by catt dahman
Red Man
catt dahman
Copyright.
catt dahman
© 2013, catt dahman
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book, including the cover and photos, may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author / publisher. All rights reserved.
The characters, places, and events depicted are fictional and do not represent anyone living or dead. This is a work of fiction.
All rights reserved.
To the most influential, life-changing student I have ever had in class: for Kelly Hancock.
Part 1
Chapter 1
Although the pale blue sky rapidly descended into the shades of late evening, Sam clearly saw the approaching purple and black bruises of storm clouds sliding over the horizon. Wasn’t that just like the summer season in East Texas; he was almost finished mowing the grass, and a rainstorm was boiling in. Cut it and grow it, just like hair.
He ran his hand through his brown hair, ruefully.
Grinning, he surveyed the lawn, thinking he should put out a few of those bubble-gum-pink-colored flamingoes, add some rusting tricycles, put a car up on blocks, let the grass grow tall, and enjoy. He could join some of the rest of the population.
He considered it a matter of pride, and with luck, he could finish the lawn before the storm rolled in, ahead of the night. He had five full minutes, probably. Rubbing an arm across his sweat-slicked face, he wiped perspiration into the small cut on his lip; he pulled the tail of his faded baseball shirt up to whisk away the sweat.
Around the last tree and beside the flowerbed, he hurried, while noting that the azaleas needed water, and then he was finished. A rumble of thunder seemed to herald the end of his task as he killed the mower and mopped more sweat off his face. There were the music of the cicadas and a mourning dove calling its mate.
In a sudden, fresh wash, cool wind blew against his skin, and Sam savored the fresh scent. Every July and August as the near-tropical-feeling heat and humidity made him feel miserable, he threatened to move away and try some place up North, but then evenings like this came, and he couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.
The emerald yard, almost black in the fading light, was like carpet, broken and split up by big shade trees, neatly kept beds of multi-colored flowers and roses, and a sweeping circle driveway. Flowering pear trees, dogwoods, and crape myrtles filled the yard, along with the beds of pink azaleas, gardenias, and miniature white roses. In the summer, along with the honeysuckle from the back fence, their scents filled the yard with perfume.
He had pilfered rocks and boulders from the Little Missouri River in Arkansas and bought flat stones from landscaping shops; he had built the fountain for the goldfish.
He could have hired a lawn service and could have afforded it easily, but this bit of manual labor was more satisfying to him than working out in a gym with other sweating, middle-aged men.
A blur of motion made him turn around just in time to see his wife’s pet, Frannie, a coal-black cat, race by the little fountain where she often surreptitiously sneaked goldfish out to eat as mid-day snacks. Leaping high into the air, she pounced dramatically onto a cricket that she batted around mercilessly before staring at it condescendingly and walking away, as if its presence was beneath her dignity.
Sam grinned. A burst of thunder exploded seconds before there was a brilliant flash of lightning; Sam flinched, and Frannie scrunched down on the lawn, her eyes looking for shelter. The storm had come on and was right on top of them with all its fury.
Sam’s wife called the cat inside. Frannie tore across the yard and into the open doorway. Sam was vexed but not surprised that Charlie had called only the cat and had not bothered to see where he was; she hadn’t even glanced his way.
It was at that second, the dusk lit with incandescent light. Sam heard someone scream, and at the same time, a tremendous pressure assaulted his muscles, bones, and every square inch of his flesh. First, he thought he had exploded. But he might have imploded. But it was bad, no matter which it was.
It was one of the other, and he didn’t know or care which it was; he was screaming, and this wasn’t stopping but going on and on. There was a horrible smell that might be his cooking, for all he knew, but he didn’t know. The white light was way too bright and was all around him, he couldn’t see. Maybe his eyeballs were cooking in his skull, but he would suffocate first because the air was searing in his lungs….
A vibration made his molars feel loose as every nerve jumped. After a lifetime, an eon of agony, everything stopped, and an inky, velvet-like darkness began to take him away. He welcomed the empty embrace gratefully.
Charlie heard the clap of thunder as the sky lit up, and she heard Sam scream. Running outside, she felt her sneakers skid on the grass as rain fell, and she skidded to a stop, going to her butt as she looked at him. She held a hand out to check for a pulse but pulled her hand back, head cocked in confusion.
Without touching him, she used her cell phone and randomly answered some of the dispatcher’s questions as she pushed sopping hair out of her face. She watched his chest rise and fall, she thought, but wasn’t positive with the intermittent flashes of lightning.
A faint blue light encircled his body like a halo, and while she was a little afraid of it, she was also curious about it. It looked alien and unhealthy. As she watched, it almost mocked her, keeping her at bay as it danced and threatened her with an electrical shock of her own. It seemed to be enticing her with its movements, but she didn’t get any closer even if she were mesmerized. It enveloped and cocooned Sam like blue fire. Under the fire, she could see the grass. It was impossible, but Charlie was sure Sam had faded away for a few seconds.
The light got smaller, and then Sam’s body thirstily absorbed the light. Charlie watched, wondering if it would return, and when it didn’t, she thought it was safe.
She called Sam’s name.
