Charlie St. Cloud

by Ben Sherwood

  “I’m a man and I can do what I want,” Sam said, enjoying the sound of it. A great moon floated on the Saugus River, and he rolled down the window. “Look,” he said. “It’s bigger tonight. Must be closer to us.”

  “Nah,” Charlie said. “It’s always the same distance. That’s just an optical illusion.”

  “What’s that?”

  “When your eye plays tricks on you.”

  “What kind of trick?”

  “Wherever it is in the sky,” Charlie said, “it’s always 225,745 miles away.” He did the math. Numbers were easy for him. “At our speed right now, it would take about 170 days to get there.”

  “Mom wouldn’t be too crazy about that,” Sam said.

  “And Mrs. Pung wouldn’t be happy about the mileage.”

  The boys laughed. Then Sam said, “It’s no optical delusion. It’s closer tonight. I swear. Look, you can see a halo just like an angel’s.”

  “No such thing,” Charlie said. “That’s a refraction of the ice crystals in the upper atmosphere.”

  “Gee, I thought it was a refraction of the ice crystals on your butt!” Sam howled with laughter, and Oscar barked in a series of sharp, distinctive woofs.

  Charlie checked his mirrors, aimed the car straight ahead, and took one quick glance to the right. The moon was flickering between the iron railings of the drawbridge, keeping pace with them as they sped home. It sure seemed closer than ever tonight. He turned his head for a better look. He thought the bridge was empty so he pushed down on the gas.

  Of all his reckless decisions that night, surely this was the worst. Charlie raced the moon, and in the final second before the end, he saw the perfect image of happiness. Sam’s innocent face looking up at him. The curl dangling over his forehead. The Rawlings glove on his hand. And then there was only fracturing glass, metal, and blackness.

  TWO

  WITH A COLD WIND RUSHING THROUGH THE SPANS IN THE General Edwards bridge, Florio Ferrente snatched the jaws of life from the back of his rig. The serrated blades weighed forty-one pounds and could chop through steel, but he wielded them like kitchen scissors in his hulking hands.

  Florio kneeled for a moment and offered the fireman’s prayer that came to his lips every time he went to work.

  Give me courage.

  Give me strength.

  Please, Lord, through it all, be at my side.

  Then came the blur of action. One thousand—one million—calculations and considerations. All instantaneous. He evaluated the spilled gasoline and the chance of a spark or explosion. He assessed the fastest way into the wreck—through the windshield, hood, or doors? And he did the math on how much time he had for this rescue. Time, precious time.

  Florio ran past the jagged skid marks and jackknifed tractor trailer. He didn’t bother to stop for the truck driver leaning against the center divider. The man’s head was in his hands. He reeked of beer and blood. It was one of the rules of rescue: Heaven protects fools and drunks. The guy would be fine.

  The instant license-plate check on the white wagon had produced the first bit of information. The Ford belonged to Mrs. Norman Pung of Cloutman’s Lane, Marblehead. Age: 73. Vision-impaired. Perhaps the first clue.

  The vehicle was crunched and tossed upside down, like a cockroach, its front end smashed into the railing of the bridge. He could tell from the trail of glass and metal that the car had rolled at least twice. Florio dropped to the pavement and peered through a squashed window.

  There was no noise inside. No sound of breathing or moaning. Blood trickled through cracks in the metal.

  With swift movements, he jammed a power spreader into the narrow space between the hood and door. A quick flick of his thumb and the hydraulics surged. The car frame groaned as the machine drove the metal apart, clearing a narrow crawl space. Florio pushed his head inside the wreck and saw two boys, upside down, unconscious, tangled in seat belts. Their twisted arms were wrapped around each other in a bloody embrace. No sign of Mrs. Pung.

  “Two traumatic arrests up front,” he shouted to his partner, Trish Harrington. “A dog in back. Scoop and run. Priority One.”

  He slid out of the wreckage and shoved the Hurst tool into the hinges of the door. Another jab of the thumb, and the blades took two powerful bites. Florio pulled the door right off and threw it across the pavement.

  “Gimme two C-spine collars,” he yelled. “And two short backboards.”

  He crawled back inside. “Can you hear me?” he said to the smaller boy. “Talk to me.” No response. No movement. The kid’s face and neck were wet with blood, eyes and lips swollen.

