Indivisible Line (4 page)

“I hope I’m not too late.” She gave a curt nod to everyone in the room before focusing her attention to the unconscious man. Her eyes widened. “What in God’s name happened to him?”

“Lather up,” Sarah ordered in a brisk tone.

Lily sprinted to the sink and scrubbed her hands. “What do we have here?” She put on surgical gloves while she looked over the work Sarah had already started.

“Gunshot wound to the abdomen. The bullet penetrated here.” Sarah pointed to the site, just below the belly button. “But there’s no exit wound, so we have to get it out now before it does any more damage. I think I might have to operate.” She hated hearing the uncertainty in her voice.

Sarah had a good idea of what needed to be done, but she wasn’t certain if she had the authority to make that decision. Under the circumstances, she might need the blessing of the tribal leader before she could proceed.

Cyril spoke as if he’d read her mind. “Sarah, shouldn’t you ask your father first? This is not your choice to make.” There was a strict law in their land: all matters involving “white folks” had to be brought before Ahila before any decisions were made.

“We’re talking about a life here, Cyril! This is the one chance he’s got. There’s no way to get him to Fairbanks fast enough.”

“One white man gone isn’t going to be missed.” His harsh words stunned them all, including Cyril himself, and he turned away on his heel in shame.

“Cyril!” Sarah gasped at his insensitive remark and its implications.

He stopped at the door and looked over his shoulder. “Fact is, we only have adequate supplies for the tribe, Sarah. What if an emergency happens and we don’t have enough for our own people?” Cyril left on that note, but the weight of his question lingered.

Sarah chose to ignore it.

“No one is dying here, not if I can help it.” She nodded to Lily, who held an injection of Demerol, the best thing they had for pain.

Oh Dotson’Sa, what am I going to do? This man is going to die.
 

No, he’s not. You’re going to do whatever you can to give him even the slimmest chance.
 

Conflicting thoughts raced through Sarah’s mind while her hands moved faster than they’d ever done in her life. Shootings in Beaver were unheard of, and this scenario was not something they’d ever expected.

Lily handed the needle to her. Sarah knew she had to work fast. Without giving in to the dread and nervousness trying to claw its way into her system, she did a mental assessment and clamped the line. She injected the needle into the port and mixed the solution and medication by turning the bag from end to end. “Now, you two,” she said to the men, “can you go find Mr. Vittrekwa so we can transport the patient to Fairbanks as soon as possible?”

Trimble and Mark scurried out of the room, leaving an air of fear and exhaustion in their wake. Sarah tried to draw some reassurance from her knowledge of how determined Trimble was to save this mysterious man.

“He’s losing blood,” Lily reported.

Sarah glanced at the clock. They had to hurry, but the Demerol hadn’t taken effect. She couldn’t bear the thought of cutting through the man’s skin without painkillers. Lily continued to wipe away the steady flow of blood that came from the patient’s wound while Sarah scrubbed with Betadine to prepare for surgery.

She felt her breath hitching while she counted from one to twenty as slow as she could. Less than a minute later, she gave up and started the painstaking task of cutting through the skin. Sarah gritted her teeth until the sound resonated in her head. There—a small incision, but big enough for her to work with.

The unconscious man groaned. It had to be from the pain.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

Sarah slid her fingers into the incision, separating the skin and the muscle underneath it, and widened the gap with her fingers. She probed until she found the bullet. Thank God. It hadn’t penetrated deeper than she’d expected, missing vital organs. She felt a little glimmer of hope. Still, Sarah had her work cut out for her, and she cursed under her breath. She was in way over her head with this situation, but in Dr. Ancheta’s absence, she had no other choice but to proceed.

Beads of sweat trickled down her temple. With the clinic’s not-so-modern instruments and limited provisions, the man would have to be airlifted to Fairbanks as soon as Mr. V, pilot of the only local bush plane, could be located.

