Adam and Sophie sat together in the parents’ lounge. They
talked about all the what-ifs of Danny’s life. Lost in their con
versation, Sophie distractedly bit her nails to the quick.
Once the conversation wound down and they had run out of
things to say, Adam stood up.
“Soph, I have to go. I’m sorry, but I can’t keep asking other
teachers to fill in for me.”
“It’s okay. You go. I’m going to call Kate. I’ll walk out with
you.”
At the hospital entrance, Adam gave Sophie a long, deep
hug, then jogged off in the direction of his car. Sophie stayed
outside, taking a moment to breathe in the refreshing cold air.
She went back into the lobby to call Kate. In tears, she told
Kate about the eye exam. The more she talked, the harder she
cried. Little kids looked at her with curiosity. Mothers looked at
her with concern. Sophie retreated into a corner of the lobby.
While talking with Kate, her phone buzzed. She ignored it.
“Sophie. Listen to me,” Kate said. “You told me yourself that
Kim said there’s plenty of time for improvement. You can’t give
up hope. It’s way too soon to know how this will turn out.”
“Kate, this is horrible. First, he gets sick and needs to go back
on the ventilator. Now this. The doctors talk like it’s business
as usual, but it’s my kid they’re talking about. To them, he’s just
another preemie, but to me, he’s my son. My only child, who I
love more than life itself.” Her phone buzzed again. “I’ve read
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about all the complications preemies can have. So far, he’s bat
ting a thousand. When will this ever end?”
“I’m coming down.”
“You don’t need to do that. There’s nothing you can do
anyway.”
“I can be there for you. I’ll take a long weekend. I’ll call you
when I know the train schedule. It’ll be Friday sometime.”
Sophie’s phone dinged with a voicemail. “Hold on, let me
see who this is.” She saw two missed texts from Adam. “Okay.
Thanks, Kate. I gotta go. Adam’s trying to reach me.”
She hung up and quickly checked her voicemail.
Adam was in the Metro Emergency Room.
Shit, what now?
Sophie jogged to the ER. Adam sat on a gurney, holding an
ice pack to his forehead. His face was scraped up, and the dark
purple beginning of what was bound to become a black eye had
started to show. Grateful to see him, she rushed over and hugged
him. He smiled, revealing a broken tooth.
“Oh my God, what happened?”
He told her the story. He had turned down a side street to cut
through to Second Avenue, where his car was parked. Caught
completely off guard, he was grabbed from behind. He was able
to break away and started to run.
“You couldn’t outrun him?”
“I could have, if the second guy hadn’t popped out from
behind a parked car. They knocked me to the ground,” he said,
grimacing as he gently touched his forehead. “Hence the goose
egg. They held my face down on the pavement, scraping it along
the gritty ice and giving me the chipped tooth.” Sophie winced
in sympathy. “Then they rolled me over, and one planted his
foot on my chest. He said if I didn’t back off, you’d be next.”
Adam pulled Sophie closer to him. “Then he pulled out a syringe
and drew up something from a blue-capped vial. I remember
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wondering what medication was in a blue vial. Strange what runs
through your mind at times like that. Anyhow, I watched him fill
a syringe. Then he plunged it into my chest.”
Adam stopped talking for a moment.
“Everything went in and out of focus, then the sidewalk
started spinning. I don’t remember anything after that. I don’t
know how I even got here. I’m still groggy.”
“We’re going to the police right now,” Sophie said, helping
him off the gurney and holding on to him as he steadied himself.
She found the nurse to sign discharge papers, and they left.
At the police station, Adam gave his statement. The police
were perfectly nice, but not very hopeful that they would catch
the two guys who had done this without a better description. The
couple then returned to the emergency room to ask if they would
test Adam’s blood to identify the drug injected into him.
Sophie took Adam home and got him settled on the couch.
With Blu cuddled up next to him, he instantly fell asleep.
She returned to the hospital emergency department to see if
they’d found the drug in Adam’s system yet.
“Yes, Mrs. Young. He had benzos in his system.”
“Benzos?”
“Yes. Sedatives that knocked your husband out while also
giving him amnesia. But he’s lucky. He recovered very quickly.”
“Thanks,” Sophie said as she left the hospital.
She went home to see how Adam was doing. He was still on the
couch but awake. He and Blu were playing tug-of-war with a
chew toy. She lifted his feet up so she could sit down at the end
of the couch, then lowered his feet into her lap.
“Take a look at this.” She pulled out her phone. She showed
Adam the picture of the edited page of her chart and explained
what she’d seen in both versions of her medical record. “Do you
remember seeing that when you looked through my chart?”
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Adam thought. “My head’s a little fuzzy right now, Soph, but
I don’t remember seeing it.”
“Me neither. I’m sure it wasn’t there. He must have added it.
Any change on an electronic record automatically has the date
and time of entry recorded. He added that information on the
day of my discharge. He falsified my medical record.”
