"Dr. Ashworth, you are needed in OR four, stat."
I took off down the hall and punched in the second floor where the surgery bays were located.
I ran toward the surgery desk. "I'm Dr. Ashworth. I had a page."
"Oh my God, I'm so glad you're here." The surgical administrative attendant looked panicked, and I began to wonder if it was a member of her family that had the emergency.
"What happened? What's going on?" I asked.
Tears welled in her eyes. "It's Wes Blakefield."
I blinked. I knew I was bad at names, but if this one was supposed to mean something, I was really screwed.
"You know, the quarterback for the San Antonio Wranglers? The Wes Blakefield."
I stared dumbly. "Yes, of course. What's the emergency?" I still had no idea who he was other than that he was an athlete.
A nurse tapped me on the shoulder. "Dr. Ashworth, come with me. We're prepping him for surgery for you."
I shook my head. These people were acting like the president was in here. I hadn't even examined the patient or seen a chart or a damn x-ray.
I put up my hands. "Everyone needs to take a deep breath and slow down. I need some information before I perform any surgery." I walked with the nurse down the hall and through the door next to the operating room.
"Here." She flipped on the lights, projecting an x-ray onto the screen.
I looked at the hand. There were two bones distinctly out of place, and as I stepped closer, I could see a small hairline fracture on a third.
"Where did these come from?" I asked.
The resolution was perfect. Our equipment was excellent, but I'd never seen scans so clear.
"The Wranglers sent them with him," she answered.
"And why is this an emergency?" I questioned her. Sure, it was an uncomfortable injury, but standard procedure would be to discuss options with the patient, book an OR, and then perform surgery.
"The playoffs. This is Wes Blakefield's right hand." She looked at me as if I were supposed to realize the significance, which I did not. "His throwing hand."
"So?" I crossed my arms. "I can see that it's a right hand."
"The Super Bowl," she emphasized. "This may be the Wranglers' only chance. You have to repair his hand and get him back on the field immediately."
"But I haven't even spoken to him. And it's not my job to help him reinjure himself. He's going to have to heal after this. He'll need rehab, physical therapy."
"We already prepped him. He said to do whatever it takes. The coach says the same thing." She stared at me, then whispered. "He's here in the waiting room. Coach Howell."
"Good Lord." I threw my hands in the air. "This is not the Pope or the Queen. It's a quarterback? You all are acting like lunatics over a quarterback?"
"He's the quarterback, Dr. Ashworth. And you're the best surgeon. He wanted the best. The Wranglers wanted the best."
I smiled at that, but the Wranglers meant nothing to me. When I lived in D.C., I knew Ben loved to watch the Sharks play football, but I never got into it. I couldn't name a single player. To be honest, I had forgotten San Antonio even had a team. All of this meant nothing to me.
"I guess I should at least speak to the coach before I go in there. Any other relatives? Next of kin present?"
The nurse shook her head. "No, but they're anxious for you to get started."
"Well, they're going to have to wait a minute. I'm not going into surgery rushed like this for a non-emergency. Let me take a breath." My heart was racing as if this was a life or death situation. I needed to calm the environment around me.
I brushed past her and walked toward the waiting room. It wasn't hard to recognize the coach. He was wearing a visor and a polo. He had an athletic look about him, even with a paunch belly.
"Coach?"
"Are you the surgeon?" He looked at me skeptically.
"Yes, I am. I have had a chance to review Mr. Blakefield's x-rays and it looks like it will be a rather simple surgery."
He scowled. "There's nothing simple about putting my star quarterback under the knife."
"I can understand your hesitation. But I assure you, I've performed this same type of procedure before and I expect it will be fairly smooth."
"When can he play again?"
I stared at him. "Excuse me?"
"Play. When can I get him back in practice?"
"He has a fracture that will have to heal on its own, and moving bones back into place is going to also add to the healing process. I'd say with physical therapy and cooperation from the patient, he's probably looking at eight weeks. That's optimistic."
"Eight weeks! We don't have eight damn weeks." The man's cheeks turned bright red, and for an instant, I thought he might pick up one of the expired magazines and throw it across the room.
"Maybe it would help if you told me how the injury happened." I still didn't have any details after I was whisked from the fourth floor.
"We were running drills this morning. The boys had a rough night last night, so I was throwing it at them a little hard." He hung his head. "Anyway, Wes slipped and the line ran right over him. Complete accident, but one of the cleats crunched his hand. Freak thing to happen in practice."
"I see."
The coach continued. "We knew when Wes stood up holding his wrist that it was serious. We did the x-rays on-site at our facility."
That explained why some of the procedures had been completed before I was paged.
"Well, Coach Howell, I think he's ready for surgery. I'll give you an update as soon as we're finished. Try not to worry. The good news is his life isn't at stake, and he's going to make a full recovery."
The coach turned toward me. "Football is his life. If that hand isn't better than it was before, you might as well kill him." His eyes blazed right through me, and I felt a chill go down my spine.
"Like I said, I'll let you know when he's out." I hurried out of the waiting room and headed to prep for surgery.
The nurses stopped whispering when I walked in the door. They were looking through the glass at the huge figure lying on the operating table. This entire scenario was absurd. It was a broken hand, for God's sake. This wasn't a triple-valve replacement. I sighed and started scrubbing in for the most important hand repair of my life.
Three
Wes
I could hear a beeping sound next to my right ear that was driving me fucking nuts. My eyes opened to a dim hospital room. I tried to sit forward, but nausea slammed into me and I sunk into the pillow. Fuck.
I looked at my right arm, which was propped up by some sort of contraption. There was a tube running into my veins and a blood pressure cuff on my left arm that kept turning on every fifteen minutes.
My mouth felt dry and I licked my lips, looking for water.
It all came back to me. The Dean. The nurse. The bottle of scotch I drank. I closed my eyes.
I never should have stepped on the practice field still drunk, but it wasn't like it was the first time I had done it. Half the team was still blitzed after last night.
I knew the snap was bad the instant I took it. I turned to try to recover it, lost my balance, and landed on my back. We were all so shit-faced no one had any balance. Canon came roaring over the line, and before he could stop, his cleats ran right over my hand. The instant I heard it, I knew what it was. A break.
The practice field was as quiet as a church. The trainers rushed me into the facility and splayed my hand on a table to x-ray it. As soon as they saw it, I was slung into a car and dropped off in the operating room at San Antonio Mission Hospital, being prepped for emergency surgery. Coach was with me the whole time.
Of all the fucking accidents to happen, why did it have to be my right hand?
There was a knock on the door and Coach walked in. He scratched the back of his head with his visor. "How you feelin', Wes?"
"Could you hand me that water?"
The pitcher was on a cart too far for me to reach. He poured a cup full and placed it in my left hand.
"Thanks." I took a sip, feeling the nausea subside.
"Surgery went well." He rocked back on his heels. "The doc's coming in to talk to you about the prognosis, and then our trainers will be in to come up with a plan. We'll figure this out. We're all behind you."
"Good." I nodded. "I want to get back on the field as soon as I can. I can throw with my left if I need to." I tried to laugh, but my head was fuzzy, and moving my right shoulder shot pain all the way down to my fingertips.
"We know you do." He tapped the footboard on the hospital bed. "Get some rest and we'll talk strategy tomorrow."
I finished off the water and reached for the remote. A broken hand wouldn't take that long to heal. I knew the drill. I'd take some extra meds. The trainers could pump me up with whatever I needed to make it through the games, we could make it to the Super Bowl, and I'd heal in the off-season. This was a standard injury. Nothing more.