The (Second) Chance of a Lifetime

It’s almost time. I can tell without even looking at the clock because Dad, settled in his recliner, for the first time since he sat down he reaches for the remote, flipping away from the ever-present old westerns that are on our television. But it’s to be expected, it’s Friday after all, and by the sound of it, it’s almost 9 o’clock. 

The summer breeze is ruffling the curtains, and with it  I can hear the sound it carries. Our neighbors are also turning their TVs, the beginning music can be heard from every house down the street. I don’t remember when the show started, actually, I am not entirely sure that anyone remembers exactly when it started. But every Friday at 9 p.m., without fail, the televisions switch programs for as long as I can remember. 

“You all know what time it is!” The host’s boisterous voice starts, the clock must have just rolled over. 

I can hear my little sister giggle as she tries to answer through the snack she has in her mouth, “Mime! Mime!” I smile at her as I scoop her up, prop her up on my lap, and settle on the floor in front of our couch. 

“That’s right, Folks! It’s nine o’clock on this breezy Friday evening! And tonight we have a special show for planned for you!”

I roll my eyes, every Friday is a special show. 

The show, as everyone knows, is famous for this kind of stuff. I personally think it’s a hoax. But everyone just accepts it as truth. 

“Tonight our special guest is Dr. Matthew Gregory Valdez!”

I feel my eyebrows shoot up, that is actually a surprise. The show's guest is usually a random person from the audience, that’s the part that I think is a hoax. How can you give someone the second chance they need without ever knowing beforehand what they need to be redone? 

Normally, it was people that would get on stage and start crying about a botched proposal, or that fender bender they got in on the way to work. Most people's second chances came down to a few crucial minutes of mistakes. One wrong turn, one wrong step, something like that. The second chance only takes a few minutes allowing around three people to be picked per show. Sometimes I wonder if that is why they have the show air on Friday, people now have a week’s worth of regret that they have a chance to take back. 

“Dr. Valdez-” the camera swoops away from the host’s smiling face, something about that smile always made me think of a clown, like there was an inside joke that the rest of us weren’t in on, and zooms in on a man sitting in a chair on the show’s stage- “Please tell us why this week’s second chance is so important.”

Dr, Valdez doesn’t answer right away. There’s a drumroll from the show’s band, and I can tell that the audience members are on the edge of their seats; except for the few grumbling that they didn’t get their chance. Dr. Valdez doesn’t seem to take any notice of the shift in the show. He stays still in his lifted chair, staring at his hands. Unmoving. 

“Dr. Valdez?” The camera moves to focus back on the host. His smile never wavers but he does arch one of his perfectly filled-in eyebrows.

The doctor on stage blinks and raises his head. He looks around at his surroundings before it focuses on our host, “Yes?”

“Can you please tell us-” his hand gestures at the audience and then to the cameras- “why this week’s second chance is so special?”

The doctor looks down at his hands once more before he rests them on his legs, then he looks into the camera, “Because this week’s second chance is life or death.”

The screen of our TV is filled with the audience’s gasping faces. I look back at my parents. My mom is sitting on the couch, a forgotten magazine laying on her lap, she looks at my father with worry in her eyes. I watch her lay a hand on his arm, I’m sure she’s going to whisper ask if he thinks this will be okay for us kids to watch. Without turning to look at her, without her even asking, my father just grunts out a dismissive, “It’ll be fine.”

I turn back to the TV.

“Oooh!” The host says, “Exciting! But can you elaborate, Doctor?”

The doctor sighs, “Hello, I am Dr. Matthew Gregory Valdez,” he says reintroducing himself, “I am a surgeon at St. Catherine’s Teaching Hospital. And last Monday I performed an appendectomy-”

“A what, Doctor?”

Dr. Valdez rubs his palms on his pants as if trying to rid them of sweat, “An appendectomy, it’s an emergency surgery to remove an inflamed appendix. It’s a very common surgery that usually comes with very few risks as long as the inflammation is caught early.”

