Have you ever had a recurring dream? I used to have different variations of the same dream. It would always start out with me showing up to school, and I couldn’t remember the location of my locker was or the combination to the lock. I would then realize that I had skipped classes all semester, and I was about to take the final exam. I had no idea what was on the test! (Insert cold sweat here!)
Then after Paramedic School, I started having dreams that I was shot on the job. I would wake up in a cold sweat. Those dreams…nightmares…seemed so real. I could almost feel the bullet pierce my skin and tear through my muscle. But my rational brain knew that getting shot on the job was pretty far-fetched.
I jerked awake and had cold sweat on my forehead…Man, now I was going to have some serious bed head! I hated that dream! Blink, blink… The fog cleared, and I realized I was lying on the cot in the back of the ambulance.
BEEP. “Unit 105…take your lunch, and advise of your destination.” As usual, we headed to the best pizza slapped on a paper plate. Nothing like pepperoni pizza with a helping hand from the honey bear sitting on the counter. (Don’t knock it until you try it!) Just as we pulled up to partake in some yumminess…
BEEP. “Unit 105, respond to 1211 Camp Avenue on a Sick.” After a massive eye roll and much grumbling, I put us enroute. (No, it doesn’t make me feel any better to know that we were only 3 minutes from that address.) “Unit 105 on scene.”…and hungry.
A “Sick” call didn’t require any other first responders. Just an ambulance. All determined by the people sitting in a dark-ish room (10 miles away) answering the 911 calls. So, I grabbed the medical bag, and headed to the front door of the residence. I was greeted, somewhat abruptly, by a 20-something young lady that ushered us in the house. “He’s in there,” she pointed to the living room with a bony finger. I looked at her, and all I could think of was the Grim Reaper pointing to his next soul.
I took one step across the threshold of a dimly lit living area. Lying on the floor, in front of my partner and I, was a man with what appeared to be several gunshot wounds across his chest and one in the middle of his forehead. WHAT?!?! He was still breathing! This “basic call” just turned into a trauma! Before I could spring into action, I felt something metal shoved to the back of my head.
“Touch him, and I will blow your brains out.” Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my partner look at the source of the voice behind me. I was frozen to the spot. There was a barrel of a gun pressed against my nap-induced bed head. All rational thought had escaped my brain. “If you make a move, you’re dead.” I firmly believed the threat that was calmly spoken.
My body started shaking uncontrollably. “Please don’t do this” was all I could think to say. Everything in my soul was shouting to run out of that house, and keep running until I was far, far away (“Run, Forrest, run!”) But the paramedic in me was also screaming (in my head) that this person in front of us was still alive, and he needed us to help him. Time seemed to stand still.
As if the situation wasn’t bad enough, I had an itch in the middle of my back. The sudden urge to scratch became almost unbearable. Oh, Lord…don’t move. Don’t think about that itch…and how much better I would feel if I could just reach behind my back and scratch. My dream/nightmare was coming true. I was going to die…in this stranger’s house…all because I had to scratch my back.
A million thoughts started sprinting through my brain… How can I reach my radio attached to my belt?… Did I tell my mom and dad that I loved them earlier?… I am going to miss payday this week… Will someone check on my cats, and let my dogs out?… I will never get to take a trip down the isle… I wish I had told my ex-boyfriend that I loved him, too… I will never get to say good-bye to my brother and sister… I hadn’t realized that I was crying until the voice behind me said, “Shut up, bitch Don’t cry for this piece of shit.”
I’m sorry…what? Suddenly the tears dried up, and before my filter engaged, I informed Mr. Bad-Guy behind me that I wasn’t crying for the guy on the floor. “I am crying because this call interrupted a delicious piece of pizza,” (even though the thought of that doughy-goodness caused my stomach acid to kick in to overdrive). I could feel my partner’s eyes widen, and I could almost read his mind. He wanted to face-palm.
I was fairly certain an eternity had passed while standing in that house. The man behind me kept talking, but the only thing I could concentrate on was the wailing sound of the young lady that opened the door for my partner and me (and that itch! THAT ITCH! I just want to scratch!). Why is she wailing? She doesn’t have something that goes “BANG” pointed at her. I wanted to tell her what I thought about…
A huge crashing sound echoed through that entryway as the front door splintered apart. At that very moment, the house was flooded with a multitude of police officers, firefighters, ambulance crews…”and a partridge in a pear tree”.
In a blink of the eye, the bad guy was on the floor…cuffed and stuffed. Chaos was all around us. I turned to my partner with a questioning look. He shrugged and said, “I pushed the emergency button on the radio.”
Rule #2: Get a Kickass Partner
Well, I’ll be damned.
Not today, Reaper…not today.