Deserves to Die by Lisa Jackson Page B

woman a smile. “Tell me, how do you feel? Rate your pain.” She indicated the chart that hung on the wall that showed caricatures of faces in varying expressions of discomfort.
    “ ’Bout an eight, maybe a nine, I’d say,” the patient said. “And it doesn’t just hurt in my leg, but all over.” Frowning a little, she added, “I think I might be coming down with something. The flu’s going around this year, you know. And my neighbor Elsa, she caught it. Nasty stuff.”
    “Hmm. Well, we can’t have that,” Amy said. “Let me check your vitals again.”
    The patient’s chin suddenly thrust out. “I need to see Doctor Lambert.”
    “She didn’t do your surgery.” Amy checked Mrs. Gehrig’s temperature, blood pressure, and pulse again, noting that everything was in the normal range, right where it should be. “Dr. Bellingham says you can go home tomorrow.”
    “Oh, I don’t think so. I’d feel a lot better if Dr. Lambert had a look at me.” Mrs. Gehrig was nodding in her bed as if agreeing with herself. Her thin hands, with veins visible, plucked at the edge of the sheet covering her.
    “I’ll let her know,” Amy promised, “and mark it on your char—”
    “Room two-o-six STAT!” Polly, another floor nurse, poked her head into the room as she passed the open doorway just as Amy heard the Code Blue announcement from the speakers in the hallway.
    “What?” Mrs. Gehrig was confused.
    Amy was already reversing toward the door. “I’ll be back.”
    “No, please—” Mrs. Gehrig’s face folded on itself in disappointment. “Wait! Where are you going? I need—” The rest of her request was cut off as Amy rushed toward the room a few doors down.
    “Mr. Donnerly’s coding!” Polly called to her as they entered 206.
    Already, the room was bustling with staff members. The patient had recently had heart surgery and had been improving enough to be released from ICU to his private room. One nurse was handling his chest compressions while another had a bag valve mask in place over the patient’s mouth and nose. A doctor was giving orders as the defibrillator cart was rolled quickly inside and another locking cart with narrow drawers for medications followed. Amy stood at the ready should she be required to administer the epinephrine or whatever other drug the doc ordered.
    “How long?” the doctor asked.
    “Coded under two minutes ago,” a floor nurse who had been attending Benson Donnerly said as the rest of the team continued working.
    “Pulse?” the doctor asked and another nurse pressed against the patient’s neck, checking the patient’s carotid artery.
    “No pulse.”
    “Code Blue!” another page called over the loudspeaker, adding to the tension.
    We’re here already, Amy thought, refusing to be distracted in case she was needed.
    “Code Blue! Room two-twenty!”
    “What?” The doctor turned his head.
    “Has to be wrong,” Polly said, surprised.
    “Double-check,” he said, nodding at Amy, who quickly slipped out of the room and caught up to two nurses headed rapidly down the hallway.
    “Let’s go,” Reba, a tall RN with a single braid falling down her back said to Amy. She was hurrying, the braid swinging side to side as she tried to keep up with Brad King, a male nurse with a trimmed beard and long, athletic stride.
    Avoiding an orderly heading in the opposite direction, Amy hurried to fall into step with Reba. “Wait,” she said, trying and failing to keep up. “The patient who’s coding is in two-o-six.” She hooked her thumb in the direction of Mr. Donnerly’s room.
    “Yesterday’s news,” Brad said over his shoulder as he broke into a jog and Reba followed suit. “We’ve got another patient coding.”
    Two cardiac arrests on the same floor at the same time? It happened, of course, but very infrequently. “But—Hold up.” Amy was processing what the senior nurse had said. “Two-twenty?” she repeated, hoping she’d misunderstood. “Isn’t that the