Dawn thought for a moment, then opened the pots-and-pans cupboard and fished out a pair of white New Balances.
“Ah,” Sharon said. “Thanks.”
I couldn’t help laughing. Typical, forgetful Sharon. It amazed me that someone so spacey could have been so sharp during an emergency.
“Tell Mary Anne the emergency-room visit won’t be so horrible,” Dawn said.
“Boring is the word I would use,” Sharon said. “The last time I had to go to one, I spent about six hours watching TV in the waiting room.”
“Nothing disgusting happened?” I asked.
“Well, one teenage kid came in with a big, red rope burn on his arm, but he seemed pretty proud of that,” Sharon replied. “The rest were just colds and stomachaches and nosebleeds. I found out that a lot of people go to the emergency room for ordinary problems.”
“That’s stupid,” commented Jeff.
“Mary Anne, you can’t run away from your fear,” Dawn said. “The Tibetan Buddhists say that you have to face that fear, like a tiger.”
“The who?” I asked.
Dawn shrugged. “My friend Maggie knows a few in L.A.”
“Tigers?” Sharon asked.
“No, Tibetan Buddhists.”
Tigger shifted his position in my lap. I ran my hand along his striped fur.
Like a tiger. That was exactly how I needed to be. I could stand stomachaches and nosebleeds and colds. Besides, if I stayed home, I would feel so ashamed of myself.
Not to mention the fact that I’d be missing one of my last chances to be with Logan before he disappeared.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll go. But if I start to faint, catch me.”
Dawn grinned. “I’ll let Logan do that.”
* * *
I regretted my decision the moment Dawn and I walked into Stoneybrook General Hospital.
A man was moaning in the waiting room. Next to him, a nurse was practically shouting in his ear, “Mr. Jones, did you take your medication today?”
Another nurse was taking the temperature of a little girl whose cheeks were all puffed up.
By the time Dawn and I arrived, the rest of the class was gathered by the reception desk. Shelley was deep in conversation with a familiar woman in a white coat.
“Hi, Dr. Johanssen!” Dawn and I said at the same time.
Dr. Johanssen happens to be one of our clients, the mom of an eight-year-old girl named Charlotte. Boy, was it a relief to see her smiling face in a place like this.
“Welcome, girls!” Dr. Johanssen said. “Dawn, it’s so nice to see you again.”
As she and Dawn chatted, I walked over to Logan, who was standing near the back of the crowd. He put his arm around me and whispered, “Sorry for being so crabby.”
That made me feel a little better. But not much.
“Now, Dr. Johanssen is going to take us on a brief tour,” Shelley announced, “after which we’ll go back to class and discuss what we saw.”
We followed Dr. Johanssen out of the waiting room and into a corridor. The walls were bright white, lined with half-open doors on both sides.
The quiet of the waiting room instantly gave way to shouting and electronic beeping.
“Dr. Bauman, room four … fibrillation STAT … MRI results … head trauma in five … STAT … reduce the intercranial pressure on Urgent One … increase the adrenaline … CAT scan … dog scan … dancing the can can …”
Well, something like that. The sounds were blending together, making no sense. It was creepy. I imagined myself as an emergency patient. I’d be petrified. The last thing I’d want to hear is all that loud medical chatter. Maybe some soft music instead.
“Stoneybrook General may be small in size,” Dr. Johanssen was explaining, “but we are as up-to-date as any major urban teaching hospital in the Northeast.”
That was reassuring, I guess.
I kept peeking into the rooms, half expecting to spot some horrible, bloody mess. But all I saw were calm, bored-looking people in blue robes.
“Mary Anne?” Logan said gently as we stopped at the end of the hallway.
I looked up at him. His eyes were soft and questioning. He had that I need to tell you something look.
My heart jumped. He’d talked to his dad. They’d fought it out. Logan was staying. I just knew it. “Yes?” I asked.
“Would you stop squeezing my hand so tightly?”
“Oh. Sorry.”
I let go. Shelley was lecturing us about concussions or something. A nurse pushed a teenage boy in a wheelchair past us. His ankle was bandaged up.
