Chapter 115
Early the
next morning, another doctor came to talk to Nick, but it was not Dr.
Kingsbury. “Good morning, Nick. I’m Dr. Mahmood,” she introduced herself,
extending her hand across the bed to shake his.
“Morning,”
Nick replied, looking curiously up the new doctor. She was much younger than Dr. Kingsbury and
pretty, with dark, striking features and long black hair that was pulled back
into a loose bun.
She had a kind smile too; he noticed it when she grinned and said, “You’re
probably wondering who I am. I’m a
pulmonologist here at the hospital – a lung doctor. Dr. Kingsbury consulted with me yesterday to
go over the results of your tests from this week, and we both agreed that a
lung biopsy was needed for a conclusive diagnosis. I was told she’d already talked with you
about this?” She arched an eyebrow
questioningly, and Nick nodded.
“Yeah, she
told me last night.”
“Okay,
good.” Dr. Mahmood said. “Assuming it’s okay with you, I’m going to be
doing the procedure. I have an OR booked
for two o’clock this afternoon.”
Nick’s eyes
drifted to the wall clock in his room; it was not quite nine a.m. yet.
“I thought
I’d come and brief you on what the biopsy will be like this morning to
hopefully put your mind to rest,” continued the doctor, with an understanding
smile. Nick nodded, forcing a smile
back. “I’ll be doing a video-assisted
thoracoscopy instead of an open lung biopsy.
It’s a newer procedure, but it’ll be a lot more pleasant for you. Instead of actually cutting open your chest,
which is what an open lung biopsy requires, I’ll just be making three small
incisions in your side. Then I’ll insert
a tube that has a tiny camera in it into one of the incisions. The camera is connected to a TV screen that
will let me see what I’m doing without actually opening your chest. Pretty cool, huh?”
The young
doctor grinned. Nick merely blanched,
and she chuckled lightly. “I know, it
sounds a little weird, but it really is a lot better than the old way of doing
it. It is a new technology, but it’s
becoming more routine; I’ve done many of them by now, so you’ve got nothing to
worry about. We’ll put you to sleep for
the procedure, so you won’t feel a thing.
And afterwards, you’ll just be a little sore from the incisions and
chest tube we’ll put in afterwards – the recovery’s not nearly as bad as for
open lung surgery,” she assured him and then paused. “Do you have any questions?”
Nick tried
to think of some, but he decided he really didn’t want to know much more than
that. It would probably just freak him
out more. “I don’t think so,” he said. “Just do your thing, I guess.”
“Alright,
great,” smiled Dr. Mahmood. “Well, you
can have me paged if you have any concerns before it’s time, and if not, I’ll
see you later in the OR, and we’ll get to the bottom of what’s causing your
symptoms.”
Nick
nodded. “Thanks,” he told her before she
left.
Once the
doctor was gone, he glanced at the clock again.
He had five hours to go before the surgery and nothing to do to keep his
mind occupied. With a sigh, he reached
for the phone beside his bed, figuring he should call one of the guys and let
them know what was going on.
Brian
answered his home phone on the third ring.
“Hello?” he asked uncertainly.
“Hey Bri,
it’s Nick.”
“Oh, hey,
Nick! Your name didn’t come up on my
caller ID; I didn’t know it was you. How
are ya, man?”
“Eh, been
better,” Nick admitted.
“Really? Is that cold you had still hangin’ around?”
Nick
sighed. “Yeah… I went to my doc the day
before yesterday, and she stuck me in the hospital.”
“What?? Why?”
Brian sounded alarmed.
“Well, I
guess it’s a little more than a cold.
They’re not sure; they think I probably have pneumonia, but they’re
still running tests.” Nick bit his lip,
wondering if he should tell his best friend he was afraid it could be a
recurrence of his cancer. He settled
instead for saying, “I’m having a lung biopsy later today.”
“Lung
biopsy? As in, surgery??” asked Brian.
“Yeah… I
guess it’s pretty minor though. The lung
doc was just in here explaining it.
