Spring glanced up at David.
“Can I come back?”
She nodded. “Of course.”
* * *
Helpless and anxious, David watched as emergency room attendants wheeled his son into a room cordoned off with curtains and hooked him up to machines.
David was terrified, so he could only imagine how Jeremy must feel. He reached deep for the anchor that would stabilize him. He needed to be strong for his son, not show the panic that raced through him. His heart beat so fast that he feared he might end up on a gurney next to Jeremy.
A moment later, he was politely asked by one of the attendants to step back.
“I can’t leave my son.”
A soft hand on his arm drew his attention. Spring was there.
“David, you don’t have to. They just need some room to work.”
He glanced around and saw a nurse or a doctor wheeling some sort of machine. He quickly moved to a spot she indicated, where he could stand and hold Jeremy’s hand and not interfere with the tests they needed to run.
“Lord, you took her. Please don’t take him, too,” he whispered in an anguished plea. “He’s all I have.”
* * *
As she’d expected, the diagnosis wasn’t good. Fortunately, it was something that was fairly routine for the hospital. Spring consulted with the emergency department’s attending pediatrician while David Camden remained in the emergency room bay with Jeremy.
“We have done an ultrasound and a CT scan,” Timothy Paquette, the department’s pediatrician, told Spring.
Worried, Spring bit her lip. “I sent him home thinking it was just gastroenteritis.”
“I would have done the same thing,” Dr. Paquette said. “I took a look at the lab you did at the clinic. With his other symptoms, it made sense.”
Spring nodded, but his words didn’t make her feel any better. She just wanted to take Jeremy in her arms and hug all the hurt away.
“You want to talk to his father, or should I?” Paquette said. “Dr. Emmanuel should be here in about five minutes. The OR is ready just as soon as he gets here and the father gives the okay.”
“I’ll tell him,” she said, knowing from experience the reaction he would have.
David jumped up from his chair when Spring entered the waiting room. Telling him his son was so sick wasn’t going to be pleasant; this part of the job never was.
“Mr. Camden—”
“Call me David,” he said, grabbing her hand. “Is Jeremy all right?”
He was clutching her hand so tightly that Spring winced.
He immediately dropped it. “I’m sorry. I’m just worried about Jeremy.”
Spring resisted the urge to massage her throbbing hand. “He has appendicitis,” she said. “Dr. Adam Emmanuel is ready to operate once we get your approval.”
“Operate? His appendix? But he’s just four,” David said.
“Appendicitis is not uncommon in children,” Spring said. “Toddlers, even infants, can develop it. But it’s harder to diagnose in the younger ones.”
David Camden looked genuinely distressed. “Are you sure?”
Spring didn’t know if his question was a result of her earlier misdiagnosis or the first and typical question from a worried parent of a sick child. Either way his question reminded Spring about their precarious financial situation. This was one of those situations where the generous donations to the Common Ground ministries paid off. The surgery Jeremy needed would not bankrupt his father or leave him with the choice between paying medical bills or paying to keep a roof over their heads, even if said roof was that of a hotel.
She nodded in answer to his question. “This is something that can’t be ignored,” she told him. “And it can’t wait. If his infected appendix isn’t removed, it could burst or leak, and that would lead to peritonitis, which can be fatal, particularly in children.”
She didn’t want to scare him, but he needed to know all the facts to make an informed decision regarding his son’s health.
David swallowed. His gaze connected with hers. She’d seen it before, the parents of her young patients looking in her eyes and trying to determine if she was leading them in the right direction.
“I...” David swallowed again, then took a deep breath and ran his hand over his face. “He’s never been sick. Nothing like this. I just... Is he going to die?”
Spring’s heart ached. She wanted to close her eyes and cry out at the arbitrariness of illness. But she maintained eye contact with him. “We need to get that appendix out as soon as possible.”
“Was it something I did? The jelly beans?”
She placed her arm on his. “Mr. Camden...David, it’s not your fault. It’s not anyone’s fault. There is no way to prevent appendicitis. It happens or it doesn’t. All we can do is deal with it when it does occur. And Jeremy is in good hands. Dr. Emmanuel is board certified and our top pediatric surgeon.”
He nodded.
“I know he’s in good hands,” David said. He looked away for a moment, as if embarrassed again, then met her gaze. Spring was sure he was going to ask how much the operation would cost.
“Dr. Darling, I don’t know you, and I don’t know if you’re a woman of faith. But I need to pray right now. Will you join me?”
The question was not at all what she’d expected. But without a moment’s hesitation, Spring nodded. That this man who had so much on him would ask a virtual stranger to pray with him said a lot about his character.
She bowed her head and a moment later felt his hand connect with hers. It was warm and strong and felt like an anchor in a storm. Given that he was the one in need, Spring could only marvel. When he began praying, she felt her own resolve grow stronger.
* * *
The surgery would last the better part of an hour. Parents, even the parent of a four-year-old, weren’t allowed in the operating room. So rather than watch him pace the waiting room for an hour, Spring suggested they go to the hospital’s cafeteria for a coffee.
Although open in the middle of the night with reduced kitchen staff, the cafeteria remained essentially empty with few people filling the gray-and-black aluminum chairs. Spring led the way across the room.
“Pardon the retro penitentiary waiting room look,” she told David. “This part of the hospital, while open to the public, is used primarily by staff, so it’s last on the renovation list. Patient rooms and family waiting rooms were the hospital administration’s first priority.”
Spring got a couple of coffees, and they settled at a table near the windows overlooking a courtyard in shadow.
“When the weather is nice,” she said, “people like to go outside to eat or take a coffee break. The fresh air itself is medicinal, especially when you’ve been cooped up inside for hours.”
She knew she was babbling, but she couldn’t seem to help it. She was at a loss as to why she was so nervous. Over the course of her eight years at Cedar Springs General, she’d had hundreds of conversations with the parents of her patients, many of them in this very cafeteria. There was no reason for her heart to have such an erratic rhythm or for her hands to feel so clammy.
It was as if she were suddenly displaying symptoms of hypoglycemia or an anxiety attack. Since she was prone to neither, she had a pretty good idea of the cause of the rapid-onset