassy, let them know what happened. I'm sure they will understand."
Anna stood, pulling her own phone from her pocket and began pulling up the number to Elsa's office at the embassy. As Anna began talking, the smooth flow of Norwegian conversation flowing between her and the person on the other end of the phone, Elsa leaned back, thankful for having her sister and brother-in-law live so close right now.
She began thinking back to when her parents had first moved them to America years before. Her father had been granted the position of Ambassador at the Norwegian Embassy in Washington D.C., he'd been home in the parlor that day when Elsa and Anna had come home from school. Their mother could barely contain her excitement as he told them, Anna had been excited too.
"We will be moving as soon as you finish this year of school," their father had concluded.
Elsa had felt her stomach sink, that was just a few weeks away. She'd been looking forward to spending the summer before her last year of upper secondary school before university with her friends, all of them still undecided in what they wanted to do when they got there. They all had plans of rooming together, sharing apartments and cooking meals together.
Anna was excited, she had just finished lower secondary school and was just about to enter into upper secondary school. Excited for the new friends she'd make, the new adventures she'd find so the thought of just doing that in America didn't phase her as much.
"It will be fun," her mother had said, smiling at her.
Elsa had smiled back, nodding and turned to take her books up to her room. It wasn't what she had hoped to hear when her father had said he might have big news on the horizon.
The next weeks had gone by quickly, with school finishing up, exams and packing in the evening. The embassy had sent several people over at different times, once a lady had come with a binder of house listings, sitting with her parents in the parlor for several hours as they went over each of the perks and flaws of each real estate listing.
When her mother had enthusiastically brought the plastic wrapped sheet of paper up for Anna and Elsa to look at, Elsa had done her best to look excited, but was sad to be leaving her current home. She liked where she lived, the old 19th century house with the small secret passage between her and Anna's room that they used to hide chocolates in when they were little. Where the shutters banged hauntingly on windy nights, causing the sisters to huddle together in bed and make up ghost stories about what might be causing the noise, other than the wind. This house had character, lots of it. She didn't want to leave it for some modern monstrosity in America, some 30 year old house that the Americans claimed to be old.
Then the movers came, carefully boxing and crating up their possessions in brown paper and sticky tape. Elsa watched from an upper window, a few of her most treasured childhood possessions laying in an open suitcase behind her. She didn't care if Anna teased her about carrying her small blanket and stuffed bunny rabbit with her, only she was going to transport them to their new home.
Their last night in Oslo they stayed with her grandparents, promises of visits, phone calls and postcards flowed around the table with the food and wine. Elsa did her best to participate, smiling and laughing at her grandpapa's silly jokes but she was already homesick.
They had arrived at the airport the next morning, suitcases all in a jumble as they unloaded them from the large taxi, her father working with his wallet to pay the driver in the krones he had not yet exchanged into dollars.
"Helene!" a female voice shouted, causing Elsa's mother to turn around, smile and wave.
"Oh hello Bulda," Helene said, as the short round woman bustled over to their suitcase pile on the sidewalk. "You both ready to go?"
Behind Bulda, a tall, blonde teenage boy pushed a cart also laden with suitcases and carry-on bags. The boy stopped the cart, leaning down on the bags and peering around to see the family.
"Girls, you remember Bulda, your father's secretary? He'd be lost without her," Helene asked, wrapping an arm around Elsa's shoulders and bringing her forward. Anna had already bounced forward to smile at Bulda. Bulda laughed, her shoulders bouncing.
"Well, I do my best to keep old Otto going on schedule. I think it's because we've been working together so long that he just didn't want to leave me behind," Bulda said, still smiling. She gestured behind her at the boy pushing the cart. "You remember my son, Kristoff?"
About to say something, her father appeared behind them, the taxi pulling away from the curb.
"Right," he said. "Let's get a cart and get inside. Best to not be late for our flight, a great new adventure awaits us! Are we on schedule Bulda?"
Bulda let out a bark of laughter.
"Like I would let you fall behind schedule," she replied, gesturing for Kristoff to follow behind the girls. "You trust me with your timetables for a reason."
Otto scooped up suitcases, tucking one under each arm and hurried forward. Elsa gave a half smile to Bulda, turning to pick up her own suitcases and shuffle behind her father to the row of carts lined up outside of the airport. The whole group, Elsa and her family, Bulda and her son were off to America.
"Elsa?" Kristoff said, putting an arm on her shoulder, jolting her from her memory. She smiled up at him with a slightly guilty look on her face.
"Sorry, guess I spaced out a little bit."
He gave her a slightly guilty look, holding up her phone.
"It's Diane, I told her what happened, she just wants to talk to you real fast."
Elsa swallowed and nodded, sitting up straighter on the sofa and holding her hand out for the phone. Kristoff gave her a guilty look, letting the phone slide from his hand and stepping back, walking back to Anna.
Elsa closed her eyes, bringing her hand up to rest on her forehead, wincing as it touched the sore bruised skin.
"Hi Diane," she said, trying to sound calm and bracing herself for hysterics.
"Elsa," came the teary voice on the other end. "How are you doing? Are you okay?"
Elsa was stunned for a moment, blinking before shakily replying.
"Ye-yes, I'm fine. A little banged up, a few cuts, bruises and a burn from the airbag but I'm okay. The baby is fine too."
"Good, good," Diane said, letting out a small sigh of relief. "The young man I was talking to, Chris?"
"Kristoff," Elsa replied.
"Yes, he told me about what happened with-with Jack," she said, pausing as her voice cracked. Elsa bit her own lip trying not to cry. She heard Diane take a deep breath on the other end of the phone.
