“You do what you need to do, honey. We’ll be here in the morning, waiting for you.”
He loved this woman, whom he could envision sleeping in his T-shirt, because she liked his smell. “I’ll be home shortly.”
He stretched out on the couch and closed his eyes. But he kept his soul wide-awake.
Rose was having a nightmare. Surely that’s what all the darkness was. Until she saw a blinking light at the side of her head; then she thought maybe she was just dead. The sad part about being dead, however, was that this blinking red light was a far cry from all of the bright lights people who were dying had reported through the years. It didn’t surprise her much. Nothing happened for her the way it did for other people. Plus, the way she’d been living, it was a wonder she saw any light at all.
Her eyes slowly adjusted to her surroundings. She noticed more blinking lights, sensed intruders up her nostrils, and felt a stinging pain in her right hand. She allowed her left hand to slowly peruse the vicinity. She felt the IV in the top of her other hand and gasped. Then her fingers drifted up to her nose and discovered the small plastic tubing. She wasn’t dead; it was worse. She’d been snatched by aliens and become a cloning project.
Her eyes focused more, and two women materialized outside her door, wearing odd-looking matching outfits. Then she realized where she was. The incessant beeping noise made the revelation completely clear. She was in the hospital. She bolted upright in the bed and heard the crinkling sound of the pillow as it rushed back to its prehead shape.
She reached for buttons, any buttons, and she pushed all of them as crazily as she’d ever pushed anything before. This experience sure didn’t feel anything like the one Christopher had described when she had gone to see him. No, she was certain she smelled death here.
She pushed herself out of the bed, causing alarms to sound off everywhere. The twins opened the glass door and rushed into her room just as her activity knocked over a cart that was somehow attached to her body.
“Ma’am, ma’am, you’ve got to relax! Please, sit down,” urged the tall, skinny one, taking Rose by the arm. The short, heavy one stooped to pick up Rose’s mess.
Rose jerked her arm away. “I will not sit down! And one of you little blue people had better explain to me what in the world all of these—these”—she motioned to the attached paraphernalia—“all of these tubes are doing sticking out of me.” She ripped the oxygen from her nostrils as the two nurses made ineffectual attempts to calm her.
The tubes’ departure made her sneeze. And all the movement made her woozy. The two blue women barely caught her, then maneuvered her to sit safely on the edge of the bed.
A man in a white lab coat appeared at the door. “Well, well, I see our patient has risen.”
Rose regained her composure. “Patient? I’m nobody’s patient!” she exclaimed. “I’ll have you know there is nothing wrong with me, and I don’t know how in the world you got me here, but I will not be poked and prodded like a lab rat.” She stood up again, spying the door. She decided to make a dash for it past the three onlookers, but suddenly felt a breeze tickle her southern region. She twisted her head around only to see a bare behind. Hers. She jerked the edges of the worn pink nightgown together and planted herself firmly back down on the bed. She touched her head, which was throbbing. “Oh my word, what happened to my head?”
The doctor rolled a stool over and sat down in front of her. He pulled a silver penlight from his top pocket and used two fingers to widen her eye. She flinched. “You had an accident. You’ve got a bad concussion and had to have a few stitches.”
She rubbed her head again.
“But otherwise I’d say you’re a miracle.” He shined the light in her other eye. “By what they tell me of the status of your car, I’d say that your being alive, never mind pretty much normal”—he emphasized the “pretty”—“means you have much to be thankful for.”
Rose stayed on the edge of the bed, digesting it all. Slowly the wreck came back. The lights, the swerving, the ice, the crash. She had been on the phone. Yes, she had been on the phone with Christopher. Talking about . . . talking about . . . oh, that’s right, they were talking about her.
“Well, if there’s nothing wrong with me, then I’d appreciate your letting me go home.”
Dr. Palmer replaced his penlight, stood up, and pushed his stool back. “Well, I’m sorry, Ms. Fletcher, but you won’t be going home tonight. I can put you in a regular room, though. And we can take some of this ‘stuff ’ off of you.” He smiled. “I’ll get you something for the pain.”
