She began to try and breathe on her own but with the ventilator tube in
place she couldn't. Panic began to build which elevated her vitals on the
monitors. He noticed the change in her vitals and wondered what was wrong.
"Bobby, please help me!" she screamed in her mind as she fought to breathe on her own.
Each time she tried to take a breath she felt as if she were choking from the tube being in her windpipe. Her eyes shot open and she looked around the room, noticing all the machines. The slightest movement of her head caused her to want to cough because the tube would rub her throat stimulating the reflex to cough. Bobby had dozed off momentarily, still lightly grasping her hand in his. He sensed something wasn't right and felt her trembling. He saw the panic and fear in her expression and assumed she'd been trying to breathe on her own.
"Kimmy calm down. You're on a vent to help you breathe. Don't fight it sweetheart just relax." He said quietly hoping to get her to calm down.
After hearing his words she began to settle down, and forced herself to not try and breathe on her own and let the machine do it for her. She heard Bobby's voice once more as he said, "I'll be right back. I'm going to go let the nurses and doctor know you're awake. Ok?"
She gently squeezed his hand to let him know she understood what he said and watched him head out.
"How long have I been in here?" she asked herself silently, looking around the room noticing the bag someone had brought for Bobby since he hadn't left her side since she came in.
He found the doctor at the nurse's station going over a chart and let him know that she'd woken up. The doctor headed in to check her over and see how she was doing and Bobby went ahead and called her mom, his mom and the guys at the station to let them know she was awake. The first call he made was to her mom since the kids were over there. She'd just finished giving Keira a bottle and had put her in her swing when she heard the phone ring.
"Joey can you get that for me?" she asked, while fastening Keira into the swing.
He ran for the phone and picked it up and heard Bobby's voice.
"Hey Joey, can I talk to your grandma for a bit?" he asked.
"Sure, lemme take her the phone." Joey replied.
She saw her grandson coming down the hall and said softly, "Who is it?"
"It's Bobby," he replied passing her the phone.
As soon as he heard Kim's mother's voice on the phone he began to tell her about Kim waking up.
"The reason I called is to let you know that Kim is finally awake. She came too about four minutes ago." He said, hearing her mother sigh with relief.
"How is she doing?" she asked, anxious to tell Joey his mother was awake.
"She's still really thin but her coloring is back to normal. She knows she's in the hospital but she can't talk since the ventilator tube is still in." he replied.
"Thank you for calling and letting me know she's awake. I just hope whoever did this to her doesn't pull anything else." She said, looking towards Joey.
"I hope so too. She's extremely lucky she was found when she was. I think her will to fight is what kept her alive. As soon as I hear more from the doctor I'll let you know what he says." Bobby replied before hanging up.
"Ok. I'm going to go tell Joey the good news." She said back.
After finishing up the conversation with her mother he called down to the station because when he called his mother no one answered so he assumed she was out running errands or something. Alex and the guys had been working on one of the engines in the bay when the phone began to ring.
"I'll get it." Alex said, wiping her hands off on a towel and picked up the phone.
Bobby heard her voice and heard the guys talking in the background.
"Hey Alex, let everyone at the house know that Kim just woke up." Bobby said, smiling as he spoke.
"She did! God Bobby that's wonderful! How long ago?" she asked anxiously.
"About five minutes ago. The doctor's in with her right now." He replied.
"I'll go tell the rest of the guys and try to come by after my shift." Alex said in return.
"Sounds good. Gotta run the doctor's coming. See you later." Bobby replied.
"Ok, tell her we all are thinking about her and I'll see you after work." Alex said before hanging up.
"Will do." He replied, hanging up the phone.
"Who was that Alex?" Jimmy asked, coming up behind her.
"Bobby," she replied, as a smile spread across her face.
"Is Kimmy ok?" Jimmy asked, concern appearing on his face.
"She's awake Jimmy!" she replied, unable to keep the excitement from entering her voice.
"She is!" Jimmy exclaimed.
"Yes, she's finally back." Alex said happily as Jimmy hugged her tightly.
"Hey guys Kimmy's awake!" Jimmy called out over Alex's shoulder to everyone working on the engine.
Cheers went up from everyone behind them at the news and for the rest of the day the members of the 55 were in a jubilant mood. As the guys went upstairs for a bit, Alex and Jimmy stayed behind down by the engines.
