Every year, Elena participated in the mock disaster staged by the largest of the Atlanta-area hospitals. The chief of staff at Mercy Hospital had been in New York on the day the towers fell, and when he came to Georgia, he believed in training his fellow physicians to prepare for a disaster on a broader scale than any of them could reasonably dream could happen. Elena had never missed a drill. The past two years, she'd even served as one of the triage leads for the pediatric patients. Over eighty kids participated last time—in a simulation meant to mimic a shooting at an elementary school. Drill or not, seeing the little ones in makeup intended to show the gore associated with their injuries, more than one staff member had been shaken at the sheer volume of patients facing them.
That drill had taken every ounce of Elena's ability to focus, but she'd never felt overwhelmed.
But right now, Elena felt vastly overwhelmed.
The fire engine had connected with an area of low bleachers and spectators in folding chairs lining the street. At one quick glance, she'd tallied a dozen people with moderate to severe injuries. At least three appeared life-threatening. None of the others were as gravely injured as the little one she knelt beside.
All the others were conscious; most were able to move at least to some degree. Her godson Bryce was lying motionless in front of her, blood pooling from an injury she couldn't find. The screams and shouts and general chaos of the panic surrounding them faded into a buzz that disturbed her little more than a gnat circling her head.
"Come on, Bryce. Stay with me." She unwound his scarf from his neck. Whenever she found the source of the bleeding, she'd need some kind of bandage. The color was draining from his face as quickly as the puddle of red expanded beneath him. As much as she hated to expose him to the cold, she had to ease his coat off to find the injury.
"Bryce!" A shriek from a voice she recognized far too well pierced her ear.
Only chancing a quick glance up, Elena yelled for help. "Bonnie, take Tori. And get Caroline out of here. No one can handle her going into labor right now."
The little figure hovering next to Elena disappeared, so she assumed Bonnie had done as she asked. Elena teased the coat off, and the gray-white of bone shone visibly from a gash Bryce's upper arm. Her stomach tried to turn, but she quickly regained control. "Jeremy!" She wrapped the scarf around the wound in Bryce's arm.
"Oh god." He slid to a stop next to her.
"If you're gonna be sick, go get someone else." She wrapped the scarf as tight as she dared before looking up at Jeremy. "Hold this."
Bryce's breathing was raspy and labored. When she tugged his shirt up, he didn't guard from any of her probing, but the mottled purple skin was far more frightening than a child thrashing or screaming from pain.
First responders had made it to the accident site. She could hear a few calling in a request for multiple ambulances.
"I need Life Flight." She must have used her trauma-surgeon voice, since the EMT immediately nodded and made and immediate call for one. The young man's freckles practically glowed beneath the pallor of his face. He couldn't have been more than twenty. He was in far over his head. His eyes darted from one patient to another, clearly unable to decide who to help.
"Standard triage protocols. You've trained for this, right?" Elena took hold of Bryce's wrist and cringed at how faint it had become. "Treat the most injured first. Just get moving."
"Yes, ma'am." He shot to his feet, moving toward an older woman who'd been crying earlier but had gone quiet and still.
Bryce's breathing gurgled.
And then stopped.
"Shit." Elena felt for a pulse. Nothing. "Nope. Not here. Not now." The rest of the casualties faded into nothing as she focused all her attention on her godson.
Precious minutes ticked away.
Sweat trickled down her forehead and dripped into the snow.
"Where's that chopper?" She yelled to no one in particular, assuming someone in authority would answer.
"Snow's too thick. Can't land." Someone spoke over her shoulder. "We've got ambulances two minutes out."
Two minutes.
Did Bryce have two minutes?
Elena didn't know how long she'd been doing CPR, but from the ache already spreading into her arms and across her upper back, it had been a while. Sirens wailed in the distance. Sirens. More than one. She'd never been so relieved to hear a group of ambulances heading her way.
"We can take over from here." A hand associated with the voice from earlier took hold of her shoulder and gave a not-too-gentle pull.
"Like hell you are." Elena didn't even break the rhythm she'd established.
"Ma'am." He had that trying-to-be-polite while also implying she didn't know what she was doing tone to his voice that she'd heard countless staff at her hospital use. The hand tugged harder at her refusal.
"Leave her alone." Damon interrupted the next attempt. He was using the voice that generally proceeded breaking up a fight at the bar. "She's a doctor."
The ambulance came to a stop right next to her, and the paramedics eased Bryce onto the stretcher. Without looking away from her patient, the doors slammed shut; they were on their way.
