Read Online Emergency: Wife Lost and Found by Carol Marinelli - Free Book Online

galloping away, except James wasn’t smiling and neither was the radiologist.
    ‘If you’ll just wait there for a moment.’ The radiologist had climbed down from her stool and headed out of the darkened room, leaving the still image of their baby on the screen. Lorna couldn’t work out the problem. Oh, she wasn’t an expert on scans but there it was, a head, two arms, two legs. They’d only been in for two minutes, for goodness’ sake. No measurements had been taken, there was a healthy-sounding heartbeat. What could suddenly be so wrong?
    ‘What is it, James?’
    ‘I’m not sure.’
    ‘James, please…’ She knew he was lying, could seehis tense jaw, could feel his hand gripping tightly as he tried not to look at her. ‘Please just tell me. I know something is wrong.’
    ‘I’m not sure, okay, but…’ He paused for a moment before continuing, ‘Lorna, I’m really not sure, but I think the baby might not be in the right position.’
    The door opened then, admitting not just the radiologist but her obstetrician and the registrar too. Lorna was too shocked to say anything. She lay there, willing her baby well. Maybe the placenta was low and she’d be stuck for weeks on bed rest, maybe…
    ‘Lorna.’ It was the first time she’d met Mr Arnold, her obstetrician, and he introduced himself and then shook James’s hand before taking over the ultrasound. His face was a picture of intense concentration as again the probe was run over her lower abdomen.
    ‘I’m sorry to have to tell you this, but your pregnancy is ectopic.’
    ‘No.’ She refused to accept it.
    ‘Your uterus is empty, Lorna. The foetus has developed in a Fallopian tube.’
    ‘No.’ She hated it that suddenly they were calling it a foetus when just a few minutes ago it had been her baby.
    ‘The foetus isn’t viable.’
    ‘The baby,’ Lorna interrupted.
    She completely refused to accept it, refused to listen when they told her that at any moment the tube might rupture, that there was no choice but to have the foetus removed. It was James who had to deal with it all. It was James who held her hand when they gently examined her and then checked their findings with ultrasoundagain. The terminology had changed—her baby wasn’t a baby any more, rather a foetus, but she could still see it moving and wriggling on the screen, still hear the whoosh, whoosh, whoosh of its little heartbeat.
    ‘Could you turn off the sound?’ It was the first time in her life that she had shouted and, Lorna realised, it worked. The room stilled for a moment, the sound of her baby’s heart filling the tense air, then the technician flicked a switch and as easily as that the sound of her baby’s heartbeat was obliterated.
    The obstetrician left then, leaving his registrar to complete the necessary paperwork. Only Lorna didn’t want to go directly to Theatre, didn’t want to face the inevitable result.
    ‘I feel fine.’
    ‘You have to go to Theatre.’ She could see the tears in James’s green eyes as he forced her to see sense. ‘If it ruptures, and it will rupture,’ James said clearly, ‘I don’t want to lose you both.’
    ‘Can we just go home?’ Even as she said it, she knew how insane it sounded, and moved swiftly to clarify what she meant. ‘I just need a night to get my head around it.’
    ‘Lorna.’ The registrar was nicer than her boss. Strict but kind, she spelt out the facts, held Lorna’s hand and took her through it step by step—only despite the registrar’s calm demeanour there was a flurry of activity going on in the room. An IV had been inserted into Lorna’s arm, blood had been taken for a cross-match and a bag of saline was now hanging and dripping into her veins, to keep the line open, the registrar said, just in case.
    Lorna knew what those words meant—on her emergency rotation she’d seen a woman rushed to Theatre, pale and exsanguinated. Her undiagnosed ectopic pregnancy had ruptured. At any moment, Lorna was being