Page 12 of What it Takes
“A little better, I think. Maybe I just had the wind knocked out of me.”
“What about pain?” He checked Corey’s pupils and did a visual inspection of his extremities. Then he took shears out of his bag and sliced his T-shirt up the front so he could look at his torso. There was some bruising already showing on his right shoulder, but his chest and abdomen didn’t look bad.
There was no obvious trauma, but the head, spine and internal organs were the real problem in this kind of accident. It’s what he couldn’t see that concerned him.
“I feel like an ATV fell on top of me.”
Ben smiled, encouraged by the attempt at humor, as he slid the blood pressure cuff onto Corey’s arm. “I guess I don’t need to ask if you remember what happened, but why don’t you give me a little more detail.”
As Corey started listing off places that hurt in varying degrees, Ben relaxed a little. Considering the size of the quad Josh had righted and pushed out of the way, it started to look like today was Corey’s lucky day.
“I’ll feel it tomorrow, for sure,” Corey said, “but I don’t think anything’s busted. I could probably sit up.”
“You lost consciousness, which is always a concern, so we’re going to hang out just like we are until the ambulance comes. We’ll get you on a backboard as a precaution and after the doctors have looked you over and done some scans, they’ll tell you when you can sit up.”
They heard a siren in the distance and Corey’s wife, who’d calmed down a lot, seemed to grow agitated again. “Is that the ambulance? Will they let me ride with him? What about the truck and our stuff?”
“That’s not the ambulance yet,” Ben told her. “That’ll be the guys from the fire department, just in case I needed help.”
He probably should have called in and let them know not to come, but he’d been busy and hadn’t thought of it. They’d brought the utility truck, rather than the engine, and he saw that Sam was driving as they pulled up next to his SUV. The guy riding shotgun was Dave Moody, who’d served as the EMT for the Whitford Fire Department for years but, because it was a volunteer position, had never invested the time and money into becoming a paramedic. He was over fifty and had no interest in off-roading so that—besides the fact Ben was qualified to offer more critical care than an EMT—was a big reason they’d decided to add his position.
“You can ride in the ambulance or you can drive the truck,” Josh was saying to Corey’s wife. “As long as you’re calm and feel up to it, since the hospital’s almost an hour away. If you want to go in the ambulance, we can make arrangements to get the truck to you sometime later today. As for your stuff, it’s fine here. We won’t throw it—or you—out in the street just because it’s past checkout time.”
She smiled, but her husband groaned. “I was rushing because we were late checking out. The tires slipped and it pissed me off, so I hit the throttle. But I didn’t take the time to put a strap on the ramps, so they kicked out and the damn thing came over backwards on me.”
“You’re not the first person to do that,” Andy told him. “You got lucky, though. It could have been a lot worse.”
“Sit tight,” Ben told Corey before standing up and walking over to Sam and Dave. “I probably should have called in and canceled your response, but you were already on the road by the time I knew I didn’t need help, anyway.”
Sam shrugged. “I was watching a repeat of a repeat of a sports talk show, so it’s all good.”
When they went over to introduce themselves to Corey and talk to the others, Ben stretched his back and watched as Laney said a few words to Rosie before walking toward him.
“Thank you for keeping his head still until I could get a collar on him,” he said when she was close enough so he could speak to her without raising her voice.
She stopped, giving him a little smile. “That’s more or less all I know how to do in an emergency. Don’t let them move their necks.”
“Or spit on open wounds.” When she laughed, he saw everybody turn to look at them—except Corey, of course—but he didn’t care. She had a great laugh. “But seriously, you did great.”
“Thanks. I really hope this doesn’t happen a lot. It was terrifying to be honest, and I was just going to my camper to get some water.”
He looked over his shoulder at the small camper that sat slightly apart from the other sites. “The one with the flamingo?”
When she looked at the wooden flamingo, she smiled and then looked at him. “Yes, that’s mine. I know it’s silly and I spent too much on it, but it was the first thing I bought for myself after my divorce.”
“Do you always smile like that when you look at it?”
Laney looked back at the flamingo and once again, her lips curved into a smile. “I guess I do.”
“Then it was worth every penny you paid for it.”
Her eyes softened and her lips parted, but whatever she’d been about to say was lost when they heard a siren wailing in the distance and getting closer.
“I guess you should get back to Corey,” she said.
“Yeah.”
She walked by him and only the fact there was a group of people watching him kept Ben from turning and watchingheras she walked away.
