Chris & Roberts - S01 E04

Story 3 years ago

Chris & Roberts - S01 E04

Read Story: SEASON 1 EPISODE 4

★★ ★★

“Doctor!, Doctor!, Quick!” A man pounded on her office door, threatening to knock it off its frame with his heavy knocking.

Amanda quickly jumped off her seat and opened the door ”what’s the problem?”

”Your attention is urgently needed at the emergency ward” the man who later identified himself to be Dave said.

There was no mistaking the urgency in his voice or the pleading in his eyes, no need to ask why Doctor wasn’t attending to the patient, he should be drunk as usual. She quickly grabbed whatever her had reached and ran ahead of the man

”Is the patient still conscious?” She asked

”Yea” the man maintained his pace behind her ”he was when I left”

Before she even entered the emergency ward, she heard the sound of a matured man moaning in pains, bloods all over the floor and the bed also. The man’s right arm was badly hurt beyond repairs, only God knows the kind of machine that could be responsible for such an accident

”Get me a syringe, and a bottle of morphine” she commanded a nurse before she saw HIM!, standing next to the brutally injured man, since that night he had attempted to humiliate her, she had ruthlessly wiped every thought of Robert McKenzie off her mind

”Doc. I…” He tried to say something slowly

”Let’s talk about keeping this man alive”

She collected the syringe and the morphine from nurse, extracted 10ml from the bottled morphine ”am going to ease the pain” she said to the man lying on the bed ”just relax, when you wake up, you’ll feel better” she injected the liquid into the man’s injured arm, then placing a powdered drug above the man’s upper lips few centimeters away from his nose, the man immediately fell asleep

”What are his chances?” The big voice asked

”I don’t know what caused this sort of lethal damage” as she spoke, she used her hand covered in latex gloves to feel the man’s right shattered arm ”but this arm is useless”

”What are you saying in essence?”

”I have to amputate the arm” any reasonable person could tell that the injury was irreversible

”NO!”

Once again Amanda turned to look at Robert, anger blazing in her blue eyes, d--n him! Did he think she enjoys arguing with him?, can’t he see that she’s nervous to chop off a mans hand, didn’t he realize she was trying desperately to keep her hands steady.

”Would you please leave?” She said as she took something with sharp round edge from a shelf and plugged it to a wall socket ”the machine that caused this accident, is not sterilized and it was working with toxic chemicals, do you know what Tetanus is?” She paused as if wanting a response from him “Every minute I waste arguing with you, endangers this man’s life and as a Doctor I can’t allow that”

”And I can’t allow you to cut off this man’s right arm, think woman, how will he work with one arm, his whole family depends on him”

was he just trying to irritate her or was he showing too much care for this unkept patient, who turned out to be working in his fertilizer factory, and she didn’t require anyone to tell her how critically important right arm was to a working man, but there was no way to save the arm – no way at all, but she had to stop the Bacteria from penetrating the unaffected part of the body, and the only way to do that was to amputate the arm

”At least he’ll be alive” she said slowly to avoid raising her voice at him, then slowly she prepared the man’s arm for surgery, and kept everything needed to dress the arm with the nurse standing beside her.

She stared at the arm for a moment, willing her hands to be steady as she switched on the mechanized saw, then biting her lower lips, she slowly lowered it to the man’s arm. Amanda heard Robert gasp as the saw rasped through the bone, but she forced her self to ignore him, it took only minutes for her to stanch the bleeding and dress the rest of the arm.

Robert and the nurses lowered the man onto a stretcher, and the nurses rolled the stretcher to a private ward with Amanda and Robert trying to keep to pace.

Inside the private ward, she gave the unconscious mam series of injections then directed the nurses on drugs to administer to him when he finally wakes up in five hour time.

Splatters of blood stuck to her white jacket as she left in a hurry to attend to another patient –a woman in labour

Robert never had the chance to thank her, even though he never accepted the idea of amputating his worker’s arm which automatically makes the man incapacitated to continue with his job, but he was happy the man was alive, had anything happened, this would have been the second death in his Mill this year and that might arouse gossip around the town.

After helping the woman deliver her pretty baby girl, Amanda was really exhausted, ”where could doctor ken be, leaving her to attend to all the emergencies, thank God she was able to handle both without casualties.

She barged into his office, and there he was -dozing- with an empty bottle of whisky lying beside him, this man doesn’t get drunk for no reason, something is definitely troubling him.

”Doctor ken, we’ve got to talk” she touched his arm which was really cold.

”Not right now” ken groaned as his hand searched for the bottle on his desk without looking up, she quickly removed the bottle, then replaced it with a cup of coffee from his teapot.

”Am sorry but we need to talk now” she slid the cup into his hand and he raised his head up, smiled then swallowed the coffee

”Thanks, so what are we talking about here?”

”You!” She refilled the cup again

”Don’t worry about me, go and check who needs your attention”

”That’s the problem, if you keep drinking, I will be left to handle all emergencies and still attend to all other admitted patients”

Ken swallowed the coffee then said ”if the job is too tedious for you, then you can put in your resignation” then he bowed his head on his desk again

”Am not saying the workload is too much on me, my point is, I can’t attend to two emergencies at the same time, what if one dies from lack of doctor’s attendance while you are lying down here drunk?”

Dr. Ken pretended like her words didn’t hurt him ”that’s why this is a clinic and not a spiritual healing centre, we save some, we lose some, just do what you can and leave me out of it for now, excuse me!”

Amanda took a deep breath in hope of controlling her anger, lack of sleep and the strain of the surgery she had performed had left her nerves frayed and her temper ready to erupt.

She looked around the office focusing on the book shelf as if looking for a particular book, as her breathing slowed she turned back to Ken

”I put it to you that you’re wrong Dr. Ken, its our collective duty to at least try to save every patient that steps foot into this clinic”.

Ken flared as he stood up, his eyes Red and rounded with tears ”where was that logic when Ada died alongside her baby?” He spoke at the top of his voice and turned to grab the bottle of whisky from her hand but she smartly refrained

”Who’s Ada?” She asked slowly “your wife?”

”Woman, leave me alone, your patients needs you” he replied

”But you employed me as your assistant and not to carry the workload of the entire clinic” Amanda said raising her voice a little louder

”Then you quit, if you can’t cope, let me be alone, for Christ sake”

With anger and frustration flushed all over her, she left the office, disposed the bottle of whisky in the waste bin and continued her daily routine like nothing ever happened.