Chapter 11
The calm darkness was instantly dissolved at the sound of the tones and the house lights coming on. The over head speakers were saying something about a structure fire somewhere but John had a problem he had to solve fast, then he'd read the address off the call slip. Where were his boots and his turn out pants?
Down on his hands and knees he quickly swept under the bed he just rolled out of but they weren't there either.
"Alright Chet Kelly, where are my turn outs!" John hollered at the top of his lungs and the rest of the half-asleep crewmates had to giggle just a little.
"You're sitting this one out Gage, remember?" Captain Stanley called back and looked in the direction of his youngest paramedic whose head was showing above the dividing walls at the far end of the dorm.
"Wait a minute, why am I wearing pajamas?" Gage exclaimed and put both of his hands through his hair and held them at the top of his head as he looked down at himself.
"I'll explain when we get back," Hank called out as he hurried to get on the engine so they could leave. Hank shook his head with a smile as he climbed aboard the engine and turned to his engineer. He was sure once John took a minute to finish waking up he'd remember or at least figure out why he was dressed as he was and why he was off duty, hopefully he would just go back to sleep.
The structure fire turned out to be an old condemned and boarded up home that looked long vacant. There were no victims to worry about and the fire was well involved when they arrived so the orders were to surround and drown and protect surrounding structures. Although it took nearly three hours to get the fire completely out the only real problem was the large number of empty gas cans that had been tossed around the place. The arson investigation team would take over once they were done. As Hank climbed aboard the engine to return to the station he took one last look at the blackened rubble left behind, 'whoever did this just raised the property value around here', Hank thought to himself and wondered if they'd ever find enough evidence to convict anyone of arson.
When they backed into the station and rolled out of their perspective trucks they were greeted by the smell of fresh coffee and a light on in the common room.
They all followed their leader in single file and no one was surprised to see John standing at the stove pouring a cup of coffee. "It's fresh," he told his crewmates, "I started it when I heard you call yourselves in available."
John was dressed in a pair of jeans and a button down western shirt with a woven sweater with a nature type pattern woven in around the bottom of it.
"Thanks John, I was hoping you would be able to go back to sleep." Hank responded to the offer.
"I did for a while," John took a sip of coffee, "Then I had a dream that I rolled out to a fire on a tricycle and was wearing nothing but my underwear. I had to put the fire out by urinating on it. That's when I realized I needed to visit the facilities but it was way too real for me."
John then took another drink of coffee and turned to the phantom. "Sorry about accusing you of hiding my turn outs Chet. I don't know what got into me."
"I do," Roy piped up, "If anyone were crazy enough to do something like that it would be Chet."
"Hey! I'd never do anything that would harm his safety," Chet defended himself but the rest of the guys just looked at him over their mugs of fresh coffee with a glare that said, 'yeah sure.'
Once John finished his coffee he rinsed his mug out and set it in the drainer. "Well Cap if you can tell me where I might find my car keys I should be heading to the hospital so I'll be there when Elise wakes up."
Cap pulled John's keys out of his desk drawer and walked John to his car. After shutting his car door behind him he looked at his friend through the rolled down window. "You take care of yourself and remember you won't be doing Elise any good if you get yourself all run down. You be sure to call if there is anything we can do to help."
"Thanks Cap, for everything," John waved through the open window, "I'll keep in touch." And then he drove off into the still darkened night.
00000
Once at the hospital John went strait to the CCU as if he worked there, standing in the doorway to the cubical just watching Elise sleep, even in her sleep she looked stronger and her color was better. John was approached by one of the nurses who had been sitting at the desk drinking a cup of coffee. "Excuse me sir, this is the Coronary Care Unit and only immediate family are allowed to visit our patients."
John turned around and recognized another of the nurses he had tried to date more than once during the last year. "Hi Alice,"
"Well hello Johnny, I didn't recognize you out of uniform." Alice responded in a quiet voice as to not wake up the patients. "Is this one you worked on?"
"Yeah," John replied.
"I still can't let you in, she has a limited visitors list that only includes her husband right now."
"Do you by any chance know her husband's name?" John asked keeping a calm cool face.
"Not off the top of my head but it's in her file." The nurse moved over to her desk where she pulled the patients file and looked up the name. "It says here his name is," she was stunned into silence as she looked into John's face, "You're her husband, I, I had no idea you were married."
"You do now. Can I go in and sit with her till she wakes up?"
"A, yeah, sure," Alice stammered, John was enjoying this, she had not been particularly kind when she turned him down before. "Wait a minute; I thought you said you worked on her?"
"I did that too, she went into V-Fib at an auto accident I responded to yesterday," John answered. "My partner was tied up with a lacerated artery I had to work on her."
"I bet that was rough." Alice commented and all John could do was nod his head.
"Did she have any problems last night after I left?" John was getting down to business.
"At shift change I was told that she'd had some tremors but they were mild so they we're not sure if it was a mild seizure or withdrawal effects from the Phenobarbital." Alice informed him, "We've been instructed to watch her close and chart the time and severity every time it happens but I haven't witnessed anything since I've been on. Her heart rhythm has remained stable with no skipping since she's arrived in CCU and all of her vitals have remained perfectly normal. With these kinds of numbers she should be able to be moved to a step down unit as planned later this morning."