  It was another rule of rescue: If the child is quiet, be scared.

  Florio wrapped a brace around the boy’s neck, strapped on a backboard, then cut the seat belt with his knife. He lowered the patient gently and pulled him out onto the pavement. He was slight, around eighty pounds, and, incredibly, was still wearing a Rawlings baseball glove on one hand.

  “Pupils are blown,” Florio said, checking with his flashlight. “He’s posturing. Blood from the ears.” Bad signs, all. Time to go after the other victim. He climbed back inside. The teenager was pinned beneath the steering column. Florio wedged another spreader into the foot space and hit the hydraulics. As the metal separated, he could see one open fracture of the femur. And he smelled the awful brew of radiator fluid and blood.

  He collared the boy quickly and tied the back brace into place, then pulled him out and carefully set him down on the pavement.

  “Can you hear me?” he said. Not a word.

  “Squeeze my hand if you can hear me,” he said. Nothing.

  The two young victims were now lying side by side on backboards. The little dog in the backseat was hopeless, crushed between the rear axle and the trunk. What a waste. “St. Francis,” he whispered, “bless this creature with your grace.”

  Florio checked his watch. This was the golden hour: less than sixty minutes to save their lives. If he could stabilize them and get them to the trauma surgeons, they might survive.

  He and his partner lifted the first boy into their ambulance. Then the second. Trish ran around to the driver’s seat. Florio climbed in back and leaned out to pull the doors shut. On the horizon, he saw the full moon. God dropped it there, he was sure, as a reminder of our small place in the world. A reminder that what is beautiful is fleeting.

  Then the ambulance lurched forward, and the siren screamed. He pulled the doors closed. For an instant, his fingers found the well-worn gold medallion around his neck. It was St. Jude of Desperate Situations.

  Show me the way …

  He put his stethoscope to the chest of the younger boy. He listened and knew the simple truth.

  This was a time for miracles.

  THREE

  A MIST SHROUDED THE GROUND, MUFFLING THE SOUNDS OF the world. Charlie, Sam, and Oscar huddled in the damp and dark. There was no one else around. They could have been anywhere or nowhere. It didn’t matter. They were together.

  “Mom will kill us for this,” Sam said, shivering. He smacked his fist into his mitt. “She’s gonna be mad. Really mad.”

  “Don’t worry, little man,” Charlie said. He pushed the curls from his brother’s face. “I’ll take care of it.”

  He could imagine his mother’s disappointment: her forehead turning red, the veins in her temples pulsing, her devastating frown with those little lines scrunching around her lips.

  “They’ll send us to jail for this,” Sam said. “Mrs. Pung will make us pay, and we don’t have any money.” He turned his head and focused on a jagged shape in the murk. There it was—the carcass of the station wagon. What hadn’t been destroyed in the crash had been cut to pieces by the rescuers.

  “You won’t go to jail,” Charlie said. “You’re not old enough. They wouldn’t punish a twelve-year-old that way. Maybe me, I was driving; but not you.”

  “What are we gonna do?” Sam said.

  “I’ll think of something.”

 
; “I’m sorry,” Sam said. “It was my fault.”

  “No, it wasn’t.”

  “I distracted you with the moon.”

  “No, you didn’t. I should’ve seen the truck and gotten out of the way.”

  Sam thwacked his glove. The sound fell flat in the nothingness. Another thwack. “So now what?” he said.

  “Give me a minute,” Charlie said. “I’m thinking.” He looked around, trying to make sense of the landscape. There was no sign of the bridge, no curve of the river, no outline of the city. The sky was a blanket of black. He searched for Polaris, the North Star. He scanned for any constellation to give him bearings. All he could see were shapes moving in the distance, solids in the fluid of night.

  And then through the gloom, he began to realize where they were. Somehow, mysteriously, they had been transported to a small hill with two drooping willows overlooking the harbor. He recognized the curve of the shore with its huddle of masts bobbing on the water and the green glow of the lighthouse.

  “I think we’re home,” he said.

  “How’d that happen?”

  “No idea, but look, there’s Tucker’s wharf.”

  He pointed, but Sam wasn’t interested. “Mom’s going to ground us,” Sam said. “We better make up a good story, or she’ll use the belt.”

