Leith took the doll from her and demonstrated how to position the baby, supporting it with one hand while slapping it on the back five times with the heel of his other hand. “Not too hard. We don’t want to break any ribs, but hard enough to dislodge whatever is blocking the airway.” He had all the students practice, going from one to the other to check their positioning and technique. Then he explained the next step to take if that didn’t work and had them practice that. Sabrina was impressed. He really seemed to know his stuff, and he had the kids’ full attention. By the time they’d finished the lesson, she felt like even she would be able to treat a choking baby.
When Leith was satisfied everyone had it down, he moved on. “Now, what if you’re not babysitting a baby. What if it’s an older child? Sabrina, can you stand up, please?” She did, and he moved beside her. “Okay, so little Sabrina is agitated. She isn’t saying anything. Maybe she’s bringing her hands to her throat.” Now Sabrina understood what Leith meant by being his assistant. Her job wasn’t to help him teach; it was to play the victim. That, she could do. Sabrina wrapped her fingers around her neck and pretended to gasp as if there was something stuck in her throat.
“Hands on the neck are a classic sign, but even if a person isn’t doing that, suspect choking if someone who was eating suddenly seems panicky. But unlike the baby, Sabrina can talk. Let’s ask her. Sabrina, are you choking?”
“Yes,” Sabrina answered in a stage whisper, tilting to one side and giving a couple of fake coughs. “Please save me.”
Leith grinned. “Remember, if she can answer you, her airway isn’t completely blocked. Let her try to cough it up herself. But if she can’t, that’s when the Heimlich comes in. Let’s try it again. Sabrina, are you choking?”
Still holding her hands on her neck, Sabrina nodded. Leith moved behind her and put his arms around her, explaining to the class how he was positioning his hands just below her ribs. “And then I’d push in hard to drive the air from her lungs and dislodge whatever is blocking her airway. We won’t do that today, because I could injure her that way. A cracked rib is a small price to pay for saving a life, but let’s not risk it today.”
“Excellent decision,” Sabrina croaked. The kids laughed.
“However, I do have a training vest in my bag. First, I want you to pair up and see where to position your hands, and then we’ll get out the vest and practice.”
The kids broke into twos and practiced. Once he was satisfied everyone had the basic idea, Leith had Sabrina wear the vest. “See, this foam plug is the food that’s obstructing the airway.” He stepped behind her and positioned his hands over the air bladder in the vest. “Now let’s see if I can do it properly.” He tightened his arms around her and gave a hard thrust to the vest. The foam plug popped out. The kids cheered.
All the kids in the class took turns using the Heimlich maneuver on Sabrina. It took some of them several tries, but Leith coached them patiently until they had all succeeded. Sabrina was glad when they moved on to the next lesson, until she discovered it involved head wounds.
“You have lots of blood circulation in your head, and so heads tend to bleed heavily. Suppose Sabrina fell against a piece of furniture and cut her head right here.” He pulled a red sticker from a sheet and stuck it to her forehead. “Who can tell me how to stop the bleeding?”
“Put a tourniquet around her neck?” one of the boys suggested, grinning.
“That would do the trick, all right, but it would also stop the blood from getting to Sabrina’s brain, and remember, you’re getting paid to keep Sabrina’s brain safe. Let’s try direct pressure instead.” He pulled up a chair. “Sabrina, can you sit down, please?” Leith took a gauze pad from his kit and pressed it to her forehead. “Here, push here.”
Leith turned toward the kids. “Position. Examine. Elevate. Pressure.” He ticked off the words on his fingers. “If you’re a chicken about blood, remember to PEEP.”
Sabrina groaned. “That pun is more painful than my head wound.” Everyone laughed, including Leith.
Before the day was done, Sabrina had been bandaged and splinted, and had her arm put into a sling. Also, while Leith was busy with some of the kids practicing CPR on a dummy, she’d explained to three girls who asked how she’d created the ombré effect on her fingernails and told them where to find an instructional video on the internet.
At the end of class, Leith held up some papers. “Great job, everybody. For me to certify you in first aid, you’ll need to pass this test. So, before we start, let’s review. What’s the first thing to do if you think an older child is choking? Kara?”
“Ask them.”
“Good.” Leith moved on through all the lessons. Between Leith’s goofy memory aids and the practice sessions, these kids had it down. Leith really was a good teacher. Sabrina only hoped she would be able to learn as much about the outdoors tomorrow as he’d taught these kids today. Because if she could, it was just possible that this unusual plan of hers might work.
LEITH SWALLOWED THE last of the coffee in his travel mug while he waited for the light to turn green. He’d been a little surprised to find that Sabrina was living in this part of town. Not that there was anything wrong with this particular neighborhood, but most of the houses here were old and small. Based on the way she dressed and the amount of money she must spend on manicures, he would have thought she’d have chosen a shiny new apartment in a trendy part of town.
She’d surprised him yesterday, too, when she’d accepted her role as training dummy with good grace. In fact, the melodramatic way she’d acted out the injuries really helped keep the kids focused. The other day at the office, when she’d declared herself a hard worker, he’d had doubts. In his experience, hard workers didn’t talk about it; they just did it. But he was starting to think she might be the exception to that rule. He hoped so, anyway, because if he was going to get through all the lessons he had planned for today, she was going to have to put in some effort.
It still bothered him that she was hiding her lack of experience from her employer. He’d been lied to and taken advantage of, and it stank. But she was trying to acquire the skills she’d claimed to have. And was her deception any worse than what he was doing, having Sabrina pretend to be his date to the wedding?
Dinner at his sister’s had gone just about the way he’d expected. Volta, with all the subtlety of a locomotive, had seated him next to the new nurse at the table and kept throwing out random pieces of information designed to force them to bond. “Leith, Marley’s blood type is B negative, just like yours and mine. That’s only two percent of the population. Interesting coincidence, huh?”
What did you say to something like that? Marley had seemed like a perfectly nice person, but after going through a divorce three years ago, Leith had decided the safest route was to avoid getting involved with women, period. So, when Volta made a point of asking him if he had a date for the wedding in front of Marley so that he’d almost be forced to invite her, it had given him great satisfaction to assure her that, yes, he did have a date. He’d almost laughed out loud at the expression on his sister’s face when her plot failed. Fortunately, Marley didn’t look all that brokenhearted. She was probably glad to have gotten out of Volta’s trap unscathed as well.
Leith couldn’t understand why his sister was so fired up to find him a girlfriend. As far as he knew, Volta had been on less than a dozen dates since her daughter, Emma, had been born seven years ago, seven months after Volta’s husband had died in an avalanche. Leith worried about his sister sometimes, but he didn’t push her. So why did she feel entitled to push him?
Anyway, this nondate with Sabrina would take care of that problem for the time being, and all he had to do was teach her a few basic camping skills. How hard could that be?
He found her apartment building, a weathered fourplex split-level.