The Great Escape: Need

“Thanks for coming over.”  Kevin offered, closing the door behind them.  “I’m sure you have better things to do besides making house calls.”

“What’s going on exactly?”

He gave a relentless sigh. “Jackie told me that you and Claudia Joy helped her earlier.”

“We did.”

“Jackie’s fever has gone up, but she refuses to go to the doctor. I thought you might be able to talk some sense into her.”

As they walked up the stairs, I could hear everything as I leaned up against the bed. Having the door open definitely had its perks. Of course I was too stubborn to admit how sick I really was, but I knew that something was up when my husband answered my phone in the other room.

“How high did you say her temperature was?”

“102.1. I just took it again just a few minutes ago—it hasn’t lowered since about one.”

“Okay, I’ll see what I can do. Give us a minute?”

“Sure.”

I could hear the reluctance in Kevin’s voice, among the soft steps of Denise as she appeared at the door.

“Denise.”

“Kevin told me you won’t go to the hospital? “ Nodding, I adjusted my pillow behind me. She closed the door so that we could have a little privacy, and sat next to me on the bed. “Why?”

“I’ve never had a need to go to the hospital, except for checkups and my drug habit.”

“If you’re afraid that he’s going to find out, why not tell him?"

I pursed my lips together. “It’s like remembering my failures all over again.”

“You know, Frank was a lot like Kevin was. Always working and never home. I remember feeling really lonely—especially when Frank was deployed. Working at the hospital always made it a little better, but then I met a really nice guy and one thing led to another—the point of the story is that Frank forgave me for what I did, and things changed between us.”

“I’m glad that everything worked out between the two of you, but Kevin and I—we’ve always been a little distant.” I let my eyes close shut for a moment. “We’ve never had that spark that other couples had, but I married him anyway because I loved him.”

“I’ve dealt with a lot of patients: their spouses and partners as a nurse, and trust me when I say that your husband is looking a little bit terrified.”

 “Mm…”

“He also said that you passed out, which means that you got worse after Claudia Joy left.”

I opened my eyes to see her watching me closely. “I started feeling really dizzy after I took a bath.”

“Jackie, have you taken anything or had anything to drink since I left?”

It was a simple answer. “No.” Her fingers were instantly at my wrist again, taking my pulse.

“Dehydration could be causing your headache, and your headache could be causing your sensitivity to light. Because your fever is climbing and you can’t keep anything down—in addition to not taking anything in—it’s causing your body to become more and more dehydrated.”

“I don’t feel like drinking anything.”

“Tell you what. . . I have to go to work in a couple of hours. If you can’t keep something down before then to get that fever down, then you can come with me and we’ll hook you up to a nice IV pump.”

“Fine.”

“I’ll be right back with some Tylenol.” I watched as Denise walked out of the room and kind of spaced off, until I heard her walking up the stairs again. She had some crackers and a glass of water in her hand as she placed the crackers and pill in my hand.

I slowly nibbled on some crackers, and she handed me the pill. My hand was shaking slightly as I put it in my mouth and took a few sips of water—to which she encouraged me to drink a little more. When I had drained about half of the water, I placed it back on the nightstand.

Within a few minutes, I began to space off again. We made some small-talk, while I drained the rest of my water. I was thirstier than I realized, and was able to keep that down and about a third of the package of crackers.

We talked about many things, including how we first met. Pretty soon we had been sitting there for a half an hour. Slowly, I was starting to feel a little better and Denise announced that my temperature had gone down, but just barely. I was down to an even 102 degrees. After that I slowly drifted off for the next half hour.

Denise had suggested a wet washcloth to help push the fever down even further. Now after an hour, I was down to 101.8. When she shook me awake to take my temperature and to take in more fluids, I drained the whole glass this time. At the same time, a part of me felt relieved that I was keeping everything down, while the rest of me felt exhausted.

I went back to sleep right after that, only waking when Denise finally switched places with Kevin.

“It’s probably going to be awhile before her fever breaks, but the good thing is that it’s going down. She should probably see a doctor in the morning—regardless if her fever goes up again. But if her symptoms worsen in any way, bring her in right away.”

“So you’re saying Jackie will be alright being home . . .”

“The most worrisome thing was that her temperature was rising significantly fast. As long as it stays down; her symptoms don’t worsen or linger—and she’s able to keep down fluids—as well as keep down food that her body can digest and adequate rest, her body should be able to heal.”

By the way that she was looking at me, I knew that was going to be harder than it looked. Kevin knew it too, because he was exactly the same way. Often times he would be down in his office or in bed doing paperwork that he had brought home with him.

“What about the meeting?” I asked, trying to gather my thoughts before she left the room.

“We’ll take it one day at a time and see how you’re doing after a full night’s rest. Until then, it’s really important that you take it easy, mostly so you don’t end up relapsing or making the sickness worse.” She looked at her watch reluctantly. “I should really get going. Call me if anything changes?” With a few nods from both me and Kevin, she left.