  “No, she won’t,” Charlie said. “I’m coming up with a plan right now. Trust me.”

  But he had no idea what to do or how to get them out of this jam. Then he saw another light in the distance, faint at first, but growing brighter. Maybe a flashlight or a rescue party. Oscar began to bark, friendly at first, then he let out a long yowl.

  “Look,” Sam said. “Who’s that?”

  “Oh shit.” Charlie never swore, and Sam tensed up.

  “Is that Mom?”

  “No, I don’t think so.”

  “Then who? Who’s coming? I’m scared.”

  The light was warm and bright, and it was getting closer.

  “Don’t be afraid,” Charlie said.

  They were dead and gone.

  No pulse. No breath. Hypoxic. No oxygen in the blood, from cardiac arrest brought on by blunt trauma. Dead and gone. Florio flashed his light stick one more time into the blown pupils of the older boy. They were black and bottomless.

  He stuck leads on the kid’s wrists and left chest, then punched the button on the monitor. The line on the six-second ECG strip was flat.

  “This is Medic Two,” he said into the radio. “I’ve got two crunch cases. Pulseless nonbreathers.”

  Florio grabbed his intubation kit and slipped the curved steel blade of the laryngoscope into the boy’s mouth. Pushing aside the kid’s slack tongue, he aimed for the entryway to the trachea, a small gap between the vocal cords. He pressed harder and the instrument eased into position. Perfect. With a whirl of motion, he inflated the cuff, fastened the ambu bag, and began to ventilate.

  The vehicle hurtled toward the North Shore ER, and Florio knew there was really only one chance left. So he pulled out the Zoll defibrillator paddles, pressed them to the kid’s bare chest, pushed the button with his thumb, and blasted him with 250 joules.

  Damn.

  The monitor showed no cardiac conversion. The heart was still in V-fib, quivering like Jell-O in a bowl. In rapid mechanical movements, Florio clamped a tourniquet on the kid’s arm, found a vein, jabbed a needle, plugged in an IV line, and pumped epinephrine. Then he dialed up 300 joules.

  He pressed the button, and the body convulsed. Again no luck, but Florio had been here before. He had saved countless diabetics in hypoglycemic seizure with shots of D50. He had rescued dozens of heroin OD’s with blasts of Narcan. He never gave up. It was never too late for miracles. Even when a casket was covered with dirt, it wasn’t necessarily over. Over the years, he had collected clippings about the dead rising up and banging on their coffins to get out. He was especially fond of the case in South Africa of the reverend who stunned mourners at his own funeral when he joined in the chorus of his favorite hymn from inside the casket. And there was the Greek Orthodox bishop lying in state as congregants paid their final respects. When church bells began to ring, he woke up, climbed down from the catafalque, and demanded to know why everyone was staring.

  So Florio dialed up 320 joules on the Zoll and hit the button. The body in front of him heaved from the shock. This was the last chance. Unless he could get the boy back into regular cardiac rhythm, it was over.

  FOUR

  THE GLOOM WAS GONE, AND THE LIGHT HAD ALMOST encircled them.

  Sam was shaking now and had wrapped his arms around Oscar. “I’m afraid,” he said. “I don’t want to get in trouble. I don’t want Mom to yell. I don’t want strangers to take us away.”

  “It’s gonna be okay,” Charlie said. “Trust me.” He felt the warmth of the light reach all the way inside, and the pain began to go away.

  “Promise you won’t leave me,” Sam said, reaching for his hand.

  “Promise.”

  “Swear?”

  “Swear.”

  “Cross your heart and hope to die?”

  “Yeah,” Charlie said. “Now promise you won’t leave me either.”

  “Never,” Sam said. His eyes were wide and clear. His face was tranquil. He had never looked so peaceful before.

  They hugged each other, then stood side by side, feeling the light come over them, a brilliant blur of white and gold.

  “Don’t worry, little man,” Charlie said once more. “Everything’ll be okay. I promise.”

  Florio heard the monitor beep.

  Perhaps it was St. Florian. Or St. Jude. Or simply God’s grace. He pulled the paddles from the boy’s chest and saw the burn marks on his skin. The ECG strip showed the boy’s heart had suddenly flipped back into a regular beat. Then, incredibly, his eyes opened slowly. They were the color of caramel and surrounded by exploded capillaries. He coughed and stared straight up. His was the abstract look of having traveled a great distance.

