Jess Garts, loopy smile and sheriff’s issue ball cap turned ‘round backwards, pushed in from somewhere around the roof of the vehicle. “Hey, Joe.” He knelt down to where I could see him. “You know, there are easier ways to get a few days off.” I managed something of a smile in response. “Everyone’s got their hands full, so I’m going to check you out right now.”
Kabe stood to give Jess room. They had to smush themselves together in this little corner of space. Somebody shouted something that caught Kabe’s attention. Whoever it was passed him a foam collar and then he handed it down to Jess. A big ol’ box came next and Kabe left that on the upturned side of the Explorer.
Jess crawled into the cab about halfway. “Alright, Joe, while I get this big ol’ thing on you, you got to tell me where you hurt.”
“Where don’t I?” Could barely bring in enough air to speak.
It was all awkward for him to fix the collar ‘round my neck, what with me on my side and the steering wheel up against his stomach. “What’s the worst?”
“Left leg.” I coughed it out. “Left arm. My chest. My face. Kinda in that order.”
“Al’right.” He nodded. “Can you move your leg?”
Tried and gave up in about a moment. “Don’t think it’s trapped.” I gritted it out through my teeth. “But I’m going to rattle rooftops two counties from here if I try to move it.”
As Jess started in on checking out my vitals he added another, “Al’right.” Took him a few minutes of having Kabe pass him the right monitor or tool to size up the damage. “Al’right, then.” Jess backed off a bit and stood up next to Kabe. “Your turn to play twenty questions.”
“What?”
“You know him as good as any of us. Ask him stuff so we can make sure he ain’t cracked that thick skull of his. I got to go talk with the guys about how we’re going to get Joe outta this tin can.”
“Back.” As Kabe knelt down, he grinned and reached in for my hand. “Miss me?” He teased before starting in with a question. “Okay, what’s your name?”
Took his grip. All of a sudden the world just seemed to slip a little closer to center. I could manage. I’d be out of here soon and everything would be okay. “Joe Peterson.” I started coughing again and it took me a moment before I could ask, “What happened to the kid in the red car?”
Kabe looked at me funny. “Red car?”
Maybe he thought I’d scrambled my brains some. “The one I was after.” Had to wade through another fit of coughs. Figured with all the dust, muck and how the belt had locked on my chest, I could be worse off. “Hit the semi and then hit me.”
“Oh.” Kabe grimaced and shook his head. “I don’t know, Joe. By the time we hit the scene…” he shrugged, “there’s five other cars, an RV and a big rig in all this mess. Did some minor first aid on the folks in the RV and then they called me over here. So I don’t know.” I let that sink in as Kabe started in with the questions again. Went through my job and my address and who the heck the president was. Kabe had to search for a moment to come up with the next round of three or four. I knew he was reaching when he hit, “Where’d you do your mission?”
I understood why he peppered me with questions: kept me awake, made sure I weren’t slipping off into territory of brain swelling. “Uruguay.” Still, I hurt and I was bushed and I wanted to be out of this vehicle. “You could at least make these questions fun.” I groused.
“Okay.” His grin went wicked. “First time we had sex, where was it.”
I coughed out, “Oh Lord.” I’d tied him up in the back of my truck while we were out in the middle of nowhere. “Let’s go back to the not so fun ones.”
“You don’t remember,” he teased.
“Remember just fine.” Took me a bit to get it out. “I don’t want to say out here.” Got saved from more embarrassment when Jess dropped back in from over the vehicle’s side.
He tapped Kabe on the shoulder as he hunkered down to where I could see him better. “Al’right, Joe. We got a couple of options.” The big ol’ set of bolt-cutters he carried went across his knees. “Can try and pull you out over the dash or the passenger side. Either way, we’re gonna take part of the roof off and,” Jess patted the tool for emphasis, “start cutting out the steering column. You’re going to be here a while.”
Kabe stared at Jess, then at me and then looked over my shoulder. “Why don’t we take him out through the back?” Pointing towards the rear of the vehicle, Kabe added, “Cut the seat back. Lay him down and slide him out.”
