The Vow: The True Events That Inspired the Movie Read Online Free PDF Page B

“Still, she’s hanging in there better than anybody thought she would. She’s strong, and she’s in excellent physical condition. The doctor has put in a call for an airlift to Albuquerque.” The door that had seemed shut and sealed only minutes ago had miraculously opened a crack.
    At the time I didn’t know it, but when the medical flight team got orders to fly my wife 130 miles to the University of New Mexico Hospital in Albuquerque, they were afraid, based on their experience, that it would be a wasted trip. It would take a solid hour for the helicopter to get to Gallup, and then it would be another hour before they could get my wife back to Albuquerque. By then they figured it would likely be too late. Krickitt would be dead.
    But by God’s grace, the staff at Rehoboth-McKinley Christian Hospital in Gallup took a chance on Krickitt Carpenter. As they wheeled her out of the emergency room to get ready for the flight, I saw her for the first time since I had been taken away from the scene of the accident hours before. She was lying on a gurney, surrounded by medical staff that were keeping track of what looked like about a dozen IV lines and monitors. My wife’s head and face were so swollen and bruised that I could barely recognize her. Her lips and ears were blue-black, and the swelling was so bad that her eyelids couldn’t close all the way. Her eyes looked to the right with a blank stare, and her arms moved around aimlessly (more signs of severe head injury). Her body temperature was unstable, so they had put her in a big thermal wrap. To me it looked like a body bag.
    I got up off my bed and grabbed both of Krickitt’s hands. They were shockingly cold. “We’re gonna get through this, Krick,” I said to her. “We’re gonna make it.” I smiled but felt the tears coming just the same. “Don’t you die on me!” I pleaded, my mouth inches from her face. She was wearing an oxygen mask and I could hear her breathing, shallow and tentative. “We’re in this forever, remember? We’ve got a long way to go!”
    When they began wheeling Krickitt’s gurney out to the helipad, I suddenly realized they had no intention of taking me with them. “They have to have two medics and a lot of gear to give your wife any chance for survival,” someone explained to me. “There’s no room for a passenger.”
    I wasn’t a passenger; I was her husband. I was also a patient, I suddenly realized, with fairly severe injuries of my own. I tried to convince anyone who would listen to get the helicopter to come back for me. But that wasn’t to be. Someone told me there were two other active calls at the time, and there was no time to make another two-hour round trip for me. As this registered, I helplessly watched my wife get wheeled through a set of swinging doors toward the waiting helicopter.
    “Hang in there, Krickitt! I’m praying for you!” I yelled, before I started sobbing as I watched the love of my life be rolled up to the waiting helicopter and eased inside. I stood there in disbelief as the rhythmic sound of the copter’s overhead rotor faded into the distance.

    From the moment I had arrived at the hospital, I had tried repeatedly to get in touch with Krickitt’s parents in Phoenix and mine in Farmington, New Mexico. But since it was the day before Thanksgiving, nobody was home. Running out of options, I finally called Krickitt’s old phone number and talked to her ex-roommate Lisa, who still lived with Megan in the apartment the three of them had once shared in California. I quickly explained the situation, then asked her to try and reach Krickitt’s parents, tell them we’d been in a wreck, and stand by for further news.
    Next I called my boss at the university, athletic director Rob Evers. I told him the situation and asked him to track down my parents. He said he’d take care of it and immediately started on the trail. He knew I had an uncle in Albuquerque with the last name of Morris, but he