"She's a fighter," John commented as he leaned on the door frame to her cubical. "I can't wait to take her home." Without another word John entered the room and sat at the side of the bed, and waited quietly for the first signs that she was waking. As he waited and watched he pulled a bundle of letters out of his pocket and opened the first one.
Dear John;
You are such a miracle worker; I can't even begin to tell you how much I've learned at your side. I only wish I had half the teaching ability that you have. Rolled on our first accident where we used the jaws yesterday. Farmer hit a moose on the road with his wife's station wagon. That darn moose pushed the engine right in on the front seat. Anyways the guys on the fire department here haven't been too willing to learn how to use the equipment from just a nurse, they wound up sending the sheriff into the hospital to pick me up and take me out there to show 'em how to use the thing. Sure surprised em when I was able to pick that thing up. (Thanks to all your weight training advice) They were a tad bit more surprised when I got it to work and got the guy and his son out without causing more harm to them. They want to learn how to use it now and will let me know when they work it into their training schedule. I'm not holding my breath although one of the guys said that it looked more impressive than wrestling a hose.
You can add two more to the list of people you've saved except these two were through your training.
I really enjoyed our time together.
Elise Holbrook Just a nurse.
Three months later.
John.
I still have so much to learn. Today we had a bad one. Small bus with ten kids and four adults on board. Antelope ran out in front of them and the driver swerved to miss it but the tire blew and the driver lost control. The bus ended up down in a ravine about a hundred feet straight down. We had to drive a bunch of jeeps with the rescue gear around a dirt road that took us a good forty five minutes to get to the sight and we accidently dumped one of our helpers out of the jeep on the way. (Broke his arm and dislocated his shoulder.) Driver of the buss went in to full arrest when we arrived there was only three of us who knew how to do CPR and thirteen victims who we were sure we could save. It was hell on those kids being hauled out over washboard roads where there were roads with their injuries. We took it slow to save them as much pain as possible took us two hours to get out of the canyon, then another half hour to the hospital. I wished I had known how to get them up the canyon wall. What else should I have done differently? Please tell me.
Elise Holbrook, just a nurse.
The next day.
John
Had another accident in the same place, just three miles from where the bus left the road. This time the car hung up on a small ledge half way down the canyon wall. The Sheriff swung by my house to get me on the way to the scene. He and four others lowered me over the edge of the cliff but how do you use jaws in that position? I managed to crack three ribs when the rope slipped and was jerked back to keep me from falling. I used a wrench to loosen the car seat and pull it away from the steering wheel so we could get the driver out. Then splinted the guy from head to toe and pulled him up using my rope. The wind was just bad enough that it took them a half hour to get the end of the rope back to me so they could pull me up. The mortuary director took the guy to the hospital while they were trying to get me up and the doctor on call thought I over did it on the splints. I guess I was just too chicken when I decided not to check the guy over good until I was on top. What should I have done differently?
Elise Holbrook, in over my head, big time.
John folded this letter back up and returned it to the envelope while his eyes fixed on the amazing women sleeping in the bed. Again he felt the fear he knew when he realized that someone without training or the proper equipment or back up staff was performing dangerous rescues because there were people that needed help and someone had to do it. He also remembered how inadequate and terrified he felt trying to teach Elise what he knew through the mail. He remembered sending her a long, three pages long, list of rescue equipment that they needed to obtain. He also recommended some training in repelling and emergency life support that included training in defibrillating, it was just a few short weeks later that he got his first call from her.
"Hi John this is Elise Holbrook do you remember me?"
Yeah he remembered her, Oh did he remember her. "Had any more major accidents lately?" John responded then slapped his head with his hand at how lame that sounded.
"No, and from that list of equipment you sent me it's a good thing. I need your advice on some things, have you got some time to talk?
John could still hear her voice, it was so full of fear, excitement and confusion all at the same time. She talked about getting an old stokes stretcher that they were going to replace the chicken wire on and reported that someone in town knew someone who had a son who was a firefighter in Huston, Texas who sent them the instructions on how to make back boards. This guy was a fair carpenter and volunteered to do the job but wondered why he couldn't just use screws to put the things together.
John remembered how stupid Elise felt and how it showed in her voice when he explained that they would need to be able to x-ray through it.
He remembered how his eyes popped out when she told him that the town leadership had purchased a surplus Army Ambulance and a heavy duty truck to haul the rescue equipment in, then reported that the local mechanics had agreed to come together and put new engines in each of them. Elise clearly worked in another world from his.
That was the phone call where Elise had asked him where she could learn how to repel.
Over the next several weeks John got a call at least once a week from Elise with update on the equipment they were picking up and always asking advice. There were a few pieces of equipment that he highly recommended that they purchase new and thanks to Cap's supply of catalogs John was able to get them in touch with suppliers.
Groups from around the area she covered started doing fund raisers. And a women's group made a few quilts and sand bags for the ambulance while a scout group supplied a hundred triangular bandages made from old donated flour sacks.
Elise was approved for Advanced Life support training at the closest medical college and John was able to plan his vacation to coincide with Elise's for some mountain rescue training. John could still remember how disappointed he was when he picked Elise up at the airport to find that she had brought a local Sheriff and one of the hospital's doctors along to join in the training.
John was in another world when a male nurse came in to the room trying to keep his back to John but when he turned around and prepared to add something to Elise's IV, John recognized him and started calling for a nurse and Security. Greg had somehow slipped into the hospital dressed in surgical scrubs.