I have been a running mess since the phone call. I knew this was going to happen and there is absoutely no time to waste. I made sure the pediatric surgeon was called and we both run out of our cars at the same time.

We don't even take the elevator because at this point it will only slow us down. Jewels is waiting at the nurse station for us when we bust through the doors. I am relieved that for some reason tonight she had to take this late shift to cover a fellow nurse.

"Labs." Jewels hands them over to me when I slide to a stop by the counter.

"We need to get the operating room called now." The pediatric surgeon calls out over my shoulder looking at the extremely high numbers.

We put on gloves and run to the patients room. The little girl is laying on the bed unconicous with her parents surrounding her.

"What is going on with my daughter." The mother yells.

"Ma'am I need you to step back now while we insert a breathing tube." The surgeon gets to prepping and placing the tubing.

"Not until you tell us what is wrong." The dad shouts.

"Sir. You need to back up and give the surgeon space to work. Your daughter is unconicous because her white blood cell count is through the roof right now. Was she in a lot of pain before she passed out?" I ask them.

"Yes, she was crying but the nurse gave her medication." The dad looks at his daughter.

"Well her appendix is completely ruptured at this point. The simple surgery we have been trying to get you to consent to would have prevented this from happening. We have been giving her antibotics to try to see if it would have helped but it didn't. It only delayed this from happening and now because she is in a critical state with bodily toxins flowing through her abdomin, surgery will be done and we don't need consent any further to treat your daughter." I rush out.

"You can't do that! There is other ways to treat her and if you had done your job this wouldn't have happened." The dad shouts.

"Sir with all due respect, you got this bogus information off of the internet. All the things you wanted us to do as treatment is not possible, meaning not safe. I am a trained medical doctor that you refused to listen too and now I am trying to make sure we can save the life of your daughter. So I need you to back up to where the surgeon can wheel the bed out." I say sternly.

The surgoen takes off with a couple of OR nurses that came rushing in. They take off and get on the elevator to get the child to the operating room as fast as they can. I can only hope the infection is not as tremendous as we think it is.

I walk out of the room quickly and step up to the nurse station.

"Jewels, I need you to call the Head Medical Specialist over this case, he needs to be aware of all of this. So get copies to him on all the refusals they signed along with our notes. Then I want Child Protective Services called. The way these parents have done and been is neglect to their own child and if they trusted the internet over a doctor I want her home life looked at to make sure nothing else could be harming her."

Jewels nods and gets to work. I hate having to do this, but this poor child should not have had to go through all of this either. It should have been a simple surgery weeks ago.

I keep tabs on how the surgery is progressing and help Jewels to get the work done I asked for. The surgery ended up lasting over two hours long to clean and flush out the toxins that was released when it bursted. The child is finally in recovery but we are having to monitor her closely which has kept the parents from seeing her, to where they can not cause any issues while we make sure she stays stable.

It is early morning hours by the time I am walking back to my car. My next shift starts within six hours, but I want to go home and see my boys before I sleep.

Unlocking the front door, I take my shoes off and see Jack asleep on the couch. Walking over to him, I kiss his lips. Jack's hands come up and cup my face before I pull back.

"I am so sorry it took awhile." I whisper.

"It is okay snowflake, you have to help others get better. I just hope it went good." Jack smiles and sits up, looking over to the clock.

"Do you want something to eat? You barely had dinner." He looks at me.

I shake my head. "I couldn't eat right now even if I wanted too."

Jack slowly nods, but doesn't press further knowing I can't explain. "Let's get to bed. You don't have much time to sleep before you have to go back." He whispers.

Jack takes my hand and walks down the hall with me. I stop him for a minute and open Nicolas's door, hearing his light snores I close it back.

"Sorry I just had to check on him." I yawn some.

"Nothing to be sorry for." Jack smiles and picks me up.

He carries me to the bedroom and I undress from my scrubs. Jack puts one of his tee shirts on me, which is my favorite gown to where at night. We get in bed and I cling to him tightly.

I hate getting nasty with parents and it is the first time I ever had too. Most of the time it is just comforting parents and calming their fears, never have I had parents refuse treatment that would help a child. My heart aches for that little girl, she is lucky that everything turned out for the best when it could have easily went the wrong way.

Children bounce back so much faster than adults but even their little bodies have limits. My only hope is that I never have another case like this but my career is still young and I know that things will be thrown at me when I least expect it and the only thing I can do is be ready for the unexpected.