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She’s not telling me something the whole time we eat breakfast she is only picking at her food. When we head off toward home and I am expecting a ride like we had on the way down to Houston. However, less than an hour into the ride she is sleeping in the passenger seat. I know she’d be more comfortable in the back bench seat so I find the nearest rest area and gently lie her down on the back bench. That’s when I realize she’s gotten a fever. I head to the vending machine and luckily they have basic medication. I pay for a packet of fever reducer and a bottle of water. Then I head back to my truck. I wake her up just enough to give her the fever reducer.
I get back in my truck and start driving us back home. I say a silent prayer that nothing happens on the way home. I call Chris and tell him what’s going on. He can hear the concern in my voice as we are talking. She starts to talk in her sleep again and Chris hears it. We both know its a nightmare of what happened to her during her relationship with Jeff.
Late last night I had received a text telling me that they had arrested the asshole and he was in holding at the county jail. At least I have a clear mind on where he’s at and can focus on getting Lilly better. I stop in Wichita Falls around lunch time. I’m just going to order me a burger and hit the road since Lilly isn’t feeling good. I reach my hand back and gently touch her stomach to check her temperature. She’s burning up with fever, the medication should have taken effect by now. I also notice that she winces when I touch her abdomen. That now explains why she was up so early in the morning saying she only had to pee.
I turn the truck to the nearest hospital and carry her into the emergency room. They ask all kinds of information about how long she’s had the problem, insurance, and if I’m her next of kin. I tell them I’m her fiancee’ since they won’t question it. They don’t know the difference, since we’re not in our home town. I give them my insurance information and make a quick call to my company adding her onto my policy so that the bill gets paid, she probably doesn’t have any insurance or just the minimum since she has a kid.
The doctor finally comes in an hour after she has been in the room that the triage nurse took us to. The triage nurse had immediately taken us back after taking her vitals. After having fever reducer in her system for almost three hours and her temperature was up to one hundred and three. They had put cooling packs and rags to help lower her temperature, but after an hour of waiting to see the doctor she’s still in the red zone with her fever. He comes in and has me describe all of her symptoms, that’s kinda hard I don’t know much. He looks over her chart and looks at the blood work that had been collected when she first arrived. His forehead scrunches when he gets to a particular part of the lab work.
I ask, “What is it?”
His answer is simple, “Her white count is through the roof which means she’s fighting an infection somewhere in her body. It makes the sudden fever and abdominal tenderness make sense.” He makes a few clicks on the computer and then says, “It’s probably her appendix, I’m having a surgeon come down and take a look. Also I’m going to get her started on some IV antibiotics.
I’ve called Chris and Kathy telling them where we are at and what I know so far. By the time the surgeon has come in it seems like an eternity. He shakes my hand and tries to speak to Lilly, but she’s getting delirious with the fever and whatever is going on. The surgeon makes his assessment and agrees that she needs to go in for an exploratory surgery. He doesn’t know what is going on, but he says he’s doubting its the appendix for a couple of reasons. One of them being the fact that her whole side is rigid and feels like it’s on fire.
He immediately calls up to the surgical floor and has them prepare the room for her. He asks me questions that I can’t answer. After several I’m not sure or not that we know of he and a team of nurses, anesthesiologist, and other surgeons have me sign a bunch of paperwork while rolling her to the elevator. At the elevator one of the nurses shows me to the elevators for visitors. That was the one that opens near the surgical bay. She tells me that surgery is on the third floor, and to the right is the surgical waiting room. When she’s out of surgery they will notify me of her status as well as the room she’ll be in after she’s out of recovery.
I am so frazzled I go into autopilot mode. I manage to find my way to the waiting room that the nurse had instructed me. I text Chris and give him the update. He and Kathy are concerned, but they will keep Luke as long as they need to. That’s a relief I don’t have to worry about where he’s going to be staying while she’s here in the hospital recovering.
A few hours later I finally hear my name called. She is out of surgery and in the recovery room. The doctor walks with me to a more private room. I’m sure he’s going to tell me something bad like they found a tumor and she only has weeks to live. However, when he closes the door he asks me, “How long have the two of you been together?”
“Four months.” I answer with a little bit of a lie.
“Are y’all sexually active?”
“Yes. Why?” Another lie, but hopeful. Now the cop in me is getting curious.
“Do you know if she has ever had anal sex?” He asks me with a concerned look on his face.
“Not to my knowledge.” I answer him honestly. She doesn’t strike me as the kind of person that would be willing to have anal sex. “What is wrong with my Lilly?” I ask becoming possessive.
“Well, you may want to sit down for this.” He pauses while we both sit down in the hospital chairs. Then he takes a deep breath before he continues. “We found the cause of her problem. She had an intestinal abscess. We had to cut out a section of intestines. Of course, we had to do a study on the section that we removed to eliminate any kinds of cancers or such.” He explains as I stare at him in shock.
I only can nod at what I’m hearing and then the doctor continues. “Well, that’s how we found it was an abscess. When the pus was drained from the section there were several splinters in the intestines...”
“Oh, my God what kind of sick shit did that asshole do to her.”
“Who?”
“Her ex. He forced her to have violent sex, but she never told me about anything like this.” I explain to the doctor who is confused.
“Lets not focus on that right now, lets focus on the positives. You noticed that she was running a fever and did the right thing bringing her to the emergency room. If that abscess had busted she could have died, not to mention the fact that if the poison got into her blood stream and went unnoticed it could have effected her brain.” He tries to calm me down, but I think he knows that it’s a losing battle. “We had to give her a colostomy bag for a few months to allow her intestines time to heal. It will be able to be removed once she is fully healed.” He explains what I can expect when I go to her room in a few minutes. I feel so helpless to her there is nothing I can legally do that can make this better.
After I’ve gotten my emotions in check the nurse shows me to the room where Lilly will be taken to when she’s out of recovery. She tells me it will be about another fifteen minutes before she’s brought into the room.