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Collin was late. We were supposed to meet with our wedding planner to discuss possible venues. Collin had his record expunged and was starting to turn his life around; he recently graduated from college and was starting his career as the CEO of Fairyland; I was a nurse at Benioff Children’s Hospital.
I tried calling Collin and texting him to no avail. It also wasn’t like him to not answer my call, or at least text me back. After I called the wedding planner to change our appointment, and thanking her profusely for letting me change, I called the one person who would know where Collin was; Miles.
The phone rang and rang. Miles always answered his phone, regardless of what he was doing. The man loved to talk. I tried leaving a voicemail when the caller ID for Highland Hospital patched through my phone.
“Hello?”
“Oh Riley, thank god! Where are you?”
“Ashley, what’s wrong? Are you ok? Are Sean and Miles ok? Where’s Collin?” I asked, doing my best to calm her down and get as much information as I could.
She whimpered before she spoke. “You haven’t seen the news. There was a police shootout with a gang not far from where Collin and Sean went for their bro date. They don’t know how it happened, but they were caught in the crossfire. Collin was hit; he was hit saving my baby.”
I fell to the floor and tried to catch my breath. Collin could be dying or dead and I wouldn’t have gotten the chance to say goodbye. Taking a breath and going into nurse mode, I asked as many questions as I could. “Are they alive? Who’s working on them? Do they think there’s paralysis?”
“Calm down you’re lucky I know what half that shit means. Miles and Sean are at Benioff getting his arm set. Collin is in surgery. He took one to the back and one to the knee. Doc thinks he may be paralysed. Get here, Riley. Get here now,”
I hung up and called an Uber. I may have asked the driver to break the sound barrier and a few traffic laws, but I had to get there. I had to get to Highland as soon as possible. I wasn’t about to let the love of my life die alone and cold on a table.
I finally made it to the surgical waiting room where I found Ashley, Miles, and Sean. Sean was seated between his parents and sporting a lime green cast on his left arm. His hair was braided in little box braids to match Collin’s former style; Collin now opted to wear his hair in cornrows but was experimenting with an afro when he wanted to give his scalp a break.
“Riley!” Sean cried when he saw me, hopping out of his chair and running to me.
“Hey, buddy!” I said, catching him when he flung himself at me. He nuzzled my neck and immediately started crying.
“Sean, what’s wrong? Does your arm hurt?” I asked, sitting on the floor at Ashley’s feet and cradling him like a baby.
He shook his head. “No. But it’s my fault. This is my fault. If we didn’t go to the park, Collin wouldn’t be dying,” he wailed.
I held him close and rocked him. “Oh baby, no. None of this is your fault. You and Collin were out having your weekly afternoon together; how were either of you supposed to know this would happen? Everything will be ok. It may take Collin a long time to heal, and we may need to have a new normal depending on what the doctor says, but he’ll still be there for you like he is now. We both will be. And don’t you think about the worst, we don’t think about that until we know what’s going on. The waiting sucks but it’s all we can do right now.”
Sean cuddled closer into me and cried until he fell asleep. I wrapped him in the sweater I brought belonging to Collin and handed him off to Miles, sitting in the chair opposite of Ashley while we waited to find out if Collin made it through surgery.
Minutes ticked by like hours. Hours counted on like days. I was finally in the position that my patients’ families were in when their children in the hospital. The waiting literally is the hardest part. It had been eleven hours since I had arrived and Highland and no one had come to update us about Collin. Ashely decided she would go ask for an update, but was stopped at the door by Collin’s surgeon, Dr. Hutson.
Dr. Hutson pulled a chair from the other side of the room and sat in front of the four of us. He checked the time on his Apple watch before holding his hand out to shake each of ours. He had obviously changed out of his scrubs, but his shoes still had remnants of Collins blood on the toes and laces.
“I’m sorry it took so long to come update you all. Collin’s surgery was more complex than we thought it would be. He was shot in the midback and the bullet remained lodged inside him. We found it lodged in his rib. It tore through his left lung. This caused it to collapse and his chest to fill with blood. It also nicked his L3 and L4 vertebrae, causing his spinal cord to swell. Swelling is normal in a traumatic injury, and unfortunately we won’t know the extent of the damage until the swelling goes down and he’s conscious enough to tell us what he’s feeling,”
“What about his knee? He was shot in the knee too, Doc.” Miles questioned, holding Ashley’s hand for comfort.
“We couldn’t operate on his knee this time. He wasn’t strong enough to withstand two surgeries. We did an x-ray and there is no structural damage done to the knee; the bullet was a through and through. It was cleaned and packed. Once he recovers a little bit, the orthopedic surgeon will go in and repair the muscle and check again for structural damage,”
“How is his oxygen saturation? What about his Babinski reflex?”
Dr. Hutson looked at me and smiled, “Doctor?”
I shook my head, “ICU Nurse at Benioff,”
“His reflexes are weak, but to be expected. He’s not currently breathing on his own. He’s intubated and will be kept intubated for a few days until his lung heals. He’s in the ICU now and I can allow one visitor for a brief moment tonight. You can come back for visiting hours tomorrow,”
I stood with the doctor and we walked to the ICU. I pulled my red hair into a top knot and followed him to a room at the end of the hall. We stopped at the sink to the left of the door and washed our hands before entering the room.
