It was Saturday night, 8.30pm and they were in A&E. Triple whammy - a situation nobody wants to find themselves in - ever!
It was going to be a tough night.
To be honest it had already been a tough day, and for Tony a tough week. He had caught the blasted cold from his wife last weekend, and whilst she had endured a grotty couple of days before gradually improving, he had got steadily worse, and by Friday he had needed to call the doctors, something he avoided if at all possible. He returned dejectedly from an emergency appointment with a pack of antibiotics for a chest infection, hopeful at least, that this time tomorrow he would be on the mend.
By the next afternoon, showing no improvement - in fact feeling decidedly worse - they had called 111 and the advisor (after what felt like hundreds of questions) had made them an appointment with an on-call doctor, who had, in turn, promptly packed them off to hospital.
So here they were and It was a madhouse!
Tony sat down whilst Diane checked him in. He felt panicky, breathless and more than a little nauseous, and all this noise wasn't helping one bit.
Fortunately, because he had been referred, he was triaged immediately and taken to a side room where he was wired up to a monitor. He sat back and closed his eyes, trying to will the awful feelings to go away.
Diane was frantic and trying not to show it. She had been short with the on-call doctor, questioning his opinions (the only sensible thing he had said was to go to hospital), and then she had got them lost, ending up at the hospital's mental health facility instead of A&E. After frantically driving round for ten minutes, she had abandoned the car next to an ambulance to get Tony inside, almost screamed at the automated check-in machine's inane questions and then had to abandon him whilst she went to find the car park and park the car. Just to add another layer of stress, when she returned he had disappeared from where she'd left him; if a friendly nurse hadn't noticed her panic and taken her to the side room where he was being monitored, they would probably have had to cart her off, back to that mental facility they passed earlier.
When she walked in, Tony looked calm - lay on the bed and hooked up to the monitors. She composed herself before speaking. "Are you feeling any better, love?"
"Not so bad," he murmered, without opening his eyes.
He was lying. She knew he must be feeling terrible. He was a brave man who hated hospitals and this was his worst nightmare - their worst nightmare.
She sat on the bed beside him and held his hand. Helplessness is a terrible feeling and she was totally at a loss as to what she could do to make him feel better. She had hoped that the on-call doctor would just give him a new prescription; not this! It was going to be a long night.
It was actually quite promising in the beginning. Initial observations complete, they were ushered through to 'Majors' to speak to a doctor. It was mayhem on another scale, with a long queue of trolleys and their miserable incumbents lining the corridor, a group of police officers restraining a furious looking man, and a huge number of people constantly bustling around.
Because Tony was being monitored they were shown into a side room - a sparse, white box but luxury compared to the corridor.
Not long after, a nurse arrived, telling them that the doctor was looking at the test results and would be along shortly with a plan. It sounded like good news; they weren't going to be home for Strictly, but it didn't sound like it would be too long.
But there are obviously different rules about time in hospitals, because 'shortly' still hadn't arrived and it was now midnight.
As Tony alternated between coughing and dozing, Diane was left to watch the monitor, feeling waves of dread followed by relief as the numbers went up and down. Tony clearly wasn't out of the woods yet and she was desperate for the doctor to walk through the door with a plan to make all this go away.
Ignoring the hateful, beeping machine, she focused on the corridor.
Trolleys were wheeled past with all manner of occupants, some bleeding, some crying, others still and silent which seemed worse for some reason. An army of health workers in a whole array of different uniforms marched up and down the corridor, in and out of rooms, pushing trolleys, taking machines and medicine and all manner of 'stuff' wherever it was needed.
Worried families followed the trolleys or stood by the beds in the corridor, trying to give comfort and support; one woman was also looking after the man on the next trolley, fixing his blanket for him and passing him paper tissues.
A worrying number of police officers were visible, escorting people back and forth along the corridor, it made Diane wonder about what sort of Saturday night 'fun' people got up to nowadays.
