‘He’ll be all right, though?’ Mrs Bartlett’s eyes were wide with anxiety.
Jodie nodded. ‘It’s very common—there’s often an epidemic between November and March. We’ve got six babies on the ward with it already, so he’ll be in good company.’ She gently rubbed Harry’s cheek again. ‘You did the right thing in bringing him in to us. He hasn’t got it that badly, though I should warn you that they often get worse before they get better. He’ll be in for somewhere between three and seven days, depending on how he responds to treatment, and he’ll be coughing for a good six to ten weeks after he gets home, maybe even until the clocks go forward.’
‘So you can do something for him?’
Jodie nodded. ‘The problem is that some of his airways are so small—less than a tenth of a millimetre across—so the mucus is gumming him up and making him wheezy. We’ll try giving him a nebuliser—that’s just a mask with a drug in it—to help widen his airways a bit, and he’ll breathe the drug in through a mist of oxygen. That might help him to feed a bit better. We may need to give him some oxygen, too. We’ll do it through a tube under his nose, which looks frightening but won’t hurt him. And if he’s finding it too tiring to feed—bearing in mind he’s having a hard time getting his breath, he’s only got the energy to take a bit of his usual feeds at the moment—we’ll feed him through an nasogastric tube. What that means is a tube goes up his nose and into his stomach, so he’ll get all the goodness he needs without having to work so hard for it.’
Mrs Bartlett looked shocked. ‘Can we—can I stay with him?’
‘Of course you can. He’ll be in a room on his own because the virus is highly infectious and we don’t want it spreading to the other children. There’ll be a notice on his door saying that he’s in isolation nursing, but all that means is that the nurses and doctors will wear a gown and gloves when they come into his room to stop the virus lingering on their clothes or their hands and then spreading to other patients on the ward. This particular virus can live for around twenty minutes outside the body, on clothes, which is why it spreads so quickly.’
‘I see.’
‘There’s a chair-bed in the room, and you’ll be able to use the staff restaurant when the public restaurant’s closed,’ Jodie added. ‘And we have a policy of shared care in the ward, so you’ll know at all times exactly what’s going on, what you can do to help and what we need to do.’
Mrs Bartlett still looked stunned at the idea of her child being hospitalised.
‘There’s a visitor phone on the ward. Parents and visitors answer it, rather than the ward staff, and that means you can take any incoming calls without worrying that you’re stopping important calls coming into the ward. There’s a payphone just outside the assessment unit, too, though I’m afraid we have to bar mobile phones because they could interfere with the equipment,’ Jodie warned.
Mrs Bartlett nodded.
‘Give Harry a cuddle while I finish writing his admission notes,’ Jodie said, ‘and I’ll ask Alice, the dark-haired nurse over there, to take you through to the ward. If your husband and Laura haven’t arrived by the time you go, I’ll make sure someone brings them through to you.’
‘Thank you, Dr Price.’
‘That’s what I’m here for. Alice will give you an information sheet about bronchiolitis and RSV, which should answer most of your questions.’ She smiled. ‘I’m on duty later tonight, so I’ll see you when I do my round and we can have a chat then if you have any other questions or you’re worried about anything.’
When Mrs Bartlett had left, cradling the baby in her arms, Sam turned to Jodie. ‘You’re good with parents. You explained everything to her without being patronising. Well done.’
‘Thank you.’ She was surprised at the compliment. He’d barely spoken to her since he’d dropped her home from Mario’s the previous week, so she’d been dreading it when she’d realised that he was going to be with her on the paediatric assessment unit shift this morning. She’d expected him to pick up every single fault, however minor. Instead, he’d let her get on with it and had only occasionally offered an opinion, phrasing it more as a question so she could show off her own knowledge of the subject.
‘You’re a good doctor, Jodie,’ he said, surprising her even further. ‘Though are you sure about the nebuliser?’
‘I know it’s controversial and some doctors don’t approve of using bronchodilators,’ Jodie said, ‘but if it helps the baby breathe, that’s the most important thing. We’ll trial Atrovent and salbutamol, see which one works best for him. Sometimes they respond to one better than the other.’
Sam grinned. ‘Yes, Dr Price.’
She flushed. ‘Sorry. You already knew that.’ Of course he did. He was a consultant, with a good six years’ more experience than her. Trust her to open her mouth and say something so stupid, just when she was trying to prove to him that she could be a cool, calm and rational colleague.
Not to mention proving to herself that Sam Taylor didn’t make her hormones run amok.
‘I’d always rather you explain yourself than make assumptions,’ Sam said gently, as if sensing her embarrassment. ‘It leaves less room for errors.’
‘Right.’
‘What else have we got in?’ he asked.
‘An asthma attack—when I know the history, I might suggest some skin tests to see if the girl’s allergic to cats or dust mites or any particular sorts of food, and I want to check whether the parents smoke round her—plus two rashes and a possible fracture.’
‘Lead on, Macduff,’ he misquoted with a grin.
Jodie stared at him for a moment, slightly dazed. That grin could only be described as dazzling. What was it about the man? Since Mario’s, he’d as good as avoided her. And just when she’d decided that he was remote, glacial and not worth thinking about, he did or said something that made her look again, see him as a man—a very attractive man, at that. Without that wall of reserve, he’d be devastating.
It couldn’t work out between them. There were too many barriers, social and professional, so why couldn’t she stop that voice in her head telling her to go for it?
Not now. They had work to do. ‘Let’s go,’ she said, forcing herself to smile at Sam in her best professional manner.
The voice grew louder over the next week until it was positively deafening. The departmental Christmas party was traditionally held in the middle of December; those who were married came with their partners, but those who were single—which meant most of their ward, as the staff were all fairly young—picked the name of their partner out of a hat, the day before the party.
And Jodie had picked Sam. Completely by accident, but it felt as if fate or some higher power had done it by design. She’d agonised over it for nearly the whole of her shift. Should she give him the option of backing out, or use the chance to break down his reserve? He’d hate it. Hadn’t he gone back into his shell since Mario’s? On the other hand, it was the Christmas party—and Christmas was a season of magic, when everything could change.
When Sam had finished his ward round, she caught his attention. ‘Mr Taylor—could I have a word, please?’
‘Of course, Dr Price.’
The formality made her nervous, but she pressed on. ‘Um…your office?’ she suggested.
‘My office,’ he agreed.
Sam’s office was the same size as that of Lyn Trevor, the other paediatric consultant, but whereas Lynn’s desk sported pictures of her husband and children and the walls were decorated