By six the following morning, Ava decided the drama of emergency had moved to the birthing suite. She’d hardly had time to catch her breath all night. She’d had to press the emergency response bell for reinforcements fifteen minutes ago, and thankfully there had been ED staff free to respond and things were settling.
As she surveyed the carnage of the birthing room, she could see blood from the mother’s post-birth haemorrhage pooled on the bed and dripping on the floor. A few drops had splashed on the TV screen that was suspended from the roof of the unit. Still, she thought, as she tried to be as gentle as she could in rubbing the new mother’s abdomen, at least I can rejoice in the now firm uterus below my fingers. Ava glanced at Zac and nodded with relief. ‘There’s no further bleeding.’
Ava couldn’t help reflecting on the emergency situations she’d spent with Zac in the past eight hours. And here they had another good outcome, despite the gory mess of the room. But that was a minor issue. The room would scrub clean and mum and baby were safe.
She remembered other places where she hadn’t been so blessed with instant expert help like Zac. It was so important to have cohesive teamwork come into play when there was an unexpected haemorrhage after a birth.
This time they’d been lucky, and the last quarter-hour had been tense but ultimately rewarding. She watched Kareena, a strong Mutitjulu woman from the community near Ava’s family station, snuggle her new son. Ava had known Kareena since they were chubby toddlers, and Kareena’s grandmother knew Ava’s through their shared mukata, or needle-felting, classes, so their history and rapport had helped keep the new mum and her support women calm during the drama. Even the shock in Kareena’s mother’s eyes had begun to fade into pride and excitement.
While she shifted to take Kareena’s pulse, she watched Zac as he talked to another doctor who’d also responded from ED. My, hadn’t seeing Zac at work been an eye-opener on her laughing lover of the night before. He had been easygoing but firm with the inebriated footy players, so gentle and kind with an elderly couple, and cleverly relaxed with a frightened toddler. But she couldn’t help noting that now, five hours after she’d last seen him in ED, his eyes read absolutely shattered. She felt the lack of sleep herself, but he seemed as if he had no reserves, and she wondered about that. Most people had reserves, and he’d only just arrived.
She had her own problems. The hardest part was pretending she didn’t know or care about him. She looked away. It wasn’t so easy to stop that subliminal awareness she felt when he was near.
She turned to help Kareena’s baby settle at the breast, careful not to interfere, but her mind lingered on Zac. If what had been between them had all ended yesterday, she wasn’t going to chase him.
Dammit – she didn’t regret learning what her body could do. Though she did feel like she’d been dreadfully uninhibited. Luckily, she supposed, nobody else knew. But they would. They always found things out. Her mother would be horrified. Her sister-in-law would be thrilled to hear of Ava’s escapades. And her grandmother ecstatic. The thought of her family’s input, which was inevitable because they dragged everything out of her, made her mouth kink upwards. Oh my.
And, regrettably, she remained mightily attracted to the man in an I-could-wake-up-next-to-him-for-the-next-millennium way. She couldn’t help feeling depressed about the waste of what could have been an amazing, if only short-term, relationship. But, if the secrecy he’d asked for was an indication of their lack of future together, that was that.
She peeked quickly back across at him and their eyes met. He smiled at her with a tired little waggle of his determined brows, the relief of another life saved between them. Although the deep chocolate eyes swirled with other emotions that baffled her.
She was used to being able to peg people – her job depended on it – but Zac resisted all efforts to peg him, and she really hated that. And it now seemed unlikely she’d get the chance to know the real man.
‘We really have to stop meeting like this,’ he mouthed quietly.
She half laughed. That was the most ironic understatement in the world. ‘I know.’
Then he looked away, pushed himself upright off the wall and nodded to the room in general. ‘Right. Good job, team. You’re all amazing. I’ll go type some notes and then head back to ED.’ And with that he walked out, his shoulders slumped.
Ava narrowed her eyes. When you were the only medically trained person in a remote town – which she often was – you learned to be observant. Her instincts said this guy, this absolute champion of a doctor who’d done as good a job at triage as anyone she’d worked with, one whom she’d incidentally spent most of the last twenty-four hours with, was on the edge of collapse. And she didn’t think it was her newly awakened libido that was killing him.
Despite the fact that they’d spent hours wrapped together in the same bed – not that they’d slept a lot – she didn’t have any right to nag him about looking unwell. Mostly because of that big ‘keep out’ sign she kept running into. Nope, she was not going there without an invitation, and he obviously thought the craziness of yesterday had to burn itself out.
Except – judging by the fresh sparks between them overnight at work – the fire still had some fuel in it.
Thankfully, the first of the three shifts in maternity she’d taken at the last minute – silly her – had almost finished. Soon, she could go to the family flat and regroup, and contemplate the final chaste kiss of yesterday morning. Jock and Hana, her brother and sister-in-law, were residing there for a few days this week, so Hana would lend a sympathetic ear if they could shake Jock for long enough to have a sisterly chat.
Ava felt the woolliness of fatigue. They’d certainly had an influx of first-time mums. The mums who’d been sitting from thirty-eight weeks in the lay-in accommodation, eager to test them. She’d bet they were just waiting for Ava and the ‘A’ team to come on duty before they brought out their strange and wonderful complications to run the staff through their emergency drills – at least it felt that way.
She checked her watch. The morning staff would be here in thirty minutes and she needed to get her own computer work up to scratch, check up on the baby in the Special Care Nursery and get Kareena and her mum to the ward so they could sleep. Then the night staff could all head home to bed.
On their own.
Sigh.
At least she would be going on holidays soon. Once she’d done three more shifts at the Yulara Medical Centre. A change of scenery back at the family cattle station would take her mind off not seeing Zac. At work or play.