Rescue Heat (12 page)

Just before end of shift, Brigid appeared at his side.

“Do you want to go for a drink?” she asked.

Matt smiled his agreement. “Where?”

Brigid named the bar where they had run into each other, over a week earlier. “Neutral ground,” Matt remarked, wryly.

The irritated look that Brigid shot him, told him that she was not quite ready for humour.

Forty long minutes later Matt was sitting opposite Brigid as Australian rock music pumped through the crowded bar.

“Doesn’t anyone in this town pay attention to the school night rule? It is a Tuesday night,” Matt said.

Damn, when did he start sounding like a wowser? His sexual and emotional frustration must be affecting his brain.

“It’s a tourist town,” Brigid said. “The party goes on most nights.”

Matt let the silence hang between them, as he sat back in the booth and challenged her gaze with his own. If she wanted to talk about their kiss, she was going to have to be the one to broach the subject.

They had changed into their civvies but while they were both wearing jeans and t-shirts, Matt had to say that Brigid’s outfit was the more glamorous. His denim certainly didn’t hug his body so fiercely. A crimson top contrasted with her pale blue eyes and her unadorned but not unnoticed lips.

“Okay,” said Brigid. “Seeing as you’re going to make this difficult for me, I’ll be the grown up and apologize for the way I reacted to Sunday night’s kiss. Nothing you did should have led to me acting like a startled teenager.”

Brigid took a deep breath before continuing, “I was surprised but that isn’t an excuse.”

“Were you really surprised?” Matt asked, his question genuine.

Surely she couldn’t have been unaware of the attraction between them? God, he hoped he wasn’t the only one who felt it. The gentle pinking of her cheeks answered that question.

“Not surprised as much as being in denial,” Brigid replied. “Having a relationship with someone in my rescue crew really isn’t an option.”

Brigid’s honesty took Matt back and it took him a few seconds to regain himself enough to counter.

“It doesn’t change the fact I want you,” he said. “Since I’ve come to Australia, you’re the only woman I’ve wanted for more than a moment. Believe me I don’t go around kissing people I work with.”

Conversations like this made Matt realise how much he disliked talking about relationships and normally his conversations with women did not have so much painful honesty on both sides.

If beautiful, intelligent women whom he happened to actually like, were a bit thicker on the ground, he would be out of there. As it was, he had put his cards on the table. The rest was up to her.

“I get it,” Matt said. “Your personal mantra is to not screw the crew. But if you happen to change your mind, I can promise discretion.”

He was not asking for more than a fling but that line made him sound like he was for hire. He really did have to get better at seduction. Hell, it normally wasn’t so hard.

Trying to mitigate his accidental arrogance, Matt smiled across the table and took a final swig of his drink. He could see Brigid was miffed, probably rightly so.

“I’m the only female doctor in this area who is rescue certified. Having a fling, or as you so charmingly put it, screwing you, would put the respect I’ve earned at risk.”

Brigid got up, as if to leave. “As gorgeous as you are Matt, sex isn’t a big enough draw.” This time Matt was left watching, as Brigid walked away.

The next day, Matt had hardly swung his legs out of a four-wheel-drive, before he sensed the action. Bob, part of the ground maintenance crew, was moving at double the pace of his usual amble. Matt grabbed his backpack and started towards the helicopter hanger at a run.

These change-of-shift call-outs were the worst. Rather than authorize hours of overtime to the outgoing team, head office preferred to put on the incoming shift twenty minutes early, without any warning.

All this meant Matt’s arrival was greeted with exclamations of relief. Luckily, he was wearing his flight suit.

“What have we got?” he asked Brigid, who was loading medical bags. At least he didn’t have to worry about small talk.

“A seventeen-year-old patient at a rural hospital,” Brigid said. “She’s twenty-eight weeks pregnant and showing signs of early labour.”

“I’m guessing speed is of the essence,” Matt said, easily picking up his pre-flight routine.

Brigid gave him a rather weary smile. “When isn’t it? But in this case, absolutely. The doctor there is doing everything she can to stop the labour, but if those efforts don’t work, that baby needs to be born in a hospital with a well-equipped neo-natal intensive care unit. The hospital she’s currently in doesn’t even have a maternity ward.”

