A/N: Guess who popped back out of the woodwork? XD Not a lot to say, really, just that I hope y'all are doing well and I hope you enjoy chapter four! Chapter five is in the works as we speak, and I'll post that as soon as possible. Until such time as that happens, enjoy and remember that reviews will consistently be answered. ^-^
Once dinner was done, Johnny remained at the station to finish his shift with Dwyer while Roy and Joanne drove home to try- probably in vain- to get some sleep. They decided to let Chris stay at the neighbors' house overnight; he still didn't really know what was going on and they wanted to let him have a good night's sleep before they took him to see Jenny in the morning.
Roy didn't know how long he lay awake staring at the darkened ceiling of his bedroom, thoughts racing through his mind, but he knew it was a long time. Each second seemed to stretch out into a minute and each minute into an hour of its own, possibility after possibility spinning through his head. The worst of all was the idea that, even with the surgery, they stood a sizeable chance of losing her anyways. He knew it was the case, and knew that Jenny's survival wasn't guaranteed until the moment she woke up.
But he would not let himself go there- not ever. His child would live. He had to believe that or he knew that he'd fall apart right then and there. The question was, how much damage had the fracture done to her brain, and how much had the hematoma added on top of that? Wondering what might happen collided with not being able to know like two semis inside his head and he sighed, rubbing a tired hand over his face.
He glanced at the clock- it was nearly two in the morning. Almost twelve hours since a completely normal day had gone in completely the opposite direction. It felt like time had turned elastic, stretching out interminably before it would come snapping back like the recoil from a gun. Roy turned his tired eyes to the ceiling and forced himself to relax, for all the good it did him. He needed to sleep and maintain his strength. It took him another twenty minutes before he finally slipped out of awareness.
The alarm jerked him back awake at eight in the morning. He groaned tiredly and rolled over, turning it off and swinging himself out of bed. Looking around, he realized that Joanne must have been up already, because there was no trace of her in the bedroom. It was no surprise he hadn't heard her; after he'd finally gotten to sleep nothing short of an explosion could have woken him up. Sure enough, she was in the living room when he found her, sitting on the couch and staring out the window into another world. He sat down next to her and she put her arms around him.
"Oh Roy," she whispered, "I'm so scared." He wrapped his arms around her in turn.
"I am too," he replied quietly.
"It's like… It's like the first time you got put in the hospital. You remember? You got knocked out cold by some chunk of that building and I thought Dr. Early was going to have to admit me for a heart attack when I showed up. I was absolutely terrified." Roy gave a slight smile.
"I do remember that; I thought you were going to give me another concussion when I woke up."
"But this is worse. I knew you were going to be a fireman when I married you- it was only a question of when you'd end up in the hospital. All I did was drop Jenny off at a birthday party." Roy closed his eyes and leaned his head against his wife's. He knew he should come up with something to say to comfort his wife but right now he just didn't know what. So he did the best that he could, holding her close to him and sharing what strength he had. They remained like that for a few minutes until Roy spoke up.
"We should pick up Chris. I'm sure Mrs. Robertson is tired of watching him by now. After that, we can tell him what happened. I know he's going to want to see Jenny but I don't know if it's the best idea right now. She's just out of surgery; all those wires and monitors might bother him."
"Roy, you know that Chris would swim the ocean for his little sister, do you really think he'll agree not to see her?" Joanne replied with a faint smile. "Just be honest with him and he'll know what to expect. Now go and get dressed. If I had to guess, your partner and every other guy on your shift are probably going to be knocking on our door in about ten seconds." She was only half right- not as soon as Roy had zipped up his trousers, Johnny was outside.
"Hey pally," he greeted his partner with a tired smile. It was obvious that he'd gotten about as much sleep as Roy had the previous night. "You're looking a little rough around the edges." He won a small snort from the older man.
"Yeah, I'm feeling a little rough around the edges too, junior. I'll be better when I get to see Jenny. I suppose that's why you're here?" Johnny nodded.
"I promised her I'd be there too when she woke up, remember? I don't make promises I can't keep. Oh, and I should warn you that all the other guys are going to show up in about an hour." That earned him another small grin.