Smiling and using an instructor’s kinda voice, Jess shot him down. “Normally that’s a great idea in an SUV.” Jess fished a smaller tool out of one of the pockets on his uniform and used it to point behind my head. “But he’s got a big ol’ plastic barrier and more important, the steel plate behind the seats. Here.” He handed Kabe the small Houdini rescue tool he carried; looked just like mine. Realized then I had mine on me…’cept in the patch pocket on my left pant’s leg. Couldn’t have gotten to it even if I had been thinking clear.
Jess stood and reached over the Explorer’s side where I couldn’t see. When he came back down to my level, he had a bunch of blankets in his arms. “Okay,” Jess eased around Kabe and started shoving the blankets down along my left side. “Flip the hook open and cut his seatbelt, then you’re going to use the bolt cutters to remove the housing and steering column.”
Kabe’s eyes went wide. “Me?”
“You got to learn sometime.” Jess snorted. “Might as well be with someone I know you’re really going to try not to hurt.”
“Come on, boy.” I took in about as deep a breath as I could manage. “Ain’t nobody in the world I trust more to get me out of here.” I even managed a smile. “You gonna do this just fine.”
* * * *
[Back to Table of Contents]
Chapter 25
I cracked open my eyes and almost immediately regretted it. Hazy, disjointed memories of ambulance rides, doctors and a world of hurt cycled around the inside of my head with no rhyme or reason to them. I could feel pain, lots of pain, but it was all muffled, like someone else’s body really experienced it and mine kinda looked on from somewhere about two feet up. My lungs ached as bad as if I’d pushed myself through a six mile sprint with full gear. On top of it, my nose seemed stuffed with cotton and the taste of Freon coated my tongue.
Since I couldn’t do much about that right then, I took in my surroundings for a bit. Down, near abouts my right thigh, Kabe slept; his shoulders propped on the bed, his face pillowed on his crossed arms. I guessed his butt must be in a chair or something, but I couldn’t see it from where I was.
Just watching him snooze quieted my thoughts. Every time I looked at that boy it hit me as hard the first time I’d ever seen him. Kabe’s wild hair fell over his eyes just a bit; a dark black mess hiding warm brown skin. A little slice of winter sunset seeped through the window, highlighting his sharp features. When he slept, Kabe looked all of his twenty-three years. It eased the normally guarded set to his muscles. After two years of prison, sleep equaled about the only time he even sort of relaxed. The hand closest to mine cupped my own…almost as if he were afraid to let go. I shifted, without really meaning to, and brushed his palm with the tips of my fingers.
Kabe’s eyes shot open in time to a sucked in breath. “Hey.” Boy looked dead tired. Still, his tight smile lit up his face like a kid on Christmas morning.
I weren’t quite ready to deal with how that smile roared through my senses, so I grumbled, “Why do I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck?” The words rolled out like I had a mouth full of marbles.
Kabe stood and moved closer to my shoulder, where I could see him a bit better. “Technically, you kind of were…” A deep, heavy breath fought its way up from inside his chest. “Hit by your own truck. Don’t you remember?”
“Yeah, sorta.” Vaguely remembered it all. Although, I seemed to lose little bits here and there when I tried to focus on the wreck. I though
t I might like to sit up some, but my brain couldn’t quite make my body do what I wanted it to. When I really forced the issue, just willing myself to move, instead of going up I started to cough…dry and hacking like someone rubbed sandpaper down my windpipe.
“Joe, you okay? What are you doing?”
Managed to force the words out through the coughing, “Wanna sit like, you know, I don’t want to lay here.” I knew I should be able to say it better and just couldn’t quite catch the words I needed. Felt like I sifted out my thoughts through a layer of sawdust that ended up dribbling down my throat.
Kabe bent down a bit and fished around the side of my bed. Then he came back up with this big old controller. “Here.”
When I just gave up and stopped fighting, the coughing eased up some. I stared up at the white piece of plastic covered in half a dozen buttons. “Huh?” It came out all wheezed.