The ticking of the clock was loud in her ears while she continued to work on her patient. It took her an hour to remove the bullet while trying to remember bits and pieces of information she’d learned from med school. Her actions would have definite repercussions, but she had no time to debate right and wrong. Infection could set in, but at that point, she’d rather take the risk so that he could live. She’d deal with the consequences later.

Lord, talk about bad timing. Of all the places to get shot, it had to be in Beaver, where antibiotics weren’t always available. Due to the cost, the clinic was unable to always keep them on hand.

“Are you done?” Lily patted her back.
 

It was now out of their hands. Sarah had given him the best fighting chance possible with what limited resources she had.

“Almost.” She looked at the patient and rubbed his arm, hoping for the best.

Her back ached. She’d been leaning over the guy for what felt like hours. Sarah bent her body forward and backward until her spine gave a snap. Then she began stitching him up, hopeful that her sloppy work would hold up until they could get him to the hospital in Fairbanks. She wrapped big wads of dressing around his belly, with drains leading out of the wound. Afterward, she placed a Foley catheter, and then hung it on the steel rod at the side of the bed.

Sarah sighed and sent a heartfelt gratitude to Dotson’Sa
for his help getting both her and her patient through the surgery. “That should do it.” She patted the stranger’s arm again, marveling that he was still alive.

With the adrenaline receding, Sarah sank down on the chair, exhausted. Her stomach growled, alerting her that she’d skipped dinner. Her father would’ve heard the news by now. It was just a matter of time before he made an appearance. The weight of the decision she’d made now came bearing down on her.

She hoped she’d saved a life. Sarah had yet to take the Hippocratic Oath, but by Dotson’Sa, she’d done what she knew to be right. Snapping off her latex gloves, she threw them in the biohazard bin and then let out another big sigh. A sudden wave of nausea hit her, and she ran to the sink. She heaved, but nothing came out.

“Are you okay?” Lily rushed over and rubbed her back.
 

Sarah nodded. After heaving several times and coming up empty, she gave up and washed her face with cold water, welcoming the coolness on her skin.

“Go home, Lily. I’ll stay with him until they can transport him to Fairbanks.”

“Okay. Do you want anything to eat?”

Sarah shook her head. Even if she’d been hungry, she wouldn’t dare eat anything until the churning in her stomach settled down.
 

The screeching sound of an alarm blared across the room. They bolted to the monitor to check the read-out.

“Sarah, his blood pressure is dropping,” Lily screeched, paling at the reading on the EKG monitor. “We have no blood in stock. What are we going to do?”

Sarah checked the reading. It was dangerously low. The patient could go into shock.

Her heart kicked in high gear. “Hook me up. We can’t waste time.”

Chapter 3

The walkie-talkie crackled, and Lily rushed to answer it. Trimble was talking even before she had the chance to say anything. “Mr. V is on his way. Dr. Ancheta was in a surgery in College but is flying to Fairbanks right now. He’ll meet the patient there.”

In all of her twenty-six years of existence, Sarah couldn’t recall making a life-altering decision until that day. One thing was certain—in the coming days, months, or even years down the road, she’d always look back on that day and be proud of her actions. She’d done many things she regretted, but saving a life would never be one of them. Ever.

Time wasn’t on their side. The facts were that it was past midnight and they had no available bags of blood for transfusion. Sarah needed to make a hasty decision—and a difficult one—taking matters into her own hands.

At all levels, this singular act had
dangerous, daring, and dumb
written all over it. However, if they were lucky, it might give him a fighting chance. Every passing minute, his condition became graver. Either Sarah transfused him with her blood, or let him die. The choice was clear.

With the continued warning blaring, Sarah wiped away the sweat running down her face and pieced her scrambled thoughts together.

“You heard what I said. Hook me up!”

Having made up her mind, she glanced with impatience at Lily, who’d been glued to her spot, staring at Sarah like she’d sprouted horns.

What was the worst that could happen? He’d develop an allergy, run a fever, have trouble breathing, or his pressure could drop much lower? In Sarah’s mind’s eye, those side-effects were a small price to pay if it meant saving his life—if he was even able to live through the night.