"I just wanted to see if you were doing okay, from what he says your sister is there with you. Pippa and I will be down as soon as I can get a flight, she's looking on the computer now."
Elsa nodded with the phone, forgetting at the moment that she couldn't see her.
"Okay, that sounds good," she said, not really knowing what else to say. She handed the phone back up to Kristoff, unsure of what else to tell Diana right now. Kristoff smiled back down at her, quickly putting the phone up to his ear and taking the conversation back over with ease.
Anna came back over to her, sitting down and grabbing her hand.
"I talked to your boss, she said you have the rest of the week off, and next week. You're supposed to call next Friday and give them an update. I guess you have a bunch of time off saved up so they are just going to use that for right now."
Elsa nodded, giving Anna a small smile.
"Thanks Anna."
They looked up as a brunette nurse with glasses knocked on the door, giving them a friendly smile. Kristoff quickly rattled off the name of the hospital and said he would call Diane back in a bit with more information when he knew it and pressed the button to end the call. Elsa stood, her hands wringing together while she waited to hear what the nurse said.
"Mrs. Frost?" the nurse asked, looking between Elsa and Anna.
"Yes?" Elsa said, taking another step forward.
"Jack is all settled in his room, Dr. North said I should come down here and take you up to see him."
Elsa nodded, looking quickly at Anna and Kristoff who moved forward to scoop up their assorted bags while Elsa strode forward to hold open the door. They moved quickly through the halls, twisting and turning and taking an elevator before finally coming onto the floor where Elsa saw Jack's name written in big black letters on a white board. More information for the nurses and doctors was scrawled next to it; nurse and doctor names, phone numbers, orders and dietary restrictions.
The nurse led them around the circular nurses station before gesturing to one of the rooms with the blue curtain inside pulled half closed. Elsa stepped inside, pushing the curtain back a little bit and hurrying over to Jack's side. She heard Anna take a deep intake of breath behind her as she saw Jack lain out on the hospital bed. There was another nurse inside, sitting at a small table and typing at a computer who looked up and smiled at Elsa as she rushed in. She had on purple pants and a wildly colorful print top, with purples, blues and greens. She wore little hummingbird earrings that dangled down her neck, her almond shaped eyes were accented with more purple and green eyeshadows. Her long dark hair was pulled back into a tail.
"You must be Mrs. Frost," she said.
Elsa nodded, turning to give the nurse a quick forced smile before turning back to Jack, leaning over to smooth a white-blonde lock out of his face. She carefully worked her hand into his, mindful of the tubes and wires feeding into the top of his hand and arm. Anna and Kristoff worked their way into the room, standing at the foot of the bed, looking up at Jack's prone form.
"I'm Mari," she continued. "I'm Jack's nurse for today. But-"
She was cut off as another nurse poked his head into the room.
"Tooth, your ortho called to say he's on the way up."
"Thanks Sam," she called out, turning to smile to the others, blushing a little. "They like to call me "Tooth" because I was a dental assistant before I got my RN."
Her watch beeped a few times, she moved her hand to silence the alarm and stepped up from the chair she had coiled herself down into. She was a small woman, moving with a fluid grace as she stepped to the tall white cabinet in the corner of the room and punched in buttons then slid a card that she removed from her pocket. She removed a small syringe from a tray before closing the drawers and stepped back over to her computer, clicking the mouse a few times and then scanning the small barcode on the syringe.
One of Jack's leg's shifted on the bed, causing Elsa to look down at it.
"I know honey," Mari muttered behind her. "I'm hurrying. They were a little off with their timing on when they gave you your dose it seems, but I'll get you sorted."
She rushed out of the room as Jack shifted on the bed again, his hand clenching and causing one of the machines to beep angrily at him. Mari hurried back into the room a few moments later, a vial in her hands in addition to the syringe she had taken from the cabinet.
"Okay, Jack, let's get you comfortable again," she said, stepping quickly behind Anna and Kristoff to Jack's free side and deftly unscrewing a tube, fitting the syringe to it and slowly depressing the medicine into him.
"This is morphine," she said, looking up briefly at Elsa who was watching her. "We keep him on a schedule of it for the first week or so, the other one is just a sedative. We don't want him waking up and yanking those tubes out of his throat."
She removed the spent vial of pain medicine, setting aside on the bedclothes and picked up the vial she had set aside, pulling another syringe from her pocket, this one vacuum wrapped in plastic that she quickly unwrapped, measured out the correct dose and administered. After a few moments, Jack's movements settled down and the angry beeping of the machines stopped. Mari tapped a few buttons on the machine, frowning at one before it started giving the read out that she was looking for.
"These machines make a lot of beeps," she warned. "Most of them are pretty harmless, but I'll be in to check them regardless. Don't panic when they go off, okay?"
She gave the group a smile, looking up at another knock at the door. A small, middle-aged Filipino man walked in, dressed nicely in dress pants, collared shirt and a tie, his mostly grey hair styled carefully. Mari smiled at him, slipping past and out of the room. He gave her a smile and stepped forward.
"Hi, I'm Dr. Layug," he said, holding his hand out to Elsa. "I'm Jack's Orthopedic Surgeon."
He pronounced his last name lie-oog, his voice surprisingly deep for his small size.
"I'll be working with Dr. North to help Jack recover, I think he might have already told you about the various injuries Jack sustained?"
Elsa nodded, looking back down at Jack.
"Okay, I'm going to be helping him with the recovery of all of his fractures throughout all of this, which will probably take the longest," he said, his voice trailing off for Elsa as she gripped Jack's hand tighter.
He'd get through this, they would get through this together. Better or worse, sickness and in health, she'd made a vow and she planned on keeping every last word of it.