For a second Kabe looked off towards the window behind him and ran his fingers across his scalp a few times, mussing up that tangle of dark hair. When he shifted his attention back to me, he wore a tight smile. “You’re stoned out of your mind.” He pressed one button and the bed started to move a bit. “Tell me when you’re good.”
When I wasn’t quite sitting, but weren’t laying down neither, I said, “That’s good.” ‘Bout that time I realized that my left hand felt about three times heavier than it should. I rolled my head and looked down. Just that small movement felt all wrong and jerky like the muscles on the left side of my neck didn’t think they really had to do what I thought they ought. My left hand, wrist to palm, was wrapped in plaster with the ring and pinky fingers bound together. I kinda wrinkled my brows together to puzzle it out, and, oh Lord, did that hurt. I brought my right hand up to try and see what was what and Kabe grabbed it.
“Don’t touch your face.”
I realized there was this hump of something right between my eyes. And one of my eyes, well it wouldn’t seem to open quite all the way. “Why not?” That and lots of little things itched across my cheeks and forehead, like a ton of paper-cuts littered my skin. Tried to huff a breath through my nose and nothing went out…or in for that matter.
“Dude.” Kabe pushed my hand down to my side. “You busted up your face pretty good.” He ran his thumb along my chin, soft, hesitant and slow. “Airbag broke your nose. Seriously, you fought the car and the car won.” He choked up something that didn’t quite make it to a laugh. “Your face is a mess.”
Now that I was kinda sitting up, I could look myself over. If my face looked half as bad as the rest of me then it weren’t pretty. Besides my hand being all bandaged up, a blue and white sleeve of plastic and Velcro covered my left leg from thigh to calf. I could see my knee through a hole in the brace. A mix of purple and red mottled the skin. All of it was propped up over a series of pillows. Kinda reached over on my left side right about where my piece would have sat against my middle. Ninety kinds of sore lived over there. Seemed that my left side of my body’d taken the brunt of my accident.
Glanced up from my self inventory and caught Kabe rubbing his eyes with the butt of his palms. “What’s wrong with your eyes, boy?”
“Chemicals in the hospital,” he sniffed and flashed another not quite smile, “they give me allergies.”
I didn’t buy that for a moment. “Oh.” But there’s some things you just don’t call a guy out on. Catching him maybe a little misty equaled one of them.
When a fair bit of time had passed just in silence, enough so’s I started to doze a bit, Kabe rousted me with. “Joe…”
“What?” I cracked one eye open. Lord, I hadn’t felt this drowsy since the time I pulled a triple shift during a blizzard.
He’d settled back into his chair, although I think he might have moved it up closer to the head of the bed. “When did you,” he paused, frittering away a little nervous energy by picking at the edge of my sheets, “put me down as your emergency contact, you know, at your job?”
Hadn’t told him about that, just hadn’t crossed my mind to. “How you figure that out?” Took me a moment to even remember why I had… a couple months or so back one of the folks from the county HR department had come around. Couldn’t puzzle out why exact, maybe new hires or something at the jail, but he’d pestered about updating information. Didn’t remember exactly doing it, but I kinda figured I had.
“Ah, let’s see,” his hand landed on my right arm and his fingers stroked my skin with these tiny, make-sure-I-ain’t-died touches. “I’m sitting in the waiting area while they’re taking you in, to try and figure out what broke, and my cell phone rings. It’s your department telling me you’ve been in an accident.”
“Oh, well, made that switch a while back.” I started to shrug like it didn’t matter none. That caused me a world of hurt more than the movement was worth. Managed to spit out, “Didn’t think you’d mind,” through gritted teeth. It also started me coughing again…too many words at one go.
Jumping back up, Kabe insisted, “No, I don’t mind.” He fussed at righting my pillows, guess trying to help some. “I’m just a little surprised.”
When I managed to catch my breath, I asked, “Why?” My wits seemed to be sharpening up, at ‘bout the same rate as the edge of the pain slipped from muted fuzz to dull, but relentless. Maybe the drugs were wearing off some.
“Ah, I, well…” He hemmed and hawed a bit. “It’s kind of a big step. Didn’t think you would do something like that.”
