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Three
DELILAH
“And that’s it, huh? I got the wind knocked out of me?”
The doctor stood over me in the pre-dawn light, yawning like a champion. He had a cup of steaming hot coffee in one hand, and my chart in the other. It was a scene right out of any weekly one-hour medical drama.
“Well we’re still waiting on a second round of bloodwork, but—”
“Why?”
The man standing at the foot of my bed looked back at me in confusion. It wasn’t a question he was ready for.
“What do you meanwhy, Ms. Gallo?”
“What was wrong with the first round of bloodwork?” I asked. “Anything?”
He looked at his chart again, as if it provided answers it somehow didn’t before.
“Well no, but—”
“What about the chest X-rays?” I asked. “And I believe you did an MRI?”
He swallowed, dryly. “The X-rays were negative. No broken ribs. You havebruisedribs though, which can be just as bad. In fact, even if you had broken your ribs—”
“I know, I know,” I cut him off. “The treatment would be the same. You can’t wrap them anymore — that’s a thing of the past. It inhibits breathing, and the bones heal at a more shallow angle than they should.”
I’d learned most of this information in my secondary anatomy classes already. Of course that was back when I was still going to classes, and still enrolled at the University.
“So my bloodwork is clean, I didn’t break anything, and I didn’t hit my head,” I said plainly. “I passed out from not getting oxygen into my lungs — a direct result of hitting the ground so hard.”
The man wrinkled his mustache, which at this point in his life was fifty-percent grey. “It would seem so, yes,” he said uncertainly. He glanced at the chart again. “Apparently, when you fell off the bleachers—”
“Jumped,” I corrected him.
“What?”
“I jumped from the bleachers,” I said again. “I didn’t fall.”
The doctor put down his coffee and picked up his pen. When he looked at me again, he was scratching his chin.
“If you’re telling me youintentionallyjumped Ms. Gallo,” he said gravely, “I’m afraid we need another type of doctor here.”
“I didn’tjumpjump,” I sighed in exasperation. “God, why does everyone always assume the worst?”
“Then what did you—”
“I leapt off the bleachers to save a falling kid,” I explained. “He was a little boy. Blonde hair. Blue eyes.” I scanned around, not exactly knowing what I was expecting. “Is he here at the hospital? He’s okay, right?”
“I haven’t heard anything about a little boy, Ms. Gallo.”
“Good,” I sighed with relief. “If he’s not here, he’s probably fine. I absorbed the entire impact, I’m pretty sure. The way I landed, I’m gonna be feeling it for a while.”
I leaned forward and reached back at the same time. A sharp flash of pain flared along my right side.
“Yeah… I definitely bruised some ribs.”
I’d been groggy during the ambulance ride, but came to my senses pretty quickly in the ER. I’d let various staff do their thing for half the night, poking and prodding me, and then slept for the other half. By now though, I was done.