He picked up her chart and wrote on it, then handed it to the tall, scrawny nurse. “I see, Dr. Palmer. I’ll call the third floor,” she said as she headed out the still-open door.
“Dr. Palmer, huh?”Rose questioned, aborting a new attempt to stand up as her head swam. “What’s your first name?”
“Doctor,” he replied, a tiny quirk at the corner of his lips. He was gone before she could reply.
The nurses moved her to a new room and offered her two little blue pain pills. Rose protested until the pain pulsed. She was snoring in minutes.
22
Rose woke up in her new room sometime in the wee hours of the morning, with a splitting headache and a screaming stomach. The entire hospital experience had to register again before she realized exactly where she was. But the sterile smell brought it all back quickly. She swung her feet over the side of the bed but decided she’d take the getting out of it a little more slowly this time. She hadn’t forgotten what sudden movement had done to her previously.
The cold floor sent a shock wave through her system. “These people should supply footies,” she told the darkness. Then she felt the draft on her backside again and pulled her gown together. “And some robes,” she huffed.
She walked over to the closet, the door of which was standing ajar, and peeked inside. Her purse was on the shelf, and her suitcase was on the floor. She sighed with relief.
Scratches covered the purse, but there wasn’t major damage, and her wallet was still inside. She pulled it out but then remembered that she didn’t have any cash. That was why she’d had to use her credit card at Fletcher’s Drugstore. The memories of the day were coming back piece by piece. She opened the wallet anyway. And tucked neatly inside, behind her checkbook holder, she found three crisp, folded one-dollar bills. She couldn’t believe it. She had searched that exact compartment earlier, she was certain.
Her stomach spoke again. She didn’t waste time trying to figure out how the money had gotten there; she had more immediate needs to focus on. She cracked her door open and peeked into the well-lighted hall. She wasn’t sure why she felt that she needed to sneak, but something about hospitals gave her the feeling she should probably let someone know when she was getting out of the bed. Of course, she didn’t do too well with rules of any kind, so getting permission for a food excursion wasn’t on her agenda.
She crept quietly up the hall and was followed only by the buzz of the fluorescent lights that established her way. She heard a few voices from around a corner and peeked to see who was there. Two different ladies in blue were in the middle of the hall behind a desk, drinking from paper cups with straws and chatting away.
Oh my word, Rose thought suddenly. Where is my phone? Nobody knows where in the world I am. I was talking to Christopher. He probably thinks I’m dead or something. I’ve got to find a phone! Her stomach growled. Well, I’ve got to eat first, and then I’ll call him.
She crossed the hall in front of the nurses when their backs were to her. She took the stairs down a couple of floors, figuring the cafeteria was on a lower level. She opened the door gently at floor two and sneaked out into another hallway. A sign declaring “Cafeteria/Vending Machines” was like a bright light at the end of her tunnel. She hadn’t died, so at least she should be rewarded with food.
She hurried toward the suppliers of food and beverage and stopped before them with great joy and satisfaction. She was
even more grateful to find they took dollar bills. She started with the beverage machine first. The sound of the bottle falling through the machine almost made her cry. She had officially had more Cokes in a twenty-four-hour period than she had had for the last fifteen years.
She deposited the dollar into the food machine. She didn’t even know what to get out of there. She hadn’t eaten chips in forever. She saw a bag of sour cream and onion ones and figured she had no one to impress, so she might as well go all out.
She stuck her dollar in and pushed A6, and the black spiral holder began to swirl. She monitored the chips as they began to fall. But they stopped halfway and successfully lodged between the Toastchee crackers and the Snickers bars.
“You have got to be kidding me,” Rose said, punching the Plexiglas. It didn’t budge. She put her hands on both sides and shook as best she could, hoping she would dislodge the food and not something in her pounding head.
“That won’t do it,” a frail yet clear voice called from behind her.