  “Welcome back,” Florio said.

  The boy seemed confused and worried, both perfectly normal under the circumstances.

  “Where’s Sam?” he muttered. “I was just talking to Sam. I promised—”

  “What’s your name?”

  “—I promised Sam I wouldn’t leave him.”

  “Tell me your name, son.”

  “St. Cloud,” he said faintly. “Charlie St. Cloud.”

  “You’re gonna be okay, St. Cloud. I’m doing the best I can for Sam.” Florio crossed himself and prayed silently.

  Thank You for the gift of breath.

  For the gift of life.

  For the gift of every moment …

  Then he heard Charlie say again, “Where’s Sam? Where’s my brother? I can’t leave him.…”

  The words didn’t really make much sense, but Charlie understood the urgency in the man’s voice. It was a tenseness that adults always showed when things weren’t going well. When they were out of control. The paramedic was working on Sam right beside him.

  Systolic pressure is 60.

  He’s no longer posturing.

  Unable to intubate.

  Then Charlie felt a wave of pain in his back and neck. He grimaced and cried out.

  “I’m here with you,” the paramedic said. “I’m giving you something that’ll make you sleepy. Don’t worry.”

  Charlie felt warmth spreading through his shoulders, down his legs. Everything grew blurry, but he knew one thing for sure. He had given his word to his little brother. A promise to take care of him. Their fathers may have come and gone, but no matter what happened, he would never leave Sam.

  Sure, they would be in giant trouble. Mom would ground them for a long, long time. But nothing was ever permanent. No matter what she did, there was no stopping them from growing up. No stopping them at all.

  In Charlie’s numbed mind, a parade of images floated along: Someday soon, they’d be old enough to leave home, go to college, get real jobs, and live near ea
ch other. They’d have families. They’d play catch with their own boys and have season tickets to the Sox.

  Charlie had never really imagined the future before. He lived in the present tense with Sam and Oscar. But in that moment, his neck in a brace, an IV in his arm, he somehow pictured the days and years ahead—the days and years with his brother at his side, always together, no matter what. There was no alternative. Life without Sam was simply unfathomable.

  He reached out across the narrow divide of the ambulance. He pushed his hand past the thick waist of a paramedic. He found Sam’s skinny arm, the IV, the baseball mitt wedged next to his body. He felt his brother’s hand, all limp and cold. And Charlie held on as hard as he could.

  II

  DIVE FOR DREAMS

  FIVE

  THE FLAGS ON THE WHARF WHIPPED IN UNISON AS TESS Carroll pulled her banged-up ’74 Chevy Cheyenne to a stop. She got out of the truck and studied the snapping shapes in the wind. There were tiny clues in every curl, subtle hints in each twist. She knew this was a calming southeasterly breeze, no more than four knots. It began up in the ice floes of Nova Scotia, blew down with the trades over New England, and eventually would meander all the way to the Caribbean.

  Tess walked to the flatbed and tried to open the tailgate but the darn thing wouldn’t budge. She had bought the old pickup from a junkyard, and her dad had put life into it with a used engine. When it needed another motor, he told her to trade it in. She didn’t listen, and years later when he died without warning, she knew she would never get rid of that Chevy. She kept it running herself now, holding on to the smooth steering wheel like it was a piece of him.

  Tess reached over the siding, grabbed hold of a big nylon sail bag, and hauled it out. She was tall and lean with dark straight hair in a ponytail that poked through the back of a Patriots’ cap. She balanced the sack on one shoulder, turned, and walked toward the dock.

  Bella Hooper was sitting in the sun on an aluminum lawn chair with a hand-painted sign propped next to her advertising: THE WOMAN WHO LISTENS. When she saw Tess coming, she lifted up one Walkman earphone and bellowed, “Pull up a seat!” A bartender for thirty years at Maddie’s, Bella had retired a few years back to start a new business. For $15 an hour, she would listen to anything you had to say, confidentiality guaranteed. She didn’t dispense advice, and she definitely didn’t accept health insurance, but she was always busy with clients who came down to the dock to give her an earful. Bella’s great gift—perhaps even art—was the ability to keep a one-way conversation aloft with just the proper number of “uh-huhs” and “oohs” and “then whats.”