I've re-written, " Level .08" For those of you had read my other version in first person and commented, thank you. I'd love to hear what you think about this new version.
Level .08
Gretchen, with a cup of tea in hand, gimped her way to the porch. She placed her cup on the antique three- legged marble corner table, a rare find she was told. She nested into her Mom’s old rocker, all cosy with the worn woolly red blanket she so loved, hugged over her shoulders. She inhaled a deep breath of the Maces Bay’s ocean breeze. As if carried into her lungs on the crisp air, memories start to expand in her thoughts. Memories of the days spent there as a child with her Mom and Dad. It made her heart ache that she hadn’t appreciated her dear old Mom’s family life stories more. When she closed her eyes, she went back in time, to recall her Mom sitting in the very rocker she now sat, knitting the red blanket.
Stewart, her carpenter, along with his son Mike worked all summer fixing her cottage roof and doors when he had spare time and if the weather co-operated. Today was the day he’d put her sun porch windows in. She looked forward to the day when Al and she could retire there by the ocean, after May died. May is Al’s mother – my mother-in-law, and she’s 92, bless her.
Something caught her eye through the porch window. She could see her neighbour Jenny cutting through the path between their cottages. They travelled that path all summer visiting each other, sharing heart to heart chats, over tea and cookies or sometimes chocolates from St. Stephen’s Ganong factory. She had her umbrella hugged tightly over her head and her high top yellow rubber boots on.
Gretchen opened the porch door and she dashed up the steps and inside.
“Whew, it’s really coming down out there!” Rain dripped off her umbrella as she partially folded it.
“Ah, but it’s dry in here,” Gretchen said. “Let me put the kettle on. I’m expecting my carpenter any minute. You can keep me company while I wait.”
“That’s kinda why I’m here.” She ran a hand threw her hair as though to assure her the rain hadn’t wreaked havoc with it. “Al phoned a few minutes ago and asked me to tell you Stewart isn’t coming today. The weather forecast put him off.”
Gretchen raised her eyebrows. “Really? What’s the forecast?”
“It’s gonna get worse. Much worse. Weatherman’s calling for high winds and a couple of inches of that wet stuff.” She gestured at the steadily falling rain. “Won’t be pretty when the wind starts driving it in sheets.”
“Damn. Wish I’d known that yesterday. Driving in the rain isn’t my favourite thing. In fact, I won’t drive at all in the winter. No, not even Al’s 4x4 truck.”
“Hey, look, since Stewart’s not coming, why don’t you come on over for dinner? Jack would love a good laugh.”
“Thanks Jenny but I think I’ll lock up and head home before the storm gets worse. I’ve not spent much time with Al this summer. I’m feeling big time guilt these past few days. Believe me when I say, I don’t wish May dead, but the doctors had her dead six years ago and she’s still going like that damn energiser bunny. Come in Jenny while I change and I’ll drive you back. I’d like to be home by three and surprise Al.”
“ I understand.”
“ Listen, why don’t you tell Jack the old story about the time I made Al’s sandwiches for lunch out of Lilly and Jitters canned tuna.”
“ Oh…can I. You told me to never tell a soul but I’ve always wanted to tell Jack, especially when we made tuna sandwiches.”
‘’You can. Come on let’s get moving.”
On the drive back to Elgin the rain splashed with such force on the windshield. The wipers were at full speed and the water puddles were scaring the wits out of her. Thoughts rummaging through her head were haunting her by the time she neared St. John, about leaving Al so much this summer. She and Al never had children but in the last six years they had definitely made up for it with his mom; she mirrored a demanding spoiled child.
Nearing the Sussex exit, she decided to turn in and pick up Al’s favourite meal; Kentucky fried chicken with coleslaw along with macaroni salad for May. She asked the petite girl at the take out window, “ no need to put the popcorn chicken and coke in the meal deal bag. I’m going to eat it on the way.” She was starving!
She placed the popcorn chicken between her thick legs and the coke in the holder, then the bag for home, she secured on the floor to keep warm.
When she got back on the highway, she nibbled away on the crispy popcorn chicken. It was tasty! In the split second, it took her to reach for the coke and look up again, she saw two cars in front of hers hydroplane and spin out of control into the ditch. When her foot touched the brake to slow down, her car hydroplaned. The coke went flying! Quick thinking had her foot pull away from the gas pedal. With her hands she white knuckled the wheel and braced for the worst. Panic had her heartbeat race out of control. She screamed,“ Please God, please, please, please…” Her car swirled into a tailspin out of control making her eyes widen and her jowls giggle with each spin.