"You relieved she's finally awake?" Alex asked as Jimmy held her close.
"Yeah. I never thought I'd come this close to loosing her for good. I can't imagine what it would be like without her around, and the thought of Joey without a mother is disturbing." Jimmy replied, tightening his arms around Alex as they sat on the front of one of the engines.
"I'm going to stop by after my shift is up and go see how she's doing, want to come with me?" Alex asked.
"Sure, I'd love to." Jimmy replied, placing a tender kiss on Alex's lips.
Joey had gone into his room to play with his gameboy when his grandmother came in to let him know the good news.
"Joey honey, can I talk to you for a minute?" she asked.
"Yeah nana." He replied pausing the game.
"Your mom's awake Joey. She just came to today." She said softly, seeing his expression change.
"Is she ok?" Joey asked, feeling as if a huge burden had been lifted off his shoulders.
"She will be. It will take some time for her to completely heal but she's going to be ok. As soon as Bobby lets me know what the doctor says I'll take you and your sister to see her." She said, seeing the look of relief on her grandson's face.
"Thanks," he said softly, a small smile playing across his face, knowing that his mother was going to be all right.
The doctor decided to go ahead and remove the ventilator tube since she was trying to breathe on her own. After the tube had been removed she coughed rather hard for a few minutes. They gave her ice to help soothe her throat, but at first it burned a bit since she hadn't taken anything in by mouth. After several minutes the doctor left, but had oxygen standing by incase she would need it since she'd just come off the ventilator. She was just happy to be able to breathe on her own once more. Forcing yourself not to breathe when you're on the machine is a very hard task, one that most people do not succeed at.
After the doctor left, he took a seat beside her, anxious to finally be able to talk to her after everything that's happened.
"Thank god you came back." He said softly, gently hugging her.
In a voice no louder than a whisper she replied, "I shouldn't have went after the boy that day."
"You couldn't have known what was going to happen. None of us could." Bobby responded gently, seeing tears forming in her eyes.
"But still, all the pain I caused you all by doing that. You don't know how much it hurt me to think what must have been going through your head, knowing that when those floors came down that you thought I was still in there." She replied, her voice getting raspier by the minute.
He saw several tears slip down her face and gently brushed them away from her face with his thumb and said, "Ssssh, rest your voice sweetheart. We've got a lot to talk about but for now just relax."
She curled up on her side facing him, thinking about the torment and torture it was to hear him Alex and Jimmy looking for her and being so close, but unable to let them know she was there. She felt more tears threatening to fall but held them back and closed her eyes briefly. He gently held her hand in his and whispered into her ear, "Apenas descanso Kimmy. Estaré aquí cuando usted se despierta, no duda jamás eso." {Just rest Kimmy. I'll be here when you wake up, don't ever doubt that.}
He noticed the rhythm of her breathing change as she drifted off to sleep. He gently brushed her hair back and placed a tender kiss on her cheek and sat beside her as she slept. It felt as if a huge burden of worry had been lifted from him when she came back to him. He thought back to the words Joey had said to her the day she'd been found. He gently stroked the top of her hand with his fingers as she slept, relieved to finally have her back. She'd slept for about four hours and woke back up feeling him still grasping her hand. He'd laid his head down on the bed and dozed off briefly. She took her right hand and gently placed it on his cheek as he slept, figuring he hadn't gotten much sleep while she'd been unconscious. He didn't even move when she placed her hand on his cheek. She smiled to herself and relaxed and let him rest.
He slept for about two hours before he was awakened by the sound of an alarm on a machine. He awoke slightly panicked, afraid something might have happened to Kim but saw she was fine. He'd looked at the monitors she was hooked up to and saw nothing abnormal and assumed the alarm had come from one of the other rooms close by. She'd been taking in some ice chips to help sooth her sore throat when she noticed him wake up.
"Finally decide to wake up?" she said with a smile, her voice quite a bit stronger than it had been earlier.
"Very funny Sleeping Beauty." He smirked in response.
"How are Joey and Keira doing?" she asked.
"Joey's been worried sick about you, along with the rest of us. It looks like Keira's first tooth should be coming in soon. She's been a bit temperamental where you haven't been around so she will probably be thrilled to death to see you." he replied.
