Chapter 23
Light pierced Damon's consciousness followed by the murmur of distant voices and beeping machines. A click sounded nearby, and a band tightened around his arm.
Still in the hospital. But which hospital?
Hazy images filled his mind of a medevac chopper kicking up dust. Durrant swearing repeatedly as he worked on him. Pain engulfing his body as Doc D put a tourniquet on Damon's left leg. He'd blacked out again at that point.
He later came to in a chaotic and rudimentary field hospital that reeked of blood and burned flesh.
Then he was shipped to the slightly less chaotic medical facility at Al Asad Air Base that smelled of antiseptic.
The only constant was the ringing in his ears and the excruciating pain in the lower left side of his body.
Amid the haze of morphine, Damon recalled snatches of conversation. Emergency evacuation. Amputation. Germany. Medical Discharge.
Wait? Amputation? Were they talking about me?
He struggled to open his eyes, needing to know. But his lids were so heavy, they refused to cooperate.
No, not me.
Then why was he in the hospital? And was he still in Germany or was he stateside now? For the life of him, he couldn't remember.
How long ago was the explosion? Two days? Three? Two weeks? Confusion filled his mind. Trying to find answers to the questions racing through his brain made his head pound.
He succumbed to the darkness that pulled at him. It felt safer than reality.
Minutes or maybe hours later, female voices pulled him from sleep.
Nurses. One filling the other in on his condition.
He forced his eyes open.
Time to face reality.
"Oh, you're finally awake." Surprise filled the middle-aged nurse's voice. She leaned over him. "How are you feeling?"
"Like I was hit by a semi-truck." The words rasped through a dry throat that felt like it was full of sand.
"Pretty close." She gave him a sympathetic smile. "Would you like a drink of water?"
"Yes, please." He attempted to sit up, but pain ricocheted through his body, so he laid back and waited for the nurse to raise the bed. He took several swallows of the cool liquid through a straw. "Thank you."
The older nurse looked at the younger one. "Go ahead and take his vitals. I'll let Dr. Campbell know he's awake before I head out."
Damon looked warily at the young nurse as she studied the monitor beside his bed and made notes on the computer. Then she ran a thermometer over his forehead and made more notes.
He kept waiting for her to look at him. When she didn't, he asked, "Where am I?"
She looked up in surprise. "You're at Walter Reed Medical Center in Maryland."
I'm stateside.
He fumbled around in his head trying to remember the other questions that plagued him earlier. Then he remembered.
Amputation.
His chest tightened, squeezing the air from his lungs.
He lifted his head and looked at each of his arms. Both sported bandages. He opened and closed both hands. They hurt because they were covered in cuts and scrapes, but they worked.
Dreading what he'd find, he shifted his gaze to his legs. The heavy thudding of his heart accelerated at the sight of his left leg propped up on a pillow, a bulky dressing eight inches below his knee.
No!
Memories came rushing back. The blast. The screaming. At least one of the voices was his. The agonizing pain.
King!
Ford!
What happened to them? Everyone kept yelling their names, but Damon was pretty sure they loaded him on the medevac helicopter first. What about McDonald?
Mind racing with questions, he looked up at the nurse, but she was already walking toward the door.
"I'll be back in half an hour with your next dose of pain meds."
"Wait." His voice croaked, sounding little more than a whisper.
The door closed behind her, and panic seized his chest. His gaze darted back to his missing leg again. She just left him here. Alone. Crippled.
He shook his head.
This can't be happening. Not to me.
But it did. It happened. It's done.
It wasn't supposed to be like this. I was supposed to come home to Grace whole. Not as an invalid who would be dependent on her.
Grace deserved a whole man.
Tears stung his eyes as anger and denial swirled around inside his head and chest like a cyclone.
He couldn't tear his gaze away from the bulky lump under the hospital blanket.
It's gone. It's really gone.
The blood pressure cuff squeezed his arm again. It may as well have been his chest.
"Well, it looks like you've finally come around. It has taken you a while." A tall slender man wearing scrubs and a white lab coat walked into the room. "They sedated you pretty heavily for your trip across the ocean.”
No wonder I don't remember anything.