“Hi, Jason,” Dr. Johanssen greeted him. “This is a summer first-aid course from the Stoneybrook Community Center.”
He nodded toward us. “Yo, don’t play with fireworks!” he called out, lifting his foot.
Ugh. That fluttery feeling in my stomach was coming back.
“When Jason first came here,” Dr. Johanssen said, “we weren’t sure we could save his foot …”
I didn’t want to hear this. I grabbed Logan’s hand again.
“Dr. Johanssen!” a voice called urgently from behind me.
I turned. A nurse was walking briskly down the hall, trailed by a woman in a summer dress and a tall man in a Hawaiian shirt. Slumped over the man’s shoulder was a motionless little boy who looked about two or three years old. He was wearing a tank top, terrycloth shorts, and tiny blue jellies on his feet, which were dangling limply.
“Seizure!” the nurse shouted.
“Room Seven!” Dr. Johanssen snapped.
“Against the wall, please!” Shelley shouted.
We all backed away to let the nurse and the family pass. They rushed into a room across the hall, followed by Dr. Johanssen.
I don’t believe I will ever forget the expression on the dad’s face. It was like a scared child’s, frozen with panic. His eyes were wide and glassy, glaring straight ahead as if they could bore a hole through anything in his way.
I choked on a gasp.
From where I was standing, I could see the nurse take the little boy from the dad. As she lay the boy on a white-sheeted bed, I caught a glimpse of his eyes. They were white. The eyeballs had rolled back.
I thought I was going to lose it.
Logan put his arm around my shoulder. I was sure Shelley would usher us away, but she didn’t. Inside the room, no one seemed to notice we were there.
Dr. Johanssen was firing off instructions in a calm but firm voice. Instantly the parents were undressing the boy to his diapers, the nurse was taking the boy’s temperature, and Dr. Johanssen was poking and prodding.
“Blood pressure’s low, temperature’s up,” Dr. Johannsen announced. “He’s dehydrated.”
The nurse quickly began preparing an intravenous tube. Dr. Johanssen turned to the parents. “He’ll be all right,” she said. “That’s the first thing you need to know. Now, would you tell me what happened?”
The mom’s voice was hoarse and weak. “He’s been running a fever since last night. He wasn’t holding any food down, not even the Tylenol we tried to give him.”
“We were having company today, and it was hot inside the house,” the dad continued. “So I took him outside to let him rest on the hammock. He fell right asleep. Then …” He took a deep breath and choked back a sniffle. “Then he started to … to …”
“Convulse,” Dr. Johanssen said gently.
The man nodded. “His body started flopping around, his eyes rolled up. I just grabbed him and yelled for Susan, and we jumped into the car to come here.”
“Has this happened before?” Dr. Johanssen asked.
Both parents said no.
“Any epilepsy in the family?”
No again.
Dr. Johanssen turned to the boy and felt his forehead. His left arm was hooked up to the IV now. He looked so small and helpless, lying there in only a little white plastic diaper.
I began sobbing quietly. Logan put his arm around me.
“His t
emperature is a hundred and five,” Dr. Johanssen said gravely to the parents. “Under the age of five or so, a child’s nervous system is immature. A sudden spike in temperature like this can throw the body into a condition we call febrile seizure. It’s not unusual, and even though it’s scary to see, it is not harmful. Usually all we do is keep the child safe and work to bring the body temperature down — lukewarm baths, acetaminophen suppositories in the case of a child who is spitting up, whatever it takes.”
“You mean, this is normal?” the mom asked. “He’s going to be all right?”
Dr. Johanssen smiled. “I believe so.”
What a relief. I slumped against Logan. I could see my friends all smiling and murmuring to one another. Even Shelley Golden had tears in her eyes.
“Just to be on the safe side, though,” Dr. Johanssen said, “I want to rule out spinal meningitis. Which means I need to take a spinal tap.”
Both parents’ faces sank. “What does that involve?” the father asked.
“Well, after he’s awake and alert,” Dr. Johanssen replied, “we extract some fluid from the base of the spine. Now, the syringe has to be placed exactly, so I’ll need you two to hold him …”
I felt my stomach rising up toward my mouth like a rubber band. “Let’s go,” I muttered to Logan.
