Chapter 5: The First Screens
Olivia was examined under protocols for possible oral sedative or other pharmaceutical ingestion. Blood and urine screens were ordered. The empty syringe was logged and photographed again under hospital chain-of-custody rules. Emma sat on a plastic chair pulled close to the gurney, still wearing one sneaker, the other foot bare where the insole had been removed. She watched every adult who entered the room as if cataloguing who might open a door to the wrong person.
Michael Carter arrived at the emergency entrance seventeen minutes after the ambulance. He was not permitted past the triage desk. Two hospital security officers and a city officer who had taken Daniel’s place at the perimeter kept him in the waiting area while child services and the attending physician controlled access. He repeated the same account he had given at the station: the girls had refused necessary medicine, become dramatic, and run off. He demanded to see his daughters and to know who had authorized the lockout. Each demand was met with the same procedural wall—the children were under medical evaluation and temporary protective custody pending toxicology and formal interview.
Daniel stayed out of the father’s sightline but within reach of the child-services worker. He provided the printed pharmacy record showing the afternoon dispensation under Michael Carter’s prescribing credential and the matching syringe identification. The worker photographed the documents, logged them, and requested an immediate hold on any parental discharge authority until the screens returned and a safety plan could be written.