The emergency room was filled with the buzz of energy Elena associated with everyone being in over their heads—never a good sign. Staff members ran through the corridors, meeting the first of the two ambulances that had arrived.
Elena only stopped her chest compressions for an instant…to lock eyes with Jo.
Jo's eyes widened as anything she was about to say caught in her throat. Another doctor that Elena didn't recognize stopped alongside Jo, his lips moved in a silent prayer. The paramedic that had ridden in the back of the ambulance with them saved Elena from having to run through the list of Bryce's injuries.
Two more patients arrived.
The doctor standing next to Jo craned his neck to the ambulance bay. "How many more?"
"Three." A paramedic answered. "All critical."
"Seven critical patients? We're not staffed for that." The older doctor came to Bryce's side. "We're not skilled to handle him."
Jo found her voice. "Elena can. She's a trauma surgeon – specializing in pediatrics."
"You're joking." His eyes widened. "Can you step in?"
Elena nodded. "Just show me where to scrub in."
Surely this was all a dream. Any minute now, Damon would wake, discover he'd just eaten too much lasagna, and roll his eyes at his over-active imagination. If it was a nightmare, it was a detailed one. It felt like he'd been sitting in the hard plastic chair for over five hours now. Ric had gone from as close to hysteria as Damon had ever seen to complete quiet, now he'd been gone for close to ten minutes—trying to get some kind of update on Bryce.
It had to be a nightmare, didn't it?
But Damon wasn't sure if his subconscious could come up with something as twisted as the day's events. He certainly couldn't have pictured watching Elena in action.
While completely focused on Bryce, she calmly shouted orders to those around her, paying no attention to the spreading crimson stain in the snow beneath her or the fact her jeans were slowly transforming to almost black with the damp. To everyone else, she was the picture of complete confidence. Damon saw the complete terror lying beneath the surface. He doubted even Caroline or Jeremy noticed. But Damon did. He saw the way the skin at the corners of her eyes was pulled too taut. The slightest tremor shook her body when Bryce stopped breathing. Of course, he'd seen this version of Elena before. She'd been lying on a sheet of white. One second he'd been teasing her as she complained about the cold gel being applied to her stomach and the next she looked at him with terror he didn't comprehend.
At least he didn't understand it until later.
Then his ears were ringing like he was listening to a seashell. His whole world seemed fuzzy and out of sorts. Elena didn't look at him the entire drive home. Honestly, he wasn't sure if she looked at him again the rest of the weekend. She'd just completed her required few days' rest her doctor had ordered, then she got dressed like it was any other day, and they never said another word about what had happened.
She'd turned to look at him that morning before she left for the hospital. Her eyes were too bright, and the muscles in her shoulders seemed stiff. Just as she'd opened her mouth to finally say something, he'd turned away from her.
God, he'd do anything to have that moment to do over again.
That's when he knew this wasn't a dream or a nightmare. Because either way, he'd have gone over to her right then, gathered her up in his arms, and they'd have cried together for what they'd lost.
The clock kept ticking—a monotonous sound when it was the only noise in the room. Sure, he and Ric weren't the only pair waiting. Somewhere, hospital staff members were doing an excellent job keeping the press away. They were here; he'd seen on his single excursion out of this room during the last five hours. For now, it seemed to be just them and the clock. Waiting. Noticing every single second as it passed.
Waiting turned to numbness. Numbness was a feeling he'd experienced more than enough of over the past few months. He'd gotten to where he didn't even mind it anymore. Numbness was better than pain.
Or at least he thought it was.
Seconds turned to minutes. Minutes slid into hours. One hospital volunteer left. Another took her place. A surgeon came to the doorway, but he wasn't there for Ric. No one came for him—not even to give updates.
After more hours than he cared to count, they were the only people in the room. At that point, they didn't even hear the shuffles of people trying to be quiet or the squeaks of others waiting's chairs. The near silence, punctuated only by the clock, the quiet was deafening.
"You awake?" Ric poked him in the arm. Damon had been so lost in his thoughts, he hadn't noticed Ric coming to sit next to him.
"Yeah. Just…thinking." Damon thought that was the safest answer. "How's Bryce? You find out anything?"
Ric pursed his lips and gave a faint shake of his head. "Not much. Just that he's in surgery. They said not to worry. Best surgeon around was working on him." He leaned forward, held his head in his hands, and began to massage his temples. "I can't find Jo or Elena. Gotta feel sorry for the surgeon with those two lurking in the OR."
