How to Save a Life

by Amber Nation

  “Awkward for who, you? Because it wouldn’t have been the least bit awkward for me. I know I said just one night, but I believe that last night proved that we could be amazing together, if you would just let it. I haven’t opened my heart to anyone in many years, so you have to know that I’m not just throwing this around. All of these feelings aren’t usual for me. And I…really care about you, Sheridan." I tried to grab for her hand that was resting upon her lap, but she moved it at the last moment.

  “Mike, you wouldn’t be saying those things if you knew…" She trailed off apparently expecting me to fill in the blanks. I wasn’t a fucking mind reader.

  “If I knew what?! Just fucking tell me already Sheridan!" I knew I had been a bit too harsh when I saw a single tear slide down her cheek and she turned to where she was looking out the window at the world passing by.

  We rushed into the hospital after parking my truck and she quickly bypassed the information desk as if she knew exactly where she was going. Her mother must have told her the room number because she didn’t stop until she was right outside of a hospital room.

  “Ok, thank you for bringing me here, Mike." She continued to fiddle with her hands and she still wouldn’t look at me but kept looking at the closed door to the private room.

  “Sheridan, I’m not going anywhere," I went to place my hand under her chin to get her to look at me but a look of pure fear came over her face as the door to the hospital room opened.

  A woman who appeared to be in her middle fifties appeared in the doorway and she was the spitting image of Sheridan, just a little older and with graying hair.

  “Sheridan, honey I thought that I heard your voice out here."

  The fearful look on Sheridan’s face had yet to dissipate and I was seriously beginning to wonder what in the world she had to be afraid of. A few seconds later, I had my answer. And that fucking answer hit me square in the solar plexus, knocking the wind completely out of me.

  A set of tiny fingers grasped the bottom of the heavy wooden door and started opening it once again. And a little raven haired boy with amazing green eyes hidden behind a pair of glasses appeared.

  He stared up at me before looking towards Sheridan and breaking out into a humungous grin.

  Those eyes and that hair. I fucking knew those eyes.

  I looked at Sheridan and she gave me a worried grin as she slumped her shoulders.

  If it wasn’t confirmed by just the looks of the little boy, the moment when he screeched, “Mommy!" and jumped into her outstretched arms did.

  My heart immediately sank and I stumbled back a step as if I had been hit square in the chest as the entirety of the situation hit me head on. This was what she was hiding? It wasn’t just a something it was a fucking someone! Sheridan had a son and didn’t tell me. She didn’t tell me. Here I had been falling in love with a woman who now seemed like a complete stranger to me, all in the blink of an eye.

  What in the actual fuck?

  I yanked my hat off of my head, my constant reminder of what I had lost in my life and drug my now sweaty hand through my hair, tugging on the ends. Pain was what I needed to feel instead of this constant despair. I wondered if I could find a concrete wall to punch, hell I was in a hospital full of them. But somewhere in the recesses of my mind I thought it would be frowned upon especially for a paramedic to punch a wall within a hospital.

  I jerked my body away from the group not even caring that I came off as a complete and utter asshole to Sheridan’s mom and started retreating back down the corridor in which we just came through moments earlier. This wasn’t something you kept from someone.

  My steps were hasty and if it seemed like I was stomping like a kid who didn’t get their way, then that was too fucking bad.

  The pressure from a hand on my shoulder had me immediately swinging around. I was incredibly defensive and I dared anyone to mess with me especially now.

  Sheridan looked distraught and for a moment I was glad that she looked how I felt. Shifting from foot to foot, the guilt seeped from her pores.

  “I’m sorry, Mike."

  That was it? That was all she had to say to me?

  I stared at the woman who I now regretfully loved and I honestly didn’t know who she was anymore. I was waiting for a further explanation that apparently wasn’t coming.

  “You’re sorry? What are you sorry that you didn’t tell me you had a son, or you’re sorry that I found out?"

  “His name is Benjamin," she twisted her hands together and turned to look back down the hall at the little boy who was still waiting for her. “The reasoning that I never mentioned him is my business." She pointed to her chest and tears were now welling up in her eyes and her voice cracked when she spoke. “I tried to stay away from you, I tried not to get close because of this very reason. I didn’t want anyone to get hurt."

  “You didn’t want anyone to get hurt?" I responded sarcastically. This whole situation was beyond disbelief. “Well, how is that working out for you?"

  She gasped and I could tell that I had her exactly where I wanted to. I hoped that the knife was putting enough pressure on her heart just as it was mine.

  “I’ll get you a bus ticket back to Brown County, I’ll be going out of town for a few days. In the meantime, I want your shit out of my house!" I yelled sternly, cutting my hand through the air trying to make a point that she messed with the wrong man, and not even giving a shit that my voice was carrying down the hallway.

  My hardened exterior was quickly put back in place as I left Sheridan and my empty heart behind in that hospital hallway.

  I failed myself and my original vow. Why had I volunteered to take in a raven haired goddess who ended up being exactly what I had speculated. A man-eater.

  I really didn’t know where I was going to end up until I was on the outskirts of Wentzville, the suburb of St. Louis where I grew up.