“I'm Dr. Campbell." The doctor eyed the machine beside the bed. "Looks like your blood pressure is spiking."
"You try losing part of your leg and see what that does to your blood pressure." Damon's voice was still gravelly and full of anger.
"Fair point." Dr. Campbell tapped some keys on the computer and studied the monitor for a long moment before letting out a low whistle. "You're one lucky duck."
"I don't feel very lucky."
"I'm sure you don't, but regardless, you're lucky to be alive."
Damon clenched his jaw, briefly thinking maybe it would be better if he wasn't. Then he squelched that thought.
I'm grateful I came home, even if it wasn't in one piece.
"Did they really have to amputate my leg?"
"They didn't have a choice. The IED took it clean off. It's a miracle they saved as much as they did." Dr. Campbell pointed at his thigh. "The whole backside of your leg was full of shrapnel, clear up to your buttocks. Your right leg took a fair amount of shrapnel too."
Great, not only am I missing part of my leg, I’m going to be covered in ugly scars.
He couldn't help thinking again that Grace deserved better.
"The important thing at this point is to make sure none of your wounds become infected." Dr. Campbell went on, mentioning some of the more severe wounds and possible complications that could arise. Then he studied the computer again before hanging his head for a moment.
“There’s one other thing.” He shifted to a chair, putting him at eye level with Damon.
“You’ve already been through a lot, so I’m sorry to be the bearer of more bad news.
” The doctor raised his hand as though warding off an attack.
“It’s not something you need to worry about right now, but it is a significant injury, depending on your plans for the future. ”
“What are you talking about?” Damon’s gut clenched, making his words sharp and rigid.
“You took some shrapnel to the groin area. Damage was minimal compared to the severity of your other injuries. The surgical team managed to repair your urinary track, but both vas deferens were severed.”
"What?" Damon’s head jerked toward the doctor so fast it made him dizzy.
"Both vas deferens were severed." The doctor repeatedly gently, empathy written all over his face. Then he continued to talk, saying something about seeing a specialist and how there might still be options, but Damon couldn't focus on his words.
The IED gave me a freaking vasectomy?
The weight of a tank pressed against Damon's chest, rolling over it, crushing his heart. He struggled to catch his breath.
His thoughts jumped to Grace again. The two things she wanted more than anything in the world were to be a wife and mother. He was damaged goods, and he could never make her a mother.
She's better off with another man.
“This is not something you need to figure out today or even tomorrow.” Dr. Campbell’s voice pulled Damon back to the present. “Right now, your focus needs to be on your recovery.” Dr. Campbell lifted the hospital blanket from the end of the bed. "I need to check your bandage and drain."
Damon's gut clenched all over again. He wasn't ready to see that his foot and lower leg were indeed missing, but like a train wreck, he couldn't look away.
"The dressing looks good. No breakthrough bleeding." The doctor handled a small grenade shaped bulb that had pinkish fluid in it. "Not a lot of fluid draining at this point. That's good. We should be able to remove the drain in another day or two."
Damon felt an odd tug in the bottom of his leg when the doctor handled the bulbous drain.
Bottom of my leg. That is such an odd thought.
He looked farther down the bed where his foot should be.
He swore he could still feel it there. He tightened his quad as though to flex his non-existent foot.
The motion caused all kinds of pain to shoot through his leg.
Not only at the stump—another odd term that he'd have to get used to—but also on the back side of his leg clear up into his low back.
He let out a groan.
"It's best not to try to move it much for a bit longer.
" Dr. Campbell folded the blanket back down.
"Don't worry, our therapists will have you up and doing PT a lot sooner than you'd like.
It's time to prop you on your right side to get pressure off your wounds on your backside.
I'll have the nurses come in and do that in a minute. "
Damon's heart rate slowed to a sluggish pace as he struggled to wrap his mind around everything.
His life had been forever changed in that blast. One minute, he was daydreaming about building a life with Grace, the next he was a broken man who couldn't give her what she wanted most. What she deserved.
"Your mother has been contacted. I believe she is supposed to arrive tomorrow." Dr. Campbell turned toward the door.
"Wait, Doc." Damon leaned forward, sending a wave of pain pulsing through his body. "What about my buddies? King, Ford, and McDonald?"