They’re gonna do it with a little camera somehow, instead of cutting me
all the way open,” Nick tried to explain.
“Ohhh, I
know what you’re talking about. I’ve
heard of how they can do that now,” replied Brian. “But… why do they need to do a biopsy if they
think it’s pneumonia? What else could
you have? I mean, do they think… could
it be something related to the tumor you had?”
Nick
swallowed hard. “Dr. Kingsbury doesn’t
think it’s cancer, but nobody really knows.
That’s why they want to do the biopsy; they can’t tell for sure from the
other tests,” he said miserably.
“Jeez,”
Brian sighed. “I wish you’d called me a
couple days ago, Nick; I could have come down to be with you.”
“Don’t
worry about it, dude,” Nick said quickly.
“That’s not why I’m callin’; I just thought someone should know. But I’m fine for right now. Stay home and play with your kid.”
“I will…
for now,” said Brian, “but you call if you need anything. I’m the closest to you after Howie, and I’d
be happy to come down anytime, bro, you know that.”
“I know,”
Nick smiled, glad he’d decided to call Brian.
He could always count on his best friend to be understanding and to be
there for him without smothering him, the way Kevin tended to. “Listen, I gotta go. Tell Baylee hi from his godfather, ‘kay?”
“I
certainly will,” said Brian, and Nick could tell he was smiling. But his tone turned serious again when he
added, “If you can, gimme a call tomorrow and let me know how things are going,
alright? If you don’t, I’m gonna be on
the phone singing to the nurses again, trying to find out details.”
Nick
chuckled, remembering how Brian had once had to sing over the phone to Nurse
Samantha to prove he was indeed Brian Littrell, Backstreet Boy, in order to get
a hold of Nick. “I’ll call,” he
promised, then paused. “Or maybe I
won’t. I’d kinda like to hear you make a
fool of yourself singing Backstreet Boys songs over the phone. Maybe they’ll request ‘If You Want It To Be
Good Girl’-“
“Get
yourself a… bad boy!” Brian screeched in a high-pitched, whiny voice that
was eerily similar to the way a then 17-year-old Nick had actually sounded in
that track. Nick cringed. Brian laughed, then sobered and said, “Okay,
I’ll let you go now so you can get some rest.
I’ll say a prayer for you for this afternoon, man. Talk to you soon.”
“Thanks. Later, Bri.”
Nick hung up with a sigh, hoping God would listen to Brian’s
prayer. Life had been looking up for him
again now that he’d finally gotten back to touring and doing all of the things
he’d done before he got cancer. He
didn’t think he could handle hearing more bad news.
***
“How are you doing, Nick?” The anesthesiologist’s face appeared over
Nick as he asked the question.
“Fine,” Nick mumbled, already starting
to feel drowsy from the medication he’d been given to relax him before he’d
been taken to the surgical floor.
“Good, good,” smiled the
anesthesiologist, crinkles appearing at the corners of his eyes. “I’m going to inject a little something in
your IV to put you to sleep, and all I want you to do is to count backwards
from one hundred for me. Can you do
that?”
“Sure,”
muttered Nick, feeling annoyed. Why did
they always ask him to count backwards?
“Hundred… ninety-nine…” It really
was a stupid thing to do. “Ninety-eight…
ninety-seven… ninety-…”
Nick had
only meant to close his eyes for a second between ninety-six and ninety-five,
but when he opened them again, he heard a voice say, “Well, hello, Nick,” and
found himself looking up into the face of a woman, her hair hidden by a blue
surgical cap. “The biopsy’s over, and
you did very well,” she said, smiling.
“How are you feeling? Are you in
any pain?”
Wow, thought Nick groggily; it was always amazing how fast surgery seemed
to go when he’d been knocked out like that.
Remembering the nurse’s question, he thought hard, trying to assess how
his body was feeling. His side was sore,
he could tell already, but nothing too bad.
His throat hurt the worst; it felt dry and raw, and he was very
thirsty. “My… my throat,” he rasped in a
hoarse whisper.