Despite their differences the day before, Matt and Brigid quickly fell into sync with a medication and equipment check.

Once the chopper reached flying height, Matt looked across at Brigid and asked, “Can you run through the stages of preventing labour? So far, dealing with the birthing process has been purely theoretical.”

Hearing Chris and Dave’s chortles in his ear, Matt said, “Okay, Okay. What I meant was that when women in the armed forces got pregnant, they generally got sent stateside. So my practical experience in medically assisting pregnancy and birth is limited.”

“Firstly,” Brigid said. “We’re going to want to keep her in the obstetric position, on her left side with her right thigh and knee raised. It’s always a slightly awkward position to get her in during flight but it is important. We’re also going to need to monitor the foetal heart tones and her contractions. We will keep her on a drip and the hospital should have already administered medication to delay the labour.”

Brigid smiled at Matt, in what he now knew was a practiced gesture to reassure, “Don’t worry, I doubt we’ll be delivering a baby mid-flight today. But I’d like to get our pregnant teenager in the care of a qualified obstetrician ASAP. They’ll need to make some decisions at Cairns Base once she arrives about whether to administer drugs to develop her baby’s lungs.”

Dave’s voice came through the headphones, alerting them to the imminent landing. Looking out the window at the threadbare sports field and the small town beyond, Matt wasn’t surprised that the local hospital lacked a maternity ward. He was amazed the town even had its own doctor. Through these kinds of hospital transfers, Matt had seen many North Queensland towns but this looked to be the smallest and most economically challenged.

When he voiced those thoughts to Brigid, she replied, “The doctors and hospital here service a few other communities. Go west of the coast and you start really having to travel for your healthcare.”

As the chopper touched down, Brigid and Matt jumped out. As usual with a hospital-to-hospital transfer, Dave and Chris stayed with the helicopter.

Fortunately, today Dave and Chris weren’t going to have to organize a refuel.

The hospital’s ambulance and ambos were waiting for Brigid and Matt and her friendly greeting told Matt this was not Brigid’s first time in Lidcombe.

“Matt, this is Sue and Reece,” Brigid said, as she introduced him to the two ambulance officers, who looked like a mother and son team, such were their bulky soft-edged similarities.

The hospital was a small one-storey building. It had, Brigid told him, ten staffed beds and a two-bed emergency room. They entered through the emergency room doors, into the busy organized chaos beyond. Reece and Sue led them to a harried looking female doctor in her fifties.

“Brigid, I’m glad you’re here,” said Dr Lehman. “I’ve got a freaked out seventeen-year-old showing definite signs of pre-term labour and I’ll be much happier when she’s in a hospital with some specialized equipment.”

Brigid turned to the doctor, “If she’s a bit stressed, you better give me her status now.”

“Uterine contractions occurring at a rate of one every nine minutes, and her cervical dilation is 3cm.”

“Does she have some family support?” Brigid asked.

Dr Louise Lehman’s face broke into a smile for the first time, “Having her boyfriend around reminded me of why I’m grateful I didn’t make an obstetrics career choice. Kids becoming parents is always a scary moment.”

With those ominous words, Dr Lehman led them down the hall to the patient. Walking into the hospital room, Matt felt instantly ancient, so young were the parents-to-be. The pregnant girl on the bed was frightened and tear-stained. Her boyfriend, sitting beside the bed, with his rat-tailed hair would have looked more at home in a skate park.

His attitude matched first impressions. “’Bout time you people got here, Kylie’s been having bad pains and the doctor here won’t give her any painkillers.”

The whiney note in the boy’s voice irked Matt, but Brigid ignored the complainer and went straight to her patient.

“Hey Kylie,” said Brigid. “I’m sorry to hear you aren’t feeling well. But the drug that Dr Lehman has already given you will be kicking in very soon. So hopefully those labour pains will disappear.”

As Brigid reassured the patient, Matt started collecting the files, readying them for transfer. He noted Kylie’s most recent obs and handed the page to Brigid.

Brigid nodded to the waiting ambos, and they brought in the hospital transfer trolley. Her voice gentled, “Ok Kylie, We’re going to take you to the helicopter. So you can help us by shifting over here onto the trolley.”

