Decisions, Quincy Moore [reading tree .txt] 📗

Prologue

Life is about decisions. Every single day we make thousands of them, either consciously or not and our decisions are based on what drives us. They are colored by our morals, our values, our principles, the things that makes us tick and distinguish us from others. We decide to get out of bed or not, when the alarm clock wakes us; we decide to go out on a date with that new guy from work; we even decide to be in a bad mood or not, even though it does not always feel that way and we believe it is the circumstances that make us act a certain way.
So, life is a continuous chain of decisions and choices that undoubtedly have consequences. Most of these are a simple result of the decisions made – like arriving late at work because we pressed the snooze button a few times too many and we are running late to catch our train; or to work longer to catch up and discovering we will be too late to buy some milk afterwards as the shop on the corner will be closed. It is like the line in that song: 'Turn a different corner and we never would have met.'

It is like the movie 'Sliding Doors'

and observing that our life could have been very different if we would have waited just a little longer or had left the house a few minutes earlier. In some cases it may even be the difference between life and death, like missing the plane that eventually crashed!
Fortunately most of our decisions are easy with relatively far reaching consequences, yet some decisions can alter our lives forever, although never foreseen or predicted, sometimes we end up in situations when we have to make a decision that feels right, aligns with who we are, yet, when looking back we may question ourselves if we would have made that same decision again if we truly had known the outcome beforehand. As we do not live in a world on our own and are continuously interacting with others, our decisions will without a doubt, affect others. This is a story about such a decision and how my life and those of many others were effected. You may ask me if I would do the same again and believe me, I have asked myself that question many times. You will find my story here and you can ask yourself the same, because you never know: one day you may too be faced with such a decision. Simple perhaps in the moment itself, yet with consequences you could never have known about....and perhaps you will think again before making your next decision. I am Elissa Lang and this is my story.

1
Discovery

Finally, my shift was over and after having provided handover to Susan, the night nurse, I was allowed to go home after a busy evening on one of the Medical/Surgical Wards in my local hospital. I used to work there as a permanent member of staff for years until I decided two years ago to join a Nursing Agency and explore a more flexible form of working that suited my altered circumstances. My marriage had broken down and I had a young son to look after, so Agency Nursing was a much better choice than staying in my permanent position that unfortunately did not allow a lot of flexibility from my employer – at least not the flexibility I was looking for. I did not regret joining the Agency as I enjoyed the freedom, the variety of the work on offer – good for keeping up my skills – and, of course, a better pay system than a permanent job in nursing would ever give me.
Working that night in my 'old' place was certainly a nice experience as it was good to catch up with some former colleagues who still seemed to be very happy were they were. It was obvious that there was quite a lot of building work going on at the hospital: they were creating a new Out Patients Department Area on the ground floor and the ward I had been working on that night - 3rd floor west wing - a Medical/Surgical ward, was in the final stages of refurbishment. In the previous months the layout of the department had been changed, all patients rooms had received a fresh lick of paint, new furniture and state of the art beds had been installed – with various functions to make life easier on hardworking nurses' backs - and a new Nursing Station and treatment room were almost up an running. During my shift I had still seen a couple of workmen, trying to get everything finished. It wasn't always easy to have them around whilst trying to do your job, as a lot of the time they had to be interrupted by us so we could get on with our work looking after patients, which took priority above everything else. The interruptions were tolerated by the workmen, but certainly not always appreciated. I thought I had recognized one of the workmen as a good friend of my ex-husband Chen. I hadn't been completely sure as this workmen had a goatee and his hair was much longer then the man I remembered, but when I hesitantly asked him if he was Wong, explaining who I was with the necessary referrals to Chen, he shook his head and in broken English just said: “No, my name Lau!Me no Wong!”
I made my way to the changing rooms and decided to have a shower before embarking on the road home. Noami, my child minder, would be waiting for me to come home and I was looking forward to see Kai, my little boy, now four years old and getting more cuter every day – and naughtier for that matter! I got out of my dirty nurses uniform and discarded it in the laundry bin. I picked up a set of towels from the rack and took my toiletry bag with shower gel and shampoo to the nearest shower cubicle. I enjoyed the warm water rinse my body from the work that night. Although we nurses wash our hands at least a thousand times a day and rub our hands in alcoholic disinfectant gels whenever we can, there is still nothing better than a long hot shower at the end of a busy shift. First I thought that the noise I was hearing was from the shower itself or from perhaps some building work still being carried out, but I discarded the latter thought, knowing that by now this would have stopped as the workmen should have left once the nursing night shift has arrived and patients were to be ensured at least good night's rest whenever possible. So I more or less ignored it and carried on lathering my body with the foamy gel and rinse myself with the hot water. I let out a deep sigh of wellbeing when I turned off the tap and rubbed myself dry with the fluffy towels. As I wrapped my hair in one of the towels and made my way back to my locker to get dressed, I heard the noise again: it sounded like a whimper, it was very faint but definitely there. I stopped in my tracks and kept as quiet as I could in order to listen more carefully. It had stopped again. A a few minutes later, having dressed and having combed my wet dark blond hair, deciding against drying it - I just tied it up loosely with my hair clip - I heard the noise again and I softly walked in the direction I believed the sound was coming from.
I walked all the way towards the end of the corridor of shower cubicles and there, at the far end was a larger space. A shower curtain was drawn closed and I hesitated for a moment before I pushed the curtain aside. For a split second I was a little apprehensive to do so, not quite sure what to find, briefly reminded of the classic movie 'Psycho'.