“Thirsty? I’ll get you some ice chips,” said the nurse,
disappearing momentarily. She returned
with a small cup of ice and an extra blanket too, which she tucked around
him. “Thought you might be cold,” she
explained.
Nick closed
his eyes briefly. The heated blanket
felt nice; he had been a little cold.
The nurse
raised the head of his bed up just slightly and helped him with the ice
chips. They cooled his throat a little,
but he really wanted a glass of cold water.
No such luck though; he knew from experience they wouldn’t let him drink
anything this soon after surgery.
“You’re in recovery now,” the nurse explained as she sat next to him,
watching him suck on an ice chip. “We’ll
observe you here for about an hour, and then you’ll be able to back to your
room. You’ve got a chest tube in right
now to help drain fluids and air from your chest, but that will come out within
the next day or two. We’re also giving
you fluids and pain meds through these IVs.”
She reached up to the bags hanging from the IV pole attached to his bed.
Nick tried
to follow her movements, but he still felt too weak and out of it. His eyelids felt heavy, and he could feel
sleep coming back on. But before he
could drift off again, the nurse got his attention by saying, “You have a
visitor too. Would you like me to bring
him in, or would you rather just get some rest?”
Visitor?
As Nick processed what she had just said, he perked up some. Who could possibly have come to visit
him? Nobody knew he was having surgery
except for Brian, and he was in Atlanta.
Noticing
his curiosity, the nurse smiled. “I
think you’ll be happy to see him; he’s a friend of yours. I’ll go get him.” Nick nodded, and she disappeared again. He fought sleep while she was gone,
determined to stay awake long enough to see who his mystery visitor was. He closed his eyes, and when he opened them
again, the nurse was coming towards him, accompanied by none other than Howie
Dorough.
“Howie D,”
Nick croaked, smiling with difficulty.
Until that moment, he hadn’t realized how nice it would be to see a
friendly face when he came out of surgery, but suddenly, he was very glad Howie
had come.
“Nicky C,”
Howie returned with a smile as he came up alongside Nick’s bed, reaching down
to take his hand. He gave it a gentle
squeeze and asked, “How ya doin’, bud?”
“Eh…
tired,” Nick murmured, his eyes opening and closing again. “This… this shit they give you… it knocks you
out reeeal good…”
Howie
chuckled. “Then you sleep, Nicky. Don’t worry about staying up just ‘cause of
me; I’ll be around when you wake up again, okay?”
“… ‘Kay…”
Nick slurred, still fighting to keep his eyes open. Within a few minutes, though, he was out
again.
***
“Hey, this is Nick Carter.
Leave me a message, and I’ll holla back at ya.”
Claire sighed in exasperation and
jerked her phone down, punching the red button to end the call. Why
won’t he answer?? she wondered, starting to pace in the living room of her
apartment. She had heard Nick’s dorky
voicemail greeting so many times in the last two days, it didn’t even make her
laugh anymore; on the contrary, she was worried.
It was Friday afternoon, and she
hadn’t talked to him in a week. He had
been sick the last time, and she had meant to call him back a few days later to
see how he was doing. Real life had
gotten in the way, and it had been Thursday before she’d tried to call
again. But he hadn’t answered his phone
at all yesterday, and despite the voicemail she’d left him, he hadn’t returned
any of her calls yet today. She’d tried
him on her lunch break that day at work and again when she’d gotten off, but
all she got was his voicemail. She was
starting to worry that something was really wrong.
Her first concern, of course, was for
his health, and as she thought of him living alone in that big house of his,
her worry only grew. What if something
happened to him? What if he passed out
or tripped on the stairs, and no one knew?
She wanted to drive over to his house
and check on him personally, but her other concern stopped her from grabbing
her keys that very minute. What if it
wasn’t that at all? What if Nick was
perfectly fine and just avoiding her calls because he’d found out about her and
Jamie?
