May I: Rockabye

Ria Torres walked into the computer lab, where her colleague, Eli Loker, had been piecing together some of the tape, and going through the video feed from the mall. “Hey, has Lightman come in this morning?”

“No.” He answered in an almost, automatic tone without looking back. With a few clicks of the keyboard, he perked up.

“Is that the video feed of the mall?” She looked up at the paused video on the screen.

“Yeah. I got most of it put together, but had to stop early with the bad rainstorm last night.” His eyes flickered up to hers, as he peered back and then showed her the feed. “I’ll call Lightman. He’s going to want to see this.”

The phone began ringing, and Torres had an inquiring look on her expression. “What do you think it meant when Foster showed up yesterday?”

“It probably meant that Foster is thinking one thing—and Lightman another. There isn’t a thing that he wouldn’t do—and my guess is Foster has got him worried.” He trailed off, upon hearing a click as someone picked up. “Hey it’s Loker. I was able to put together the tape, but you’re going to want to see this.”

---

When he walked back into the room, Gillian was rocking Sophie in the chair. As she looked up, she had a twinkle in her eye, but said nothing. Everything he needed to see was all in her expression. She had let her guard down. “That was Loker. He put together the feed from the mall.”

“Go.” She put her hand on his shoulder as he drew closer. “I’ll call you when the doctor comes in, or has any new information.”

His lips turned up at the corners, as he watched her rock Sophie; dressed in a blue

gown—wires tucked underneath and an IV wire that was hooked into her arm, after many attempts to get it in--they were both exhausted with being up all night, and it showed.

“Are you sure you’re going to be alright here, being alone? You know the last time—” He was half-serious, while his tone held a teasing manner as he stood near the frame of the door.

She leaned forward a little in the rocking chair. “Go. We’ll still be here when you get back.” He nodded back in satisfaction, then left. When he was out of earshot, she began to run her fingers through her hair. Then a few minutes later, she was talking to her. “I’m sorry I left you.” And that’s all she could get out, as a tear trailed down her cheek. She wiped away the tear with her hand, and leaned back in the chair when she heard the door creak open.

When she opened her eyes, one of the nurses that had helped take care of Sophie came in.  She had red and gold highlighted hair; green sparkling eyes and a voice of an angel. Her name was Angelica, a very fitting name. “Hi. I thought I would come in and see how everyone was doing.” when in fact, she was not here, just to look over Sophie’s vitals—but to make sure that she was okay as well. “Have you been sitting in that chair all night?”

“Most of it.” Gillian confessed, beginning to rock automatically again. She watched her quickly take Sophie’s vitals, in silence.

“Have you ever heard your daughter’s heartbeat?”  She offered, holding the stethoscope in her hand.

It was an odd question, and she wondered what Angelica was aiming at. “No, I haven’t”

“Would you like to listen?”

“I would like that.” The words were out of her mouth before Gillian realized it. The desire to know that her daughter was still alive, despite all the wires and sleep that had overcome her daughter’s tired body.

Freeing her hand, she took the stethoscope. It had been many years since she had held a stethoscope. The one that Gillian had gotten from her parents after graduating was in one of those shadow boxes, hanging over the couch, downstairs.

Listening carefully to her daughter’s breathing, she heard the beat of her daughter’s heart. It was hard to hear the heart murmur that the doctor had talked about: still, the rhythmic beat brought a smile to her face. After she listened for a few minutes, Gillian handed the stethoscope back to Angelica.

Placing it back over her neck, Angelica sat down beside her with a sigh. “Dr. Jacobzi is an amazing doctor. I’ve worked with him for the past five years—and when my daughter was three: he operated on her without any hesitation, and ended up saving her life. I haven’t seen a man more willing to save a life than he does.”

Just then there was a knock on the door, a middle aged man with blue-grey eyes, wearing a blue dress shirt and black pants, walked in. Dr. Jacobzi. “How are we doing today?”

Angelica looked back at him with a knowing smirk. “She’s been sitting in that chair, pretty much all night.”

“Ah.” He remarked, washing his hands in the sink. “Angelica—alert the media that we have a sitter.” Dr. Jacobzi had a rather large grin on his face as he dried his hands off. He pulled a chair up in front of Gillian, and cleared his throat. “Your daughter has what’s called Ventricular Septal Defect—“

“A hole in her heart?”

He nodded. “Correct. A Septal Defect is a hole between her right and left chambers in her heart. Sophie is also experiencing the early signs of Acute Congestive Heart Failure. In addition to the diuretic that we have her on—I would also like to add in a low dose of Digoxin, which stabilizes the rate and rythmn of her heart.”

Gillian blinked. It felt like she was in medical school all over again. Except this time she wasn’t completely aware of all the details, and her daughter was the patient. “What are the side effects?”

“Lower stomach pain, fatigue, drowsiness and confusion and headache—which we’ll be monitoring her for while she’s here. I understand you just took parental guardianship of Sophie this week, and so this is probably all new to you on a whole other level. I checked with all of Sophie’s doctors and despite all the checkups, Sophie never seemed to show signs of heart problems.”

“Until last night.”

Dr. Jacobzi nodded again, opening the chart and scribbling instructions down. “I believe this has been going on for quite some time.” He looked up, and clarified. “Between the last time she went in and now. I don’t think it was any coincidence that waited until now to be addressed.” And then he went back to writing.  When Angelica put a hand on her shoulder, Gillian nearly jumped—and Dr. Jacobzi continued. “After the Digoxin is administered, we’ll want to monitor Sophie over the next day or so. If she stabilizes fully, we might find we’ll be able control this with medicine.”

 “And if she doesn’t. What do we do then?” Gillian felt her stomach knot, as she looked down at Sophie.

“Well, we have a procedure called: transcatheter device occlusion that would allow me and try to close up the hole, without putting her through any kind of surgery. We would do the procedure in our cardiac lab, under general anesthesia. And the last would be surgery where I would have to actually go in and close the hole manually.” He stood. “Let’s see how the medicine does first, and we’ll go from there.” He gave her a wink, then turned towards Angelica and gave her instructions to give Sophie the Digoxin. “If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask them.”

Gillian nodded, her chest heaving. She shook his hand, and left her alone. She stood with Sophie, and placed her carefully back in her bed.

“It’s a lot to process—I know.” Angelica sympathized, drawing the medicine. 

Wiping away a tear, Gillian carefully walked towards the door. “I think I’m going to take a walk.” She called over her shoulder, before stepping out of the room.