Rescue - By Anita Shreve Page 0,74

going to college. I’ll be with you every step of the way. Even though you got a good hit on the noggin, this is just routine. You remember I’ve told you about airlifts before? Nothing to it. Just like answering a call, but on a different vehicle. I’m going to keep holding your hand. You’re tough, Rowan. We both know that. Pretty soon, after they get you to the hospital, it will be time to wake up. This is important, Rowan, so listen up. You’ll have to concentrate when you get there. It might feel hard to do, but you have to do it. And don’t worry if you don’t remember everything I just said, because I’ll be there with you, holding your hand and making sure they do everything right. You’re in good hands, OK? The best.”

Webster watches the helicopter circle and then land. The pilot won’t want Webster on the bird. He moves behind Rowan when he sees the airlift crew running toward the rig with their own stretcher. The nurse and the medic will hear Koenig’s report, switch Rowan to their equipment, and then return to the helicopter.

“Weight?” the flight nurse asks.

“About one twenty-five,” Webster says.

“That medic is the girl’s father,” Koenig explains.

“The patient’s father is a medic?”

“He’s been keeping her calm,” says Koenig. “Talking to her.”

Webster jumps out of the rig as soon as the chopper crew has Rowan on their stretcher. He walks with them, holding Rowan’s hand. He talks to the helicopter medic ahead of him.

“I promised her I’d go with her,” Webster says.

The medic doesn’t reply.

“I’m one eighty. She’s one twenty-five. That’s three hundred five. Under the limit.”

The medic is still unresponsive. Webster wants to yell at him, but he knows that to do that is the fastest way to get himself kicked off the chopper.

The fire engines have booted up their lights, making a fierce perimeter that’s hard to look at. Webster can feel his shoes on the cinders, then on the grass, the wind from the propeller blowing his hair. The scene feels dreamlike and terrifying. He has to break his handhold when they reach the bird.

The pilot radios back to the medic, wanting to know weight and how long it’s going to take to go through the Seven Ps. “Ten to fifteen on the Ps,” the medic says. “The girl is one twenty-five. The dad’s a medic. Can we extend a courtesy ride?”

“Weight?”

“One eighty,” says the medic.

“You’re looking at him,” the pilot says. “Weight?”

“One eighty,” the medic repeats without hesitation.

“Give him the protocol.”

“I know what to do,” Webster says before he needs to be told. He climbs into the chopper and sits up front with the pilot. He won’t be able to hold Rowan’s hand, but he’ll be there. Maybe she’ll sense his presence, even through all the medication. He’s heard of unconscious patients who claim to have heard conversations.

The fifteen minutes prep seems like an agony of time to Webster. He wills the chopper to take off. He wants Rowan in the ER as soon as possible.

When he feels the odd angle of the lift, Webster goes into silent medic mode, as if he were a rookie, observing. Head turned, he concentrates on the medic’s hands, the lines, the monitor, the nurse—watching it all unfold as it should. He tries not to look at Rowan’s face, which is far too calm.

He has little sense of time during the ride. He notes the lights of Burlington and can feel the helicopter descending to the roof of the hospital. Another team will meet the chopper, and once again Rowan will be transferred.

Webster remembers his mother’s admonition: You can’t regret anything that leads to your children. Webster wants to add a corollary: You will regret something you did that caused your child harm. If only Webster had forbidden Rowan to go to the dance. If he hadn’t read her diary, she might have lingered at the house, waited for Tommy to knock on the door, and somehow those few minutes might have altered the universe in such a way as to cause her not to drink so much, not to be so willing to take a dare. If he’d tried to get in touch with Sheila sooner. If he hadn’t sent his wife away, depriving Rowan of a normal family life.

Webster feels the jolt as the chopper lands. The ER doc and nurse have the door open at once and are already wheeling Rowan into the hospital, the chopper medic giving his