Rose turned around to see a small elderly woman standing with a walker, wearing a gown that peeked out from underneath her silky pale pink robe. She was grinning at Rose with her head cocked and the back of her hair pushed toward the front as if she’d been lying on it for a long time.
“You have got to give it a little hip action,” she said as she scooted her way around to the side of the machine. She moved away from the walker and gave the machine a little hit with her tiny hip. Rose thought the lady might break her entire left side with that whack, as frail as she looked.
But the potato chips dislodged immediately. Rose perked up. Obviously she had done this before. “You’re good.”
“I’ll be even better if you’ve got enough money to get me some of those regular M&M’s,” she said with a glint in her eyes, raising her eyebrows up and down.
Rose eyed her last dollar as if it were gold. She scrunched her lips like Elvis and hoped the lady didn’t want a drink too. Rose let her dollar slide into the machine.
“It’s C5,” offered the little voice.
Obviously the little lady got these often too. Rose punched C5 and the M&M’s fell without incident. Rose pulled them from the vending machine and handed them to her. “There you go.”
“Why, thank you, Red. Now, come on, follow me.” She started scooting away.
Rose stared at her. The only one who called her Red was her granddaddy. “Well, I would love to, but actually, I really have to get back to my room and call my brother,” Rose protested.
The little lady turned around and used her index finger to give a come-hither motion. “He’ll find you, Red. Don’t you worry. He’ll find you. So come on with me.”
Rose eyed the odd, scooting figure and wondered how in the world she knew that Christopher would find her. Obviously she was just speculating that whoever was searching for her would eventually find her. But she had piqued Rose’s interest. After all, why should the whacked events of her day stop here, in the corridor of a hospital, staring at processed food, before following a strange old lady to who knows where? After all, twenty-four hours had not officially passed, so it was still the same crazy day that she had started.
Rose followed the white-headed, pressed-haired, half-scalp-revealed, walker-scooting vending-machine companion up the hall, around the corner, and through some swinging double doors before they came to a halt in front of another door. The tiny figure opened it and flipped on a light switch as she entered. A low light filtered through the room. She backed up to the edge of the bed and sat down.
“You wouldn’t mind helping me get all the way in, would you?” she asked Rose. “I’m still a little weak.”
“Uh, sure. Yeah, I guess I can.” Rose set her Coke and chips down on the small table next to the bed. She moved the walker to the foot of the bed and gave the light body a lift until the lady was firmly in the middle of the bed. Rose picked her feet up and helped her turn them; then the lady scooted herself back comfortably. Rose fluffed her pillows and watched as she leaned back into them with a loud sigh.
The stranger reached over to the bedside tray on the opposite side and picked up a cup. “Do you mind giving me a swig of your soda?” she asked, extending the cup in Rose’s direction.
Rose was absolutely certain she had never met a more aggressive person in her life. The entire world thinks that Northerners are pushy, but she was certain it was the other way around. And the simple fact that Southerners did it with accents reminiscent of Scarlett O’Hara made it somehow less offensive.
The stranger patted the side of the bed with a delicate, wrinkled hand. “Here, take a load off, and give me a little sip.”
Rose tried not to look amazed. “I’ll give you a little sip, ma’am, but I really can’t stay,” Rose said, unscrewing the lid of her Coke.
The lady patted the bed again. “You don’t have a place to go until your brother gets here, Red, so why don’t you just sit down and spend some time with a little old lady who has been having some trouble sleeping. We’ll eat, chat, and then both get a better night’s sleep.”
Rose knew she looked bewildered now. There was simply no way to hide it. But much to her own dismay, she sat on the edge of the bed and poured the little lady some of her Coke.
The woman sat forward and took a long drink. Rose studied the lines around her lips as they pressed around the cup. She had to be eighty if she was a day. “Ahhhh,” she said, leaning back into her pillow and closing her eyes. “There will be Coca-Cola in heaven. I’m just certain of it.”
