"911—what’s your emergency?” the operator asked.
"There, there's a, a thing out there at the old Robbins’ place. I think it wanted to kill me!" Cindy babbled hysterically. "It was horrible!"
"Ma'am, are you hurt?"
"No, no; I got away. I, I'm sorry. I guess I shouldn't have called. It's just that I thought that he was going to hurt me," she apologized.
"Ms. Goodwin?" the operator asked.
"Um, yes," Cindy replied, "this is her."
"Ms. Goodwin, you have to stop calling us every time you think that there’s someone out to get you. You've cried wolf so many times that if there really was an emergency, well, we'd still respond to it, but you’re causing undue stress on our limited resources."
Cindy gulped in embarrassment then uttered a heartfelt, "Sorry."
"Now, if there isn't anyone hurt or in immediate danger, I'll go ahead and hang up," Dyane said. This wasn't her usual job; she was the vacation replacement for the regular dispatcher, but she knew all about Cindy and her panic calls.
"Wait, wait," Cindy blurted out, desperately trying to save face. "There is someone out there. I mean, he probably wasn't going to hurt me, but he was on the ground and not moving and, really, maybe you ought to send someone out there. He's right under the big for sale sign, just before you get to the old Robbins’ place.”
“Okay, Ms. Goodwin, I’ll get an officer out there right away. Thank you and good-bye,” Dyane said, then disconnected the call.
“If you don’t need me for anything, Dyane, I’m going home,” Billy said as he popped his head in the dispatch office. His shift was over and he had a big bed with his name on it, just waiting for him to plop down and get some much needed shut eye. It had been a long night.
“There’s nothing but another ‘Cindy call.’ She said there’s an old man passed out, there by the old Robbins’ place. You know, where that woman and crazy old man disappeared a few months ago? I’ll just send a patrol car out there. You know her,” Dyane said with an eye roll and finger twirl around her ear, indicating the woman was cuckoo.
Billy inhaled sharply. “Uh, no; don’t bother,” he said. “I’ll just take a drive out there on my way home. There won’t be any overtime involved: I’ll give this one to the city,” he said with a fabricated smile. “See you tonight,” he added, giving her a salute in farewell.
Billy walked out of the building, his phony smile still locked in place. “Just a few more yards to the truck,” he said softly through clenched teeth and taut lips. He opened the door of ‘The Beast,’ his red ’64 Dodge pickup truck, buckled up, powered up, and backed out of his parking spot, nearly bumping into a slow moving pedestrian.
“Watch where you’re going, asshole!” screamed the bleached blond, middle-aged barfly, punctuating her remark with a middle-fingered gesture and glare.
“Sorry,” he said, then double-checked to make sure he wasn’t endangering any other inmate’s friends or relatives on their way to the jail for visiting hours.
As soon as he was out of the parking lot and onto the highway and its blessed anonymity, he let his face relax. Could it be that his father had come back? The site that Dyane had referred to was where he had picked up this same truck after his brother, James, and best friend in the whole world, Leah, went back in time to the 18 century. It was also where Leah’s mother had disappeared a few weeks before that, her destination that same, 232 years in the past, time period.
Billy shook his head. It was too much to hope for. It was his business philosophy to keep an open mind when approaching the scene of a crime. Or an incident, he reminded himself. Hopefully, the old man Cry Wolf Cindy had reportedly seen was really only passed out, not dead.
Billy slowed down as he approached The Trees, watching his route carefully to be sure he didn’t run into or over someone. He left the road and took the often used, but unpaved, shortcut to the Robbins’ place.
And there he was.
Billy stopped the truck, took two quick, sharp breaths, then pushed open his door and immediately puked on the ground. He turned his head, wiped his mouth on his sleeve, and held onto the side of the truck, hugging the flanks of the steel behemoth for both physical and emotional support. First, his stomach had failed him, and now his knees had forgotten how to keep his thighs and shins in alignment. He clutched the top of the truck’s bed, pulled himself up straight, and turned back to look at the person on the ground again. Yes, he was breathing, or at least moving his hand toward his head. Dead men don’t move.