Shelley already had the same idea. She was leading the class toward the waiting room.
I have never walked so fast in my life.
“I’m driving the hook and ladder truck!” Claire Pike shouted. “RRRRRRRRRRR …”
“I get to use the ax!” Nicky Pike yelled.
“I spray the hose!” Margo Pike called out.
“I’m the Dalmatian — rowf! Rowf!” Vanessa Pike barked.
Adam Pike burst out laughing. “Dalmatian?”
“Yes,” Vanessa replied. “All firehouses have Dalmatians. Didn’t you know that?”
I guess you know what Kristy’s idea was.
I am very glad she didn’t try to teach the kids about febrile seizures. Why traumatize them? I was still a basket case myself. I barely remember leaving the hospital. I know we all walked back to the Stoneybrook Community Center, and I know we finished the class, but I was in such a daze, I couldn’t tell you what we learned.
Oh, in case you were wondering, the little boy was all right. Dawn called Dr. Johanssen on Tuesday night to check. He did not have spinal meningitis, and he left the emergency room with flowers, lollipops, a near-normal temperature, and two very relieved parents.
In the twenty-four hours or so afterward, I discovered that lots of people knew about febrile seizures. Kristy, Anna Stevenson, a niece of Sharon’s, Jessi’s cousin — all of them had had one.
Still, the thought of that boy haunted me. The visit had shaken me up. I was on the verge of quitting first-aid class.
Some tiger I was. More like a scaredy-cat.
Kristy, of course, had fully recovered by the time of her sitting job. In fact, she was bitten by the emergency-safety bug. With the Firefighters’ Fair around the corner, she decided fire safety would be the theme of the day.
It was a good idea. Mallory has enough brothers and sisters to form a real fire department. Seven, to be exact. Claire is the youngest. She’s five years old. In ascending order, Margo is seven, Nicky eight, Vanessa nine, and the triplets (Adam, Jordan, and Byron) ten.
“WEEE-OOOO, WEEE-OOOO, WEEE-OO!” Byron was wailing.
“We have a four-alarm fire at One Thirty-four Slate Street!” Jordan announced, cupping his hand around his mouth like a megaphone. “The place is burning up!”
Claire looked horrified. “Hey, that’s our house!”
“All the kids have survived except the littlest one!” Jordan continued. “She’s melting like the Wicked Witch of the West —”
“Make him stop!” Claire pleaded.
“Jordannnn,” Mallory scolded.
“Okay, guys, what if your house is burning?” Kristy asked. “What do you do?”
“Say, ‘AHHHHHHH!’ ” Claire screamed.
“Call nine-one-one,” Nicky suggested.
“Turn on the faucet all the way and stick your finger in it!” Byron blurted out. “You can make the water shoot out, right at the fire!”
“Roast hamburgers,” Adam volunteered.
“No, s’mores!” Vanessa exclaimed.
“Nicky’s on the right track,” Mallory said. “But what if you can’t get to a phone?”
“Open the window and yell for a neighbor,” Margo answered.
“Like this: ‘AHHHHHHH!’ ” Claire demonstrated.
“Ow, my eardrums!” Jordan moaned.
“Okay, you’re in your room, your door is closed, and you smell smoke,” Kristy continued. “Now what?”
“Push the door open and run away, of course!” Nicky said.
Kristy shook her head. “But you might run right into the fire. So first you feel the door and the doorknob.”
“If it’s hot, forget it!” Adam piped up. “Out the window you go.”
“Well, you do keep the door closed, because that keeps the smoke out temporarily,” Kristy said. “But you don’t jump, Adam. Not until you’ve attracted your neighbors’ attention and someone has called the fire department. They can lower you safely to the ground with ladders.”
“What if your door isn’t hot?” Mallory asked.
“Meep-meep!” Vanessa said, imitating the Road Runner and darting away.
“Not so fast,” Kristy called out. “Do you know what causes the most harm in a fire?”
“Burning flames that melt your flesh and make your eyes dribble out!” Adam said.