"I wouldn't cross either of them." Damon stood and stretched his back. He reached for the cup of coffee the volunteer had prepared hours earlier. Cold coffee swirled in the Styrofoam cup. It was better than nothing. He finished the drink in three swallows.
"How'd you manage to get away from the bar for a week? Didn't you say you were having trouble with your manager? You left him in charge?"
Damon sputtered, regretting the timing of the question. A heavy weight settled in the pit of his stomach. "You really want to do small talk right now?"
"Better than watching the clock. Aren't you here to distract me?"
"You heard Stefan?"
"He wasn't exactly being quiet."
Damon wiped his palms on his shirt as he sat down. Even a mere mention of the bar was enough to make him sweat these days. "I closed it for a week."
"You closed the bar for Christmas." Alaric sounded like he was a mixture of stunned and impressed. His eyes looked at Damon like he'd just announced he'd been abducted by aliens.
"I don't think you're working tonight, are you?"
Ric cocked his head to the side, raising his eyebrows. "My son's in surgery. And Matt's totally capable of taking care of the Grill. On top of that, not many people are at a bar at 4 a.m. What's your excuse?"
It would be easy to say that he'd decided to give his employees time off for the holidays. Or he could invent a non-existent repair or remodeling job. But given the fact that Ric knew him better than any other human on the planet, Damon suspected any lie would fall flat.
"Construction's killing us. With the sidewalk closed for months, we lost the foot traffic we had. Can't get through the intersection, so no one's going out of their way to drive to the bar—not in that neighborhood." He let out a sigh. "Believe it or not, being closed for a week will save me money."
"That bad, huh?"
"Yep."
"Didn't Elena say something about the neighborhood before you bought the place?"
"Something she liked to remind me about with annoying regularity." Damon wished he could take back those words. A spark of a question lit in Ric's eyes. He'd said too much…damn his lack of filter.
Ric turned his former-history-teacher questioning skills on him. "And what does she say you should do about it now?"
"She doesn't know."
Now Ric's eyes widened in real surprise. "You haven't told your wife you're bleeding money?"
Damon wanted to correct him. Saying that a business was bleeding money sounded so desperate. Too desperate for him. Still, it was true. "She's been busy."
"What are you going to do about it?"
Now they got to the punch line of the whole experience. Damon had spent hours in meetings the day he left. Even he couldn't fully grasp the irony. "The city's offered to buy it. Their engineers measured incorrectly. Apparently they need exactly one additional foot of land in order to complete the intersection…land currently occupied by my bar."
"You're going to sell? You said that was your dream."
"Yeah." Damon swallowed. "Well, I've given up on a lot of dreams lately."
That stunned Ric into silence. Now Damon was certain he'd said too much, but it honestly felt good to get it off his chest—even if Ric didn't have a clue what he'd meant. This year, Damon had excelled at giving up on things he'd thought was important to him. The papers he'd seen tucked inside Elena's overnight bag proved that.
He'd given up on his marriage.
He'd given up on having a family.
Giving up on his bar didn't seem like such a loss.
Ric blinked at him like he was still waiting for the punch line. Damon didn't have one. His best friend shifted forward in his seat, moving into Elena's-guardian-mode.
"Ric?" Jo's voice caught them both off-guard. Ric shot to his feet, his conversation with Damon forgotten—hopefully permanently.
"Bryce?" Ric only managed to stutter out the single word.
Jo nodded, tears forming in her eyes. "He's going to be fine. Really. Elena's still back there with him." She swept her hair back from her face with her fingertips. "He's going to be okay."
Ric rushed forward and caught Jo just as she dissolved into tears. He rested his chin on her shoulder, and Damon felt uncomfortable witnessing such a moment of raw emotion. He stuffed his hands into his pockets and turned away from the pair.
"It was a long surgery. There was just…so much damage. But the snow actually may have saved him. It gave him some cushion from the wheels." Jo choked again.
"But he's going to be alright?" Ric's eyes were still filled with concern.
"Yeah." She gave an exhausted smile. "He had the best surgeon we could have asked for."
"And I'll bet Elena nitpicked every move that surgeon made." It was the fatigue talking…not Damon. But he could just picture Elena standing in the surgery suite, offering advice. Surgeon or not—he couldn't believe they'd let her stay back there with him. Even Jo hadn't been allowed to watch.
Jo couldn't have looked more surprised if he'd slapped her. "Damon, Elena was the surgeon."
Now it was Damon's turn for surprise. "She what?"
"This hospital only has two trauma surgeons on staff. We had three patients who needed immediate surgery. Of course the chief of staff let her do Bryce's surgery. Do you know the reputation she has?" Jo blinked at him. "I don't know if anyone else could have saved him."