  I knew what I needed to do, but I really didn’t know if I would be welcome in my parents’ home. I hadn’t been back or barely even spoken to my father in the three and a half years it’d been since I’d moved to Brown County.

  Things hadn’t changed much as I navigated my way around town. I stopped by Jameson Auto first to see if my dad was piddling around under the hood of a vehicle but what I saw was a closed shop. And by the looks of it, it had been vacant for some time now.

  I jumped down out of my truck and walked around the lot, kicking stray rocks with my boot that inhabited the place. Piles of used, worn out tires cluttered the parking lot and weeds had grown up through the cracks in the pavement. There were cracks in the concrete?! My dad wouldn’t ever fail on the upkeep of the shop, it was his pride and joy. He loved being here and being able to help fix everyone’s vehicles. My dad liked being depended on, thrived from it actually.

  What had happened to the shop? It worried me that my dad never tried to contact me to let me know about the status of the shop. But then again I never ever really gave him the resources to be able to contact me. What kind of son have I been to not even let my own father know where I lived? The kind that was shutting everyone and everything out.

  Pulling up in front of my childhood home nothing really seemed amiss on this aspect. The yard was neatly trimmed with colorful flowers filling all of the beds, just like my ma had it every year.

  Sitting in my truck just looking at the place that was always home up until the last several years, the dread of my father’s reaction to my being here was gnawing at me. It was almost to the point where I just wanted to take off and not even show my shameful face to him, but I had already trekked this far, might as well face the music sometime or another.

  Just when I was going to stall myself for a few more minutes, not being able to muster up the courage to even connect my knuckles to the door, I looked back up at the front porch to see my father leaning against the railing that attached to the house, arms crossed in front of his chest with his stern, parent-like expression on his face. It was the face that I remembered getting w
henever I was in trouble, which didn’t happen all that often growing up. But whenever I was on the receiving end of that look I knew not to mess around.

  I took a deep breath and let it out hoping that it would alleviate some of my nerves, but if anything it just made it worse. I couldn’t believe that here I was a grown ass man and I was afraid of what my father would say to me.

  I pulled the bill to my ball cap down, lowering it over my face so my dad couldn’t see all of the dishonorable guilt that consumed me and got out of my truck, with slow movements. Why had I waited so long to come back here?

  I knew the answer, Hannah wasn’t here so there was absolutely no reason for me to be.

  I saw my dad release an impatient sigh as he turned around to re-enter his house.

  It felt weird stepping back over the threshold, but looking around it was as if I had never left. Absolutely nothing had changed, he even still had it the same as it was when my ma was still alive. That was how opposed to change my father was, which just further reiterated my confusion with the shop.

  I stuffed my hands into the pockets of my worn out jeans and saw that my dad had taken up his usual seat in his old La-Z-Boy recliner. “What happened to the shop?" I muttered half underneath my breath.

  “Boy, sit your ass down," his voice boomed throughout the living room. I had forgotten just how loud my father’s voice had projected.

  I took my hands out of my pockets and let my arms hang down my side as my shoulders slumped forward. I was time warped right back into tenth grade whenever my father got mad at me for sneaking out. I said that I didn’t get in trouble much growing up even though I snuck out…

  All. The. Time.

  You just had to know how to not get caught. The one time I did, I felt that backlash weeks later as I was grounded for that long.

  Most kids got their electronics taken away, but I wasn’t much on modern day devices. No, I got my toolbox taken away. My father knew exactly how to sock-it to me where it counted the most.

  I did as my father instructed and planted my ass on the old couch that my mother had picked out during my freshman year of high school. I remembered it had been that long because this was, in fact, the same couch that I had lost my virginity on that summer. Memories that weren’t necessarily good ones now though.

  I rested my forearms on my knees and leaned forward, trying to somewhat brace myself for what was going to come next.

  Just looking at my dad, I could tell that he’s aged a great deal in the three and a half years it’s been since I’ve seen him. His hair was thinning out and the gray was much more prominent than it had been. He had even lost quite a bit of weight, he actually looked quite fit, not frail like I would’ve pictured since he has lost some weight. But it was his eyes that held the most change, he didn’t really look all that sad. There was almost the twinkle back in his eyes that he had lost after my mother passed away. He almost looked…happy, content, satisfied even.

  “You’ve met someone," I said looking him directly in his eyes. I almost missed the small flutter of guilt pass over him.

  “I was about to say the same thing to you, son," he looked down at his lap, where he had one foot resting across his other knee. “Mike, it really has been too long."

  And that was all it took for my proverbial dam of emotions to break. For the next three hours, he told me all about how he sold Jameson Auto because it had just become too much for just himself and he couldn’t trust anyone to do exceptional work on vehicles since I had left. So he retired and took up running, which I really got a kick out of because my father was never really much of a runner, but now that explained the toned look and his weight loss. Then he told me of meeting Sandra, she was a few years younger than him, and it turned out she was also my Sophomore English Teacher. Remembering back to when I had Mrs. Westmore, I always thought that she was a looker, for a somewhat older woman of course, so I didn’t give my dad too hard of a time. It also helped that he told me that no one could ever replace his first and only true love; my mother, but he really enjoyed Sandra’s company.