"Thanks for the warning. Worse things could happen. Uh, why don't you come in? We're just waiting for our neighbor to drop Chris off and then get going." In the kitchen, Joanne was calling Mrs. Robertson, who brought Chris over shortly after.
"Hey, buddy," Johnny greeted him.
"Hi Uncle Johnny," Chris replied quietly. "Are we going to the hospital today?"
"Yeah, we are," Roy told him, crouching down to meet his eye level. "Your sister had an accident, Chris, and they had to do surgery on her to fix some problems it caused. She probably won't be awake when you see her and you have to be very careful when you touch her. She's going to have some bandages on her head too."
"I want to see her," Chris told his father forcefully. "I don't care how many bandages she's got on. When can we go see her?"
"That's just where we're headed," Roy told him, "and your Uncle Johnny's going to come along with us. Now why don't you go put your overnight bag in your room and then we'll get going." Chris ran upstairs so fast he nearly tripped and tossed his bag on the bed unceremoniously, only concerned with visiting his sister. The small group set off for the hospital and got there just after nine, the very start of visiting hours.
Roy approached the receptionists' desk nervously. "Excuse me ma'am, could you tell me what room Jenny DeSoto is in? We were told she's already been settled down." The receptionist scanned over the files, biting her lip in concentration.
"Could I have her full name, please?"
"Jennifer Mary DeSoto." The receptionist dove back into the drawer full of files, scanning them expertly.
"Ah, yes, here she is. She's in Room 403, up in the SICU ward. Do you know how to get there?" Roy nodded. "Okay, just tell the head nurse who you're there to visit when you arrive. Nurse Walters runs herself a very tight ship." The receptionist gave him a friendly smile. Roy thanked her and left, hurrying back down the hall and running into Dixie along the way.
"Hey Roy," she told him. "Have they told you where Jenny is yet?"
"Yeah, Joanne and Johnny and I are going up to visit her; Chris is here too. The receptionist told me to watch out for Nurse Walters." Dixie smirked.
"I'll say; she gives a new meaning to crossing your t's. But she's nice as long as you follow her rules. Good luck. Let us know how Jenny is."
"Thanks, I sure will," Roy replied. He found Chris, Joanne, and Johnny and they proceeded to the elevator. SICU was directly on the left as they stepped out, an imposing set of swinging double doors, each of which held a strict warning not to yell, smoke, or disturb recovering patients. None of them knew what to expect as they slipped through the entrance- they were halfway anticipating it to be some setup out of an old Victorian novel, dark and dreary, but it wasn't. The ward was well lit and clean, relatively empty right now. They approached the nurses' station to sign in.
"Ah, you must be Jenny's family," the nurse said when she read his name. She was a grey-haired woman that by some standards might have been called elderly, but it would take a real idiot to actually do so. She wore her nurse's uniform with the creases so sharp she could have used them to cut paper and had a stern- but kind- face. "I'm the head nurse, Nurse Walters. The sign-in process is fairly straightforward, and so long as they are very quiet, one person is allowed to stay overnight with Jenny. You just need to let the station know who's going to be there and when."
"Thank you, Nurse," Joanne told her. "Is Jenny awake yet?"
"Not yet, but they've removed her from the sedation totally now so if all goes well it shouldn't be too much longer. She's in Room 403, directly across from the desk." Nurse Walters gestured to the door sitting parallel to the nurses' station, which was propped open at the current time. They thanked her and crowded into the room, hearts nearly breaking at the sight of Jenny lying there on the bed, so, so still. Chris moved over to his sister's side.
"Hey Jenny? Can you hear me? Dad said you might not be able to but if you can I hope you wake up really soon and feel better." He spoke quietly, but his voice was earnest. "The sooner you wake up the sooner you can come home. So wake up." His shoulders slumped with disappointment as Jenny remained still. Roy moved forward, placing his hands on his son's shoulders.