He opened his eyes, startling her.
Sam had been thinking for some reason about his own death and was imagining he was at the place where he was dead, but he was almost dead, not dead. He was in that one second before death, and his stomach hurt as if a fire had been lit in it. And of all things, he had seen his friend and law partner staring at him with horror etched on his face. Then, Sam was lying in the rain, and his estranged wife, Charlie, was there.
He knew something had happened because she was looking at him with fear in her eyes, yet as he tried to ask her what was wrong, he found his mouth didn’t work. No words came out. Trying a finger, a toe, a hand, and finally a foot, he found he was unable to move at all. Maybe his head had detached from his body and was, ‘what was it called--disembodied?’ He thought of Vincent Price and an old black and white movie.
Get a grip, he ordered himself. Of course, his head was attached, or he thought it was anyway. He could feel hysterical laughter building inside him, but a wave of nausea cooled the humor at once. Rain, falling into his mouth and nose, made him feel worse. He might drown, he figured remorsefully. That wasn’t good. Nothing was going well if Charlie’s facial expression were an indication of the gravity of the situation.
From a million miles away, he could hear an ambulance wailing; he surmised it was coming for him because something terrible had happened. Something had happened after Charlie called Frannie. Oh. There had been a loud explosion and light. And pain. Dear God, he thought, has lightning hit me? Was that why Charlie looked so afraid?
Had he been dead? He k
new he was in that last second, but his stomach wasn’t hurting now. Could this not be his death after all?
He was aware of voices and a stretcher beneath him, with paramedics attaching all kind of tabs and wires, which meant he still had a body. What a relief. In fact, he was becoming more aware of his body as feeling returned to his limbs. Turning his head, he saw an IV line and a heart monitor.
The across-the–street neighbor was standing with Charlie at the doors of the ambulance; she spoke animatedly, and both looked up at the sky and then at the yard with curiosity.
He looked and saw what remained of his left arm; he flinched. That oozing, blistered, thing was his left arm? The edge of the wound had black char on the edge. It looked as if someone had cut his arm open and then burned it. Lightheadedness took over, along with a wave of the most incredible pain, a pain so bright and pure it was almost beautiful.
The doors slammed, and Charlie and the neighbor were gone. She had been saying something, maybe reassuring him, but he figured whatever she had said wasn’t quite true anyway. Maybe this was the worst part, and from here, it would be better. Wasn’t the first twenty-four hours always the worst? Sure. People made it through these things. Maybe the worst part was the first hour. He could handle that.
He just had to get through this first minute really because this minute was the worst part; it had to get better. His pain wasn’t unbearable. It was tolerable, he lied to himself. Sam clenched his jaws closed to hold back the shriek that was building inside him.
Don’t let me scream because I may not stop.
He tried to imagine being in a place with no pain, where every nerve wasn’t under the torture of a million cigarettes or flames and a nice place where he didn’t need to scream. He wished he were at a Ranger’s baseball game. He wanted to be at the Ranger’s ballpark, at a game.
That was it. He wanted to be at a game where he wasn’t in pain and there was the wondrous scent of roasted peanuts, beer, roast beef sandwiches, and dill pickles. He wanted to hear the cracking of a bat against a ball and the fans cheering. He had to be at a game….
Sam blinked as he bumped into a man holding a soft drink.
The man frowned, “I didn’t see you. Where….”
“Sorry, “Sam said. He felt disoriented and had suffered the strangest hallucination of riding in an ambulance, but no, he was in Arlington at the Ranger’s stadium, standing at the concession stand like he had done a hundred times before.
A knot formed in his belly. Why was he feeling out of place, and why was his memory fuzzy. He recalled the ambulance and then the man he had bumped into. He stroked his left arm, almost able to feel pain, but no, there was no pain at all.
He leaned against a wall to get his mind straight, noting he wasn’t drunk or high on drugs; he had never used drugs. He wasn’t with anyone, didn’t remember driving to the park, parking, or anything else. Had he eaten? Who had he spoken to? All he could think of was mowing the lawn, the loud noise, pain, the ambulance, and then bumping into the man.
He bought a beer, found a place to watch the game, and tried to understand this wonderful thing happening to him. The scoreboard showed it was the top of the fifth. He didn’t remember any innings before.
He thought about the pain and wished he were somewhere else.
The game: the other pitcher, Tim Wakefield, walked the first batter, Ian Kinsler, and then Elvis Andrus took two strikes, letting the runner steal second. Sam focused on the game and watched as Andrus cracked a line drive and ran to first as Kinsler slid into third. Lance Berkman hit a fly to left, and as it was snagged from the air; the inning ended.
He had a few more beers that he drank thoughtfully while he considered that a beer was what he would want after mowing the lawn on a muggy summer’s night.
He imagined the sounds of the paramedic saying reassuring things and the whoop of a siren, and he could almost feel the pain in his arm. It was so intense. The pain had been unreal, he thought, as he took another sip….
He suddenly spit beer in a spray that misted the air and ran down his chin onto the stretcher where he was lying. The pain ran through him in a hard wave. He looked at the ceiling of the ambulance, smelling Budweiser. Impossible. Not fair.
