Chapter 10: Overstitch

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As they drove away from the farm, Kaybri kept glancing to her right to watch Noah as he wrapped his hand with a bandanna and tied the ends to stem the bleeding. Kaybri, seeing the blood flow through the cloth, pulled over to the side of the road and stopped the truck.  

     Suddenly, tears were streaming down her cheeks and her hands were shaking. Noah pulled her to the passenger side of the bench seat and close to his chest. She burrowed her face into his jacket and tugged on his coat so that he was as close as possible. They stayed like that until she regained her composure. 

     Noah’s calmness quieted her, and her fear transformed into an unfamiliar yearning. Building courage, Kaybri pulled herself away from his chest, maneuvered her knees so that she was straddling his legs, and touched her lips against his. Noah hesitated at first, but then kissed her back with enthusiasm. Seconds later, though, Noah gently pushed her head away from his. 

     “Are you alright?” Kaybri asked. 

     “Yes,” Noah said, as he fought to catch his breath. 

     “Why are you stopping?” 

     “We just got attacked by dogs. I’m bleeding. We have a hurt animal in the back, and I just exchanged my first words with my father in ten years. I didn’t think…” 

     “...saving me from those dogs is exciting?” Kaybri said. She felt exhilarated. She moved forward for another kiss, only to find Noah tense and rigid. “What’s wrong?” she asked.  

     “Can we please go to the clinic? We need to treat the dog.” 

     “You’re right.” Kaybri lifted herself off Noah’s lap and got back to driving. Of course, they needed to get back to the clinic right away. Noah was absolutely right. She felt embarrassed by her forwardness at such an inappropriate time. And why would Noah be interested in her at all? What had she been thinking?  

     His words broke the train of her thought. “Kaybri, slow down a little. We need to get there quickly but safely.” She eased off the accelerator.  

     “I apologize,” she said. “I know I’ve been awful to you. I was an idiot to think you felt…about me…like I feel…” 

     “I do feel…” 

     “Then why did you push me away?” 

     “You surprised me.” 

     “Is that bad?” 

     “No.” Noah took a deep breath. “It’s a good surprise. What’s wrong has nothing to do with you. What’s wrong is that my father has attack dogs.” 

     “Hasn’t he always had them?” 

     “Despite what you think of him and the way he breeds dogs, my father is one of the gentlest people I know. I can’t imagine him using dogs as a weapon. Plain folk don’t do that. He doesn’t do that.” 

     “Maybe he’s changed? Frank did warn me to be careful.” 

     “My great-grandfather, my grandfather, and my father have been running that farm the same way for over a hundred years. They don’t change unless there’s a serious reason.” 

     “What do you think it is?” 

     “I don’t know,” he said pensively. “But I have a way of finding out. It will take a few days.” 

     Kaybri hesitated. “Your mother?” 

     “How did you know?” 

     “I didn’t. It was a guess.” 

     They fell silent again and remained so for the remainder of the drive. 

     At the clinic, they worked together to lift the still-unconscious dog out of the truck, as Noah had the use of only one of his arms. They brought the dog inside and placed him on the examination table.  

     “So, what exactly did you do to him?” Kaybri asked. 

     “I had to incapacitate him. The only way to do that, short of killing him, was to cut off the air supply until he fell unconscious.” 

     “I think the trachea is ruptured. There might be other injuries.” 

     “I pushed harder than I wanted to.”  

     “You did what you needed to do in the moment,” Kaybri said solemnly. Noah had hurt the animal to save her and himself. It had to have been a painful choice for him. 

     “Can you fix him?” 

     “It’s risky. Normally, I’d tell the owners the damage is too great and the dog’s recovery is questionable.”  

     Kaybri turned on her computer and examined detailed schematics of this breed’s throat. “This, however, is not a normal situation.” She studied the screen some more before turning back to Noah. “Let’s get an IV in him. Usually, I’d scope his throat to see where the break is. Instead, I’m going to open him up. If the rupture is too close to his lungs, then this isn’t going to work.” 

     “You can do that?” 

     “I know the technique. I just don’t know if it can be done until I see what I’m facing. Let’s get going. I need you to monitor the dog’s vitals while I do the surgery.” 

     Kaybri opened the dog’s throat and resected the tissue, sweat pouring from her forehead as she worked quickly to find the break. Noah dabbed at her brow from time to time with a clean towel.  

     When Kaybri placed a probe in the ruptured trachea and found there was room below the rupture for the respirator, she gasped with relief. “Oh, thank God.”  

     “Hold this open,” she said to Noah. “I’m going to suction the lungs and throat. If we can get him to breathe without distress, then we can go to the next step.”  

     The sedated dog coughed up a bit of liquid, and the wheezing sounds stopped.  

     “Okay. I’m going to insert a respirator and oversew the soft tissues that have been damaged.”  

     As she proceeded, Noah watched intently and kept saying things like, “Oh, man,” and “Wow.” He was clearly impressed by what she was doing.  

     “In the ten years I’ve worked for Frank, I’ve never seen him attempt a procedure like this.”  

     “Now it gets more complicated. I think the C7-21-T1 has been fractured.”  

     “Do we x-ray?” 

     “I don’t think so. Normally, we would x-ray and do a posterior cervical decompression and fusion. Since he’s already open, we’ll gently shift the trachea and look from the front.” 

     “You can do that?” 

     “Yes…but truthfully, the prospects for a full recovery aren’t good…and this is your dad’s…”  

     “Do what you think is best. He’ll understand.” 

     An hour later, Kaybri had fused the dog’s spine and returned the resected soft tissues to their original places. She turned to Noah. “Why don’t you close?” 

     “I’ve never stitched a dog’s wound,” Noah said nervously. 

     “No time like the present to learn. You’re gifted. You have the skills to do more than you think you can.” 

     Noah slipped on a fresh pair of surgical gloves over the gauze bandages on his hand, and, with Kaybri talking him through it, stitched the incision closed. 

     “Did we do it?” Noah asked. 

     “Maybe. The dog is strong. We’ll keep him sedated and on the respirator for a few days. I want to give the wound a chance to heal before he starts to stress the sutures.” 

     “What do we do now?” 

     Kaybri stripped off her gloves. “We watch his vitals. We clean up the room, and then…” Kaybri sidled up to Noah and tilted her head upward. This time they managed a much warmer and less awkward kiss. As they disengaged, Noah whispered in Kaybri’s ear, “Thank you.” 

     “With a little luck, you’ll be able to return this beast—who owes me a work boot—to your father.”  

     Noah initiated the next kiss. The blush on his face matched the color of his hair and beard. This time, it was Kaybri who put the brakes on their display of affection.  

     “Let me see that hand,” she said. “I can fix that.” 

     For the next twenty minutes, Kaybri put her full attention to cleansing and stitching Noah’s hand. As she worked, she kept looking up to smile at Noah, and each time she saw that he was grinning back at her. “Doesn’t this kind of hurt?” she asked with a smirk. He winced and nodded but never stopped grinning. 

     “I like you holding my hand. I hope it lasts forever.” 

     Forever. What a word. She liked the sound of it.