by L. N. Cronk
She turned back to me and took my hand. She leaned over my bed and touched her forehead to mine.
“I promise I will get in touch with Tanner for you,” she said. “I want you to get some rest and quit worrying. Please.”
“And tell him to call me.”
“I will.”
“No matter what time it is, tell him to call me.”
“Okay.”
“Promise?”
“I promise,” she said, kissing me. “Please try to get some rest, okay?”
I nodded.
“Don’t forget,” I begged as she turned again to leave.
“I won’t,” she said, looking back over her shoulder at me. “Get some sleep.”
~ ~ ~
BETWEEN MY LEG itching and waiting for Tanner to call, sleeping was an almost impossible mission. I drifted off once, jolting awake from a nightmare in which Amber was looking out a window, banging on the glass, calling for me. I was lying on the ground below with my leg twisted grotesquely under my body, unable to move. I tried to call back to her, but my voice wouldn’t work.
“Would you like something to help you sleep?” the nurse asked when she checked on me in the middle of the night. I shook my head, afraid that if she gave me something, I wouldn’t wake up when Tanner called.
If Tanner called.
I fell asleep again, this time waking from a dream that Jacob and Charlotte were going to Disney World together. They would have invited me along, but they were going to rent a Corvette and drive all the way to Florida. There simply wasn’t going to be enough room for me and my cast.
I was fuming by the time Laci picked me up in the morning.
“You promised me you’d get in touch with Tanner!” I said as soon as she walked in the door.
“I tried!” she said, defensively. “I called him and there was no answer. I went over to his place, he wasn’t there. I left a note on his door, telling him to call. I went across the street and talked to Jordan and their mom – they haven’t seen him. I even went over to the high school and looked for his truck, but it wasn’t there.”
“Where could he be?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted, “but all the paperwork’s done for you to get discharged and they’re bringing a wheelchair up for you. You ready to get home?”
I nodded.
“I brought you this,” she said, producing the rod from my gun cleaning kit. It was made of three separate metal rods that screwed together – one after another – to create one long, thin rod that could be inserted into the bore of a rifle. “I didn’t think a knitting needle was going to be long enough.”
“Give me that!” I exclaimed. “You’re a genius!”
“Of course I am,” she smiled, and I scratched until the wheelchair arrived.
Laci obliged me by driving by Tanner’s house and the high school again before we went home, but his truck wasn’t in either place.
We got home and I couldn’t believe how hard it was for Laci to help me get into the house. We went in through the garage where there were only three steps, but it was still a nightmare. It was obvious that I wasn’t going to be going up the stairs to get to our bedroom for a good, long while, so Laci turned the sleeper sofa in our living room into a queen-sized bed. I stood there on my crutches watching her put fresh sheets and a blanket on it.
“Thank you,” I said when she’d finished.
“You’re welcome,” she said. “Here, let’s get you settled.”
That was another big struggle because the bed was a whole lot lower than the hospital bed.
“I’m never going to be able to get up out of here again,” I said as she helped me swing my legs around.
“Yes, you will,” she assured me. “We’ll get the hang of it.”
“I doubt it.”
“Why don’t you try to get some sleep?” she asked. “You look awful.”
“Thanks.”
“I mean you look tired. Did you get any sleep at all last night?”
“Not much.”
“Look,” she said. “I’m going over to my parents’ house to get the kids. You see if you can get some sleep while I’m gone.”
“Will you bring me my phone and my laptop?”
“You need to sleep!”
“I will after you get back,” I promised her.
“You’re worried that you won’t hear the phone, aren’t you?” she asked and I nodded.
She brought me my phone and plugged the charger into a nearby plug. Then she brought me my computer and plugged that in too.
“I’ll be back in a few minutes,” she said, kissing me before she left.
“Thanks,” I said, opening my computer.
I checked my messages, but found none from Tanner. I emailed Scott and explained to him what was going on and that I expected to be able to keep working as soon as I got all my equipment from my upstairs office relocated into the living room. Then I tried Tanner one more time and left him another desperate message.
Laci’s parents didn’t live far away and she was back with the kids soon. They were glad to see me and Dorito was fascinated by my cast.
“Can I sign it?” he wanted to know.
“Sure.”
“I’m gonna be the first one to sign it!” he said excitedly as Laci handed him a marker.
“You’re gonna be the only one to sign it if you write that big!” I complained. His D was the size of my hand.
“People have to be able to see it!” he explained.
Lily seemed more interested in the fact that the couch had turned into a bed. She stood up and then bounced down hard, laughing.
“Ow!” I said, wincing in pain.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Laci said, scooping her up. “No jumping on the bed, okay? That hurts Daddy’s leg.”
Lily looked at me.
“Come on, let’s go upstairs and play and let Daddy sleep, okay?” Laci suggested. Lily stuck her lip out and tears came into her eyes.
“No,” I told Laci, “it’s okay.”
“Come here,” I said to Lily, holding my hands out to her. Laci handed her to me. “It’s okay. You wanna lay here with Daddy and watch TV?”