Billy didn’t remember running to his father’s side. He was just there as soon as he saw that he was alive.
“Dad?” he asked hopefully.
Marty forced open one eye and whispered, “Billy?” then shut his eye again and smiled. “Water, please,” he mouthed then let his relieved smile take over his face. He was home.
Billy sprinted back to the truck and brought his plastic water bottle with him. He held up his father’s head, and dribbled a few drops at a time into his mouth. “Just a little bit to start with, okay?”
Marty sniffed then nodded that he understood. He felt like he was crying. Emotionally he was—the tight throat, urge to sniff, and chest heaves were all there, but his body was so dried up that it couldn’t produce a tear. He was home and his son, the son he never knew he had, was taking care of him.
“Dad, I’m going to take you to the hospital. Now, I’m not a doctor, but I have had quite a bit of first aid training, and it looks to me like you’re severely dehydrated. I don’t want to wait for an ambulance, so you just let me carry you, okay?”
Marty answered by tightly squeezing his eyes, sending up a silent prayer that he would make it to the hospital. His heart’s thump, thump, thudding was now thump, thud, thudding; his ticker wasn’t beating right.
Billy assessed the situation before acting. Where should he put him? Should he be seated in the front so he could keep an eye on him or should he lay the frail man in the bed of the truck where there would be less stress on his body? The hospital was nearly a half hour away. No, twenty minutes, maybe less: he had the magnetic mount siren behind the seat. He could make a path through traffic and still beat the time of any ambulance dispatched to retrieve him. But, he didn’t have an IV bag of Ringer’s lactate solution or an EMT standing by to administer it. Marty was in rough shape. He needed to get to the hospital ASAP and a prone position would probably be easier on his severely dehydrated body.
Billy opened out the tailgate of the truck and threw in his jacket. He’d arrange it as a pillow later. “Here, have a little bitty bit more water before you get in the back.” He dribbled a few more drops into the parted cracked lips. “Okay, how’s your stomach? You’re not going to puke, are you?”
Marty’s eyes were still shut. It hurt to open them and he knew why. They were totally dried out. There wasn’t any lubricating moisture left between his desiccated orbs and the papery sheaths that served as eyelids. He shook his head in answer to Billy’s question. He was going to will that bit of moisture to stay inside him. Besides, the water he had already drunk never made it to his stomach. It had been absorbed by the lining of his mouth, his tongue, and his parched gullet. He couldn’t open his eyes to get another look at his son, but he could smile at him. Hopefully, they would have time to talk and gaze at each other later. He could only pray that he would pull through, so he did.
Billy gently pulled Marty up into a seated position, wrapped the old man’s arm around his neck, grasping him around his bony back with one arm, the other under the knees. “On three,” he said, and then lifted him from his squatted position to a wide stance, grunting just a little on his way up. His father was definitely lean but still a tall man and not scrawny. He steadied himself and his load then asked, “Ready to go?”
Marty replied with a gentle squeeze of his arm around Billy’s shoulder. The excited son loaded with his feeble father shuffled to the truck. “I’m going to set you in. Hold on,” he commanded as he shifted his fat
her’s weight, lifting him onto the tailgate. “Now don’t go falling out,” he ordered as he let go so he could jump in and settle him into the bed.
“Here, use this as a pillow, and then…” Billy said as he wadded up his windbreaker under the old man’s head. He pulled a red bandana out of his front pocket and shook it out, “I’ll put together a fluid delivery system.”
Billy jumped out of the truck and ran back to retrieve the water bottle. He looked around quickly to see if there was anything he had missed; his detective nature was still functional and on high alert. “Yup,” he said as he picked up the small silver coin in the dirt and stuck it in his pocket, “we don’t want to leave you here.”