"Is the kid from the fire ok?" she said curiously.
"He's fine, he had some minor smoke inhalation but other than that he was just fine." Bobby said in response.
He noticed her expression change and figured she was thinking about something.
"You ok?" he asked concerned.
She nodded her head in response and replied, "Yeah, just trying to avoid thinking of what happened."
"I don't think I'd been that petrified since the night of that explosion. When I heard the message that someone associated with whoever took you left on the answering machine the night after I stopped to check on your mom and the kids after I'd gotten checked over at Mercy, I thought that everything was going to come crashing down around me." He said softly.
"You weren't hurt that evening were you?" Kim asked worriedly.
"No. I took in too much smoke. Alex and Jimmy told me not to go in but I didn't listen to them, my primary focus was getting to you. I found the boy in your jacket but he didn't know what had happened to you, when Alex appeared. She tried to get me out of there but I wouldn't listen. I gave her the boy and kept looking for you, despite the fact several floors above us it was nothing short of a raging inferno. After Alex had taken the kid down to Doc and Carlos she came back for me but I wasn't about ready to leave. The only reason I finally left was because of the violent coughing spell I started to have when she spun me around to tell me that we were leaving." Bobby said, seeing the look of guilt cross Kim's face.
Kim knew that Bobby could have been hurt much worse, or possibly even killed if Alex hadn't gotten him out of there.
"This is all my fault, I shouldn't have went in there in the first place." She replied quietly, looking away from him.
"None of this is your fault. You couldn't have foreseen what was going to happen. Had whoever that was that took you not of done so, you would have gotten that boy out and everything would have been just fine." He said gently, turning her head back towards him.
"But if Alex hadn't have gotten you out of there, this could have had a different ending. I could be sitting here having just lost one of the most important people in my life all because of a foolish decision." She weakly replied, forcing back the onslaught of tears at the thought of him not being there.
He saw her forcing back the tears and knew she probably wouldn't stop blaming herself for what happened. Ever so gently, he pulled her into a hug as the tears began to fall from her eyes.
"Come on Kimmy, don't beat yourself up over this. I'll never leave you. Do you really think I'd miss seeing our little girl grow up to be an amazing woman just like her mother?" he asked.
"Bobby, please help me!" she screamed in her mind as she fought to breathe on her own.
Each time she tried to take a breath she felt as if she were choking from the tube being in her windpipe. Her eyes shot open and she looked around the room, noticing all the machines. The slightest movement of her head caused her to want to cough because the tube would rub her throat stimulating the reflex to cough. Bobby had dozed off momentarily, still lightly grasping her hand in his. He sensed something wasn't right and felt her trembling. He saw the panic and fear in her expression and assumed she'd been trying to breathe on her own.
"Kimmy calm down. You're on a vent to help you breathe. Don't fight it sweetheart just relax." He said quietly hoping to get her to calm down.
After hearing his words she began to settle down, and forced herself to not try and breathe on her own and let the machine do it for her. She heard Bobby's voice once more as he said, "I'll be right back. I'm going to go let the nurses and doctor know you're awake. Ok?"
She gently squeezed his hand to let him know she understood what he said and watched him head out.
"How long have I been in here?" she asked herself silently, looking around the room noticing the bag someone had brought for Bobby since he hadn't left her side since she came in.
He found the doctor at the nurse's station going over a chart and let him know that she'd woken up. The doctor headed in to check her over and see how she was doing and Bobby went ahead and called her mom, his mom and the guys at the station to let them know she was awake. The first call he made was to her mom since the kids were over there. She'd just finished giving Keira a bottle and had put her in her swing when she heard the phone ring.
"Joey can you get that for me?" she asked, while fastening Keira into the swing.
He ran for the phone and picked it up and heard Bobby's voice.
"Hey Joey, can I talk to your grandma for a bit?" he asked.
"Sure, lemme take her the phone." Joey replied.
She saw her grandson coming down the hall and said softly, "Who is it?"
"It's Bobby," he replied passing her the phone.
As soon as he heard Kim's mother's voice on the phone he began to tell her about Kim waking up.
"The reason I called is to let you know that Kim is finally awake. She came too about four minutes ago." He said, hearing her mother sigh with relief.
