Chapter 10 - The Spark of Life
"Flatline! Asystole!" the anesthesiologist barked, slamming his palm onto the emergency alarm button. "Start chest compressions! Charge the paddles to two hundred!"
A tall male nurse jumped onto a step stool beside Nora, interlocking his fingers and driving his entire body weight down into her chest. One, two, three, four...
Two pediatricians were across the room, bent over the warming tray where my daughter lay motionless. One was using two fingers to deliver micro-compressions to her tiny ribcage while the other squeezed a miniature silicone bag valve, forcing air into her collapsed lungs.
I stood between both tables, my back pressed against the cold tile wall, watching the two people I loved most in this world die simultaneously.
"Clear!"
THUMP.
Nora’s entire body jerked off the steel table as the electric current tore through her heart.
The monitor didn't change. It stayed flat, mocking me with that single, unending scream.
"Charge to three hundred!" Dr. Patel yelled, her hands deep inside Nora’s abdomen, packing surgical sponges to stop the fountain of arterial blood. "Keep compressing! Don't let her go!"
Over at the warming table, the pediatric nurse called out, "No spontaneous respiration! Suctioning meconium! Give me zero-point-one of epi in the umbilical line!"
My legs gave out. I slid down the wall to my knees, burying my face in my bloodstained hands, a silent, broken howl tearing out of my throat. I had failed. I had let my mother and sisters poison our lives until the venom finally killed my family.
"Clear!"
THUMP.
Silence hung in the air for one... two... three seconds.
Then, a faint, metallic blip echoed from the cardiac monitor.
Blip... blip... blip...
"Rhythm returning!" the anesthesiologist gasped, wiping his brow with his shoulder. "Sinus bradycardia, but it's holding! Blood pressure rising to seventy over forty!"
"Bleeding is controlled," Dr. Patel panted, her voice trembling slightly for the first time. "Beginning closure."
Before I could even process the miracle, a tiny, sputtering cough came from the opposite corner of the room.
It started as a wet gurgle. Then, it exploded into a furious, ear-splitting, glorious wail that cut through the sterile hum of the operating room.
WAAAAAAAH! WAAAAAAAH!
"We have lungs!" the pediatrician laughed out loud, tears in his own eyes as he swaddled the screaming, bright-pink infant in a warm flannel blanket. "Apgar is six, moving to eight! She's breathing on her own!"
The nurse walked over and lowered the warm, squirming bundle into my trembling arms.
I looked down at her. She had a thick mop of dark hair, Nora’s delicate nose, and tiny, perfect fingernails that immediately grabbed the collar of my scrub gown.
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"Meet your daughter, Mr. Mercer," the nurse whispered.
I buried my wet face into the blanket, kissing her warm forehead as Nora’s cardiac monitor beeped a steady, triumphant rhythm in the background.