She nodded and snuggled up next to me while I found one of her favorite cartoons that we had recorded. I turned the volume down very low.
“Will you please try to sleep now?” Laci asked, picking up my phone. “I’ll keep this with me and I promise I’ll wake you up if Tanner calls.”
“There’s not much battery left on it,” I worried. She checked it.
“It’s almost halfway charged already,” she said. “I’ll take care of it.”
“Okay,” I agreed, suddenly aware of how hard it was to keep my eyes open. I pulled Lily closer to me and buried my face into her hair, and then I fell sound asleep.
When I woke up, the TV was off, Lily was gone, and it was dark. I could see a light in the stairwell coming from upstairs and hear the faint sounds of Dorito giggling.
“Laci?” I called. The hallway light came on and Laci came down the stairs.
“He still hasn’t called?”
“He actually did call,” Laci said.
“You promised me you’d wake me up!”
“Well,” she said, “he told me not to. He told me that he didn’t have anything to tell you yet, but that he had a plan and that he’d call you as soon as he had some news.”
A plan. I was laying here all busted up and not able to do anything to help Amber because of Tanner’s last “plan.”
“I wish you’d woken me up,” I said.
“I’m sorry,” she said, “but he really acted like he was busy and needed to go and he said he didn’t have anything to tell you.”
“What are the kids doing?” I asked.
“They’re making you a get-well-soon card on the computer,” she smiled.
“Can you hand me my scratcher thingy?” I asked, pointing at the gun cleaning rod.
She smiled and handed it to me.
“Charlotte called and your parens and Jessica stopped by, but you were pretty sound asleep.”
“What did Charlotte want?”
“She wanted us to come over for dinner tonight.”
“When are we supposed to be there?”
“We can’t go over there for dinner!” Laci protested. “I ordered a pizza!”
“Why can’t we go?”
“Well, first of all, it took us half an hour just to get you into the house and onto the couch,” she reminded me. “I can’t even imagine trying to get you up out of here and back down the steps and then out into the car again without a nurse to help us. Second of all, you aren’t exactly ‘dinner guest’ material.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, you haven’t had a shower since the day before yesterday. I don’t even want to think about how we’re going to tackle that, but until we do, you aren’t going over to anyone’s house for dinner.”
“So they’re having dinner without me,” I said.
“Yes,” Laci said. “I suspect that they will continue eating and stuff even though you’ve broken your leg.”
I was quiet for a minute, looking down at my stupid cast on my stupid leg. Then I looked back at Laci.
“We’ve got another problem, too,” I said.
“What now?” she asked.
“I’ve gotta go to bathroom.”
I won’t even get into that whole process, but after I was finally up and had gone to the bathroom, I hobbled out onto the deck. I managed to lean over into the hot tub and get the upper third of my body fairly clean. Then we ate pizza.
Even though I’d slept most of the day, I was still pretty tired and I decided to go to bed when the kids did.
“Do you want me to sleep here with you, or do you think you’ll sleep better alone?” Laci asked me.
“I’ll sleep a lot better if you’re here with me,” I said, and she crawled in next to me. I snuggled up next to her and buried my face into her hair like I had done with Lily that morning. It worked just as well as it had earlier, and soon I was sound asleep again.
~ ~ ~
TANNER CALLED A little after midnight.
“What?” I asked, as wide awake as I’d ever been.
“You need to get down here to the hospital,” Tanner said.
“What happened?”
“Amber’s here.”
“In the hospital?”
“She’s . . . she’s okay,” he said, hesitantly, “but you need to get down here.”
“What happened?”
“Just get down here,” Tanner said. “And bring some clothes that’ll fit her. Come to the emergency room.”
“What happened?” Laci asked.
“I don’t know,” I said, “but Amber’s in the emergency room and Tanner said I need to get down there.”
“The emergency room?”
“He said she’s all right. I don’t know what happened.”
“Who are you calling?” she asked.
“Jordan,” I answered, and she got out of bed to change into jeans and a sweatshirt.
“Jordan,” I said when he answered. “Wake up.”
“I’m awake.”
“Are you at home?”
“Yeah.”
“Can you get over here and watch the kids?”
And help Laci get me out of bed?
“Sure,” he said. “I’ll be right there.”
He not only helped me get out of bed, but he helped Laci get me into the car.
“Wow!” Laci said as she backed out of the garage. “That was a whole lot easier with him helping!”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “I’m gonna call him over every time I need to go to the bathroom.”
Someone at the emergency room entrance helped Laci get me out of the car. There was a wheelchair handy, so I plopped down into that and Laci wheeled me into the waiting room and up to the admittance desk.
“We’re here to see Amber Patterson,” Laci told the receptionist. Tanner must have heard her because he stuck his head out of a doorway down the hall.
“Down here,” he said, motioning to us.
Laci wheeled me down the hall and into the room where Tanner was waiting for us and where Amber sat in a chair, wearing a hospital gown. She was busy wrapping a gauze bandage around the leg of a stuffed dog.
