Chapter 2 – Defiant
Susan is curled up in a ball on the floor, whimpering, trying to recover from the blow to her stomach. The man bends over and grabbed Susan's arm. Dragged her along, putting her against wall, leaving her next to Doug. The man stormed off to the sink, situated in the corner and bends over putting his mouth under the tap to take a drink.
"I'm sorry" Doug whispered, shuffled closer to Susan putting his arm round her. He gave her a friendly kiss on her forehead.
"Don't touch her!" The man shouted, aiming his gun at them.
"What? What is the problem? I'm not going to do anything"
"Just don't touch" He scowled "Move away"
"No I am not," Doug said, refusing to let go of Susan.
The man swung his arm with the gun in his hand and hits Doug across the face. Susan gasped when she saw her colleague knocked to the floor, unconscious. She groaned out from the excruciating pain by clutching her stomach. The man is watching her suffering.
"Now you know how I feel" The man laughed and thrusts his gun against her forehead. Susan hits her head back on the wall and gritted her teeth from the bump. "Maybe you want something stronger now?"
Susan ignored the man by turning her head away. He moves his gun to her chin and moved her head back to look at him again.
"Don't look away when I'm talking to you, you want to suffer more?"
A hard banging on the door caught their attention and then a shout. The man puts his hand on Susan's mouth "Shush" He got up and walked to a window. He gently separated the blinds to see who it is. A man in scrubs with glasses with a group of people stood about in the corridor. Then his eyes raced round and noticed the police are rushing to the nearby door. He lets go of the blinds and stood on the spot running his hand through his hair letting out a sigh. He looked at Susan. Her arm reached over to feel the pulse on Doug's wrist, just to make sure he is alive. She has a worrying frown.
"What's wrong?" The man asked
"His pulse is faint" She struggled to get up, holding her stomach and leaned over to look and noticed that Doug's chest is not moving.
"Oh my god! He's not breathing" Susan shouted with her head down against his chest.
"Don't touch"
"Oh for god sakes, he's dying here!" Susan said, panicking "I need to resuscitate him"
"I said don't touch him!"
"He will die if I don't do anything! And you go down for murder!"
"Not if they catch me"
"Oh whatever!" Susan shouted shaking her head. She's got better things to do than listening to the weirdo drabbling on. Susan rolled her colleague on to his back and looked round the room for the crash cart, no sign of one.
"Shit!" She muttered to herself.
Susan straddled on top of Doug and clasped her hands on to his chest. She started doing reps "1, 2, 3…" and then leaned over to his face. She pinched his nose and placed her mouth against his. Susan blew deep breaths into him. She found that wasn't a success because his chest wasn't moving up, something is blocking his airway. Susan sits upright and probed her finger into his mouth gently.
"Shit he's swallowed his tongue!"
"What?" The man said, "How the hell did he do that?"
"Simple" Susan got up, letting out a groan from her bruised tummy and walked to a trolley with surgical instruments. She looked down, tracing her finger over the selection and picked one up. "Some people get a knock on the head, sometimes the tongue slips back down your throat, it obstructs the airway, it is uncommon for it to happen. The saying 'swallowing your tongue' is a figure of speech because you cannot physically swallow it"
The man shuddered at the thought as he watched Susan kneeling down next to her colleague doing her procedure. He moved closer to them and looked over her.
"Is that to pull it out?" He asked
"Yes" She replied, curling her lip thinking 'Is he stupid or what?' He is now distracting her by his nearby presence, She can feel him breathing down her neck. Susan quickly probed the instrument in to Doug's mouth. She blew a loose strand of her hair away and focused. She winced with concentration pulling the tongue back in its place. "There…"
"So he's alive now?"
"I don't know!" Susan snapped at him and sighed with annoyance "Will you shut up for one minute".
"Don't you fucking talk to me like that" The man said, anger flashed in his eyes. He swung his arm and backhanded her across the face.
"Uh!" she yelped, her head swung away from the blow. Susan took a couple of deep breaths and turned her head back to look at him. There is blood seeping from her nose and side of her mouth. She gave him the defiant look and leaned over to Doug's mouth giving him, her breath of life.
Susan moved herself to straddle on top of Doug for her to position herself to do the chest reps. The phone rang. The man looked at it while Susan carried on doing the CPR.
"Aren't you going to answer it?" Susan asked, panting at the reps.
"No I want you to do it"
"I can't do it!" Susan scoffed at the man "I am trying to revive him!"
The phone carried on ringing. The man walked up to it and stared at it. Susan again leaned over to Doug's mouth. She looked up to see the man staring at the phone.
"Look… will you answer the phone, we need meds for Doug"
"No!" He lashed out at her. The phone stopped ringing. "No"
Susan flinched at his reaction; she puts her fingers on Doug's wrist. A strong pulse.
"Welcome back Dougie" She muttered and relieving herself with a nervous laugh. She sat back against the wall, looking up praying that someone would get herself and Doug out in one piece. She started to feel vulnerable…