Chapter 55
“CUT IT OUT!”
The forceful words echoing hauntingly in his mind, Nick’s eyes
flashed open to find that the dark ocean, the boat, Claire and the rest… they
were all gone. The walls of bare
whiteness and glass, the sterile smell, and the high-pitched beeping reminded Nick
of where he was – the hospital, ICU. It
had all been a dream, a horrible nightmare.
He took a moment to let this sink in, then, concentrating hard,
tried to lift his left leg. He saw it
rise slightly beneath the bedsheets, the whole long thing, and although it hurt
to do so, he felt immediate relief.
Wondering if the drugs they had given him had caused him to dream such
scary shit, he looked around, wondering where his nurse was.
Something in the very corner of his cubicle catching his eye, he
glanced over and jolted in surprise when he saw a figure curled up in a
chair. On second inspection, he realized
that it was Howie, and that he was sound asleep, scrunched in a very
uncomfortable-looking position in the stiff chair.
“Howie,” Nick tried to say, but his throat felt funny, and no
sound would come out. Alarmed, his hands
flew to his mouth and were met with tubing.
The respirator. So they had
put a tube down his throat. He let his
hands drop and assured himself that at least it was not a paper towel roll,
like in his dream. Still, he couldn’t
talk, and he had to find a way to get Howie’s attention.
His fingers crawled blindly down his neck and to his chest, where
he touched one of the wire leads stuck to him, measuring his heartbeat. He gave it a pull, and off it came, the
others pulling off along with it.
Immediately, he heard the short, steady beeps of the heart monitor
transform into one, long, continuous wail.
Flatline.
Well, that was cool. He
glanced over at Howie to see if the sudden change in noise would awaken him,
but his friend did not stir. Damn
Howie. What if his heart really had
stopped beating? He’d be dying over
there, and Howie would still be sitting on his ass, sound asleep. Some friend he was.
Vaguely, he heard a voice call over some intercom, “Code Blue to
ICU 9! Code Blue to ICU 9!” It didn’t occur to him that ICU 9 was his
cubicle or that a whole team of doctors and nurses were running to it at that
very moment, ready to resuscitate him.
Clear! Nick thought and secured the leads back to
his chest. The short, steady beeps
returned. We got him back, Nick
thought, thinking it might be fun to be a doctor. Maybe he could persuade that cute nurse
Samantha to let him play with some of those shocking paddles when he felt
better.
At that moment, the code team burst in, lead by Mersey, the only
familiar face of the bunch.
“Nick!” she gasped when she saw that he was awake. “Are you all right?!”
“Where’s the code?” a man behind her asked, looking around in
confusion.
“No code,” Mersey said breathlessly. Striding up to Nick’s bed, she checked the
wire leads on his chest and frowned, apparently seeing that they were not
placed in the same spots as they had been before. “Did you pull these off?” she asked him.
Nick nodded guiltily.
Whoops. Maybe that hadn’t been
such a good idea.
It did its job though.
Amidst all the commotion, he looked over at Howie to see his friend leap
out of his chair, a befuddled expression on his face.
“What’s going on?” he asked, his voice high and frantic. “Nick!”
“Nick is just fine,” Mersey said dryly. “He only pulled the leads off his chest and
gave us quite a scare.”
“But he’s awake?” Howie asked, hurrying over to Nick’s bed.
“Hey, Howie,” Nick started to say, then remembered he couldn’t
talk.
“He’s triggering the vent,” said Mersey, glancing back at one of
the men in white coats that had come charging in with her. “Should we extubate?”
The man came up and looked at Nick’s monitors. “Yeah, I think he’s ready.” Looking down at Nick, he asked, “Do you want
me to take the tube out of your throat?”
Vigorously, Nick nodded, his eyes pleading. “Okay.
Then when I say so, I need you to blow, like you’re blowing out a
candle. Got it?” Again, Nick nodded, and the doctor took hold
of the hose coming out of his mouth.
“Ready? Now – blow out.”
Gathering together all of his strength, Nick blew, and the doctor
pulled the tube from his throat.
Immediately, he was sent into a violent coughing fit, his throat
burning. He gasped for breath, choking,
hacking, trying to fill his lungs with a single precious breath of air.
“Just relax; it’ll pass,” urged the doctor. “Mersey, get him on a mask.”
The nurse covered Nick’s mouth and nose with an oxygen mask, and a
moment later, he lay back in relief, the sweet oxygen pouring into his
lungs. He took a few deep breaths, and
his coughing ceased, though the fiery sensation in his throat did not.
“M-my throat,” he rasped, his voice soft and hoarse, as if he had
a bad case of laryngitis.
