None of my chemistry or electronics training or a semester of Latin in high school prepared me for this work, but even my basic assistance allowed the doctor to concentrate on diagnosis and treatment instead of running back and forth to the lab. He said the hospital saved about four lives a day and having me in the laboratory raised the number to five. Still, I had not heard from Beth.
A few days before Christmas I had a dream in which I received a letter from Beth breaking off our relationship and then in the dream I died. That very morning the letter from Beth arrived and she did indeed end things between us. Naturally, since the dream scarily predicted the letter, I was convinced I was about to die!
I thought of all the possible causes of death in Haiti. In the hospital we encountered any number of infectious diseases: malaria, TB, parasites, hepatitis B & C. Some of those could be transmitted when one of us accidentally stuck ourselves with a needle or lancet that we had just used on an infected patient; something I did a number of times.