The Pain Nurse - [16]

Suits and scrubs. The best nursing administrators maintained the fine balance. Stephanie Ott, RN, MSN, seemed to have little interest in such esoterica. After five years as vice president for nursing, she had yet to visit many of the wards and departments at Cincinnati Memorial. Most of the nursing staff had never seen her outside the large meetings or video-casts that usually announced an unpleasant new policy or staff cutback. She probably hadn’t touched a patient in years, but her ability to reach out with vengeance was legend. One victim was Cheryl Beth’s friend Denise, who had kicked an obnoxious film crew out of the ICU. Denise was one of the best ICU nurses Cheryl Beth had known, and she couldn’t have cared less that the crew worked for an advertising agency owned by a member of the hospital’s board. Stephanie Ott cared, and the next day Denise was banished to the overnight shift on a patient floor.

Now Ott was leaning against an L-shaped desk covered with thick reports constrained by colored binders, blue, taupe, yellow, orange, sage. A small Christmas tree anchored one corner of the desk. As Cheryl Beth entered, she stood, crossed the carpet and took both her hands, leading her to a nearby sofa.

“How are you holding up?”

“I’m okay. It’s been a rough few days.” She sat and relaxed a bit.

“I can only imagine.” Ott sat precisely in a nearby armchair. “Finding her that way.”

Cheryl Beth’s native volubility deserted her. That had been happening a lot the past week.

“What in the world were you doing down there, at that time of night?”

The question was in the same conversational tone, but Cheryl Beth’s initial caution returned. She explained about Christine’s message, told more than was needed about the deserted hallway, the bloody body, the phone ripped from the wall and the inability of cell phone signals to escape that damned basement. Ott continued to look at her, but her attention shut off, as if on a timer. Cheryl Beth shut up.

“I got a call this morning from one of our board members. She told me that a friend of hers was brought here from an auto accident, and the emergency room had run out of stretchers.” A harder tone slowly took over her voice. “Ran…out…of…stretchers. Can you believe it?” Cheryl Beth nodded sympathetically. The ER often ran out of stretchers. Memorial was the primary caregiver for thousands of low-income and indigent people. It also operated a Level One trauma center. The hospital had been through years of budget cuts that had not just made it hard to buy new equipment, but had even reduced the nursing staff. Cheryl Beth could see it on nearly every floor, the nurses overworked, understaffed. It was a wonder they did so well.

“This hospital is in trouble,” Stephanie said. “I’m told this used to be the top hospital in the city, the place where the rich came for treatment. Now we have a great neuro-science unit. We’re still a teaching hospital. Then, well, what’s left is pretty much a welfare hospital.” Her eyes narrowed. “There’s talk of merging with University Hospital, if they would have us. Or simply shutting down. Do you know that?”

She didn’t wait for an answer. Cheryl Beth, of course, had heard all the gossip. She also had been approached several times about joining University Hospital, which made her even less afraid of Stephanie Ott.

The suit kept talking. “It doesn’t help that the black ministers have been holding a vigil outside every night this week, because of that boy, I mean, young man, whom the police shot. Do we need this kind of trouble? Why are they singling us out? I just don’t understand this sense of grievance.”

“Well, I’m not black,” Cheryl Beth said. “So I can’t see it through their eyes. There’s a lot of hurt…” She stopped herself.

Ott looked at Cheryl Beth as if she should say something, to make sense of all this…to take the blame? She said, “Why are you telling me this, Stephanie?”

The woman stood and strode to her window, staring out at the black scrimshaw of winter trees. “I’ve always had my reservations about you. You like to make your own rules.”

“I can play well with others,” Cheryl Beth said lightly.

“You didn’t want to stay on the pain management committee…”

“I just thought I could use those eight hours a week to be helping people.”

“Yes, well. We’d all like to stay in our comfort zones.” She turned back and stared at Cheryl Beth. “You do things you shouldn’t. Doctors complain.”

“Who? What?” Cheryl Beth demanded, unable to control her temper. “I work directly for Dr. Ames and Dr. Carpenter. I’m certified with advanced practice credentials.” Just like her grandmother, she talked, shouted, with her hands. “Docs sign off on my orders. I work with them. My record is totally clean. The only ones who complain are the same bastards who say ‘pain isn’t an emergency’ and let their patients hurt. They say, ‘This namby-pamby patient’s still moaning seven days after surgery and needs to get a grip.’ And too many nurses are terrified to say anything about it. That’s not me.” She made herself calm down and put her hands obediently in her lap.