“Hey, Amber!” I said, so glad to see that she really was okay.
Her eyes opened wide when she saw me and she scrambled off her chair and ran over to me, climbing into my lap.
Ow, ow, ow! But I didn’t say it out loud or let her see me wince.
“What happened to your doggie?” I asked her. She leaned toward my head and cupped her hand to my ear.
“He broke his leg, too,” she whispered.
“Oh,” I said, smiling. “Tanner told you I broke my leg, huh?”
She nodded.
“Look where Dorito signed my cast,” I said, showing her. “He hardly left any room for anyone else to sign it, did he?”
She giggled silently and shook her head.
“You wanna see if you can find some room to sign your name?” I asked her. She nodded.
“All right,” I said. “Tanner and I are gonna go find a marker and you wait here with Dorito’s mommy. We’ll be right back, okay?”
She nodded and crawled out of my lap.
Tanner pushed me out of the room and back down toward the receptionist’s desk. The receptionist was gone.
“What happened?” I asked in a low voice. “Why’s she in the hospital?”
“They needed to do some tests and stuff,” Tanner said, reaching over the counter of the desk and pulling a marker from a cup.
“Tests?”
“Look, David,” Tanner said, “I don’t know if–”
“Hey, Coach?” I heard a voice say. I turned and saw a young police officer approaching Tanner.
“Hey, Jaron,” Tanner answered.
“I just need you to read this statement over and then sign it. That way we can go ahead and press charges. ’Course, like I said, I can’t see this thing ever making it to court, but . . .”
“But you’re going to let social services know what happened, right?”
“Oh, yeah. I’ve already contacted them. Her case worker’s on the way.”
Great.
“Did you tell her what happened?” Tanner asked.
“I told her briefly,” the officer said, “but I’ll fill her in on everything when she gets here and make sure she understands.”
“Understands what?” I interrupted. “What happened?”
“This is David,” Tanner told the officer, as if that explained everything.
“Oh,” he said, knowingly, “the tree climber.”
“WHAT HAPPENED?”
“Coach here’s a hero,” the officer said, clapping his hand down on Tanner’s shoulder. “That’s what happened.”
“No, I’m not,” Tanner said.
“You risked a lot for that little girl in there,” the officer disagreed, jabbing his thumb down the hall toward Amber’s room.
Tanner just shook his head.
“Officer Donoho?” I heard a voice call. He turned and I saw Amber’s social worker, Erin Lamont, walking toward us.
Her pace faltered when she saw me. She glared at me for a moment, but then turned her eyes back to the policeman and made a point of ignoring me as she started talking to him.
Tanner wheeled my chair halfway back down the hall toward Amber’s room.
“Wait!” I said. “I still have no idea what happened!”
Tanner stopped pushing and stepped up beside me.
“Look,” he said quietly, squatting down next to me, “I don’t think you really want to know what happened, and besides, we don’t have a lot of time for me to explain everything to you right now.”
“Is that the lady that you pissed off?” he asked, nodding back in Erin Lamont’s direction
.
“Yeah.”
“Well then, listen to me,” Tanner said. “Amber’s not ever going back to that house – not ever. I can guarantee it. So, they’re going to have to find another family for her. Now, it seems to me that this is your big chance to show that lady what great parents you and Laci would be to Amber. Don’t you think?”
I was still so confused, but I nodded.
“Good,” Tanner said, standing back up and starting to push me again. “Now get back in there and play nice.”
We got back into Amber’s room and found that a nurse had helped Laci change Amber into an old sweat suit of Dorito’s that we’d brought along. Poor Laci was more confused than I was, but by the time Erin Lamont stepped into the room, Amber had written her name on my cast and was drawing a puppy.
“Is that puppy going to have a broken leg too?” I asked.
Amber nodded and giggled.
“Hi, Amber,” the social worker said.
Amber looked up and froze.
“Do you remember me?”
Amber gave a slight nod.
“How are you doing?”
Amber didn’t move.
“Kind of a rough night?”
She still didn’t react.
Erin Lamont crossed the room toward Amber and stooped down beside her.
“We’re going to find you a nice home where that won’t happen to you again, okay?”
She waited for Amber to nod, but Amber still didn’t move.
“May I have this?” she asked, taking the marker from Amber’s hand and snapping the lid in place. She thrust it in my direction and dropped it in my lap when I didn’t take it from her.
“Let’s go, honey,” she said, taking Amber’s hand and standing back up.
“Wait!” I said. “Can she please be placed with us? Please?”
“No,” Erin Lamont said, shaking her head. “That’s out of the question.”
“Why?” Laci asked.
“I don’t think that would be in Amber’s best interest.”
“Why not?” Laci wanted to know.
“There are many factors that go into deciding where to place a child. I’m not going to stand here and discuss–”
“Please?” Laci interrupted. “Please let her come and stay with us. We’ve already gone through the certification process and we’re almost approved. We love her. Please let us have her.”