Unethical? No doubt, but given the direness of the situation, she felt the gamble was warranted. It was a major decision that might lead her into serious trouble and could forever alter the course of her professional life. Even so, she wasn’t going to stand there and watch someone die.

“You’re . . . you’re kidding, right?” Lily stuttered in disbelief.

One look at Lily, and Sarah knew what her friend had to be thinking. She knew she was acting crazy, stupid, and impossible, but she still wouldn’t change her mind. “Do I sound like I’m joking here?”

Instead of letting her friend’s negative reaction slow her down, Sarah began moving toward the drawers. She pulled one open, rattling bottles and instruments while she retrieved an IV line and needles. Taking the scissors from the table, she cut through the bag and emptied all of the liquid in the sink.

“My blood type is O-positive, so that makes me a universal donor.”

Lily made no attempt to move except to follow Sarah with her eyes, a dumbstruck expression on her face. “And then what?”

“We have no other choice in this situation. C’mon, Lily, I can’t do this by myself. I need your help. If we don’t, he’ll die!” Sarah gathered all the supplies she needed and placed them on the metal cart next to the exam table.

“Have you lost your mind? Do you know how much trouble we’ll be in? I can’t be an accessory to this insanity,” Lily cried in frustration.

Sarah just shrugged. She had no time to waste on trying to convince her. With hurried movements, she pulled out a chair and sat down. She breathed in and out, needing to calm down before she started the process, and prayed that her lack of food and the task ahead wouldn’t make her sick.

“Help me, Lily,” she pleaded to her friend, who still stared at her with brown eyes filled with uncertainty.

The machine beeped again, and that made Lily spring forward like she’d been linked to a coil. “What do you want me to do?”

“We’ll have to do a direct transfusion.” Bold, yet utterly stupid. Sarah wasn’t even sure it would work. At that point, though, she was willing to try anything.

Lily stared at her again, looking more bewildered than ever. “You’ll do what?”

Sarah handed her the end of the plastic IV line. “This is going to be tricky. I have to be positioned higher than him to allow gravity to force the blood downward.” She put one foot on the chair and stepped up.

Lily remained baffled. “What are you doing?”

“Lily, look at me. Focus,” Sarah commanded while fitting one end of the line with the needle, then taping them together. “Do the same thing with the other tip.”

Lily gave her head a quick shake before jumping to the task.
 

Sarah straightened her arm. “Hold the other end of the line, and insert the needle into his vein. We have to do this at the same time. Ready, Lily? Ready?” Sarah slid her needle into an exposed vein and cursed under her breath. Wincing, she waited while her blood began to trickle down the tube. “Lily, find his vein. Do it now!”
 

With trembling hands, Lily tapped the unconscious man’s arm several times before she found one and was able to inject the needle into his skin.

Trying to balance her feet on the chair and keeping tabs on the flow of her blood, Sarah trembled but remained focused. While she watched the transfer happen, the weight of her action began to sink in, just like the blood traveling from her body and into the patient’s.

“Let’s hope that this beautiful white man is worth the trouble,” Lily said with a sigh, her body straining to maintain her position over the man’s arm, making sure the transfusion continued.

Repercussions were inevitable, but Sarah would worry about that later. Right that minute, her mind was focused on the task at hand. “For me, there’s no white, black, brown, or yellow. This is how it should be. I wouldn’t be able to forgive myself if I didn’t give him a fighting chance.” She glanced at the man again.

For the first time since he had been brought in the clinic, Sarah got a good, long look at him. She noted the perfect blond hair that fell on the side of his face—matted but still perfect. His features were rather forbidding, even in his unconscious state. The defined jawline framed well-proportioned lips that were pale and parted slightly. The suggestion of dimples on either cheek made her ache to see him smile. Then there were the long, dark eyelashes and the contoured nose, all coming together to create a striking, attractive package that kept her eyes glued to his face.