“My God, you were gone,” the paramedic said.
“Was I dead?”
Ummm.”
Sam tried to focus. Maybe he had been dead. That explained a lot, like Heaven was a baseball game with beer, and he could drink and watch for all eternity. He might opt for death if that were true. It could have been hell because he was far from a saint; he was, in fact, a fairly bad man at times, (he was a lawyer so it figured) but no, there wouldn’t be baseball in hell.
“No, I mean you were gone. You weren’t here. Not in the ambulance,” the man’s voice softened to a whisper. Fear filled his eyes. He reattached the heart monitor and restarted the IV with a faint blame-filled look at Sam.
“I wasn’t here.” Sam watched the man’s face. Was that the correct response?
“Right. You. Vanished,” said the paramedic, looking glazed-eyed.
Sam didn’t know why the man was afraid. It was pretty simple. “Exactly, I wasn’t here. I was at a Ranger’s game.”
He felt better. The beer had tasted good. “I was at the game, and it is one that hasn’t been played yet. It’s being played tomorrow. Dustin Pedroia will begin the sixth with a standup triple right down the third baseline. He’ll be brought home by a sacrifice fly to center. That will be Big Poppy.”
“Ortiz,” the paramedic repeated. He would have thought this was shock, but the man had vanished right before his eyes, and he was spouting baseball talk. And he couldn’t forget the beer, beer, of all things.
“Yep, you watch and see if I’m not right. Nelson Cruz is gonna crack out a hanging curve deep into left field, bottom of the sixth.”
“The paramedic was greenish now. “You hang on, Buddy.” They had to be close to the hospital by now, and he wanted away from this disappearing, beer-spitting man that was scaring the hell out of him.
“Bottom of the seventh, Elvis Andrus is gonna lead off with a double.”
Like a moth, the paramedic was drawn to ask the big question. He was wide eyed and in a quiet voice, he asked, “Who wins?”
Sam grinned. “Rangers 10-3.”
Pain was rising again, but Sam just let the darkness take him as it had comforted him before. Sam savored the bitter-good taste of the beer he had and could still taste. As he lost consciousness, he smiled.
He loved a beer and a good ball game.
Part 1
Chapter 2
Lightning kills about twenty to thirty percent of those it hits, or about three thousand people a year, but with about a hundred lightning strikes per second around the world, the possibility of being hit is significant. Sam was hit because he was around tall trees in the open.
He heard his name being called and finally opened his eyes to see Charlie standing by his bed.
“Do you know who I am?”
“Charlie,” he said with a dry throat and barely able to croak out a response.
“Right.”
She had waves of honey-colored hair that had strands of white, pale blonde, dark red, and more shades in it; witch’s hair, he had once called it. Her eyes were jade green, pale and intense. She was a pretty, young woman with a face full of compassion for him although he didn’t think he deserved it. He hadn’t been very pleasant to her.
It wasn’t compassion, just pity.
For the last five years, they had kept separate bedrooms and separate lives because he didn’t want her to take half of everything he had amassed and she wouldn’t budge on the house. It was a daily war with dirty looks and irritations.
“You’ve been really out of it,” she said. He had a morphine pump and was on nice drugs, but he had been only semi-conscious for days, confused and without memory. It happened sometimes when a person was affected this way. It was as if his personality had vanished and he wa
s just a body with injuries. For the first time, he was making eye contact and seemed alert.
“Arm hurts,” he said, hating that he was whining but unable to stop.
“It’s burned. You were hit by lightning. Do you remember that? Your arm is where it hit you. It came out your calf. I bet that’s sore, too.”
“I was hit. I remember that. Raining. The ambulance. I remember.” The beer, he thought, and the ballgame, too.
Now that she mentioned it, his leg did hurt. “Is it all bad?”
“It’s pretty severe, but you’ll have treatment and rehabilitation exercises, and it’ll get better. But that’s later. Not now.”
“Have I been here long?” Sam asked since had no concept of time.
“A few weeks,” she said as she frowned, “you really don’t remember anything?”
“Pain. Yelling. People hurting my leg and arm, but it’s like a nightmare now.” Trying to claim specific memories was like trying to catch fog; all of what happened was faint.
“They’re watching your heart to make sure you’re okay and watching for infection. So far you seem okay. You just wouldn’t wake up totally and blithered about stuff.”
“What stuff?”
“Baseball. Court cases. Nonsense. You really talked a lot about baseball.”
“Oh.”
“Your watch melted and was a goner. I tossed it.”
“My Rolex?” He sighed and said, “Damn, I loved that watch.”
“No one mows the lawn in a Rolex. That’s what happens,” she snapped.
“I know.” He knew she was pissed off that he was focusing on a stupid watch.
“Just eat what they say to, sleep when they tell you to, and rest, and you’ll be back in the courtroom arguing cases before you know it.”
“I’m tired.”
“You can do it.” She straightened the covers and handed him a cup with a bent straw so he could sip.
“I hate this.”
“It won’t be forever. I’ve seen kids in here burned, and they make it without all the whining. Just take one step at a time. At least, you’re awake.”