"How is she doing?" she asked, anxious to tell Joey his mother was awake.
"She's still really thin but her coloring is back to normal. She knows she's in the hospital but she can't talk since the ventilator tube is still in." he replied.
"Thank you for calling and letting me know she's awake. I just hope whoever did this to her doesn't pull anything else." She said, looking towards Joey.
"I hope so too. She's extremely lucky she was found when she was. I think her will to fight is what kept her alive. As soon as I hear more from the doctor I'll let you know what he says." Bobby replied before hanging up.
"Ok. I'm going to go tell Joey the good news." She said back.
After finishing up the conversation with her mother he called down to the station because when he called his mother no one answered so he assumed she was out running errands or something. Alex and the guys had been working on one of the engines in the bay when the phone began to ring.
"I'll get it." Alex said, wiping her hands off on a towel and picked up the phone.
Bobby heard her voice and heard the guys talking in the background.
"Hey Alex, let everyone at the house know that Kim just woke up." Bobby said, smiling as he spoke.
"She did! God Bobby that's wonderful! How long ago?" she asked anxiously.
"About five minutes ago. The doctor's in with her right now." He replied.
"I'll go tell the rest of the guys and try to come by after my shift." Alex said in return.
"Sounds good. Gotta run the doctor's coming. See you later." Bobby replied.
"Ok, tell her we all are thinking about her and I'll see you after work." Alex said before hanging up.
"Will do." He replied, hanging up the phone.
"Who was that Alex?" Jimmy asked, coming up behind her.
"Bobby," she replied, as a smile spread across her face.
"Is Kimmy ok?" Jimmy asked, concern appearing on his face.
"She's awake Jimmy!" she replied, unable to keep the excitement from entering her voice.
"She is!" Jimmy exclaimed.
"Yes, she's finally back." Alex said happily as Jimmy hugged her tightly.
"Hey guys Kimmy's awake!" Jimmy called out over Alex's shoulder to everyone working on the engine.
Cheers went up from everyone behind them at the news and for the rest of the day the members of the 55 were in a jubilant mood. As the guys went upstairs for a bit, Alex and Jimmy stayed behind down by the engines.
"You relieved she's finally awake?" Alex asked as Jimmy held her close.
"Yeah. I never thought I'd come this close to loosing her for good. I can't imagine what it would be like without her around, and the thought of Joey without a mother is disturbing." Jimmy replied, tightening his arms around Alex as they sat on the front of one of the engines.
"I'm going to stop by after my shift is up and go see how she's doing, want to come with me?" Alex asked.
"Sure, I'd love to." Jimmy replied, placing a tender kiss on Alex's lips.
Joey had gone into his room to play with his gameboy when his grandmother came in to let him know the good news.
"Joey honey, can I talk to you for a minute?" she asked.
"Yeah nana." He replied pausing the game.
"Your mom's awake Joey. She just came to today." She said softly, seeing his expression change.
"Is she ok?" Joey asked, feeling as if a huge burden had been lifted off his shoulders.
"She will be. It will take some time for her to completely heal but she's going to be ok. As soon as Bobby lets me know what the doctor says I'll take you and your sister to see her." She said, seeing the look of relief on her grandson's face.
"Thanks," he said softly, a small smile playing across his face, knowing that his mother was going to be all right.
The doctor decided to go ahead and remove the ventilator tube since she was trying to breathe on her own. After the tube had been removed she coughed rather hard for a few minutes. They gave her ice to help soothe her throat, but at first it burned a bit since she hadn't taken anything in by mouth. After several minutes the doctor left, but had oxygen standing by incase she would need it since she'd just come off the ventilator. She was just happy to be able to breathe on her own once more. Forcing yourself not to breathe when you're on the machine is a very hard task, one that most people do not succeed at.
After the doctor left, he took a seat beside her, anxious to finally be able to talk to her after everything that's happened.
"Thank god you came back." He said softly, gently hugging her.
In a voice no louder than a whisper she replied, "I shouldn't have went after the boy that day."
"You couldn't have known what was going to happen. None of us could." Bobby responded gently, seeing tears forming in her eyes.
"But still, all the pain I caused you all by doing that. You don't know how much it hurt me to think what must have been going through your head, knowing that when those floors came down that you thought I was still in there." She replied, her voice getting raspier by the minute.
