“I’ll do that.”

“Thank you.”

I’m about to end the call when Nurse June sweeps the curtain aside. “The chopper is five minutes away. We’re getting your husband prepped for the flight. I assume you’ll want to go along?”

I nod and say to Paula, “I have to go now. The chopper’s almost here.”

I end the call without saying goodbye.

“Mom,” I say as I slide off the bed onto throbbing, unsteady legs. “Can you tell Carrie, the paramedic, that I have to go to Halifax? And can you take care of Winston if . . .” I stop myself. “When they find him?”

“Of course I will,” she replies. “I’ll stay on top of it. Don’t worry about a thing. Just stay focused on Alan.”

I reach for my jacket but freeze when someone shouts from the trauma room.

“Code blue! We need some help in here!”

I drop my jacket and immediately start running.

CHAPTER SIX

I hear alarms going off in the trauma room. Dr. Sanders is standing over my husband, listening to his chest with a stethoscope. There are two nurses present, and a third enters behind me.

“What’s happening?” I ask, hobbling into the room, wanting to help.

Dr. Sanders speaks as he scrambles for defibrillator pads. “He just had some short runs of VT, and then he went into V-fib.”

Nurse June has her finger on Alan’s carotid artery. She shakes her head. “No pulse.”

“Start chest compressions.”

My stomach explodes with heat, which isn’t the usual adrenaline I feel in a medical emergency. This isn’t the same, because it’s Alan and I’m terrified that he’s going to die.

I want to step in, but my heart is racing, I’m petrified, and I can’t move. All I can do is watch Dr. Sanders place the pads on Alan’s bare chest, then plug the cord into the crash cart.

“Stop chest compressions,” he says. “It’s still V-fib. Set to two hundred kilojoules.”

Nurse June says, “Charging.”

The machine makes a whirring sound.

Dr. Sanders glances around the table. “I’m clear. You’re clear. Everyone’s clear!”

Shock! We all watch in focused silence as my husband’s body lurches, then settles.

“Resume compressions,” Dr. Sanders says. He designates one of the other nurses as timer and notetaker. “Let me know when two minutes are up. We’ll do a pulse check. Get epinephrine ready, and have amiodarone on standby. Keep up with chest compressions.”

I snap out of my trance and move to help out, but I don’t have hospital privileges here. Besides, I’m the patient’s wife, and I know I should be standing back and letting the others do their jobs.

Dr. Sanders begins to think out loud. “Why is he arresting? Trauma patient . . . most likely cause is blood loss and hypovolemia . . .”

He looks at me sharply, and I know he wants help. I immediately step forward. “Other possibilities—he could have tension pneumothorax. Could be cardiac tamponade.”

“Yes.” Dr. Sanders addresses the younger nurse. “Give him a liter bolus of Ringer’s lactate.” Then he picks up the stethoscope and listens to Alan’s lungs. Next he checks his neck veins, looking for jugular venous distention. “Veins are flat. He’s dry, losing blood somewhere.”

“Bruising on left lower ribs,” I offer.

“Could be a ruptured spleen. He’s losing blood. Abdomen is distended. He needs to get to an OR. Is the helicopter here yet?”

“It just landed,” the younger nurse says.

June is still doing chest compressions, and I see that she’s perspiring.

The other nurse speaks loudly. “Two minutes almost up.”

I circle around the bed. “Move aside, June. I’ll take over.”

June steps back, and I lean over the table and begin chest compressions. I’m counting in my head, but I’m also praying at the same time. Come on, baby, come on . . .

I feel an almost manic energy as I push on my husband’s heart with the heels of my hands—one, two, three—willing it to start beating properly on its own. My own heart is racing, and I, too, begin to perspire.

Dr. Sanders says, “Stop compressions.” He checks for a rhythm. “Let’s shock again. Still in V-fib. Three hundred kilojoules.”

We go through the process again, and I watch vigilantly, impatiently. I’m distressed and frightened, but I’m focused.

Come on. Come on!

Nothing.

I resume chest compressions.

It goes on and on. Everyone is stressed, but no one gives up.

The chopper paramedics come running in, and my eyes connect with one of them. He understands the look on my face. He sees the exhaustion, and without a word, he takes over for me.