Nothing however, could have prepared me for what I was about to discover, and, as I shoved the shower curtain aside, I saw an old woman lying in the empty bathtub. She was wearing a patient's gown and was haphazardly covered by a thin blanket. It looked like she had tried to get up or roll around but had not managed to do so except for ending up more disheveled and she was partly rolled up in the blanket and partly exposed. Her skin colour was very pale with a blue tinge to her lips and fingers and I immediately knew I needed to seek help. My mind was suddenly in high alert and emergency mode! I quickly ran back to the towel rack and grabbed more towels to cover the old woman to at least try to keep her warm. I felt for her pulse and asked her if she was alright. She barely responded, except for the whimpering sound that I had heard since taking my shower and, after establishing that she was still breathing and had a reasonable pulse, I quickly ran back to the department. The nursing station was deserted and I knew that Susan, who had taken over from the evening shift of which I had been part of that night with three other nurses, must be on one of her rounds. I searched for one of the telephones, normally situated on the desk but this time frightfully absent from their usual place. I then suddenly remembered the workmen that had been busy with some of the final touches of the refurbishment. Where on earth was the phone? I needed to get help! I looked around the corridor, aware that Susan could be in any of the rooms and I would have to check every single one of them only knowing I would loose valuable time whilst an old woman was in serious need of help and medical attention. I turned to the other side of the corridor and just saw one of my colleagues of that evening come out of the male changing rooms. I sprinted towards him as he was making his way to the lifts and shouted: “Thomas, please wait, I need your help!” Thomas had turned around as he heard my voice and, as I reached him I said between breaths: “Thomas, you got to help me, there is a patient in the female changing rooms. She is in the bathtub, probably hypothermic and she needs medical attention. You were in charge tonight, how did she get there?”
Thomas looked at me in annoyance. He was dressed in a nice suit and smelled heavily of aftershave. It was obvious that he had plans for the rest of the evening.
“You have to ask Susan to give you a hand. I have a 'hot date'

and I am already running late!”, he answered, raising his brows in a suggestive manner when he said 'hot date'. He then added:“Trisha and Carly were possibly looking after that patient. They were very busy on their section of the ward, as they had a lot of admissions and I was quite busy with a patient who needed to go back to theatres for further surgery. So you need to speak to them. I have to go now!”
“Trisha and Carly have already left and you can't just leave me like this Thomas?” I replied. “Susan is busy,