“Ewwww,” Margo groaned.
“Dribble out?” Claire’s bottom lip was quivering.
Mallory put an arm around her little sister. “Don’t listen to him. Smoke is what hurts people the most. If you breathe too much of it, it can burn your lungs.”
“But what does hot air do?” Kristy asked.
Seven blank stares.
“Make popcorn?” Nicky finally guessed.
Kristy shook her head. “It rises. Which means the air will be cooler and clearer near the floor. So if you do see smoke, you do three things — stop, drop, and roll. Stop the moment you see it, drop to the floor, and roll as far as you can. Like this.”
Kristy demonstrated (very dramatically, I’m sure). Immediately the kids tried to imitate her. Margo flopped onto the grass. Vanessa rolled over her, giggling. Nicky sprawled on his back and Claire sat on him. The triplets rolled all the way to the next-door neighbors’ fence.
“I won!” Jordan proclaimed, jumping to his feet.
“It wasn’t a race!” Byron protested.
“I’ll race you!” Nicky challenged.
The kids scurried into a rough line, giggling and jostling each other.
“Uh, guys …” Mallory called out.
Kristy reached into her backpack for her referee’s whistle. (Yes, she actually brings one to most of her jobs. It works wonders when she needs to attract the attention of unruly kids.)
“Okay, everyone lined up?” Kristy asked in her best gym-teacher voice.
“Yeeeeaaaahh!” the kids replied.
“Kristy, what are you doing?” Mallory asked.
“If you can’t beat ’em …” Kristy said with a grin. She raised the whistle to her lips and shouted, “Stop … drop … roll!”
Phweeeeeet!
“Remember your spending limit,” Mrs. Bruno said, pulling her car to a stop in front of Bellair’s.
“Okay, Mom,” Logan replied, as he and I climbed out.
“And let Mary Anne help you,” Mrs. Bruno continued. “She has a good sense of style.”
“Uh-huh,” Logan said.
“Afterward, use the credit card to take yourselves out for a nice lunch. Call me when you need a ride back.”
“Yup.”
“Thanks, Mrs. Bruno,” I said. “That’s really nice of you.”
Logan and I said good-bye to his
mom and walked toward Bellair’s front doors. The air was warm, but a cool breeze was blowing.
It would have been a perfect day if it weren’t for our mission. We were going to shop for Logan’s boot-camp clothes.
Neither of us was looking forward to that.
Logan seemed to be in his own world. I smiled at him once or twice, but he didn’t seem to notice.
“Are you angry about something?” I finally asked.
“I hate shopping,” Logan murmured.
“Oh. I thought maybe you’d had a fight with your mom or dad.”
“Why would I do that?”
“Well, you know, about the summer, about prep school …”
“Nahh, we don’t talk about that stuff anymore.”
“So I guess that’s it? You’re going? You’re not even trying?”
Logan glared at me. “Why should I? Do you want me to fight with them?”
“I didn’t say that, Logan. I’m just surprised you gave up.”
“I didn’t give up! I just —” Logan stopped himself. He looked straight ahead and walked in stony silence.
I didn’t say a thing. I was afraid I’d just make things worse. Or start crying. Or both.
“You know,” Logan finally said with a sigh, “in football practice, you learn to tackle by running into these huge padded cylinders. It’s supposed to make you more aggressive. But you can never actually tackle them. They’re balanced on this sturdy metal frame. You’re like an animal doing the same thing over and over for no reason. Well, that’s what arguing with my dad is like. I just don’t want to keep doing it.”
I nodded. “So because of that, you’re just going to throw away years of your life in a place you don’t want to be in.”
“No! I mean, yes. I mean, why do you have to put it that way?”
“Because it’s true, Logan. Isn’t it?”
Logan fell silent.
“Remember when your teammates were teasing you about being in the BSC?” I pressed on. “You tried to ignore them. You figured they’d go away. But they just made you more and more miserable. Finally you stood up to them, and it worked. They backed down.”
“My parents aren’t my teammates, Mary Anne.”
“I know! But the point is, if you don’t fight back for something you want, you lose.”