Billy jumped into the back of the pickup. “I don’t want you drinking, but I think this will work to keep your mouth moist. Here, I wet my bandana and then stuck one end in the water bottle. Don’t let the bottle fall over,” Billy said as he stuffed it among the creases of the jacket, “but go ahead and take a pull every once in a while. Can you handle that?”
Marty nodded, his eyes still closed and the smile of serenity still pasted on his tanned, leathery face. He couldn’t talk but did sigh deeply, letting his son know he was ready to hit the road to the hospital.
“Gotcha,” Billy said joyfully as he realized he could understand the tacit communication. “I’m not going to spare the rubber, but I won’t be taking any fast corners either, so you won’t be rolling around back here. I’ll see you at the hospital, Dad.” He smiled at the designation then bent down and kissed his father on the forehead, hoping he hadn’t lingered too long with the buss he thought he would never be able to give.
Billy called for support from his cell phone as soon as he hit the main highway. Two squad cars with sirens and lights joined his blue light, horn honking, fast-paced procession to the hospital. His escorts made sure he made it through the construction zone without delay. The truck drivers didn’t like that they had to wait, but then again, they only had a road to pave and not a man on the verge of death who needed medical attention.
The hospital’s emergency room nurses, a gurney, and IV delivery system were ready and waiting behind the double doors before the truck was in sight. The truck pulled to a stop and two hefty interns were right there to lift Marty onto the gurney. They paused after letting the tailgate down. They could see that Billy wanted to be the one to move him to the end of the truck. “We’re here, Dad,” he said, gently pulling the red handkerchief away from the frail man’s mouth. “These guys and gals will put you back together again in no time. And, I made a quick call to Mom. She’ll be here soon.”
Marty’s eyes popped open. Evidently, he had enough fluid in him to allow his eyelids to work again. “Yes, Bibb’s on her way,” Billy said gently. “I’ll bring her in as soon as she gets here. Thanks for coming home.”
Ж
Billy followed behind the nurses and intern a little too closely. “Billy, now you know we know what we’re doing here. Why don’t you wait out in the lobby? We’ll let you know what’s going on,” the big, dark-skinned male intern suggested strongly.
“Not this time, Nate; he’s my father, and you’ll need more muscle power than you have to pull me away,” Billy said with a judicious mix of mirth and determination. He knew Nate had been a wide receiver for the Carolina Panthers, was twice his size, and probably three times as strong as he was, but he’d waited too long to be with his father to be sent out to wait in some holding pattern.
“Okay, I’ll make an exception this time, you bein’ a cop and all. But, if you start to get squeamish, I’d appreciate it if you found a place away from us to lose your cookies.”
“No worries,” Billy said as he smacked the big button on the wall to get inside the emergency room’s doublewide doors. “You won’t even know I’m here.”
The first order of business was to start an IV. The overhead lights were as bright as the sunny morning outside, but that didn’t help the big man get the cannula inserted. “shit,” Nate mumbled.
“What’s wrong?” Billy whispered loudly. “Is he okay? Do you need a hand? Can I help?”
Nate exhaled loudly in frustration. “Yes, you can. You can go out into the lobby and drink about three quarts of water. Your dad is so dehydrated that I’m having a hell of a time finding a vein. I’ll get a smaller gauge, but you really need to be out of here—you’re getting on my nerves.”
“Come on, Billy,” Nurse Mandy said as she put her hand on Billy’s elbow. “It probably won’t rehydrate your father when you drink for him but, hey, it’s worth a try. Besides, I think he’ll be able to relax more if you aren’t so close. You have a tremendous amount of negative energy bouncing all over the place. Remember what Leah always said, ‘Negative energy keeps away the healing,’ or something like that.”
“Okay, I’ll go. Hey, Dad,” Billy called back, “I’m going to drink a gallon of water for you. Don’t let him hurt you or I’ll kick his butt!”