Phew… finally, it stopped on the roads shoulder inches from the ditch.
She held her foot on the brake as she gasped with heavy moans to catch her breath. With one hand on her chest and the other on her head she wondered now what ever possessed her to start for home in the first place. For safety sake she searched for the flasher button. When she looked up to the rear view mirror she couldn’t see the cars that hydro-ed. She slowly eased back until she got closer to them.
With her body still in turbulence mode, she found the energy to flop out and slowly paced her steps, like a chicken stride, toward them. She was in hopes she wouldn’t fall and shake the earth below.
“Do you need help?” She yelled towards the three men standing beside the black car.
“No… we’re all ok… but thanks anyway… a tow truck’s on the way. Hurry…get back to your car before you get run over.’’
Gretchen was drenched through the layers of her clothing; even her flesh was dripping when she returned to her car. With shaking fingers, she turned the heat button to full high and then wrestled one hand to strip her jacket off. She flipped it over to the back seat only to have the belt splash water in her face. If a video camera were rolling, she’d be sure to win a top spot on u-tube with her long wet hair stringing in all directions and her drooping booby twins showing themselves through her wet blouse. The uneaten popcorn chicken was smooched under her feet and where the damn coke cup ended up was anyone’s guess.
As she neared the Elgin exit, the rain was easing up a bit having her body feel a twinge safer. She loosened her grip on the wheel while relaxing her aching shoulders to the back of her seat. Being humped over like, that hunched back of wherever, along with her nose pinned to the windshield for almost an hour exhausted her. Here hands ached! Al would definitely be shocked to know that she weathered this storm.
Awe…the driveway!
For some reason Al had more lights on than usual in the house. His car was parked near the back shed. What was he up to this time? Gretchen sometimes sensed that Al had many, what she called, “ field days” when she was away.
It took more than a few minutes, for Gretchen to gather her bag of chicken and dislodge her large aching body from the seat. But when she did her steps quickened for her run to the back door, forgetting her jacket. She quietly laid the bag on the stove so their three cats wouldn’t feast on it first. Tuffy loved Kentucky chicken, Lilly and Jitter were more tuna lovers but if it were only chicken on the menu they’d be sure to gobble it.
“ I’m home sweetie- pie.”
Trying to sneak in on Al, she gated her stride into the living room on her tip- toes. She heard loud scattering sounds of sort. In the living-room, May was sound asleep in her chair as usual with Jitter snuggled on one side and Lilly on her other. Tuffy was likely following Al wherever he was and God only knows what he could be up to.
“Oh my good God, I’ m exhausted! I think I’ll sit in my cosy recliner beside May’s until Al shows himself,” Gretchen thought out loud to herself.
As she dozed away, she thought she could hear a crash tumble sound with glass breaking. Exhaustion overtook her but she felt she should at least try to get up again and take a look.
She limped her stiff legs to the basement doorway only to find Al at the bottom of the stairs.
“What on this earth is going on Al? Are you hurt…what the hell are you doing down there? Al, talk to me. I can’t… nor will I climb down those steep steps… get your butt up here. Al you’re scaring me,” she hollered.
“I’m trying,” his faint voice answered.
“Oh my God, it’s dark Al! I can barely see you.”
With only a dim light hanging at the bottom step she could see he was bleeding. But she could do nothing but watch as he crawled his way up struggling each step at a time, all the while babbling with painful moaning sounds. Why in hell did he go down there in the first place was what she wanted to know? As far as she knew there was nothing down there, or was there?
When Al finally reached the top step, Gretchen braced one hand on the doorway and with both feet braced tight to the door casing, she extended her right hand as far as she dared. With one last tug, she reeled her sweetie, past the doorway to his feet.
Holding his hand onto his chest he cried, “my… rib’s…oh Gretchen…. my aching… ribs….”
She pleaded with him to sit down but he kept crying and moaning, “my ribs”…. His head showed signs of a gash with blood streaming down his face that resembled something one would witness in a horror movie He paced in a circle in the front entry with one hand on his ribs and his other to his head. Pitiful sight, indeed!
