‘Okay?’ he asked, his voice trembling.
‘I... Yes. I think so.’
‘Thank God.’ He pushed himself to his feet and grabbed her hand. She found her footing amongst the glass and vaguely noticed a rip in her pants.
People ran towards them. A man she didn’t recognise—his face white with shock—gasped, ‘I thought you two were dead for sure.’
‘We’re fine,’ Charlie said, his voice suddenly loud and commanding. ‘We’re doctors. You call the police and ambulance. We’ll check on the others.’
‘Go to the doctors’ clinic,’ Lauren called out, her voice not quite as steady as Charlie’s. She pointed down the street in the direction of the surgery. ‘Tell Lexie I need the AED and the emergency kits. All of them.’
‘Emergency kits. Got it.’ The man turned and ran.
Lauren quickly assessed the devastation in front of her. The rear of a small four-door sedan was protruding from the café and the jagged remains of the huge glass frontage hung over it like stalactites. Her thoughts took the obvious path—were the car’s occupants alive? Horrifying reality cramped her gut. What about the people inside the café? Had the car hit any of the staff or customers?
Charlie, who was already at the driver’s door, looked up as if reading her thoughts. ‘Triage inside.’
She nodded and ran. Fortunately, the door to the café hadn’t buckled and it opened. Steve, the young barista, and another man stood stunned and rooted to the spot, their horrified gazes fixed on the front of the car. Lauren saw a pair of female legs splayed at a rakish angle and protruding from under the car. As she dropped to her knees, she said firmly, ‘Steve. Find me a torch. You...’ she pointed to the second man ‘...do a head count. Tell me who else is hurt.’
Both snapped to attention. ‘On it.’
A phone with the torch app activated was thrust into Lauren’s hand and she crawled under the car. ‘It’s Lauren,’ she said to the woman, having no idea if she was a local or a tourist. Dead or alive. Conscious or unconscious. ‘I’m a doctor.’
The woman didn’t move or make a sound. Lauren’s hand reached for the patient’s neck, her fingers seeking a carotid pulse. It took her a moment but she finally detected a faint and thready beat. Moving forward on her belly, she gained a few centimetres and somehow managed to check the woman’s pupils. Sluggish response to light.
‘Lauren!’ Charlie’s voice called out to her. ‘What have you got?’
‘Head injury and probable internal bleeding. Her breathing’s shallow but I can’t move or see enough to examine her.’
‘We need to pull her out.’
‘What about spinal injuries? Can’t you move the car back?’
‘Too risky. The front of the building might collapse. Here.’ His hand shoved a neck brace at her and she gave thanks for Lexie’s fast arrival with the emergency packs. ‘Put this on her.’
‘I need light.’
‘Got it.’ Charlie’s face appeared and he directed two phones towards her.
Lying on her side, Lauren’s fingers felt thick and clumsy, and while she fitted the brace she agonised over the compromises that always came with triage—save a life but risk exacerbating an injury in the process. ‘Brace on.’
‘Her name’s Celine. Can you support her head while I pull her legs?’
‘I’ll have to come out and go back in at a different angle.’
‘Do it.’ Charlie said. ‘Fast.’
Feeling like a trainee soldier, she wriggled out on her belly before re-entering so her head and Celine’s were next to each other. ‘Okay, but slowly.’
‘Got it. On my count,’ Charlie commanded. ‘One, two, three.’ The distance Celine needed to be moved wasn’t huge but it felt like miles. Lauren concentrated on keeping the patient’s spine in alignment. ‘And we’re clear,’ Charlie yelled. ‘She’s not breathing.’
Lauren rolled out from under the car as sirens blared. Charlie was already doing CPR and she grabbed the automatic emergency defibrillator. Ripping open the woman’s blouse, she quickly applied the electrode pads. ‘Clear,’ she said loudly. Charlie’s hands moved off Celine’s sternum and he held them up as if a gun were being levelled at him. She pressed the shock button. Celine’s body shuddered. Charlie recommenced CPR, counting to thirty before giving the patient two breaths.
‘Stop CPR. Analysing,’ the electronic voice of the AED instructed.
Charlie lifted his hands ‘Look at her trachea. Grab a cannula.’
‘Tension pneumothorax?’ Lauren handed him a fourteen-gauge needle and swabbed Celine’s upper chest. The pressure would be preventing her heart filling with venous blood. With nothing to pump, the heart was a fibrillating mess.
‘I’m hoping.’ Charlie plunged the needle into the skin between the second rib space in the mid-clavicular line and a faint whoosh of air followed. ‘Now we might be able to get her back.’
‘Clear!’ Lauren said loudly again, before depressing the shock button. Her eyes were glued to the liquid display. Thank, God. ‘Sinus rhythm,’ she said, catching the relief on Charlie’s face. ‘Good call.’
He shrugged. ‘We’re not out of the woods yet. You got this? I’ll check on the others.’
‘Sure.’ She inserted an IV and did another set of observations. Although Celine was breathing and her heart was beating, she was still unconscious. Given the trauma she’d experienced, being out of it could be a good thing but the doctor in Lauren knew her sluggish pupil response was a serious concern.
‘Do you need the helicopter, Lauren?’
She looked up at the familiar voice and smiled at her father, who was standing above her in his blue paramedic’s uniform. ‘Yes. Probable head injury and post cardiac arrest. She needs to go direct to The Edward.’
Ian pulled out his phone and made the call while Lauren helped his partner load Celine into the ambulance for the short trip to the helipad. As the ambulance drove away Lauren returned inside. Charlie was splinting a young girl’s leg and Lexie was handing out blankets. Her mother was sticking bright pink sticky notes on people, describing symptoms and seating them in chairs. The young barista was making coffee.
‘Who’s first?’ Lauren asked, ignoring the dull ache all over her body that was probably soft tissue bruising from colliding with concrete.
‘Jake Lawrence. He’s got a nasty cut to his arm. Do you want to stitch it here or at the surgery?’ Sue asked.
‘Here might be better.’ Lauren saw two police officers talking to an elderly man wrapped in a blanket who she assumed was the driver of the car. ‘There’s coffee and people need to stay together and talk so they can start to process it all.’
The next ninety minutes passed in a blur. Her father and his partner returned and transported the two patients with fractures to the hospital in Surfside. The police interviewed people who felt up to telling their version of events and while Lauren stitched wounds, she listened to people’s outpourings of shock and grief.
‘It came out of nowhere. One minute I was paying for coffee and the next... Crash. I thought a bomb had gone off.’
But amidst their trauma the locals’ concerns were for the tourist who’d taken the brunt of the accident. ‘No one expects to be injured when they’re drinking coffee on holiday. Will she be okay?’
‘I don’t know the full extent of her injuries,’