She frowned, halting her pacing for a
few seconds. She hadn’t told Nick she
was engaged yet, partly because she’d only talked to him for a few minutes
since it happened, and he’d sounded so miserable that it had been easy to let
him go without it coming up. The other
reason was that she wasn’t ready. She
was dreading telling him because she knew what his reaction would be. He certainly wouldn’t be happy; he might even
be hurt. It had been less than
two-and-a-half years since she’d broken off her engagement to him, and now here
she was, engaged to another man. And not
just any man. Jamie. The one person in her life Nick couldn’t
stand.
She would tell him eventually, of
course; how could she not? She was just
waiting for the right opportunity, for a time when she could tell him without
sounding like she was rubbing it in his face.
But what if he already knew? She
tried to think – who could have told him?
Of course, lots of people knew by now… but no one that was particularly
close to Nick. Laureen was the only one
who even had his number, but Claire knew she wouldn’t have called Nick and told
him.
Again, she sighed and resumed her
pacing. Somehow she knew it wasn’t that…
which brought her back to worrying about him again. She eyed the set of car keys lying on her
kitchen counter, but instead of grabbing them, she raised her cell phone again
and brought up her contacts list. She
still had the guys’ numbers stored; she would call one of them first and see if
any of them had heard from Nick in the last two days. That would be more rational than flying over
to his house in a panic.
She found Howie’s cell phone number
and dialed. At first, she was taken
directly to his voicemail as well.
“Don’t you Boys ever answer your phones??” she ranted in frustration,
hanging up before the beep sounded for her to leave a message. She scrolled back up her contacts list and
was about to try AJ when the phone rang in her hand.
Startled, she looked down at the
caller ID and smiled wryly when she read Howie’s name. She punched a button and put the phone to her
ear. “Hey, Howie,” she answered.
“Hey!
Sorry I missed your call; I had to go find somewhere where I could use
my cell,” apologized Howie.
“That’s okay,” said Claire, not
exactly sure what he was talking about.
“Sorry to bug ya, but I was just calling to find out if you had talked
to Nick in the last couple of days. I
keep trying to call him, and he won’t answer his phone, so-“
“Ahh – I was wondering if you knew
what was going on,” Howie interrupted.
“You’ve always been like Nicky’s rock through this stuff.”
“What?
What’s going on?” Claire
asked, her heart beating faster.
“Nick’s sick. He went to the doctor a couple days ago
because he couldn’t shake this cold he’s had, and she put him in the
hospital. I guess it’s more than a cold. Brian said Nick called him and said they
thought he might have pneumonia, but they weren’t sure. They were doing a lung biopsy on him today,
so I came down from Orlando. He just got
out of surgery awhile ago; he’s sleeping now.
I guess he’s okay… the nurse said the biopsy went fine, but no one’s
really telling me anything. You know how
it is.” Howie sounded slightly frazzled
as he babbled on, Claire struggling to process it all.
Hospital… pneumonia… surgery… Her worries were being realized; something
was wrong with Nick. Right then, she
decided she had to go to him; she couldn’t handle just waiting by the phone for
Howie to call back and update her later.
“Are you going to be at the hospital with him for awhile?” she asked
Howie. “I want to come up, if you think
it’d be okay.
“Yeah, sure,” replied Howie. “Come up if you want; I could use the
company. It’s pretty boring right now,
just sitting around… Nick was awake for a few minutes in the recovery room when
I came in, but now he’s totally out of it again.”
“Okay,”
Claire said quickly. “I’ll be there in a
little while. Where can I find you? Is Nick in a room yet?”?
“Yeah, Room
502.”
Claire drew
in a sharp breath. “He’s in Oncology?”
There was a
pause, and then Howie said slowly, “Yeah… yeah, I guess he is… but it’s
probably just because he knows the staff there, and they know him. And his doctor works on this floor… Dr.
Kingsbury…”
Claire
nodded, not at all sure about Howie’s explanation. She didn’t think Howie was sure himself. But she didn’t want to worry him, so she
said, “Yeah… you’re probably right.”
When she hung up, though, her stomach was in knots. Howie had mentioned Nick was having tests
done, including a biopsy. What exactly
were they looking for? she wondered. If
he didn’t have pneumonia, what was making him so sick?
