Page 4 of Surviving Her

The emergency room at Holy Souls Hospital had become a living nightmare. What had begun as a typical day, which was about as busy as Eliza could generally handle, had rapidly taken a downward spiral into fear and confusion. Eliza Carter, the chief resident, had barely taken a breath since the outbreak of the mysterious virus. The once-familiar buzz of the ER was now more than she could handle as alarms blared, distressed relatives and patients cried out for help, and nurses and doctors ran from one room to another.

Eliza tried to move down the overcrowded hallway, her eyes darting left to right as she realized that more and more desperate people were flooding into the building.

We don’t have enough beds. We can’t handle this…

Night shifts were always chaos. Eliza liked to think of her professional (and private) life as organized chaos. But this…situation…was fast becoming a frenzy. Eliza rarely felt overwhelmed—in fact, the need to move fast and make even faster decisions was what made working in the emergency room so thrilling. Nurses and doctors tended to bustle about, their faces etched with worry, but this was something different. Shestopped in her tracks and joined a crowd of people whose heads were craned upward to look at the TV mounted on the wall. All she felt in that moment was dread.

“Breaking News,” the anchor’s voice crackled, her face a mask of anxiety. “Reports are pouring in about violent attacks by individuals infected with an as-yet-unidentified virus. The situation appears to be rapidly deteriorating, with no clear understanding of the virus’s nature or how to control it. Authorities are urging everyone to stay indoors, to avoid contact with anyone displaying symptoms, and to wait for further instructions. Emergency alerts have been issued, but solid, reliable sources of information remain scarce.”

Avoid contact? Well, it’s a little too late for that.

Eliza’s stomach churned as she watched footage of the chaos unfolding on the screen. The streets in Campdale and beyond were filled with panic-stricken people running aimlessly, some pushing others with an aggression that seemed almost primal. The camera panned to police and firefighters struggling to manage the crowds, their faces lined with pure exhaustion.

This can’t be right. It looks like a movie…but that’s downtown Campdale. What the fuck is going on?

Yann Lopez, one of the ER’s junior doctors, stood beside her. His ordinarily calm and casual demeanor was replaced by what Eliza recognized from her years working at Holy Souls as physical distress. He was visibly sweating, and his top lip quivered.

“What is this, Lopez? One of those mockumentaries? Why’s everyone staring at the TV? This isn’t the real news, is it?” Eliza asked, sensing the rising alarm in her voice.

“I checked my socials. Apparently, it’s some sort of mass hysteria,” he replied, his voice tight with nerves despite trying to sound relatively assured. “It looks like something out of a dystopian nightmare. Way worse than last time. Am I right,Eliza? It wasn’t like this last time. But I just called my buddy, Josh. You know Josh, right? He’s a midwife up on G-wing. But he’s big on Twitter or X—I don’t even know what it’s called now—and he said we’d be going into lockdown, Covid-style. It’s this virus. But it might just be a new strain of the flu. People are getting the wrong idea, and…”

Eliza nodded as she touched his elbow and gave it a reassuring squeeze. “Look, from what I can gather, this virus is nothing like Covid. We’re not seeing the same symptoms. This isn’t respiratory. We’ve got fever, dehydration…and what else have you been seeing, Yann? Jesus. It is a virus, right? It’s hard to believe this is actually happening. Why is it all over the news?”

“I have no idea. I think this is a pretty big deal. Shit. But the reports are so inconsistent, and the information is all over the place. It’s making everything so much harder. My lab results are coming back with ‘unknown pathogen’ written all over them,” Yann said in a low voice.

“Listen up,” replied Eliza, trying to keep a level head. “This is nothing we haven’t seen before. We get people on drips. Everyone wears a mask. We’ve done it a thousand times. This is all just media exaggeration. Let’s not panic. It must be a slow news day, and you know how?—”

“But…” Lopez interrupted, shaking his head. “But people out there are losing their minds. We’re getting conflicting info and no real guidance. It’s a nightmare.”

“IV lines. Masks. Calm. Got it? There’s your guidance.”

As Eliza turned on her heel to see her next patient, the ER doors swung open and a new wave of patients poured in. She started in disbelief, but then rushed into a cubicle to tend to a young woman who was barely conscious.

“I’m so sorry for the wait. It’s been such a busy night. I don’t know…” Eliza stopped talking. She didn’t know how to finish her sentence. She put a hand on her patient’s forehead. Her skin wasclammy and she clearly had a high fever. The nurse beside her caught her eye, looking harried and out of breath.

“It’s Dr. Sharples. She was found collapsed on the street,” the nurse explained, her voice tinged with panic. “Her vital signs are all over the place. I’d say she’s been exposed to the virus, but we’re not sure.”

Eliza stared at the nurse in disbelief. “This isn’t Dr. Sharples. You must be mistaken. I saw her about a half hour ago. She’s working on trauma. Listen…this woman looks nothing like her. What are you talking about?”

“I’m sorry, Dr. Carter,” the nurse said slowly, shaking her head. “This is her. This virus seems to…I don’t know…the shape of her face has changed.”

“Jesus,” muttered Eliza under her breath, feeling a knot form in her stomach. “Get her on a monitor and start an IV drip. We need to stabilize her. I’ll be back in five.”

As the nurse got to work stabilizing their colleague, Eliza stepped outside and stumbled down the hallways, pushing past people as she went. As she reached the door to the staff locker room, she punched in the code on the keypad and hurled herself inside. She collapsed onto a bed and put her head between her knees, taking deep breaths in an effort to calm her nerves.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck.

Her mind drifted to her family. They were out of town, weren’t they? Where had Michael said he was going? She knew he and his wife were taking their parents away on a short vacation, but she’d paid absolutely no attention to what her brother had said on the phone.

Where are you guys?

She tried calling Michael’s number, her father’s, and then her sister-in-law’s. There was no answer. She hadn’t been able to reach them all evening. There was a chance the networks were overloaded, but a gnawing sense of helplessness pushed downon her shoulders as she went over every conceivable scenario in her head.

Maybe they’re in the mountains with zero reception. Maybe their phones are switched off because they’re on holiday. Maybe the electricity went out, and their phones weren’t charged. Maybe they’re all just asleep after a long day, and their phones are on silent. Maybe one of them got sick. Maybe they had a car accident. Maybe they fell off a cliff. Maybe they got abducted.

Eliza stood up, the quiet of the locker room feeling unnatural, almost suffocating. She couldn’t shake the memory of the dinner she’d had with them a few months ago, the image of her parents and brother vividly replaying in her mind. The smells of her mother’s homemade pot roast had filled her senses as she opened the oven door, the heat blasting into the small kitchen.

Her mother had smiled at her from across the table, but there was something different in her eyes—something Eliza hadn’t noticed when she’d first arrived at her childhood home. It was only when they’d all settled down, wineglasses in hand, that the real conversation began, one that now echoed in Eliza’s mind like a haunting melody.

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