“That’s what she was eating when I talked to her before.”
“It’s what she eats every day.”
I raised my gaze. Finished with the waders, Callie was still high on the stepladder, now hanging fluorescent hunting vests. I was wondering again how she’d come to know my grandfather when I heard Frank call out my order.
“You should grab your burger before it gets cold,” Claude said. “A quick question, though. I’ve heard rumors that you’re going to sell the place, so why worry about the hives?”
“I’ve decided I’m going to keep it.”
“Yeah?”
“It’s what my grandfather would have wanted.”
Claude smiled. “No doubt about it.”
*
The burger was cooked and seasoned perfectly, and I devoured my lunch in minutes. While tossing the remains in the wastebasket, I heard a sudden crash from the back of the store and saw Claude rush out from behind the register. Other diners jumped up as well, everyone moving in the same direction, and I followed. When I spotted the toppled ladder and Callie’s crumpled form on the floor, instincts kicked in, and I began pushing past people.
“Let me through!” I shouted. “I’m a doctor.”
Claude was already squatting beside her body, his face strained with worry, and by the time I reached her side I was already taking in the scene, the information coming quickly.
Patient on her side…not moving…pallor almost a grayish white…possible internal bleeding?…blood in her hair and beginning to pool on the floor beneath her head…arm bent at an unnatural angle beneath her body, indicating likely fractures of the radius and ulna…
I gently reached for her carotid while others crowded around; I vaguely heard Claude telling people that he saw her fall from the ladder. Her pulse was thready and weak.
“Everyone step back!” I shouted. “Claude…I need you to call 911!”
It took a second for him to register that I was shouting at him.
Claude dug into his back pocket for his phone and I returned my attention to Callie. Though it had been years since I did a rotation in emergency medicine, I’d seen numerous head wounds, and the blood from her ear was a dangerous sign. While I suspected a possible subdural hematoma, she’d need a CT scan before anything was definitive. I gently repositioned Callie’s body onto her back, while keeping her neck as steady as possible. Her breathing was shallow, the compound fractures visible. Her arm was already swelling and beginning to turn black and purple. She remained unconscious. Pulling my phone from my pocket, I turned on the flashlight and checked her pupils. Thankfully, they dilated with the light, but head wounds always needed to be treated with caution…
I heard Claude on the phone, panic in his voice as he explained the situation before growing silent.
“They’re saying that an ambulance might be a while. There was flooding at one of the nursing homes and emergency services are swamped. They’re also uncertain whether an ambulance can make it here because the roads are so bad.”
In front of my eyes, Callie’s pallor seemed to grow even more ashen, another serious complication. I saw numerous bruises on her undamaged arm; most appeared to be days or weeks old. Gently lifting her shirt, I looked for evidence of internal bleeding but strangely didn’t find anything that would explain her worsening color. She needed to be at the hospital, sooner rather than later. I calculated the odds, knowing that while there was risk in transporting her, there was more risk in waiting for an ambulance that might not be able to make it here at all.
“My SUV can make it, but you’ll have to drive so I can stay in the back with her. Do you have something we can carry her on? A stretcher? A cot? Anything?”
“We have cots in the back. A shipment of camping gear just came in. Will that work?”
“Yes,” I said. “Go get one!”
Claude rushed off. Around me, men watched with wide eyes. I pulled the keys from my pocket and held them up.
“I need one of you to go out to my SUV. It’s parked to the left of the entrance, the big black one. Fold down the seats and make room for the cot. Leave the back hatch open. For the rest of you, I’m going to need some help getting her on the cot, and then carrying her. Does anyone have an umbrella? I want to keep her as dry as possible.”
They stared at me, unmoving, until Frank suddenly lunged forward and grabbed my keys before racing toward the door. At the same time, Claude burst from the back carrying a bulky cardboard box.