Damon should have had an answer for her. Sadly, he didn't.
"I do need your help with her now, though." Jo was still looking at him with outright astonishment. "She's refusing to leave."
"That surprises you?"
"After doing a sixteen-hour surgery completely on her own, yes." Jo's words were laced with anger now. "I need you to convince her to leave and get some sleep before she becomes a patient too. Maybe see if she'll eat something along the way."
"I'll see what I can do."
It had been a while since Damon had visited Elena at her hospital. Walking into the recovery room felt totally foreign. Staff members he didn't know circulated around beds of patients he didn't recognize. At the far end of the room, Elena stood with her arms crossed—glaring at a monitor.
"How's he doing?" Elena startled at the sound of his voice. Damon studied his godson. He'd never seen that many tubes and wires on a single person, not to mention a five-year-old. God, they must have come close to losing him.
Elena rubbed her eyes with the back of her wrist. "His oxygen levels are a little lower than I'd wanted, but they're within acceptable limits. We let him come off a little of the sedation when we first brought him out. He squeezed Jo's hand." She massaged the back of her neck and winced, reminding him of why he'd been sent back in the first place.
"Jo said I needed to take you home."
"I'm not driving back to Atlanta tonight."
Damon tried not to laugh. She really was exhausted. "I think she meant Stefan's house."
"Oh. Yeah." She smoothed a clump of Bryce's hair off his forehead. "That makes sense."
"I'm pretty sure she's going to get security involved if you don't come willingly."
Elena took one more look at the monitors. "He's stable." She glanced his direction. "If something happens, you'll drive me back?"
"In a heartbeat."
"Then we can go." She walked to the nurses' station and had a short conversation with one of the women behind the desk while jotting something on a notepad before walking back to Damon. "I just wanted to give them my cell phone number."
"Of course you did."
"What was that supposed to mean? I'm not on staff here. If something happens, and they need to get ahold of me, I don't need them playing the telephone game with half of Mystic Falls." She took the kind of slow breath he'd become far too familiar with over the year and changed the subject. "How's Tori doing?"
"I hope she's asleep now."
"I meant earlier." Elena snapped in response.
"I talked to Caroline on the phone. Stefan took Tori shopping for an extra Christmas present for Bryce. Then Bonnie came over to make cookies. She's doing okay." Damon stepped forward and opened the door to the waiting room. He waved to Ric and nodded to Jo as he steered Elena by the elbow through the room. "Do you want to grab something to eat?"
"This is Mystic Falls. I don't think anything's open. I'll just grab some cereal or something when we get to Stefan and Caroline's." With each step she took, he could see the energy draining out of her. She must have been operating on pure adrenaline.
"We can probably manage something better than cereal." He held up a hand before she could interrupt. "No eggs. I remember." He tried to remember what he'd seen in the fridge at the boarding house. "I might be able to manage waffles. I know they have oatmeal."
"I haven't had oatmeal in forever."
"Because you always make it too lumpy."
Even her laughter sounded tired. "I just don't have the patience for it."
"You can do a sixteen-hour surgery, but you can't wait for water to boil for oatmeal."
She shrugged a shoulder. "It's a gift."
"So it's decided. I'll make you oatmeal when we get back to the house."
"With cinnamon?"
"And nutmeg if they have it." Damon slid behind the driver's seat and waited for Elena to fasten her seatbelt. The snow had continued to accumulate over the last few hours. Driving back to the boardinghouse was going to be a challenge. If he wasn't careful, they'd end up as the hospital's next patients. He gripped the wheel so tightly his hands ached, and the stream of nervous chatter Elena initially started fell quiet. When they finally pulled into the circle drive, the front porch light snapped on immediately. Stefan stepped onto the front porch.
"Were you waiting for us?"
"Ric sent me a text. Said you were on your way." Stefan stared at the passenger door that was staying closed. "How was the drive."
"Pretty soon, Santa's going to be the only one getting anywhere in this town." Damon opened Elena's door skeptically. She wasn't just waiting for him to be a gentleman. She was sound asleep. "Elena," he tapped her shoulder. "Elena."
"She's out cold."
"Looks that way." Damon reached across her, unbuckling her seatbelt. When she didn't stir, he lifted her out of the car and kicked the door closed behind him. Stefan held the front door open. Damon tried not to make too much noise stomping the snow off his boots before carrying her up the stairs and tucking her into bed, still in her borrowed hospital scrubs.
Oatmeal would have to wait.