“You might want to give your morphine a little squeeze,” Winslow said.
Lucy hit the pump.
Winslow started at the bottom, peeling back a patch of black foam, and then unwinding the bandage around Lucy’s leg.
“You tell me if you start to feel sick,” Winslow said.
“I have a strong stomach…are those scabs?” Lucy asked.
“No,” Winslow said. “You have to have skin to make scabs.”
For the most part, her foot was intact, though when she wiggled her toes she could see three of the five metatarsals twitching.
It was above the ankle that the real damage began.
Portions of her tibia were exposed, along with half of her patella.
She’d seen raw muscle on many occasions, but always after dragging someone at eighty miles per hour for five miles, and by that time, the muscle had been reduced to bloody, dripping strings.
Her tibialis anterior and gastrocnemius were largely intact, and she could even move them, finding the interplay between ligament, muscle, and bone simply gorgeous.
“You doing okay there, hon?” Winslow asked.
“I don’t know.”
“I know it looks bad, but they can work wonders with skin grafts.”
Lucy watched Winslow remove the bandage from her left leg.
Even worse.
Less skin coverage, and it looked as though portions of the muscle in her thigh had sustained damage-when she flexed her left quadriceps, the muscle quivered differently than her right. She could barely make it move.
This was bad-and not because she was anything approaching vain-but because her beauty, her body, had always served as her most effective camouflage. In the summertime, standing on the side of the road in a skirt that stopped two inches above her knees was almost guaranteed to lure someone into pulling over.
Even assuming she recovered from this, her legs would never look the same.
They’d be horribly disfigured.
And Donaldson had done this.
He was responsible.
Lucy had never hurt anyone out of anger or rage. Up until this moment, her only drive had been curiosity and lust and something else she’d never been able to name.
That was all going to change.
Tonight.
She wondered what time it was. The blinds in her room had been drawn all day, but she could tell that the light coming through had weakened into the pale, orange glow of evening.
“Do you have a watch?” Lucy asked.
Winslow was swabbing her right leg with an icky-smelling antibiotic ointment, Lucy wondering how intense the pain would be right now if she wasn’t on morphine.
Winslow checked her wrist. “It’s six-fifteen.”
“It really burns,” Lucy said.
“The ointment? It has a topical anesthetic in it.”
“My peehole.”
“You can feel the burn?”
Lucy nodded.
“I’ll talk with Dr. Lanz, see what he says.”
Lucy screwed her face up and let out a moan. “I really need the catheter out…now.”
Her heart rate monitor displayed a pulse rate at nearly 100 bpm, and if she could only get a moment alone, Lucy knew she could drive it higher.
“Okay, settle down, sweetie. I’ll go get the doctor.”
Winslow scurried out of the room, and Lucy shut her eyes and held her breath, summoning all the anxiety she could muster.
By the time Winslow had returned with Lanz, Lucy’s heart was pounding away at 120 bpm and she was sure her face was flushed and beginning to break out with sweat.
“You’re experiencing a lot of discomfort?” Lanz asked, grazing the back of his hand across Lucy’s forehead.
She nodded. “My peehole is on fire.”
“She could have a ureter infection,” Winslow offered.
“Thank you for the diagnosis, Dr. Winslow,” Lanz said. “Oh, hold on. You’re just a nurse, and unqualified to make a diagnosis.”
Lucy watched Winslow’s face go scarlet.
“Lucy, is the pain also up in your bowels or only close to your vagina?”
“It’s everywhere.”
“Okay, the Foley’s coming out.”
Lanz squeezed into a pair of sterile gloves, said, “Surgical scissors.” Lucy could feel him working down there. “Cutting the inflation valve…draining nicely.”
“I have to shit,” Lucy said.
“Winslow, grab a bedpan-”
“No,” Lucy said. “I’m not using a bedpan. It’s fucking humiliating.”
“We’re all professionals here,” Winslow said. “I’ve done it a thousand times.”
“You shit in a bedpan a thousand times? Why?”
Winslow frowned. “I’ve assisted patients. It could be very painful to move you into the bathroom.”
“Nothing’s worse than pissing and shitting into a bedpan in front of strangers.”
“I understand,” Lanz said.
Lucy felt a wickedly uncomfortable twinge, and then Lanz said, “It’s out. Better?”
“Yes. Thank you so much, Dr. Lanz. You’re the best.”
“My pleasure. Deputy!” Lanz called without even looking at him.
Lucy watched the lawman struggle onto his feet and lumber into her room. “What’s up, Doc?”
“Unlock these handcuffs. We need to take her into the bathroom.”
The deputy hesitated. “I got my orders, and she ain’t supposed to-”
“I don’t give a fuck about your orders. This is my patient, and she needs to use the bathroom.”
Lucy watched the deputy’s face.
So young. Early twenties. Smooth-shaven. A big dough-boy.
“I don’t know, Doc.”
“What do you think, she’s a threat? She weighs all of ninety-four pounds and has such severe damage to her lower body I doubt she can even walk. Look at them.” Lanz pointed to Lucy’s legs, and it warmed her heart to see the deputy wince. “Besides, the level of morphine running through her system will pretty much render her as docile and harmless as you are. So…unlock her wrist before I throw you out of my hospital.”
She was a very good girl on her first trip to the bathroom, mainly because she had no other choice than to be.
Winslow pulled out Lucy’s IV lines and helped her to sit up in bed.
The deputy stood guard with his tactical baton extended and ready in his right hand.
A big orderly named Benjamin lifted her out of bed and set her on her feet.
She could hardly stand. The nerve block made it feel like her legs were asleep.
“Just give me a second,” she said, holding her arms out in an attempt to find her balance.
It was there.
Barely.
She stared down at her legs, which Winslow had yet to re-bandage, and took a tentative step.
Near her left ankle, it was like watching the workings of an internal combustion engine-ligaments and muscle stretching, bones moving together, protected by cartilage.
She could have watched herself walk all day.
But she couldn’t have walked all day.
Lucy got three steps and said, “I’m going to fall.”
There was no pain.
Just a beautifully weak imbalance from the morphine, like standing on a ship in heavy seas.
Benjamin grabbed her under the arms, said, “I got you.”
Five steps, and then she stood in the open doorway to the bathroom.
Winslow hit the light switch for her.
“I think I can make it to the seat,” Lucy said. She looked at Lanz. “Doc, can I still sit and shit considering-”
“You rectum is bruised and suffered a major abrasion, but you should be able to have a bowel movement. Just sit down gently. Nurse Winslow will irrigate your rectum when you finish, to make sure no infection sets in.”
“I can’t wait. Thanks, Doc.”
Lucy limped inside by herself, shut the door behind her, and raised her hospital gown. Stumbling two steps to the toilet, she eased down onto the freezing seat.
It felt strange-definitely more tissue on her right cheek than her left. She leaned to one side like a car with a flat tire.
“You okay in there?”
Nurse Winslow’s voice through the door.