Susie awoke in a new place. She was in a room with a curtain and bright lights overhead. From somewhere far away she heard a low voice speaking slowly.
“Nineteen-year-old white female. Banks. Susie Banks.”
There was a woman talking to a bearded man wearing a white coat.
“Carbon monoxide poisoning,” the woman said in her distorted speech. “We brought her to the MDC because you have the hyperbaric oxygen unit.”
“Smart thinking,” said the bearded man.
Carbon monoxide. Not food poisoning.
“BP was sixty when we got to her. Couldn’t get a pulse, but got leads on her quick and she was in sinus tach, one forty per minute. Respirations very shallow, only six to eight. We strapped on an O2 mask, started an IV, and got a finger stick sugar of eighty.”
While the doctors spoke, people dressed in scrubs placed things on Susie’s body, and connected her to monitors with wires. A dollop of cool gel made Susie’s skin tingle. Her eyes were closed, but Susie could hear people talking all around her. She could hear the bearded doctor clearly, even though she did not understand what all his words meant.
“I want a carboxyhemoglobin, stat! Let’s get a carbon monoxide oximeter reading as well. Add a urine myoglobin and blood for lactate and cardiac enzymes. Also a toxicology screen and cyanide level. Increase her oxygen to one hundred percent.”
At that moment, Susie wished the blackness would come back to take her away. She could smell the soaps and astringent cleaners; she could feel the prodding, pricking, and poking against her limbs; she could hear whispers, low voices amped up with anxiety.
“Blood pressure is stable. Ninety over sixty.”
Moments passed. For Susie, time had lost all meaning.
“Carboxyhemoglobin is twenty-five percent, and most of the other labs are back.”
Susie’s breathing echoed in her ears, making it hard to pinpoint the location of the woman who spoke.
I want to go to sleep now, Susie thought.
“CBC is normal except for a slightly high white count of eleven point five. But I’d expect that with carbon monoxide. Tox screen is negative. Arterial blood gases seem pretty good, considering. Lactate is high at one point seven. Again, fits the situation. Her liver function tests are mildly high, too. Not sure what that means.”
“She’s nineteen. Where are the parents? Are they coming, too?”
I want them … where are they … I want my mom …
“Her parents are dead.” Susie startled briefly. “They were found in the second-floor bedroom. Nothing we could do. We think Susie broke a window with a lamp, but it was too late for them.”
In the next instant, Susie’s heartbeat accelerated. She could hear it racing in the monitors, too, the beeps getting louder and faster.
Mom … Dad … no … they can’t be …
Everything felt suddenly strange, as if Susie had gone hot and cold simultaneously. The odd warning seemed to signal a coming explosion from inside her body. Something horrible was about to happen to her, she could just tell. An intense chill came over her. For a moment she felt simultaneously weightless and unbelievably heavy. A strange whiteness filled her eyes and she could feel her whole body shake.
“She’s seizing!”
She heard the voice cry out, but could see only white.
“BP fifty-six over thirty-six, pulse one fifty. Sinus rhythm, but with frequent ectopy. A very unstable heart. Not much time before she codes. Respirations too shallow to even register. Temp one oh one. Call anesthesia and let’s get her intubated. Now!”
Time slipped away and then returned. Faceless voices spoke from the void where Susie had gone.
“Amp of D-fifty now. Diazepam eight milligrams IV. Where’s anesthesia? Open the IV to two hundred an hour. Let’s get fosphenytoin ready. I doubt the diazepam alone is going to hold her seizures.”
“Ready to intubate. Let’s stop these convulsions. How much does she weigh?”
“Fifty kilograms by the bed scale.”
“Let’s get a portable chest film, and get her on a ventilator. Where’s anesthesia? We need to tube her!”