Hearts of Avon

by Scott Toney

shouting outside. What? he wondered before looking outside and seeing a trucker step out of his big-rig close by. The man seemed to be having an argument with a young man who had just stepped out of his Lamborghini.

  Ben rubbed his eyes and set his seat’s incline back to where it had been. What time is it? He looked to the car stereo. It was almost 4 p.m. How in the world had he slept through his phone alarm? His body must have known he needed rest, much more than his mind.

  -- --

  Pittsburgh’s suburbs were nothing like Ben had seen before. Rolling hills marked the landscape with houses somehow built into the sides of uneven terrain. Businesses lined the streets, like boxes crammed into a grocer’s aisle. The streets themselves were patched with long swatches of black tar.

  It was vastly different from the Outer Banks, the place he had spent most of his life. But the people here looked interesting. He decided he looked forward to having the opportunity to experience all Pittsburgh had to offer.

  As Ben drove down the road toward the city with his map opened up in the seat beside him, he marveled at the fact that he was so close to Pittsburgh now and yet could still not see any of its buildings. He had heard that all roads leading into the city either went through a tunnel, over a bridge, or both. It was shaped like a triangle and rivers and massive hills surrounded two of its three sides.

  Soon the road he was driving led him into one of those tunnels. Its darkness surrounded him as yellow lights swept by along his sides.

  At the end of the tunnel, he began to see the yellow beams of a bridge. He passed through the tunnel’s exit and his eyes widened. Towering skyscrapers stood like giants beyond. One was nothing but glass, with the look of a castle at its top. Others reached up toward the sky, grasping for the clouds above with their silver sheets of steel.

  The way the city rose up instantly from beyond the river took his breath away. He could see why Caroline said she loved this place.

  He reined in his sense of awe as he drove over the massive bridge of yellow-painted steel. He looked down to his map, trying to navigate where to go. After several turns off the main road and a brief episode of being lost, Ben finally entered the misshapen grid of Pittsburgh’s streets and was confident that he could locate UMPC Hospital before dark.

  Then, after another half hour of getting lost and finding his location again, Ben finally saw his destination. A massive brick giant with UPMC on its side rose up before him.

  Ben parked his Jeep at a parking meter along a side street and stepped out, taking all the quarters he had and loading up the machine. He wasn’t planning on returning for a while. There was probably a parking garage close by that he could have parked in for free, but right now all he cared about was getting to Caroline.

  How is she? he wondered. Has she made any progress? That was it, though, what progress could you really make when you were in a coma, other than coming out of it? He just hoped he could help her in some way, now that he was here.

  The automatic doors swept open before him as he went through the main entrance. It reminded him a lot of the hospital Caroline had been transferred from. A nurse hurrying somewhere almost ran into him as she rushed by.

  “Excuse me,” Ben said as he approached the main desk.

  The nurse there looked up with a frown, seeming perturbed, stressed or both. “What can I do for you?” she asked.

  Ben let some of the stress and tension leave his body. I’m here, he thought. After all this time, I’m here.

  ”I’m here to visit Caroline Lilly, a coma patient that was flown in from North Carolina a week ago.”

  The nurse clicked away on her keyboard. “What’s your name, sir?”

  “Benjamin Towne, I’m…”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Towne, but I cannot disclose any information regarding this patient to you.” She looked up with that same agitated look in her eyes.

  Ben braced his hands on the desk. He felt himself going weak with exhaustion and hopelessness. He should have expected that they wouldn’t let him see her because he wasn’t family. That was the same thing they said when he called. “She’s here though, right?”

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Towne, but I cannot disclose any information regarding this patient to you.”

  Obviously Caroline was here. Why else would this nurse be so adamant in denying him? Did her father specifically request to keep me from finding out how she is? The thought angered him. It angered him even more to be so close and yet still unable to see her or be by her side.

  “I’m a good friend. Can you at least confirm for me that she’s here?” He didn’t know why he was asking again. Maybe the nurse would have a heart and give him at least that information.