“It hurts, doesn’t it?” said the doctor. “Don’t worry; it will feel better in a few
days. Your voice will recover too. I know that’s important to you, being a
singer and all.” He gave Nick a knowing
smile.
“Good,” Nick whispered, although singing was the last thing on his
mind. He hadn’t thought about singing or
the Backstreet Boys or the new album in a long time. His career seemed to be growing forever more
distant to him, something that lay just beyond his reach. Would he ever be well enough to record and
tour again with the group? Maybe he
should tell them to just go on without him…
“How do you feel, Nick? Are
you in any pain?” Mersey asked, interrupting his thoughts.
“Not too bad, I guess,” Nick answered. “My chest is kind of tight, but that’s just
the pneumonia, right?”
“Yes. But that should go
away in a few days. You’ve gotten
through the worst of it now.”
The nurse’s words struck him as strange, and he looked up in
confusion. “How… how long did I sleep?”
he wondered.
“You’d been out of it for about a week,” replied Mersey, and
Nick’s mouth dropped open in utter shock.
“A week!” he cried. It had
only seemed like a few hours! “W-was I
in some kind of coma or something?”
“Not a coma, just unconscious,” she said. “You drifted in and out, but we had to keep
you sedated most of the time because you kept thrashing around and trying to
pull out your tubes and things.”
He shook his head, his head still spinning with this knowledge. A whole week… he had just slept through an
entire week of his life.
“Well, if you’re feeling better, Dr. Dunn and I will go and let
you visit with your friend.” Mersey
glanced over her shoulder at Howie, who had retreated back from the bed.
“Oh… okay.” Nick watched as
the doctor and nurse left the room and then looked to Howie. “D… what are you doing here?”
Howie smiled slightly and dragged a chair up to Nick’s bed, into
which he then lowered himself. “Your mom
called,” he replied. “Well, really she
called Brian, and Brian called me and the guys.
She was really freaked, and she thought we would want to come and be
with you.”
“So are the other guys here too then?” Nick asked, surprised that
his mother had called them. Had he
really been that sick?
“Just Brian. AJ and Kev are
still out in California, but they’ve been calling every day to see how you’re
doing.”
“So I guess I was pretty sick then, huh?” Nick said slowly as he
absorbed this information.
“Yeah,” Howie answered, his brown eyes wide and serious. “You have pneumonia, Nick. That can be pretty serious anyway, but in
your case… well…”
Nick nodded. “I know. I just didn’t know it was that bad… and I
didn’t think I’d been unconscious for a whole freaking week! It seemed like I had just slept for a few
hours… I had this dream… God, it scared the shit out of me.”
Howie frowned. “What did
you dream about?”
Nick snorted. “You’ll just
laugh.”
“I won’t laugh. What was it
about?”
“It was another shark dream.
Where I’m swimming, and a shark’s after me. Man, I haven’t had those since I was a kid.”
“I know,” said Howie, both of them remembering how Nick had had
nightmares about sharks when he was just a teenager and homesick on tour. Sharks – they had always been the one thing
he feared. Some people had nightmares
about vampires or spiders or clowns.
Nick dreamed about sharks.
“Yeah… this one was hella freaky though. The shark… it… it bit off my leg, dude. And, God, the blood… it was fucking gory!”
“Ew.” Howie shuddered. “Don’t tell me any more, man, I don’t wanna
hear it.”
Nick smiled. “They musta
given me some pretty strong drugs to make me dream all that whacked out shit.”
“Yeah, it was probably the sedatives,” Howie said with a
grin. “God, I’m glad you’re back,
Nicky. You scared me, you know? You scared us all.”
Nick shifted uncomfortably in the bed, embarrassed. “Sorry.”
Howie laughed. “No, don’t
be sorry! Not like you could help
it. Anyway, I better go call the hotel –
your family and Rok will want to know you’re awake.”
“My family?” Nick repeated.
“They’re here? All of them?”
“Everyone except BJ. Your
mom said she had some kind of modeling something or other, I dunno.” Howie shrugged. “But yeah, your dad and Leslie and Aaron and
Angel all got in the same day I did. So
anyway, I’m going to go call them, okay?”
Nick nodded slowly. “Okay.”
Howie smiled and started to leave the room. Then he stopped, turned back, and walked back
to Nick’s bed, bending over and gently wrapping his arms around him. Surprised, Nick patted Howie awkwardly on the
back until Howie finally pulled away.
“What was that for?” he laughed slightly.
“Sorry.” Howie smiled
sheepishly. “I just… well… like I said…
you scared us, Nicky. It’s good to have
you back.”
Nick smiled blankly and nodded.
“It’s good to be back.”
***