“But this wasn’t caught early enough?”

The doctor shakes his head, “No, it was. But it wasn’t enough.” He swipes his palms on his pants, and again, back and forth, like there is something on his hands that he couldn’t get off.

“What happened, Doctor?” I don’t how a person pulls off looking concerned with a smile on their face, but apparently it is possible.

“The patient was 12 year old Madeline Nottingham,” the doctor finished looking at his lap.

I heard my mother gasp behind me, and for the next few minutes the crowd couldn’t be quieted. Everyone is asking questions over each other. The host has his arms up trying to silence the audience. Finally, there is silence on the screen. 

“Madeline Nottingham?” The host asks turning back to the doctor. 

Dr. Valdez nods.

“As in the Prime Minister’s daughter, Madeline Nottingham?”

Again the doctor nods. 

“Tell us more.”

The doctor continues to stare at his lap, “On Monday afternoon Ms. Nottingham was sent home from school for a slight fever and pain in her abdomen. Her parents brought her to our emergency department that night because of the persistent pain, that Ms. Nottingham insisted was getting worse. It was quickly determined to be appendicitis, I was the surgeon on call. It was a routine procedure,” I can see him swallow all the way from my seat, “it should have been a routine procedure.”

I look at my mother. One hand is covering her mouth and the other is back on my father’s arm, with my father’s hand wrapped around hers. I look down at my sister, even though I know she’s too young to understand. She, of course, ignores me as she babbles to herself and chews on her fingers. 

“How is it Matthew,” the doctor flinches, “that we haven’t heard about this until now?”

“We don’t allow the press in our Hospital or on the grounds. Mrs. and Mr. Nottingham asked for time to mourn before releasing the information to the news. Of course, we weren’t going to deny them that.”

“So what changed?”

Dr. Matthew Gregory Valdez raises his head and looks directly at the host, “I want to change it.”

With that, the grandeur returns back in the host’s expression, “Well, sir, you have come to the right place because this is where anyone can get a Second Chance!” The band begins playing the show’s theme. “This is Second Chance and let’s get started!”

There’s movement on stage, the host finally steps up on stage with Dr. Valdez. Dr. Valdez stands and someone is there to whisk the chair away. A small foam mat is placed on stage behind where the doctor is standing, we’ve seen this before, sometimes when coming back from their chance at a second chance people can be dizzy and fall. Though, I’ve only actually seen someone fall once. 

Finally, the band’s playing of the show’s theme comes to an end and the host is standing with Dr. Valdez’s hands in his. “Are you ready, Doctor?”

“I think so.”

If possible the host’s smile gets wider, “You think so? Dr. Valdez this is your one chance at a Second Chance, you had better be ready.”

The doctor nods with a new look of determination on his face, “I am ready.”

“Perfect!” He raises their combined hands in the air, “Now, Doctor, do you remember where you were? Be specific.”

“I was at St. Catherine’s Teaching Hospital in Operating Room 1-A.”

“Do you remember when?”

“This past Monday, May 12th, scrub in started at 22:37. The patient went under anesthesia at 23:00. Everything was going fine until closing at 23:55, just as I was about to close I noticed more blood at the incision site than there should have been. Upon inspection, although we had stopped the bleeding just a few moments before the cavity had filled back up with blood. It must have been due to a hemorrhage that we were unaware of.”

“Do you know what you are going to do differently? Do you know how you’re going save the girl?”

Silence followed the question.

“Doctor Valdez, do you know how you are going to save the girl?”

“I’m-” there was a far off look in his eye, “I’m-” again he paused, blinked, and then steeled himself. “To find the hemorrhage and stop it before it causes her to bleed out internally.”

The band starts playing music to get our heart rates increased. It works, for me at least. I can feel my heart jump into my throat. The host’s eyes light up and the lights on stage dance. 

