Blue

They wheel around the corner to the trauma bay, where the three of us are waiting. Bright yellow Stryker with a black mattress, blue and black Zoll at the foot, O2 tank with the green canvas cover.

Mabel is standing on the side of the gurney as they wheel in, doing compressions as the medic squeezes the ambu-bag. I meet her eyes across our patient.

"Ready?" she says.

I nod.

She lets go and steps back. I reach over and wrap my hands around the tiny body, continuing CPR with my thumbs as I lift him from the gurney to the infant warmer.

I know immediately that our efforts will be in vain. He is too cold, too stiff, too blue.

But we do it anyway. Because he's only 6 weeks old.

Lucy takes his temp. "Core temp of 89.6, doc," she says.

Doc shakes his head. They've got an IO established, but we need an airway. He's holding the miniaturized laryngoscope in one hand as he looks for the chords. In the other is an equally miniature ET tube.

He and his wife will be having a baby next weekend. I wonder what he's thinking. If he's thinking.

"Tube's in." RT connects the BVM and starts ventilating again. She puffs his little lungs for him as I pump his little heart for him.

I feel the cold of his skin under my hands and the warmth of the heat lamp on my arms. I try to will some of my heat into him.

"Another round of Epi," says Doc. Mabel reaches for one of the syringes she made up when we heard they were coming.

I squeeze my thumbs and fingers together over and over, circulating the drug as she flushes it through the line.

My forearms are cramping. I ignore it. An alarm sounds and a robotic voice intones, "Check patient." I can see the monitor over Lucy's shoulder. It looks like we have a rhythm.

"Hold CPR," says Doc.

The deflections turn to a straight line. It was just me. I was only fooling myself.

"Resume CPR."

I start to feel a burning behind my eyes. Reality is rearing its ugly head.

Doc squirts the ultrasound gel on the tiny chest. The transluscent blue shines on his pale, pale skin. I do compressions in between each look at his tiny heart. The gel squishes around my thumbs.

"Stop CPR."

We all wait for the words. We know they are coming.

"No cardiac activity on the monitor. No cardiac activity on ultrasound. There's nothing else we can do. Time of death: 0316."

We stand there for a minute looking at the tiny body in front of us. Then we start disconnecting leads and lines.

We swaddle him in blanket, leaving only his face showing. I think to myself that our blankets aren't soft enough to wrap a baby in. The tube sticks out of his mouth, reminding us that there will not be a happy ending to this story.

Sometimes you know that there was nothing you could have done.

It doesn't make it any better.