Rose held her bottle in one hand but still hadn’t opened her bag of chips. All she could do was stare at the little lady.
Suddenly the lady jerked forward and opened her eyes. Rose jerked backward. The lady’s eyes twinkled with mischief. The green of them was strikingly brilliant and clear. “You want to share your chips, and I’ll share my M&M’s?”
Rose didn’t know why this lady thought Rose wanted her snacks to become the midnight buffet, but the childlike smile was irresistible. “Sure, you can have some of my chips,” she said, setting the Coke between her legs so she could open the bag. She started to extend her chips, then pulled them back close, smiling. “But you have to share your M&M’s too.” Rose set the bag on the bed.
“I’ll share my M&M’s and some of my other stash with you. I’ve got all kinds of goodies,” the little old lady said, reaching crooked fingers over to the drawer in her bedside tray. She opened it with excitement, revealing a stash of candy the likes of which Rose hadn’t seen since her cousin Bobby Dean had robbed the 7-Eleven. She had Skittles and chewing gum and candy bars. “I’ve got plenty to share,” she assured Rose, then reached into the potato chip bag.
Rose picked up her Coke and took a long drink. She could never tell anyone she’d been drinking these. Anyone who knew her would be convinced she had officially fallen off the deep end. She settled it back between her legs and reached for a chip. “Well, since we’re sharing our midnight snack, don’t you think we should know each other’s name?”
The little lady pulled a tissue from behind her pillow and wiped her fingers on it, then extended her hand. “Well, excuse me for my rudeness. My name is Abigail Turner, and I would be privileged to know your name.”
“My name is Rose,” she said, shaking Abigail’s hand.
Abigail’s eyes grew extremely large. “Rose?”
“Yes, ma’am, Rose.”
“Huh, well, um . . .” She gazed downward and fidgeted with the bag of M&M’s. “Rose is a very pretty name. Is that your only name?” she asked, finally returning her eyes to her bed companion.
Rose laughed. “No, I have more. It’s Rose Fletcher.”
“Hmm, Rose Fletcher. Well, it’s very nice to meet you Rose, Rose Fletcher.” She dug in the bag for another chip and then leaned back once more on her pillow. She offered Rose an M&M from her other hand, which she accepted. “What’s that bandage on your head for?”
Rose reached up to touch it. The pa
in had eased.
“Why do people always do that?”
Rose’s expression turned puzzled. “Do what?”
“Touch things someone asks them about before giving an answer, as though they’re not quite sure the other person really saw what they saw.”
Rose could tell Abigail’s mind wasn’t deteriorating at the rate of her body. “You know, I’ve never thought about that before.” She chuckled. “Maybe we could find out someday.”
“We’d make millions!” Abigail exclaimed, tossing her free hand in the air. “And then if we could figure out why every time someone eats something that tastes horrible, they stick it in someone else’s face and say, ‘Here, you try this,’ we’d make millions again!”
She sure was an excitable little creature. “I’d say we’d make tons on that one too.” Rose laughed.
Abigail’s expression changed immediately. “So tell me again about that Band-Aid.”
“Well, I had a car accident last night.”
“Oh, Red, are you all right?” she asked, leaning back up off her pillow.
“I think so. Nothing much more than a few stitches. I mean, it’s apparent nothing has happened to my appetite,” she said, lifting her Coke and taking another swallow.
“You want to taste something really good?” Abigail’s expression grew as mischievous as Charlotte’s used to be.
“You have something better than we’re already eating?”
She nodded in affirmation. Then she reached behind her back pillow and pulled out a jar of peanut butter. Her smile grew wider and wider the farther that jar got into the room.
Rose wasn’t sure what else she might try to pull from behind that pillow of hers.
Then, from the drawer, Abigail pulled two plastic packages of utensils and napkins. “I saved the silverware from the lunch my daughter brought me. And she sneaked in the peanut butter for me. You’ve got to try this,” she said, poking a package in Rose’s direction. They tore them open to get the spoons.
Flies on the Butter Page 18