Do No Harm

Chapter 8

Sandra Yee, the most animated of the ER residents, flashed David dueling thumbs-up as he walked down Hallway Two to the Central Work Area. She was literally bouncing in her white Reeboks. The fact that she was only 5'2"; made her excitement all the more endearing.

"I caught a big-ass triple a on a fifty-five-year-old. Surgery just swept him upstairs." She bent gracefully in an operatic bow.

"Abdominal aortic aneurysm? Good catch. Probably saved his life." David squeezed her shoulder, and she put her arm across his lower back.

"Thank you, thank you." Sandra turned, heading down the hall, whistling her theme song, "Look at me, I'm Sandra Dee" from Grease.

An elderly radiologist snapped his fingers after her. "Excuse me! You wanted the read on the broken arm?"

"I'm sorry," Sandra called over her shoulder. "You must have me confused with some other short Asian." She jogged off, sneakers squeaking on the tile.

David turned away to hide his smile. He entered the CWA, where a potpourri of scrub tops gathered around the main desktop, heads riveted on the portable TV the clerks kept on a cabinet near the board. "Any update on the alkali thrower?"

A clerk glanced up from the phones, shaking his head. "Only good scoop was some guy stopped a robbery at the Kinko's on Wilshire. Scared off the robbers, took a bullet in the ass, then split before the cops showed. But no new word on the fuckhead who attacked Nancy."

David felt his good mood instantly dissipate.

One of the nurses shook her head. "I hope they nail the bastard soon."

Two interns crashed through the door and jockeyed for position around David.

"Fifty-two-year-old female presents with-"

"Nineteen-year-old comes in with a nickel lodged in his-"

David held up his hand, fighting his way to the board. "One at a time." A prescription order appeared in front of his face and he glanced at it, then signed it. Somewhere down the hall, someone moaned, a loud sound that grew to a scream.

David slowed to accommodate the throng around him. "Who's screaming and why?"

"Homeless Harry," a nurse said. "We've had to keep him in four-point restraints ever since Diane did a rectal on him."

"You'd have to keep me in four-point restraints if Diane did a rectal on me," one of the medicine interns joked.

David said, "She'll be flattered to hear that."

"I need sign-offs in Six, Nine, and Fifteen-One," a resident said.

David checked the board to see what patients they had where. "Why are we so far behind? Where's Don?"

"Our other attending is, as usual, missing in action."

Sandra swung her head around the corner. "I take odds on the lounge."

"I'll take the cafeteria," someone else shouted out.

David fought to keep his anger at Don from showing. "Excuse me for a minute." He walked down the hall to the doctors' lounge, but there was no sign of Don Lambert, the missing attending. As David left the lounge, Don nearly collided with him, cradling a banana, two bags of chips, a can of Coke, and an El Pollo Loco burrito in his arms. The banana slapped to the floor, and Don crouched to pick it up.

"Goddamn it! Watch where you're-" Don stood up and looked at David's face for the first time. "Oh, Dave. I'm sorry. I didn't realize it was you."

"You were in the cafeteria?"

He nodded. "I haven't taken a break since-"

"Dr. Lambert, we always have two attendings from three to eight because these are generally the busiest hours. No one-not even those of us who have been on since eight-have taken a break yet. Just because we aren't completely slammed today does not give you an excuse to go AWOL for half an hour at a time. Plus, you know the staff's been upset about Nancy's attack. You should be keeping a closer eye on them."

Don set down his food on a nearby chair and skimmed a hand across the top of his perfect ledge of blond hair, a red stone glinting from his gold chunk of an alma mater ring. His piercing blue eyes and relaxed, apathetic air made him irresistible to the women on staff. He rarely walked through the hospital corridors without being accosted by female patients and visitors. "I was gone for fifteen minutes," Don said, doing little to hide his irritation.

"Fifteen minutes is enough for two traumas to roll in here and put me on overload," David said. "Surely you've paid enough attention during your shifts to notice that things heat up rather quickly when they heat up."

"Don't treat me like an imbecile."

"Then don't give me reason to treat you like one." David sighed, then took a calmer tone. "Look, Dr. Lambert, I'm a relatively flexible guy-"

At this, Don snickered.

"— but there is one thing for which I will not stand and that is compromising the care in this facility. You've been irresponsible on more than a few occasions, and I'm reaching the end of my rope. As an attending, you should be setting an example."

"Name one time I've put a patient at risk." Don picked up his banana and peeled it. "Well?"

David could feel his face growing red, but he fought down his anger. "Think of it as taking preventative measures." He was walking away when he heard Don call his name. He took a moment before turning around.

"When your wife came in here," Don said, "didn't I take excellent care of her? I mean, didn't I do everything that any excellent doctor would have thought to do? That you would have thought to do?"

It took David a moment to find his voice. His right hand instinctively went to his wedding band, which he still wore. "Yes," he finally said. "You did."

Don took a bite of banana and David felt his impatience growing as he waited for him to chew and swallow. Don gestured with his hand, the banana peel flopping over his thumb. "Let's just give the devil his due, all right?"

Too disgusted to respond, David walked back toward the CWA. In the hall, Diane was talking Carson through the process of putting a shoulder back in joint, letting him use her arm to practice the motion. David passed the nearest doorway and saw a young man in a UCLA tank top on the gurney inside, cradling his right arm, the shoulder clearly out of joint. If the kid knew the medical student resetting his arm was practicing the gesture for the first time two feet from his line of sight, he probably would've gotten up and walked out of the building.

"I hear you ducked out of tying sutures again this morning, Dr. Donalds," David said.

Carson looked up sheepishly. "The kid was a little uneasy. I didn't want to cart out a big needle or anything and freak him out."

"Oh. So you used Dermabond for his benefit."

"Exactly."

David pointed at him, mock authoritatively. "You're going to be my first professional embarrassment if you don't learn to stitch by the end of this rotation. Next windshield job we get in here, you're tying every last suture."

Carson gloomily returned to practicing on Diane's arm. David saw her cringe when he rotated it too briskly, and felt a fresh wave of sympathy for the injured kid. Hands-on training. Despite its drawbacks, the only way to train doctors.

When David swung into the CWA, Don was fielding questions and folders from a flurry of clerks and nurses. Pat was holding Don's arm a little too firmly, her face drawn tight. "I really think you should give Lembeck in Three something for the pain."

Don tapped Pat's shoulder with the chart and gave her a brief smile. "If you want to fly the plane, you really oughta be a pilot." Using the chart, he pushed her gently toward the door. "We need a vaginitis whiff test in Exam Eight."

"Carson told the wrong Martinez she was pregnant," one of the clerks said.

"I did not," Carson yelled from the hall.

"Poor girl was only fifteen." The clerk imitated a girl's crying voice: "But I only kissed him," he wailed.

"Jesus," Don said. "Always double-check the Martinezes and the Ramirezes. They all lo- " He caught David's glare and cut off his sentence midthought.

Jill appeared before David out of nowhere. "Houston, we have a problem. Gunshot wound in Four. He claims he has no insurance and would like to pay in cash."

"A GSW?" She nodded, and David quickened his pace to keep up with her. "Location of the wound?"

She swung open the door, revealing a man with a clean-shaven head, lying facedown in a gown on the gurney. He did not look up.

"Rear end," Jill said.