It was my turn for hesitation, “Well, I just figured…I don’t know, it felt right.” At the time it seemed reasonable, I guess. My folks off in Russia and my sister didn’t live nowhere nearby. Something told me I’d also put him as my healthcare proxy. If’n he didn’t bug about that then I guess the situation hadn’t been so dire that they’d needed to pull it out of my medical file.
“Wow.” His upper lip got all tight and his eyes went kinda skittish. “‘kay.”
Lord we were heading towards a discussion I was no more ready to have than I was ready to walk on water…or just walk for that matter. “What’s the damage?” I took my usual tack and moved the conversation someplace with fewer minefields.
Kabe blinked. “Huh?”
“I know where I hurt.” A coughing spell grabbed me again. After I rode it out, I finished my thought. “But what they say is wrong with me?”
“Oh, ah…” Kabe ran one hand up to the top of his skull and hooked the thumb of the other in his back pocket. “Broke your nose and two fingers on your left hand. Screwed up your knee, most likely, ‘cause it was already swelling when you came in.” Chewing on his bottom lip, he seemed to try and remember everything. “X-rays show you didn’t break it, but they want to wait for the swelling to go down just a little so they can get a clear MRI.” With a huff, he dropped back into the bedside chair and let his hands dangle between his legs. “The doctor figures you’ll probably have some neck issues, other sprains, but they needed you awake to tell them that.” Nodding, he finished with, “You’ve got some pretty badass bruises going on.”
“Why does it hurt to breathe?” Maybe I’d cracked a rib or something. “Everything tastes like I’ve been sucking on a fire extinguisher.” Out of all of it, that I didn’t understand. “Like my nose is filled up with it.”
A worried, or a more worried, look blew over his face. Kabe hustled around the bed and stuck his head out the door. “Nurse,” he called out to someone down the hall, “Joe says he’s having trouble breathing.” He stepped back into the room. Seconds later the sound of sneakers on linoleum heralded the arrival of a woman in a purplish smock and tightly bound blond hair. Kabe turned to me and asked, “That right?”
“Yeah.” I started to nod and thought better of it. “Hey, Carla.” Recognized her from years of being in and out of Garfield County’s only hospital. “It’s like I can’t quite get a lung full and then I start coughing.”
She pulled a stethoscope off from around her neck and leaned over me. “Do you know how long he was in the v
ehicle?” Her questions came as she tugged down the neck of my hospital gown and slid a too cold bit of metal underneath. “After the accident?”
Tried to think on that, and couldn’t quite remember. “Ah, I, ah…”
“Not asking you.” Carla chided. “You breathe in and out with deep breaths.” Turning her face towards Kabe she asked again, “Do you have any idea, anybody tell you?”
“Took us a good twenty, thirty minutes to get him out.” Kabe jammed his hands under his pits and kinda shrugged. “Took us maybe another fifteen between call out and getting on scene. Tropic Fire got there a little ahead of us.”
“You were on scene?” Carla sounded downright suspicious, like he pulled her leg or something.
“Yeah, ah,” Kabe seemed all nervous, like he weren’t quite sure of himself, “I’ve been riding with Panguitch Fire some.” Maybe ‘cause he wasn’t official or nothing. “The call came in as pretty bad, somewhere halfway between the departments so we all rolled.”
She raised her eyebrows. “I didn’t know you were one of the volunteers on the fire department.” ‘Cept for the forestry service, all the fire departments ‘round these parts were volunteer.
“I’m not, not really,” Kabe explained. “Working on my full EMT card.” Shifting his weight from one foot to the other, he added, “Joe convinced them to let me ride along some. For my hours requirement.”
“Ah.” That one syllable carried a whole bucketful of meaning, mostly it kinda said, you’re one of us. “Were the windows closed?” Then, like she realized they’d switched gears a bit, “I mean in his patrol vehicle, when you arrived.” As she spoke, Carla moved the stethoscope around on my chest. Even talking to Kabe, I could tell her attention mostly focused on what she was hearing in my lungs.
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