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The thought of holiday pay was no longer enough to sustain me as I walked back down to Y4. Between being tired, being hungry, and being disgusted with myself over Gideon, Dren, and Jake, I had no strength left to hold up my head.
I slouched into the locker room and changed my scrubs quickly, so I wouldn’t bring strange germs back down. As if anything I’d seen in trauma could be stranger than my job here.
Gina came in, all coats and cold from the outdoors. I was surprised to see her. “You do realize there’s no holiday pay after midnight?” I asked.
“Yeah, I know. ”
“Um. So how was the thing with the thing?”
Gina hissed out air through pursed lips, hauling off her outdoor gear. “Spent Christmas with my folks. Avoided Brandon entirely. I got called into work, and here I am. ”
“If I didn’t know better I’d say you were exhibiting classic avoidance behavior. Or oppositional defiance disorder. I always get those two confused. ”
Gina snorted as she opened her locker. “It’s a good thing you don’t know better then. ” I headed toward the door of the locker room. “Hey, Edie. ” Gina called after me. “Thanks for asking. ”
“Sure. ”
* * *
I went out to Y4. Meaty was nowhere to be seen, but there was a ton of talking from the were-corral side of the room, around the bend. I found my name on the assignment board—I was with Gina again, and Winter, same as last night.
Meaty came back from the corral side of the floor just as Gina came up behind me. “Spence, Martin—break room consult now,” Meaty said and lumbered off the floor.
“Marteen?” I said, pronouncing Gina’s name with the same accent Meaty had given it. “I always thought it was just Martin. ”
“Yeah, because you’re white. ”
“Why didn’t you ever correct me?”
“Because I’m lazy. ”
“Which is clearly why you’ve gone through more schooling than I have, Ms. Doctor of Veterinary Medicine. ”
Gina rolled her eyes. “All those extra letters mean is I get to be the one standing nearer the teeth. ”
We reached the break room door together. Meaty already occupied the far side of the table, waiting for us.
“We all need to be on the same page here,” he began. “First thing—we’re trying to set boundaries on visitors, but day shift was a freaking circus. Between family members, gawkers, and people paying their respects—” Meaty made a disgusted sound. Each of us knew gawkers/family/respectors were often the same thing. “We’ve told them visitors have to leave for the night, but I expect it’ll start up early this morning again. Second thing—they’ve started posting guards at the door. ”
“They don’t trust us?” Gina asked.
“Deepest Snow doesn’t trust anyone. Don’t take it personally. Just know they’re going to look at your paperwork and watch you with the eyes of a hawk. ”
Gina hissed in disapp
ointment. “I knew I should have ignored that call tonight. ”
“Do we have to talk to them?” I asked.
“Only to answer their questions. Don’t go looking for additional topics of conversation. ” Meaty looked from one to the other of us. “Last but not least, the family’s produced a DNR. ”
“Oh, fuck,” Gina cursed, and I groaned.
At this late stage in the game, Do Not Resuscitates were slippery fish. Unless you had yours on you, say tattooed on your chest when you collapsed, by the time you got to the hospital it was usually too late. Tubes had been installed to make you breathe—it was one thing for everyone to make an informed decision about not putting tubes in in the first place. It was another thing, after that, for family members to agree on disconnecting them.
“Does everyone agree?” I asked. The other thing about DNRs was that anyone could tell you to ignore them—from a wife or firstborn, right on down to a distant cousin. Anyone who had any need for closure could say stop, and pull the brakes on the death train.
“The nephew is recusing himself. The daughter is undecided. We’re having a family conference tomorrow. I suspect they’ll want to hold off until the full moon. ”
“Shitty way to spend the day after Christmas,” I said.
“Shitty way to spend the next eight hours,” Gina said, giving me a glare.
She was right. We would spend the night keeping him keeping on, but not have much room for error. If he crashed and we did extraordinary things to save him—all our good work might be undone tomorrow. And who knew how long he’d hang on afterward? We would drive his body right past death’s station, and who knew when the next stop would be? I’d seen people with DNRs continue living for weeks, not just days.
Or if he did die, and the family hadn’t come to a resolution yet, they’d be looking at us firmly. People experiencing sudden tragedy usually wanted someone to blame. Couldn’t punish death or fate, but you could definitely punish staff.
