Paul didn’t like this aspect of his job. He knew he served a purpose in life, something he had always felt he needed to feel, but he could in way say he ever grew callous to the effects of seeing a child struggling for life and knowing damn well it was going to lose the fight.
He was an auto pilot, carrying out tasks he did so routinely that they had become second nature. His mind on the other hand was filled with frantic dissonance, choruses of words alerting him to the horrendous nature of the situation he chose to put himself in day in day out. He often battled these demons that tried to highlight only the negative in his life, but he never let them prevent him from doing his job. He didn’t care if they were telling him that underneath the façade he knew the kid was going to die, he was going to try and save it anyway if it was the last thing he did.
The body lying on the gurney had come from the orphanage, it was a body no one wanted. The demons were getting louder again.
“What’s his name?” Paul called out to his partner.
She dropped her eyes to the information that had been provided by the woman who had been on site when they arrived. She opened her mouth to tell him as the vehicle hit a pot hole and jolted violently, dislodging the mask that was providing the kid with oxygen. His partner rushed to attend to it.
In the hospital, less than a mile away, Michelle had already been informed of the possibility that she would be performing surgery within the next hour. She didn’t fret, she was confident in what she did. She paced out of anticipation, an odd excitement she always felt before it was time to pull on the gloves.
Paul and his partner hurried the gurney through the open doors of the emergency department where staff were ready to take over. They watched as a group of doctors and nurses burst through into the next hallway, the doors swung back and closed, the kid now out of sight and never to be seen again by either of them.
“It aint right.” He mumbled.
“What’s that?” his partner asked.
He could feel his eyes glazing over but knew they wouldn’t let a tear slip, he had had to learn to control this reaction over time, knowing that no one would want to be partnered with someone who couldn’t handle the harsh reality of the job.
His partner didn’t question the past tense he used, they both knew the little body wasn’t coming back out.
“That kid aint even a person yet” he said.
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