"She just needs time, Chris. She'll wake up when she's ready." He gazed down at his seven year old daughter, practically buried in medical equipment and with bandages covering the whole top of her head and circling around under her chin. Those bandages hid not only a skull fracture but the hole where the bone had been drilled out and then replaced. The area was still slightly swollen from the surgery. Jenny lay motionless in the bed, only the rise and fall of her chest confirming that the worst hadn't happened.
"I wish she'd wake up now," Chris answered.
"We do to, buddy," Johnny told him, "but we gotta let her take things at her own time." There were only two chairs in the room, so Johnny and Roy stood, letting Joanne and Chris have them as they all watched the sleeping girl. They passed a few minutes in silence until Dr. Early appeared in the doorway.
"Morning all," he greeted them with a calm smile. "I figured you'd be here the moment visiting hours started." He retrieved Jenny's chart from where it hung off the edge of the bed, flipping it open and observing the information. "Her vitals held constant all night, and she's breathing on her own, which is good news." They all sighed with relief but something in Dr. Early's voice told them there was some bad news on the horizon.
"However, I'm concerned about her temperature. She's been running a low-grade fever since about three this morning; now a fever is a common side effect of an epidural hematoma but I want to draw some blood and run a few tests to rule out infection."
"How bad could the fever get?" Roy asked warily.
"Unless it abates, her temperature could go as high as 104 or 105," Dr. Early told him, "but we can't tell for sure what will happen." Joanne held her daughter's still hand and sighed angrily.
"I'm getting very tired of not knowing anything for sure." Roy moved beside her and rubbed her back comfortingly.
"I know it's frustrating," Dr. Early told her sympathetically, "but from now until she wakes up, it all depends on her. We're going to monitor her temperature every hour and if the fever increases we'll go up to every half hour. I promise you that we are going to do everything that we can for Jenny."
"I know." Joanne sighed apologetically. "I didn't mean to snap at you, Dr. Early; it's not your fault. I'm sorry."
"It's perfectly alright," he replied. "You're just worried about your daughter. Now, we need to look a little further into the future. We'll keep Jenny in the SICU for a few days until she's stable enough to be moved down to the Pediatric ICU and hopefully from there to the general pediatric inpatient floor. Once she's regained consciousness and had some time to settle in, we'll need to do some more evaluations on her."
"Evaluations for what?" Johnny asked from his post near the doorway. He had a sneaking suspicion that he knew but he needed to have it confirmed.
"To see what any after-effects of the hematoma might be," Dr. Early responded. "I have to warn you that we don't know how much damage the concussion, the fracture, and the bleeding did to her brain. She could wake up nearly fine or she could have very serious complications."
"Could there be any permanent damage?" Roy asked hesitantly, seeming to wince away from the words. Dr. Early met his gaze levelly. He hated being the one having to tell them, but they had to know the truth.
"Yes, there could be. But again, we won't know until she's woken up." Nurse Walters swept through the door to take Jenny's temperature and Dr. Early spoke to her. "Once you're done taking her temperature, I'd like you to have some blood drawn so I can have it sent to the lab for testing."
"I'll have one of the nurses in here in just a minute," Nurse Walters told him. She retrieved the thermometer. "101.6."
"It's gone up again," Dr. Early remarked, more to himself than anybody else. "Okay, if her temperature goes above 103, administer ibuprofen and start external cooling measures. Monitor her temperature every half hour."
"Alright, doctor. I'll go get Josie in here to draw blood." Nurse Walters turned and bustled out, all business, and Dr. Early turned back to the DeSotos and Johnny.
"I know you'll probably think I've lost my mind when I say this, but what you need to do right now is relax. If you burn yourselves out with worrying about maybes and mights we'll end up having to admit you too. You need to believe in her now, and when she wakes up you need to be strong for her. And as hard as it is you need to accept that until she wakes up there's nothing you can do."
"I wish she could be awake," Chris responded softly. "'Cause if she's awake then that means we can do something." Silence fell over the group. They were all worried, and they'd be flat out lying to deny it. They were worried and they were tense and they were scared to death, and the knowledge that- however much they might wish otherwise- they were more or less useless until Jenny woke up didn't help. All in all, despite Dr. Early's advice, morale was low in Room 403 of the SICU.