Jacinta put the leg up on her side, completely knowing he’d never tell her to stop. “Drake, have you ever suffered from vertigo before? Is this a regular thing?”
“No.”
I put up his other knee while she spoke to him about absolute nothings, probably just to keep him awake and conscious. Had he bumped his head? What the hell happened? My heart fluttered, and my head went light and fuzzy. My breath whistled in my ears. He has to be okay. He just passed out. It does happen. It happens to people all the time.
When the paramedics arrived, they asked all the questions I had floating through my mind.
A burly, short medic with very hairy forearms and faded tattoos underneath took Drake’s pulse. “Hey, bro, you had a fall? Did you hit your head?”
“I don’t kn…”
Jacinta answered, “Yes. On the table.”
Jason piped up. “Then again on the floor when he fell out of his chair.”
It drove me mad that Jay was involved on any level with this kind of thing. It was his fault we were here. Not only in this room but dealing with a man who’s blood pressure or anxiety or whatever had gotten so out of control that a grown, healthy specimen of a human tumbled over in his own goddamn chair. I wanted to tell Jason to shut the fuck up. I wanted to shove a fucking ball gag in his mouth.
I didn’t care if he still had lingering affection for Drake. I didn’t care if he had any ounce of regret. I’d never forgive him for doing this to Drake. Never.
“I’m just going to slide my stethoscope under your shirt,” Burly Paramedic said. “It’s gonna be cold.”
Drake awakened at the touch of the metal. “It’s LA and that thing is cold? You must keep it in a freezer.”
Burly Paramedic laughed but concentrated then on what he heard in Drake’s chest. He took all other vitals then he shined a penlight, looking in Drake’s eyes, presumably for signs of concussion. “One last question for you, brother. Have you ever fainted before?”
“No man. Never.”
“All right, usually when someone faints, I just slap them across the chops and they come to.”
Jacinta chimed in, trying to lighten the mood. “Really? I’d love your job. I’d just go around pretending people looked faint all day.”
“Ha. Tell me about. Unfortunately, I’m kidding. But what is true is that usually people who faint come to a lot faster than you are, my friend.”
I feared the worst. “Do you think he has a concussion?”
“It’s hard to say. My basic check says no but… it’s just…” Suddenly he seemed serious and turned to Drake again, putting a hand on Drake’s shoulder. “You need to just get some tests done, all right. Rule out anything serious. But you ain’t walking out of here. So it’s a stretcher or a chair. What’s it gonna be?”
Drake hadn’t managedmuch communication apart from non-verbal humiliation at being wheeled out of RI in a chair. He shouldn’t have been ashamed, but I had to admit I felt all eyes on me, too, as I walked by his side. It was impossible for people not to stare and question.
It was a quiet ride in the ambulance. They didn’t put the lights or horns on or anything, and Drake didn’t talk. Was he thinking about all of this? Was he worried? Or was he still simply out of it? I didn’t want to press him.
Everything at the hospital felt routine to me. I’d been in a low-level car accident when I first started driving, and Peaches ran us over a curb and into a tree. I still remembered how the ER worked from that. And yet, this was so different on many levels. For starters, Peaches and I waited impatiently, knowing we were totally fine. Drake, on the other hand, didn’t seem that much more alert. He was still limp. He hadn’t spoken much.
And one other thing that was strange and different from my car accident incident… the doctor actually came to us quickly. And anyone who’d been to an emergency room for a minor injury knew that didn’t happen.
A doctor in her early fifties came in with a clipboard. “Well, hello there, Mr. Jackson. And you are…?”
“Maeve. I’m Drake’s girlfriend.”
She went to Drake’s side but didn’t examine him. She didn’t check him over like she was supposed to. Like I’d expected her to. “Mr. Jackson, we’re going to need to run some blood tests. It’s important we rule out any serious underlying health conditions, okay? I’ll have someone come in here so you don’t need to make your way down the hall.”
“Wait,” I interrupted. “I thought we were here for a concussion. Shouldn’t you be doing scans?”
She turned to me. “We’ll do those, too. But we need to get some bloods going first, and when I see those results, we’ll order the scans.”
I shook my head. “What could be more serious than a concussion? How long will the bloods take?”
She kept a steady face. Doctors always did. “I should have the complete blood count in an hour or so. We’re looking for hypoglycemia. Anemia. Myelodysplastic syndromes.” The doctor turned back to Drake. “We need to get to the bottom of this. If it was an everyday fainting incident, you should be feeling better by now. It could be nothing, but I’m not sending you home like this.”