At around 2am, and after another check by the nurse (still no doctor), Diane turned the light off and pushed the door to. Tony was dozing, his mouth wide open and making little gasping noises. The machine was bleeping incessantly and an alarm was going off somewhere. She leaned her head back against the wall and closed her eyes, trying to zone out the noise. Horrible dark thoughts kept popping into her head, nasty little gremlins dropping nightmare scenarios that she couldn't push away; she felt as though she was going out of her mind.
Rising sharply, she left the room and crossed the corridor to the bathroom. There was a large smear of blood on the wall. She felt sick.
She washed her face with cold water only to discover that there were no paper towels in the dispenser, and made her way, dripping miserably, back to the room.
Tony was awake.
"I need a wee," he said sheepishly.
"Oh, " exclaimed Diane, "well I'm not sure how we're going to get you to the bathroom with all your - adornments. We'd better call the nurse."
Once the situation had been explained, the nurse brought a cardboard bottle, placing it on the bed before leaving with a breezy, "Press the button when you're done."
Tony and Diane looked uncertainly at each other. Tony was lay on the bed fully clothed in jeans and a jumper, with a drip in one arm and a blood pressure cuff on the other, an oxygen tube was draped over his shoulder and up into his nose and several wires were attached to his person. "Well this should be interesting," he said.
Diane was mortified. "What shall I do? Do you need help - no, surely not. Oh my word!"
"Just make sure nobody comes in," Tony replied, "I'll find a way."
Diane went and stood with her foot against the door, glancing back every few seconds to see how he was getting on. It was certainly complicated, but eventually the business was done. Who'd have thought that having a wee could be so tricky.
"Hope I don't need a number two!" Tony proclaimed, and they both giggled. It felt nice giggling, like the weight had shifted ever so slightly.
The doctor arrived at about 3am.
"About bloody time!" thought Diane.
Tony just looked relieved.
After recounting the events of the last few days for about the fifth time today, the doctor announced that he would arrange for a chest x-ray to be done.
"Hallelujah!" exclaimed Diane, when he'd left the room, "They should have done that about six hours ago."
A few moments later, the doctor returned and wheeled Tony away, and Diane was left alone with her thoughts again.
Before she could begin to dwell on them though, a woman caught her eye. She was dressed in a hospital gown and was drifting along the corridor uncertainly. As she passed the door of the room it became apparent that the gown was 'all' she was wearing and she turned to go into the bathroom with her backside on display to everyone.
Diane gasped and then laughed out loud. She then felt guilty for laughing, emotions tumbling around her head and tears streaming down her face. "Unbelievable!" She muttered to herself, "pull yourself together woman."
On their return, the doctor announced that Tony's cold which had become a chest infection, had now become pneumonia, and that they would be starting him on a double-barrel of antibiotics immediately, one intravenously and one by mouth.
Tony was clearly alarmed and just nodded as the doctor showed him the x-ray and explained the plan.
"At least there's a plan now love," Diane said gently, "it's a step in the right direction."
Tony just closed his eyes and nodded.
At that moment, the most terrible hullabaloo began as a woman in a hospital gown took off at speed and raced, shrieking down the corridor, closely followed by a couple of police officers and some porters.
"What a little rascal!" remarked a nurse, as though this was an everyday occurrence.
"Well it woke us all up, didn't it." replied her colleague, and they both laughed as the escapee was brought, wailing, back up the corridor by the two officers.
"This is a bloody madhouse!" Diane said, almost to herself.
"Well it's entertaining, if nothing else," said Tony, "but I could do with a bit less entertainment and a bit of shut-eye."
Antibiotics were administered and it did quieten down for a few hours, allowing Tony to doze. Diane sat back against the wall again and closed her eyes, listening to the beep beep of the machines and the gentle snores coming from her beloved, sleeping Tony. Whatever would she do if anything happened to him?
Determinedly, she put that thought out of her head. He was being cared for by the greatest institution in the world, the NHS, and by all these amazing people who, despite working in a total madhouse 'and' having to put up with people like her constantly asking stupid questions, came to work with a smile on their face, day-in-day-out, and saved lives.
This army of angels carried out their mysterious chaotic dance every day, and that dance would work its magic on her Tony...she just knew it!
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