  “I’m sorry, sir, but I can’t…”

  Ben didn’t even let her finish her sentence, turning and heading back out the hospital’s automatic doors. I’ll have to find a way to get hold of her father and convince him to allow me on the visitor’s list. If he doesn’t answer my calls, then I’ll just get online and figure out what law firm he works for. He can’t ignore me forever.

  He walked past the parking meter, looking at his still unused time left on the digital clock. What am I doing here? I don’t even have a reservation at a hotel to stay tonight.

  Ben started his Jeep. He would head out of town. He only had a limited amount of money to spend and didn’t want to waste it just to sleep in the city. Tonight he would rest and collect his thoughts. Tomorrow he would attempt to search out Francis Lilly.

  Dark clouds rolled by above him as he drove Pittsburgh’s congested streets, and then turned onto one of the massive yellow bridges extending out of the city. His car rumbled on the bridge’s cement.

  As the traffic came to a stop, he turned his head and stared out over the massive river rushing beneath the bridge. Somehow it calmed him. He smiled as he watched a ferryboat emerge from beneath the bridge and continue down the waterway.

  Honk! a horn blared from a black minivan behind him.

  A bearded man leaned out the van’s window. “Move it, buddy! The light’s green!”

  Ben waved his hand to the man and pressed his foot on the gas once more. He had the urge to stop on the bridge and take in the sight of the river below.

  There was a shopping center near the end of the bridge and he turned towards it. A sign with a train on it greeted him as he entered. Station Square. It must have been a train station, once. I wonder if there’s still a station here.

  After parking in the shopping center’s garage, Ben walked up to the walkway on the bridge.

  A harsh, cold wind whipped through him. He might as well have not even been wearing his jacket, for how cold he was now. The river was beautiful though.

  As he reached the center of the bridge, he leaned against the cold steel rail. A speedboat skipped by beneath the bridge and a ferry was docking in a port near the shopping center.

  Caroline, where are you? he thought. He wanted to be here, but he felt hollowness beside him, a vacancy. He wanted to share this with her. Will I ever have that chance again? He looked up to the sky and the cold clouds moving slowly there. Help me, God, he thought. I am alone.

  As he turned to walk back across the bridge, toward the shopping center, he noticed something he hadn’t seen before. A bearded man and worn-looking woman with tattered clothes sat in the walkway of the bridge a distance down. The man held a cardboard sign in his hands. A bucket sat in front of them.

  Words Caroline had spoken to him suddenly came through Ben’s thoughts. “Your story reminds me of a bridge in Pittsburgh that I walk across when I meet my dad for lunch downtown. There is this homeless couple that is always sitting on one side of the bridge. Most people just walk by and ignore them, but I always give something if I have change or a dollar on me.” That was what she said after he first told her about Excelsis.

  Could it be? He stared at the couple for a moment, and then started walking toward them. As he walked he fumbled with his wallet, taking out a five-dollar bill.
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br />   “Thank you,” the man said as Ben placed the bill in his bucket. The woman was asleep on his shoulder.

  Ben couldn’t help but wonder where they would sleep tonight. He knew he should offer to pay for a room for them for the night, or at least a hot dinner. He was still leery of that though, somewhat afraid of the unknown. “Gladly,” he responded to the homeless man.

  “Bless you,” the gray-bearded man replied. “May the Lord be with you.” He huddled back up with the woman, wrapping a torn blanket tighter around them.

  Ben took a moment to read the cardboard sign. Homeless. Disabled VET. Anything will help.

  As he walked back across the bridge he thought of Caroline, and then wondered if God had led him onto this bridge because of her. I am meant to be here, he reassured himself. He could feel her with him, because of the homeless couple, even though he hadn’t been able to see her at the hospital.

  Something suddenly struck his thoughts. He stopped, turning to look back at the couple. What was the story he had heard, where the man was waiting for God at dinner, but instead of God coming, a hungry child came? Then, after the child came, a pregnant woman came and then a homeless man. God had later told the man that he had come, that he was the child, the woman and the man.

  He thought of that story, and of Excelsis, before turning and heading toward the couple once more. He couldn’t buy them a room for the night. He wasn’t sure he had that in him. But a hot