Matt turned to the boyfriend whom he presumed to be the baby’s father. “We’re taking Kylie to Cairns Base Hospital, so if you can give us a mobile or home number, I’ll get the hospital staff to call you on arrival.”

The young man was taken back by Matt’s overture and as he went to leave, he reached his hand out to Matt, “Take care of her.”

Matt took the moment to reward the courage it would have taken the teenager to reach out. “She and the baby really are in the best possible hands,” Matt said, as he shook the young man’s hand.

On the way to the helicopter Brigid spoke in quiet tones to the clearly afraid mother-to-be. After calling ahead to make sure the helicopter was ready to fly, Matt sat back and watched Brigid. She was patiently explaining the measures that would be taken in attempting to prevent early labour. Communication, Matt had long ago realised, was one of Brigid’s gifts as a doctor. She always took the time to explain what was happening and did not allow her patient to be excluded through her use of medical terminology.

In the past week, Matt could feel his emotions towards their patients begin to seep in. For so long, he had kept an emotional wall up. He had feared the horrors of the war would overwhelm him. Here in the one-to-one mode of treatment, individual stories began to creep into his consciousness.

Once in the helicopter, Matt and Brigid took longer than usual to get Kylie settled. The foetal monitor had to be looped gently around Kylie’s stomach and they found extra pillows to get her lying comfortably on her left side. Looking over at a bareheaded Brigid perched next to their patient, Matt told Dave to get their bird into the air.

Brigid listened intently to the rapid beat of the in-utero foetal heart. She was just able to hear the reassuring rhythm over the thundering noise of the helicopter. Despite the early signs of labour, the baby was not in distress. The mother-to-be, however, was not looking particularly relaxed or happy. Brigid couldn’t blame her. Too early a labour was always frightening. For a teenager giving birth for the first time, it must be terrifying.

She could also see Kylie giving dubious looks to Matt, as if his very size and presence made him a threat. This was something Brigid could understand; his maleness sometimes intimidated even her and she’d worked with some pretty ‘macho’ men in rescue. For a teenager unused to such a species of man, Matt must seem overwhelming.

To distract and calm Kylie, Brigid leaned forward as if to confide in her. “Matt here is a bachelor, so I think we can totally freak him out by talking about what that baby is doing in your stomach.” Brigid could see a reluctant smile tug at the corners of Kylie’s mouth, so she continued. “I really think he would prefer it, if instead of being pregnant, you were missing an arm. So, next time your baby kicks, I think we should get him to feel it.”

Under Brigid’s ‘it’s us against the world’ patter, Kylie was relaxing. She leaned back and stayed quiet for a few minutes, before nodding furiously at Brigid.

“Ok Matt, I think it’s time for you to measure the baby’s leg strength from his kicking,” said Brigid, winking at her co-worker.

Matt knew his role, so he hammed it up, putting out his hand as if he was going to put it into a viper’s pit. However, the smile of wonder upon his face as he felt the kick, was so glowing it was genuine. Brigid was momentarily dazzled by the look of joyful excitement in his eyes.

Through her own hand resting on Kylie’s arm, Brigid could feel the physical exhale of relaxation, as the teenager connected with the big man. “So a kick like that means you are, surely, having a little boy,” Matt said.

While Kylie was talking happily to Matt, Brigid ran her experienced gaze over the file and the observations they had recorded in-flight. The chatting she had done with Kylie was not just for amusement; keeping the pregnant teen calm was medically important. Luckily, Kylie’s contractions seemed to have almost halted.

Matt was doing an excellent job distracting Kylie. Brigid realised she had not even been surprised by how easily he took up the conversational reins with the girl; he was someone who could anticipate her needs. This unspoken communication was something Brigid had not experienced with any other co-worker, however eager or professional they had been.

Australian paramedics were among the best trained in the world and the airborne division was elite even in that group; but Matt was special.

Emergency pre-hospital medicine wasn’t as simple as stopping the patient from dying. It was about delivering the patient in the best possible condition and headspace for further treatment. Matt seemed to understand instinctively how he could assist Brigid’s chosen methods of treatment; even when that treatment included soothing an anxious teen mum-to-be, something a gung-ho paramedic might normally leave to a female doctor.