I step back in a daze, weak and dizzy. My emotions explode and shoot to the surface, and my knees buckle beneath me. It’s as if my legs have turned to Jell-O. I collapse like a house of cards and hit the floor hard but quickly scramble to my feet before anyone can see that I’ve fallen, because there can be no distractions. I need this team to save my husband’s life, not to be concerned with me.

They continue to make every effort. They do everything possible to bring him back, but the internal bleeding is extensive. I recognize what is happening. All his organs are shutting down.

I recognize it, but I can’t accept it. He’s my husband.

Surely there’s still hope . . .

Dr. Sanders prepares to shock Alan again. He places the pads on his chest and shouts, “All clear!”

Alan’s body heaves, but the results are the same, and the adrenaline in my veins becomes a thick, oppressive dread that pours through me slowly and agonizingly. I can barely move. I feel like I’m going to pass out.

The second paramedic takes over chest compressions.

Feeling nauseated with despair, I back into a corner, hold my forearm up to my eyes, and cover them while I weep. Then I turn my back on the table, unable to watch any more of this unbearable scene, because I know where it’s heading. I see it on everyone’s face, even though they’re still trying.

I’ve been in this situation many times but never with a loved one of my own. I don’t know what to do. I’m choking.

In the end, it doesn’t matter what I do. Nothing can change the fact that my husband is not going to make it to the QEII for surgery tonight. He’s not even going to make it out of this ER.

The thought of losing him is excruciating. I don’t want to face this. I continue to turn away.

Eventually, all the sounds of rapid activity slow to a halt. Total silence descends upon the room.

Dr. Sanders begins to speak in a somber voice, and I double over in agony as he finally calls the time of death.

CHAPTER SEVEN

My husband is gone.

Tears roll down my cheeks as I watch the medical team shut off the machines. Slowly, with an air of defeat, they roll them away from the bed.

A nurse quietly removes the tube from Alan’s throat while another peels the defibrillator pads from his chest and respectfully covers him with a blanket. No one speaks a word.

I can’t think or breathe or move, and my body is numb. How can I accept that it’s my beloved husband lying on the table, dead?

And Zack . . . oh God, Zack . . . he just lost his father. I can’t bear to think about what this will do to him. Our happy family has been decimated. It can’t be real.

This morning started out perfectly normal. Alan was fine when he ate breakfast and left for the clinic.

Please, let this be a nightmare . . . I’ll go home soon, and everything will be okay. Alan will be there, sitting on the sofa, waiting for me, and our lives will be just as they were before.

I realize Dr. Sanders is standing beside me. He lays a hand on my shoulder. “I’m so sorry, Abbie.”

I wipe the tears from my cheeks and nod my head to acknowledge his kind words of sympathy, but still, I can’t seem to move from my spot on the floor.

The other members of the medical team express their sympathies as well, and one by one, they walk out. Nurse June is the last to leave.

“Take as much time as you need,” she says as she passes by.

I thank her. Then I am left alone in the quiet room, besieged by death and unfathomable misery.

I take a moment to prepare myself for what must be done, because I can’t stand here forever. I have to take this time to say goodbye to my husband before breaking the news to my son.

More tears pool in my eyes and stream down my cheeks. I wipe them roughly from my neck and taste their salty wetness on my lips. My body shudders with each breath.

Swallowing hard over the jagged lump in my throat, I force myself to take a few steps forward and look down at Alan’s bruised and bloodied face. I run my fingers along his bare arm and stand at his side for ten minutes, maybe more. I have no idea. Then the sobs come like a tidal wave, and I bend over him, lay my cheek on his chest, and cry inconsolably for what feels like hours, pleading for him to wake up because I can’t bear the thought of living without him.

Eventually, I draw back and look down at his face again. His flesh is pallid, and his lips are blue. There is no life left in him. He can’t speak or explain why this god-awful thing happened, which causes yet another emotional upheaval in me. My heart hammers in my chest, and piping hot anger ripples down my spine. Right now, we should be at home in our pajamas, settling down to watch television after cheering for Zack at his hockey game.

I imagine us there, and my breathing becomes ragged, because future happiness like that has been stolen from me. It’ll never happen again, but I want it so badly—to be curling up on the sofa with Alan beside me, each of us relaxed and content. It feels impossible that I’ll ever be relaxed or content again. Alan is dead. I’m a widow. My son is fatherless. The grief is overpowering.

I hear a sound and turn to see my mother standing in the doorway, staring at me with a look of anguish. She walks toward me, and I step into her arms.