I gasped when I saw Collin. His normally large body seemed swallowed amongst the tubes and machines currently keeping him alive. The endotracheal tube in his throat kept him breathing; the central line on the right side of his neck replenished the blood he lost. The c-collar around his neck kept his spine straight to heal. Multiple lines fed into his left arm, providing fluid and nutrients while he slept. His chest was wrapped in bandages; lightly covered in a thin blanket. His left knee was wrapped in gauze and resting on a pillow.
I sat in the chair next to the bed and held Collin’s hand. His normally warm sepia skin seemed to have lost its shine; his nailbeds and palms showing how truly pale and unwell he was. My alabaster freckled skin still contrasted against his; and brought a sense of normalcy to the situation.
“Quite the day you’ve had, mister,” I whispered, chuckling as I kissed his fingers. “I feel like I haven’t spoken to you in years, but it’s only been hours. Jesus Christ, Collin. What the hell is happening to our neighbourhood?!”
“Sean was so upset when I got here; he thinks it’s his fault you’re like this. I told him it wasn’t, that there’s no way that you could blame him. The whole family is out in the waiting room. Your mom is on her way back from LA; she’ll be here as soon as she can.”
I took a breath and rested my head gently on the right side of his chest, being mindful of his surgical wounds. “If you don’t feel strong enough, if you don’t think you can survive this, I need to thank you, Collin. I need to thank you for sticking by me; for not only being my friend but being my love; my confidant. Thank you for letting me be weird, for encouraging me to be weird. I love you so much. I told you that I’d be with you until the end of the line, and if this is it, then I’m here. But please, don’t leave me. Give us another seventy years, please Collin. Please don’t say goodbye,”
Collin’s chest went rigid and the heart rate monitor let out a shrill cry. I knew that sound like I knew my own voice; that was the sound of a flatline. His heart stopped. Collin was dying; he was leaving me. I jumped back as the nurses hit the CODE BLUE button above the bed. The team worked like a machine; starting compressions and providing oxygen. A nurse in purple scrubs led me outside the room and held me as I screamed for Collin; I cried for him to survive.
Charge to 300. CLEAR!
It’s been seven months since Collin was shot. Seven months since he flatlined in the hospital. The incident had been investigated, and he was shot by two Oakland PD bullets. The force never properly secured the scene, and never evacuated the area. He received a hefty settlement from the PD and the City of Oakland; enough to keep him comfortable for the rest of his days.
He was recovering extremely well. After his stint in the hospital, he’s been living in a rehab facility. He needed to learn how to navigate life in a wheelchair for the next while. His spine was healing, but injuries to the spinal cord take a long time to heal.
Collin was being released from the facility today. He was finally ready to come home; to live his new normal. Miles, Ashley, and Sean were with him already, helping to pack up his room and to lead us home.
I stepped through the door of the facility and signed in on the visitor’s log.
“Hey Riley! Big day today. Collin finally gets to go home,” the clerk at the desk smiled.
“I know! I can’t wait to have him home; to sleep in our bed together. It’s been so lonely.”
She nodded, “He’s down in the therapy room having one more session with Andrea. She asked to have you meet them there,”
I thanked her and headed down the hall. Stepping into the room, I saw Collin and his therapist at the other end, working on leg exercises. Collin had shaved but was sporting a new hairstyle. His braids were out, and his hair was brushed back into a small bun at the base of his neck. He looked so happy; so healthy.
“Well this is a look I can get behind,” I called, walking closer to the pair.
Collin turned his chair to face me, a huge grin on his face. “You like it?”
I nodded. “I do. I like it a lot.”
“Good. Stay right there, I’ve got something to show you,”
I stopped and watched him. Collin locked the wheels of his chair and moved the footrests to the side. Looking me square in the eye, he stood and proceeded to walk to me. Steadying himself, he stood straight and confidently closed the distance between us.
I gasped and waited for him. Tears filled my eyes and pride filled my heart. He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me into his chest. I started sobbing into his chest.
“Surprise!” Collin laughed and started rocking me back and forth. “I still feel like a newborn giraffe, but I don’t need the chair anymore.”
“I’m so proud of you, baby!” I kissed him passionately, relishing the feel of his lips on mine.
He kissed my forehead. “You said you’re with me till the end of the line. Well, I just got to the end of the line.”
“Are you breaking up with me? Bro, we’re getting married in a month!”
Collin let out a hearty laugh. “No, fool. I just made it to the end of the line of my rehab. You wanna start another line with me? Maybe make the end seventy or eighty years from now?”
“I’d love nothing more, Hoskins. Now, can we go home? You need to stop smelling so clinical, and we’ve got seven months of bedtime to make up for,” I smirked, pinching his ass.
“As long as you forget about wearing clothes for the rest of the day; and you remember your place,” Collin whispered, nipping my ear.
“Yes, Sir!”
I held his hand as we walked out of the therapy room, heading down the hall to the car.
“Hey, I love you,”
He smiled and kissed my head. “I love you too. Let’s go home.”