  “Now that I’ve done all of the talking, it’s your turn to spill. What the hell have you been up to and what is her name?"

  I gave him a true, honest grin.

  “You know it’s nice to see you smiling again," I saw a tear form in the crease of my father’s eye, I had never seen him cry very often, so it really took me aback. “You weren’t the only one who lost someone, Mike. I lost my only grandchild and then six months later your mother, and during all of that time, I lost you as well. When you went through the depression, I never thought you would come out of it, I was so worried about you. I tried and tried for you to get help, but you didn’t hear me, you wouldn’t. The underlying guilt of everything totally took over everything. You drank your way through those six months and I’m really sorry to say this, but I’m surprised it didn’t kill you."

  “I know, dad. So many times I thought about killing myself so I could be with Hannah, but I knew that she ultimately wouldn’t want that. One day it was like a switch, as hard to believe as that is. I just woke up and knew that I had to start over, although I really didn’t start anything over. I just moved to Brown County and threw myself into several different things, but keeping to myself the majority of the time. I’m a drummer in a band, we play a few gigs every now and again. I also work on cars on the side, and I became a paramedic. I now know that my mission in life is to save lives."

  I looked up at my dad and seeing the pride written all over his face was exactly the reaction that I had missed seeing from him. I knew that I was doing something right in my life now.

  “Now, that answers one part of my question, what about the other?"

  I had tried my damnedest to not mention Sheridan, but I could tell that my father wasn’t going to let this go.

  I swallowed past the lump that had formed in my throat at the thought of Sheridan and my hasty decision to leave her behind with only a bus ticket to get herself back to Brown County. That wasn’t me, that wasn’t the man that I was. I almost felt ashamed to tell him what I had done, but just her deceit did me in.

  “Her name is Sheridan and I love her. But I just found out purely by accident that she has been hiding a son from me. She knew my standpoint on not having any more children, so she just lied to me by not telling me." I went on to tell him how I met Sheridan and about her past and our friendship. That she was the first woman that I had let into my life and my heart since Erin and Hannah. How she cracked through my shell and taught me how to love again.

  “So let me get this straight, you left her with a bus ticket back to Brown County because you found out that she had a son? But you also said that she’s had to change her last name because she is running from an ex-boyfriend? And also that you never knew where she was from until you went to take her to the hospital?"

  “I still don’t know where she is from, her parents had moved to a different town after she had moved out of her house after high school, but yes that’s the gist of it."

  He rested his hand up underneath his chin in a movement that I always used to call his thinking stance. “I don’t know the whole story but it seems to me that she hid her son from you because she was hiding her son from everyone. She has basically been continuously running from a horrible man, so she didn’t mention her son because she was trying to keep him safe. You are just like your momma, boy, always jumping to conclusions."

  I gave him a snort, my way of a dismissive laugh, he was talking about my ma and I was going to begin to get defensive. He pointed to my facial expression and chuckled, “See what I mean, again you just jumped to some imaginary conclusion. You didn’t take the time to find out what I meant, you instantly were ready to react and attack. I didn’t mean anything bad by being just like your mother, but it’s true, she was never one to be patient and always jumped to conclusions." He stood from his recliner and came over to have a seat next to me on the couch.

  “You know you said that your
mission in life was to save lives because you couldn’t save Hannah’s?" I looked down at my hands that I had clasped in front of me and swallowed loudly and nodded my head. “I believe this Sheridan has saved your life as well, don’t you?"

  I sat there just letting his words seep in. I never really thought of it that way, but I supposed he was right. Who knew what kind of path I was ultimately leading myself down? I still had the occasional drink, but it wasn’t as profusely as before my move, so I wasn’t too concerned with major depression again, but who could predict those instances? Without Sheridan, who knew if I would’ve actually ever let someone else in? And as much as I didn’t want to admit it, he was completely one hundred percent correct in the aspect of me jumping to conclusions. I immediately get up on my haunches and retaliate, asking questions later which wasn’t any way to live my life.

  But now I’ve gone off on Sheridan and told her to get out of my home and more or less my life. Would she completely move out of Brown County? What could I do to make it right?

  “Don’t think I don’t see those wheels turning in your head. You may have to wait awhile for wounds to settle and heal a little, but when the time comes you’ll know what to do to make things right with her."

  Now it was time for me to think about the other hindrance, her son.

  “How could I ever replace Hannah though? I don’t know if I have it in my heart to be a father to Benjamin." I knew that Sheridan was no longer able to have children, everything made sense now. How she skirted around different topics and the constant phone calls with her mom. Who knew if I’ll ever have the chance to know the entire story?

  “Now Mike, whoever told you that you had to replace Hannah? Did Sheridan?"

  “Well, no."

  “There is absolutely no replacing her. She will continue to hold a special place in your heart, same as she does mine. But that doesn’t mean that you should completely shut yourself out to the idea of having more kids. Do you remember how much joy she brought you and how much fun you used to have together? Why would you want to deny yourself that joy again? You said that Hannah wouldn’t have wanted you to kill yourself just so you could be with her, don’t you think that she would want you to have more kids so you could have that again?"