Oh God, please… please don’t make it
be that, she
prayed silently, squeezing her eyes shut.
After everything Nick had been through, everything he had overcome, the
last thing he needed was to relapse again.
It would be absolutely devastating for him… and for her too. She couldn’t fathom it. God couldn’t possibly be so cruel, could
He? Please… please let him be
alright. He doesn’t deserve this…
Swallowing
hard, she forced back the lump in her throat and opened her eyes, blinking a
few times to clear away the moisture in them.
She spotted her car keys, still lying
on the counter. This time, she
snatched them up on her way out the door.
***
When Claire
stepped off the elevator onto the oncology floor, she veered right, heading for
the larger, private rooms. A hospital
security guard was casually patrolling the hallway, so it wasn’t hard to figure
out that Nick was close. They always had
extra security around, just in case some fans found out he was there. She had just spotted his room, 502, when the
guard asked sharply, “Visiting a patient, ma’am?”
Claire
turned to face him. “Yes, I’m here to
see Nick,” she answered, wondering if he was going to give her trouble. She didn’t have much pull now that she wasn’t
Nick’s fiancée; he wouldn’t know who she was.
“I’m a close friend of his,” she said.
Of course,
he gave her a skeptical look. “I’ll have
to check on that,” he said finally, after a long pause.
Claire put
on a smile and nodded. “Okay,” she said
brightly. “Howie should be around here
somewhere. Just tell him Claire is
here.”
The guard
narrowed his eyes at her, apparently trying to look intimidating. She just stared back, an innocent look on her
face, until he finally broke her gaze and turned around. He rapped on the door to 502 and then opened
it just enough to stick his head in. She
heard his deep voice rumble something she could not make out, and a moment
later, he stepped back, and Howie appeared around the door.
“Hey, Claire,
c’mon in,” he said, beckoning into the room.
“Thanks,”
Claire chirped to the guard, walking around him on her way to meet Howie. “That guy’s sure on a power trip,” she
whispered to him in a low voice as they walked into Nick’s room, shutting the
door again behind them.
Howie
laughed lightly, but Claire’s giggle died in her throat as she got closer to
Nick’s bed. She was overcome by the
memories of seeing him in ICU after his lung surgery two-and-a-half years ago. The ashy grayness of his skin… the hiss of
oxygen and beep of the heart monitor… the tube in his side… It was all the same, and as she took in the
sight of him, a lump rose in her throat.
The last surgery had saved his life… but now he was sick again. And from what Howie had said, no one knew
why.
Howie came
up alongside her. “He’s been sleeping
like that for awhile,” he said quietly.
“I guess he needs his rest after the biopsy.”
She
nodded. “Have you heard anything from
his doctor yet?” she asked, turning to look at him.
Howie just
shook his head. “Nothing yet.”
They stood
together in silence, just watching Nick sleep, the rhythm of the monitors
lulling them into a stupor. After
awhile, Howie said, “Well, I’m gonna go take a little walk, maybe grab a soda. Do you want anything?”
She shook
her head. “I’m fine. You go ahead.” When Howie left, she walked around Nick’s
bed to the chair that was sitting off to the left of it. She sank down, her eyes drifting to the
monitors that surrounded him. His heart rate
was high, she noticed, and his oxygen saturation was low. After enough time in the hospital, she’d
learned what normal levels should be, and his were slightly off. Frowning, she reached out and laid her hand
on top of his, very lightly rubbing it. She
watched his heart rate jump and then drop again, as he seemed to relax. He was sleeping, but not too deeply; he could
sense her touch.
Soon the
beeping from the heart monitor started to accelerate again, and lines appeared
on Nick’s forehead. When he let out a
low moan in his sleep, she gave his hand a squeeze, watching him
carefully. Was he in pain?
His eyelids
began to flutter then, and before long, they flew open. “Nick?” she asked cautiously.
Slowly, he
turned his head towards her, his blue eyes clouded with confusion. “C-Claire?” he rasped, blinking a few times.