Marty managed to open one eye. He looked up and saw the size of the doctor-type person. He looked like an armored truck on steroids. “You’d better do like he said,” he whispered to Nate then chortled softly. “And, don’t worry about hurting me; just get it done.”
Nate grabbed a smaller gauged cannula and got the line started. “Sorry for the extra pokes there, sir. This solution will have you feeling better in no time. Now, while we’re waiting, I want you to have some sips of this,” Nate offered him the straw and the orange flavored medical grade sports drink, “and then I’m going to give you a bit of a sponge bath. Unless you’d rather have Nurse Mandy do that for you.”
Marty shook his head minimally; he still had a monster headache from the dehydration. He swallowed and realized he had some spit in his mouth now and could probably speak in a normal voice. “Ahem, Lord, thank you for the saliva, and good hospital help, and, well, everything. No, if you don’t want to do it, go ahead and send my son in here. We have a lot of catching up to do and I’m sure he can talk and scrub at the same time.”
“Did you call?” Billy asked as he poked his head into the room, his smile brighter than the high intensity spotlight above the examining table.
“Here,” Nate said as he handed Billy the empty plastic tub. Fill ‘er up at the sink and then you can make use of this.” Nate waved the plastic wrapped sponge at him. “I’ll go grab some washcloths and hand towels. Wet ‘em, then spread them on the thin skinned areas of his body, like his wrists and neck. You’d be surprised how much moisture skin will absorb topically.”
“You’re just being kind about the stink, Doc,” Marty said. “It’s been a long time since I’ve enjoyed a bath or a shower, and I guess if you can’t scrub me up fast enough, then you can go ahead and cover me up with wet towels.” Marty pulled the light blanket off his thigh with his non-punctured left hand and stuck his foot out. “I think we’re going to have to throw these boots away. I pretty much wore them out.”
“Um, what happened to your pants or do I want to know?” Nate asked.
“It’s a long story,” Billy interjected, “and we’ll tell you all about it, more or less, at Dad’s homecoming party. I’ll make sure you get an invitation. In the meantime, let me get him cleaned up. And, if you see a very beautiful gray-haired lady out there in the waiting room looking a bit anxious, that’s probably my mother. Could you escort her in? I’m sure Dad wants to see her right away, pants or no.”
“Sure, but, um, I thought you were an orphan like me,” Nate said softly, hoping the old man didn’t hear him.
“That’s another long story and, as you can see, it has a happy ending. How long does he need to stay here?” Billy asked.
“Well, we’ll let him get juiced up with the Ringers lactate, and then do a blood test to make sure all his levels are good, and then he should be ready to rock and roll. That is, unless he has other problems he didn’t mention.” Nate spoke loudly directly to Marty, “You didn’t break an arm or a leg and forget to tell us about it, did you?”
Nate nodded and exited without saying a word. Billy was a good man and was one reason he was able to go back to medical school. A good detective was worth more than his weight in gold. In his case, Billy’s diligence had kept him free, out of prison or worse, after the extortion accusations had been proved false. James Bradford had skipped bail before coming to court, but Nate’s good name had been cleared.
Ж
“Oh, Dad, it looks like I have some help here. Or would you rather give him the bath all by yourself, Mom?” Billy asked cheerfully.
Marty looked up and saw Bibb, the mother of his two sons, standing arm in arm with Nate.
“Oh, um, I mean…” Marty stammered. He brought his left hand up to cover his face, hiding his eyes and mouth, as he tried to compose himself. He had planned what he was going to say to her for the last two months, and now all of the sudden, he was as tongue-tied as a four-year-old sitting on Santa’s lap.
“How are you feeling?” Bibb asked, not sure what else to say. She had hoped he’d come back from the 18 century, but never allowed herself to believe he really would, so never thought about what to say if he did return.
Marty dropped his hand to his lap and asked, “Will you marry me? I mean, I’d like to get down on one knee or both knees or hell, after what I’ve put you through the last thirty years, I should be down on my belly, at least, begging you to forgive me, and well, will you, marry me, that is?”
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