Chapter 3 - Triage and Tainted Lies
The gurney wheels clicked rhythmically over the threshold as Diaz and her partner wheeled me out into the chilly night air. Flashing red and blue lights painted the suburban front lawns in stark, bleeding shades. Neighbors peered through drawn blinds, watching the shame of the Mercer household spill into the street.
"BP is 170 over 110 and climbing," Diaz announced into her radio as they loaded me into the back of the rig. "Contractions are two minutes apart, lasting forty-five seconds. Suspected uterine trauma and facial laceration from domestic battery. Alert labor and delivery."
Through the open ambulance doors, I caught sight of Mark standing on the front lawn. He was shouting at the junior officer, waving his arms, pointing back toward the house. "You don't understand, I pay the taxes here! My mother has a heart condition!"
Evelyn, however, was already in handcuffs. She wasn't yelling; she was glaring at the ambulance with an icy, unblinking hatred that chilled me far more than the wind. Her fingers were still stained with the residue of my blood.
Mark suddenly broke away and sprinted toward the ambulance doors. "Elena! Tell them it was an accident! If I get charged, I lose my license! Think about our child!"
"Back off, sir!" the escorting officer yelled, tackling Mark to the damp grass before he could reach the bumper. The sound of metal cuffs clicking shut on Mark's wrists was the sweetest symphony I had ever heard.
Diaz slammed the ambulance doors shut, shutting out the shouting and the flashing lights. Inside the sterile cocoon, she swabbed my cheek with antiseptic and placed an ultrasound probe against my swollen belly. A faint, rapid, galloping beat filled the cabin: *thump-thump-thump-thump*.
"Baby's heart rate is elevated, but she’s fighting," Diaz murmured gently, wiping sweat-soaked strands of hair from my forehead. "You did amazing, Elena. You held on."
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I closed my eyes, letting the tears finally fall. The physical pain was excruciating, but the fog of gaslighting that had suffocated me for nine months had finally burned away. They had tried to erase my pain, to make me a ghost in my own marriage, but the sound of my daughter's heart proved we were still here.
***