He saw several tears slip down her face and gently brushed them away from her face with his thumb and said, "Ssssh, rest your voice sweetheart. We've got a lot to talk about but for now just relax."
She curled up on her side facing him, thinking about the torment and torture it was to hear him Alex and Jimmy looking for her and being so close, but unable to let them know she was there. She felt more tears threatening to fall but held them back and closed her eyes briefly. He gently held her hand in his and whispered into her ear, "Apenas descanso Kimmy. Estaré aquí cuando usted se despierta, no duda jamás eso." {Just rest Kimmy. I'll be here when you wake up, don't ever doubt that.}
He noticed the rhythm of her breathing change as she drifted off to sleep. He gently brushed her hair back and placed a tender kiss on her cheek and sat beside her as she slept. It felt as if a huge burden of worry had been lifted from him when she came back to him. He thought back to the words Joey had said to her the day she'd been found. He gently stroked the top of her hand with his fingers as she slept, relieved to finally have her back. She'd slept for about four hours and woke back up feeling him still grasping her hand. He'd laid his head down on the bed and dozed off briefly. She took her right hand and gently placed it on his cheek as he slept, figuring he hadn't gotten much sleep while she'd been unconscious. He didn't even move when she placed her hand on his cheek. She smiled to herself and relaxed and let him rest.
He slept for about two hours before he was awakened by the sound of an alarm on a machine. He awoke slightly panicked, afraid something might have happened to Kim but saw she was fine. He'd looked at the monitors she was hooked up to and saw nothing abnormal and assumed the alarm had come from one of the other rooms close by. She'd been taking in some ice chips to help sooth her sore throat when she noticed him wake up.
"Finally decide to wake up?" she said with a smile, her voice quite a bit stronger than it had been earlier.
"Very funny Sleeping Beauty." He smirked in response.
"How are Joey and Keira doing?" she asked.
"Joey's been worried sick about you, along with the rest of us. It looks like Keira's first tooth should be coming in soon. She's been a bit temperamental where you haven't been around so she will probably be thrilled to death to see you." he replied.
"Is the kid from the fire ok?" she said curiously.
"He's fine, he had some minor smoke inhalation but other than that he was just fine." Bobby said in response.
He noticed her expression change and figured she was thinking about something.
"You ok?" he asked concerned.
She nodded her head in response and replied, "Yeah, just trying to avoid thinking of what happened."
"I don't think I'd been that petrified since the night of that explosion. When I heard the message that someone associated with whoever took you left on the answering machine the night after I stopped to check on your mom and the kids after I'd gotten checked over at Mercy, I thought that everything was going to come crashing down around me." He said softly.
"You weren't hurt that evening were you?" Kim asked worriedly.
"No. I took in too much smoke. Alex and Jimmy told me not to go in but I didn't listen to them, my primary focus was getting to you. I found the boy in your jacket but he didn't know what had happened to you, when Alex appeared. She tried to get me out of there but I wouldn't listen. I gave her the boy and kept looking for you, despite the fact several floors above us it was nothing short of a raging inferno. After Alex had taken the kid down to Doc and Carlos she came back for me but I wasn't about ready to leave. The only reason I finally left was because of the violent coughing spell I started to have when she spun me around to tell me that we were leaving." Bobby said, seeing the look of guilt cross Kim's face.
Kim knew that Bobby could have been hurt much worse, or possibly even killed if Alex hadn't gotten him out of there.
"This is all my fault, I shouldn't have went in there in the first place." She replied quietly, looking away from him.
"None of this is your fault. You couldn't have foreseen what was going to happen. Had whoever that was that took you not of done so, you would have gotten that boy out and everything would have been just fine." He said gently, turning her head back towards him.
"But if Alex hadn't have gotten you out of there, this could have had a different ending. I could be sitting here having just lost one of the most important people in my life all because of a foolish decision." She weakly replied, forcing back the onslaught of tears at the thought of him not being there.
He saw her forcing back the tears and knew she probably wouldn't stop blaming herself for what happened. Ever so gently, he pulled her into a hug as the tears began to fall from her eyes.
"Come on Kimmy, don't beat yourself up over this. I'll never leave you. Do you really think I'd miss seeing our little girl grow up to be an amazing woman just like her mother?" he asked.