SIX
NORTH PLATTE
On Wednesday, we broke the news to the Imperial hospital staff that we
were taking Colton to the Great Plains Regional Medical Center in North
Platte. We considered Norma’s suggestion of Children’s in Denver, but felt
it would be better to stay closer to our base of support. It took a while to get
Colton checked out, as it does anytime you leave a hospital, but to us it
seemed an eternity. Finally, a nurse came in with the discharge papers, a
copy of Colton’s test results, and a large, flat brown envelope containing
his Xrays. Sonja called ahead to the office of pediatrician Dr. Dell
Shepherd to let his staff know we were coming.
At 10:30 a.m., I picked Colton up out of the hospital bed and was
shocked at the limpness of his body. He felt like a rag in my arms. It
would’ve been a great time to panic, but I tried to keep my cool. At least we
were doing something now. We were taking action.
Colton’s car seat was strapped into the backseat of our SUV. Gently, I
laid him in, wondering as I buckled him in how fast I could make the ninety-
minute trip to North Platte. Sonja climbed into the backseat with Colton,
armed with a pink plastic hospital dish for catching vomit.
The day was sunny but cold. As I steered the SUV onto Highway 61, I
twisted the rearview mirror so that I could see Colton. Several miles
passed in silence; then I heard him retching into the bowl. When he was
finished, I pulled over so that Sonja could empty it onto the side of the road.
Back on the highway, I glanced in the mirror and saw Sonja slip the Xray
film from the brown envelope and hold it up in the streaming sunlight.
Slowly, she began shaking her head, and tears filled her eyes.
“We screwed up,” she said, her voice breaking over the images she
would later tell me were burned in her mind forever.
I turned my head back enough to see the three small explosions she was
staring at. The misshapen blotches seemed huge in the ghostly image of
Colton’s tiny torso. Why did they seem so much bigger now?
“You’re right. We should’ve known,” I said.