“Alright, Doctor Matthew Gregory Valdez let’s begin your Second Chance!” There was an appropriate cheer from the audience. "Now, picture where you want to be, picture how you are going to be. That's right, close those eyes. Now take a deep breath." 

As always there’s a flash of light. That’s another part of the whole thing that I think is a hoax, ooh flash of light and abracadabra the person disappeared. All very showy for it to be real. But the doctor is gone, leaving the host on stage by himself. 

The host turns to the audience and smiles, “Let’s have a look at our doctor and see how’s he doing!” His arm sweeps over to a big screen on the wall.  They must fix and camera and a mic on the audience person during one of the commercials. 

“Now, as usual, the doctor has no contact with us but we will be able to see and hear what he is doing.”

The big screen turns on, and the doctor is staring at bland walls and a sink. He looks down at his hands and holds them away from his body. He must already be scrubbed in.  

“Doctor Valdez, she’s ready.” A nurse in scrubs opens a door with the news. 

The camera shakes a little as the doctor nods and walks through the held open door. The sounds of beeping can be heard before any of the machines come into sight. 

“Whoa there, Folks!” The camera focuses back on our host, “Some of the following video and audio may not be suitable for all audiences. If you are a bit squeamish or of a younger age perhaps you should step away now.”

I looked back at my mother, she’s already looking at me. “Maybe you should take Maggie out back and play on the swings?”

Maggie’s head popped up at the mention of swings, but I groaned. “But Mom!”

She shakes her head at me, “No arguing, go on ahead now.”

“Yes, Mother.” I grabbed Maggie and hoisted her up on my hip. “Come on, Maggie let’s go swing!”

I have to wince at Maggie’s squeal but I take her out to the back yard anyway. I put Maggie in her favorite swing, the red one never the blue one unless you want an earful. Maggie cheers with the first push.

“High! High!” 

“Higher? Are you sure that you want to go higher?”

“Yeah!”

For a moment, she’s happy just swinging. But soon she is bored and starts flexing her hands asking to be picked up. “Okay, okay Maggie. What now?”

She points at the wooden, handmade sandbox. Once I make sure she’s settled and not going to eat any sand I sneak back into the house. The floor groans under my feet and I’m sure that I am caught, but after a moment of holding still, there’s no rebuke from my parents so I continue on. I peak my head around the corner and I see why my parents weren’t paying me any attention. 

The show is doing what it can to blur the picture but there’s no mistaking the blood. 

“Doctor! We’re losing her!”

I hear my mother gasp, when I look over her head is buried in my father’s should. Dad’s hand is holding her close. 

“Doctor! You have to do something!”

The camera snaps up to look at the women, “I am doing something dammit!”

The camera goes back to being blurry. Pale hands fly across the red background, trying desperately to stop the bleeding. No matter what the doctor does, the blood keeps coming. I watch in silent horror, not noticing the beeping in the background until it becomes one solid ring. I’ve seen enough TV to know what that means. 

There’s a flash of light and the doctor is back on stage. For the first time, the host isn’t smiling. No one is smiling. 

“No,” Dr. Valdez drops to the ground, “no.” He beats his fists on the floor. “No! No! No!”

“Doctor,” the host tries.

“This wasn’t supposed to happen!” He slaps the ground. “I was supposed to fix it! This was supposed to fix it! I was supposed to save her.”

“Doctor,” the host tries again. 

Dr. Valdez looks up, “You,” he crawls over to the host. He pulls himself up by the host’s pants. “You can send me back. You can send me back and this time I can fix it.”

The host takes a step back, “I can’t-”

“You can! You have to! I have to save her!” Then quieter, “I have to save her.”

The host tries to take another step back, tries to get the doctor’s hands off his pants. “I’m sorry I can’t.”

“Why not?” The doctor’s voice has turned from pleading to menacing.

“That’s not how this works. This wasn’t supposed to happen. This is Second Chances. Everyone wins.”

Everyone is silent.

“That’s not how this works. I can’t. There are no third chances.”