Author's Note: Hi, guys! Thank you so much for the reviews on the last chapter! :) Sorry for the delay in updating: school has been crazy lately. I have a huge Organic Chemistry exam this week (yikes!), so I had to make this one a bit shorter, but I wanted to get something out, at least. Anyway, hope you enjoy, and don't hesitate to review. Oh, and, great job to the readers who figured out what the second riddle meant. ;)
Izzie jumped up from her chair and immediately noticed that the boy was pale and that his chest was rising and falling rapidly. She placed her stethoscope to his chest and listened. He's tachycardic. She half-ran to the nearest supply closet, seized the syringe she was looking for, and darted back to Jared's bed, where his mother was panicking.
"What's wrong with him? Why isn't he saying anything? What are you giving him?!" Melissa almost shouted, frantically watching the physician as she injected Jared in a vein in his arm.
"Mrs. Anderson, your son's heart is beating too quickly. I'm giving him a dose of verapamil, which will slow his heart down for now, but it won't last. I need to figure out why he's…" Izzie trailed off as she noticed the small area of skin that had been exposed by Jared's shirt shifting up slightly when she had moved his arm to inject the medicine. What should have been a normal skin color was a mixture of black and blue. Izzie lifted up the boy's shirt more and saw a relatively large area of bruising covering the bottom left side of the boy's abdomen. What the hell?
"Oh, my God," Melissa gasped.
"Mrs. Anderson, do you know how this happened?"
"I…Oh, my God…"
"Mrs. Anderson, I know you are scared right now, but I need you to tell me how this happened. Your son's life may depend on it."
"He…I think…Last night…Last night, he ran into the table. The end table next to the couch in our living room. I panicked, but he didn't cry or anything, and it was just a little bump, and he kept insisting he was fine, so I didn't think anything of it. He dresses himself now, so I didn't even notice. Oh, my God, is he all right? What did I do?!" Melissa covered her open mouth with her hand and began shaking her head in worry.
Jesus. What is wrong with…? Izzie glanced down at the wound on the boy's knee, which was still bleeding profusely, and back up at the boy's stomach.
Oh, God. "Mrs. Anderson, we need to get your son to surgery. Now," Izzie insisted. "I need a gurney over here!" she yelled.
"Surgery? What? What on—" Melissa looked even more terrified than ever, something Izzie didn't think was possible.
"Mrs. Anderson, please just follow me," Izzie interrupted. "I'll explain on the way." A nurse came over with a gurney, and he and Izzie carefully moved the boy from the bed to the transport. "We need to get him to surgery as quickly as possible," she instructed to the nurse, and the pair began walking towards the elevator, the unconscious boy's mother frenetically following them.
As they passed the nurse's station, where a female nurse was sitting at one of the computers, Izzie turned to her and ordered, "Call O.R. 1, and tell them we have a six-year-old hemophiliac with internal abdominal injuries on the way. And page Dr. Bailey!" The nurse nodded and picked up the phone.
While they were moving, Izzie turned to look at Melissa. "Mrs. Anderson, your son has hemophilia. When he ran into the end table last night, it should have been a normal bruise that healed within a week. But, his body can't heal injuries properly, and he's bleeding internally. That blood loss, combined with the bleeding from his knee injury, caused him to faint. We need to operate to assess the internal damage and repair it. We'll also be giving him medicine to help his body heal." Izzie saw Melissa turn white, and she smiled. "I know it sounds completely scary, but he should be fine. You're at a great hospital."
"But…But I don't have health insurance. I'm a waitress. That's why I came to the clinic in the first place. How am I supposed to pay for this?" Melissa cried.
"Don't worry about that for now," Izzie reassured her. "We need to focus on getting your son healthy again."
Finally, they reached the surgery floor, and Izzie instructed the panicked mother to sit in the waiting area. "I promise that we're going to do everything we can, Mrs. Anderson. This isn't a complicated or difficult surgery. He's in good hands."
"Th-thank you, Dr. Stevens," Melissa stammered. She sat down slowly into one of the plush yet somewhat uncomfortable chairs, her face still pallid and full of fright.
At that moment, Izzie couldn't help but feel a sudden wave of empathy for Melissa. Though she had given up her daughter, Hannah, years ago, she could still vividly imagine what it would be like to learn that your child is chronically ill, that you have no control over it, that you can't perform some simple "mommy magic" and fix it with a Band-Aid. When Hannah's adoptive parents brought her in to Seattle Grace and informed Izzie that she had leukemia, Izzie instantly felt helplessness and fear for the daughter that she barely knew. It is one of the worst feelings a parent can suffer, probably second only to actually losing a child.
Izzie turned to the nurse that was waiting with the gurney carrying Jared. "I'll be right there. Go on ahead." She walked a few steps over to where Melissa was sitting, kneeled down in front of her, and took her hands in her own. "Mrs. Anderson, I understand how scary this is for you, and although we can never promise anything, I can almost promise you that your son will be okay, and he will be able to live a happy, normal life. This is not your fault. You love your son, and that is enough. I'll be out as soon as it's over, okay?"
Melissa, who had begun crying silently, nodded, and Izzie smiled. She stood up and resumed her path towards O.R. 1.
It only took five steps, however, for Izzie to stop.
The sea! Ships live in the sea, too! Then, that means…farm…sea…Pharmacy! Izzie chuckled to herself. She couldn't believe how simple the answer to the second riddle was, yet it had taken her quite a while to figure it out. This is why baking is my forte, she thought, grinning.
Giddy with both victory at solving the puzzle and anticipation at saving a life, Izzie put on her scrub cap, vigorously washed her hands and arms, and walked through the doors of the Operating Room.