Lie Still
Chapter OneHenry Rojelio, Day One
All she said was, "Doctor, he's turning blue." She spoke the words softly, quickly into my ear. I turned to look, expecting a grin. All I got, though, was backside, hurrying away to the exam bay, like a game of tag.
I've relived it a million times. It wasn't a game, it was a play. A stage
whisper blurted by a vanishing actress. She knew her audience. She
told me the patient was cyanotic -- cyan-colored, like ice -- but the delivery had its own message: I may be new here, but I'm not panicked. I've done this before; I'll do it again. On TV she would have stood up straight
and tall in the center of the ER and ceremonially announced just short
of a shout, "Doctor! The patient is acro-cyanotic. Come stat!" Writers
love the word stat. Clinicians only use it when they're pissed off. Stat is Latin for "hurry the fuck up."
Anyway, that's how it started. Henry, Day One.
She got exa ... read full excerpt from Lie Still ebook