She smiled
gently. “You bet.”
“What’re
you doing here?”
“Just
making sure you weren’t playing phone hooky on me. I’ve been trying to call you for days, and
you wouldn’t answer. Thought maybe you
were just ignoring me,” she teased with a wry smile. “I called Howie, and he told me you were
sick, but I thought I better come and make sure you weren’t just faking it.”
“Wish I
was,” Nick said with a tired smile. His
eyes held a defeated look that made her blood run cold. She knew how miserable and scared he had to
be, back in the hospital again after he’d just finished a successful tour. But he couldn’t give up now. He had to keep the faith, had to ready
himself in case the news was bad. And
then he would have to fight. He would have
to fight, because she couldn’t stand the thought of losing him. “I feel like hell,” he moaned. “My chest is killing me.”
She bit her
lip. “You probably need more pain
meds. Lemme call a nurse; where’s your
call button?”
“Uh… I
think it’s… over here somewhere…” he muttered and tried to fumble around for it
with his right hand, which was still pinned under her left.
“Oh, I see
it,” she said, suddenly spotting the device.
She let go of his hand to reach for it, and when she handed it to him,
she heard the air in his lungs rattle as he gasped softly.
“What’s
that on your finger?” he asked in a low, flat voice, and she felt her heart
drop, her eyes immediately flashing to the sparkling Claddagh ring on her left
hand.
She met his
eyes briefly and then looked away, unable to make eye contact as she quietly
replied, “Jamie proposed.”
“When?”
“Valentine’s
Day.”
Nick let
out a dry chuckle that sounded more like a cough. She looked over in time to catch him wince in
pain. She could see the muscles along
his jaw working as he gritted his teeth.
Then he said, his voice strained, “Valentine’s Day… gee, that was
original.” He coughed and winced again,
squeezing his eyes shut. She could tell
he was in pain and felt bad for him, but she hadn’t missed his little dig at
Jamie. There was nothing she could say
though; he was right. The way Jamie had
proposed was certainly beautiful, but there was nothing original about it.
“Yeah, I
know,” she said.
“Well, hey…
if he’s the one you wanna be with…” Nick
replied sarcastically, trailing off.
“Jesus,” he said with a grimace, trying to shift his weight a little in
the bed. “This really hurts…”
Claire was
on her feet immediately, her hand on his shoulder. “You probably shouldn’t move too much,” she
said, watching him worriedly. “The
surgery… you’ve got tubes and stuff…”
“My chest
fucking hurts,” he spat, tears of pain springing to his eyes, and he pounded
the nurse call button with his clenched fist.
The beeping of his heart monitor started to face, and Claire’s eyes
flickered to the monitor to see the number that measured his heart rate jump
several digits and continue to rise.
“Nick,” she
pleaded, grabbing his hand again and squeezing, “just hold on, calm down... a
nurse will be in here in a minute…” She
looked around worriedly, wishing a nurse would burst in right then. Please hurry, she begged
internally. She couldn’t bear to stand
there and watch while Nick was in pain.
“I… I
can’t… breathe,” he gasped, ripping his hand out of hers and fumbling with the
oxygen canula he was wearing. Claire
took her eyes off of him just long enough to look at the monitor again; his
oxygen saturation level was falling lower, and she knew he was in trouble. She didn’t want to leave him, but she had to
get help; the nurse wasn’t coming fast enough.
Thankfully,
she had no sooner left his side than the door burst open, and in came not just
one nurse, but several, accompanied by a doctor in a white coat. Claire flattened herself against a wall as
they barreled in, immediately surrounding Nick’s bed. “Mr. Carter?
Nick? Can you tell us how you’re
feeling?” the doctor hurled questions at Nick.
As Nick
tried to answer, Claire heard bits and pieces of the nurse’s comments. “He’s tachy… SATS are falling… Dropped his
pressure… No breath sounds… Nick? Nick,
can you hear me?”
Then the
monitors went completely haywire, and as she squeezed her eyes shut, Claire
heard one of them call, “He’s crashing!”
***