FF: Tum, Me, aur Wo
Chapter 1: Rush
Arnav Singh Raizada rushed through the doors of the ICU. He was walking alongside a stretcher, on which lay a young girl, covered in a thick black blanket. Trailing after him was his older sister, Anjali Jha and her husband, Shyam Manohar Jha, his cousin brother Akash, Arnav's Mama and Mami, and his grandmother.
"Where the hell is the doctor?" screamed Arnav. Anjali put a hand on his shoulder.
"Calm down, chote! Nothing will happen to her!" she said, while crying.
"Nothing can happen to her, Di! I will sue the hospital if something happens to her!"
The nurses led the stretcher into the operation room and made the Raizada family wait outside. A young doctor appeared, and helped take the stretcher inside. She then turned towards the family.
"I need you all to be calm here. We will try our best, but I can see that the patient has suffered severe burns. Have faith in us, " she said quietly as she pulled on her mask and went inside the room, closing the doors.
Arnav peered through a small mirror and watched as they transferred her body onto the bed, and began to put an oxygen mask on her. He turned away in pain.
His family began to sit down slowly in the chairs outside the room, while Shyam took Anjali to the temple inside the hospital. Arnav angrily paced down the hall. Nothing could happen to her! He wouldn't let anything happen. How had she even gotten stuck in that room of AR? How had a fire started? Arnav leaned against a wall and closed his eyes. A nurse walked up to him with some legal papers. He quickly signed them all.
Inside the operation room, all hell was breaking lose. The anesthesiologist had come, so that the patient would not feel the surgery. The doctor was trying her best to save the patient, who was looking gruesome on the operation table. The burns were covering different parts of her body, from neck down. Her face, was thankfully saved.
"Nurse, how is the blood pressure looking?" she asked.
"Low, Doctor," replied the nurse. The doctor cursed behind her mask. That meant that there was quite a lot of damage in her blood, so the other fluids of her body were moving where they shouldn't be. And that also meant that her heartbeat was getting higher, as it was trying to maintain blood pressure, so the blood can reach other vital organs. She began to inspect the burns. Thankfully, the burns looked to be Second degree (deep partial thickness), which extends only into the reticular dermis. Only the burns on her arms were Third degree. Those would require severe care. It would take weeks to recover, and some skin grafting was required for the patient. There would be scarring. The doctor prayed that she would survive. If the patient didn't make it, Mr. Raizada would kill her.
"Nurse, keep an eye on the heartbeat. It cannot increase much," warned the doctor as she began to remove the dead tissue and slowly wrap the burns up.
Finally, four hours later, the patient was under control. Her heartbeat was regular, blood pressure was slowly turning normal. She was still using the oxygen mask, as her lungs were weak from the smoke she had inhaled. The doctor had managed to treat the second-degree burns, and graft skin from the patients thighs for the burns on her arms. She left the patient under the care of her team, and finally stepped out of the operation room to face the anxious family.
Arnav watched as the operation light went off and the doctor stepped out. He was surprised at how young she was. She walked up to him and smiled.
"There is nothing to worry about, Mr. Raizada. She is safe. But some of her burns are scarring, and these can take a toll on the self-esteem of many people. I need you to be strong, when dealing with her. Most of her burns were second-degree, but some burns on her arms were third-degree, which required some skin grafting. These will usually leave large marks, but the other burns will heal within a few months. I will give you more details about patient care after we shift her to different room. She is still unconscious, due to the anesthesia. You may meet her after we shift her, put her inside a, how do I explain this…a cover?, and after you are properly dressed," she said, all in one breath. Arnav let out a sigh of relief and the rest of the family broke out into smiles and tears of happiness. Arnav took the doctors hand in his.
"Thank you, doctor. If you weren't here….I have lost her," whispered Arnav. His whole family looked at him in shock. Anjali couldn't believe it. Her chote had said thank you?!
The doctor nodded. "Now, if you excuse me, Mr. Raizada, I must go and get some papers ready for you to sign. In this hustle to save her, we couldn't get all papers properly signed. Oh, and please visit the main desk to make some payments. I will call you to my office later, for some important things." She smiled again and began to walk away.
"Wait! We never even asked you your name, doctor!" said Anjali. The doctor turned away and smiled the sweetest smile Anjali had ever seen in her life.
"Dr. Gupta. Dr. Khushi Kumari Gupta," she replied.
Authors Note:
I am a doctor, for all who do not know. Not a burn specialist, but I have surely studied it. I have tried to make the whole process much more easier to understand and have tried to use not many large medical terms! Please comment and press like if you would like me to continue this!
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