Gretchen waddled like a chicken to the kitchen passing May who was still asleep in her chair. She was thankful for small mercies when havoc tugged at her trying to help Al. Lilly was still snuggled in with her but Jitter was nowhere to be seen. While she held a big towel under the tap until the water was cold enough, her thoughts pondered her next move. From where she stood she could see Al still circling in the puddle of blood under his feet.
With her gated chicken walk she returned to Al.
“Where in hell are your shoes Al? Talk to me…shit…your scaring the be-jesus out of me Al….”
He wouldn’t take his hand away from his head or his ribs. He kept moaning, my ribs…my ribs…oh my ribs. Al had his right lung removed because of cancer ten years ago, since then Gretchen was scared out of her wits for his other one.
Tuffy was looking from the top shelf of the entry table and to his left sat Jitter spying from the window -sill wondering what on earth was going on. Al was now looking possessed with his head bobbing and his hands exchanging turns from his ribs to his head.
With shattered nerves and an eye on Al, Gretchen had no other choice but to dial 911.
The man’s voice on the other end answered, “ Hello, my name is Eric. You have reached 911. Can you tell me what is your emergency?”
“It’s my husband; he fell down the stairs to the cellar. He’s bleeding from his head and holding onto his ribs. I think he may have broken a few. He won’t stop moaning… he’s hurt! ”
“How long ago has this happened Mrs.? Can you give me your husband’s full name and your civic address?”
“I don’t know exactly how long ago it happened.” I answered as I held my sights on Al. He changed his position and was bent over puffing for air. Tuffy was near his feet.
“How old is your husband and could you tell me if he takes any medication? How badly would you say he is bleeding at this time?”
Gretchen became more agitated with the twenty questions and told him, “Please get an ambulance to our house. My husband is in serious pain and still bleeding for pity sake, man. He needs to get to the hospital. Oh God, please hurry before he bleeds to death.”
“I’m dispatching an ambulance but please stay on the line until they arrive Mrs….”
By that time she was in total breakdown mode and ready to throw the phone out the damned door.
“Listen to me Sir, it’ll take them at least thirty minutes to get here. I’m not talking that long; I can’t. I’ve just got home and need see to my mother-in –law. The front door will be unlocked, please hurry.”
With that she hung up the phone with a loud bang that had her mother-in –law’s eyes to open. May looked up at her and but then closed them again. Al kept moving in a circle mournfully groaning ribs….
Once more, Gretchen grabbed a towel and ran cold water to place on his cut. He had a pooled mess of blood under his feet that was taking on a wicked dead smell along with a strange sticky sound.
Finally…she heard the sound of the ambulance with siren’s blaring. Gretchen’s heart couldn’t take much more. She opened the door for the tall skinny man and the short stocky heavy - set woman following him. She sure had the look of a woman that wouldn’t be shoved or pushed into a corner. With one look at Al and then a look at each other, confusion by both were visible as to how they’d get him on the stretcher without bloodying each other in the process.
I overheard the man say, “ Well Lena, we’ve got us some kinda situation here. What is your call on it?”
“ Well Ron, let’s wrap him up first and then try to get him on the stretcher. We’ll bag his feet and let the hospital take care of the rest.”
“ Let’s do it.”
They lift the stretcher to the height of Al’s hips and then took a doubled sheet and with one on each side of him they drape it over his shoulders. They carefully guided him to step back to the middle of the stretcher slowly sitting him in position. He was still moaning, “ribs.” They protected his left side, one holding his head and the other his shoulder until his body lay flat. Ron put in place the oxygen mask and intravenous bag, while Lena tightly buckled the straps over his hand that still hugs his ribs. She repeated “sorry sir” each time Al cried. Al kept repeating, “ribs.”
Once he was safely tucked in, Ron asked me, “ Could you bring his medications along with his health card to the Sussex emergency department. You will need to hurry Mrs., the hospital will need to know all of his history as soon as possible.”
“ I’ll be right behind you.”
In a panic state, Gretchen grabbed his wallet along with his medications and out the door she flew, forgetting to take one last look at May or clean up the blood so the cats wouldn’t mess in it. Damn it! Within her thoughts she pondered, “if they mess in that bloody mess, it will be a bloody bath for them.”
The rain began to pelt down once more on her windshield along with heavy gust of wind staggering the car back and forth. It was scaring the be- jessus out of her! By the time she reached the emergency department her sweating body was taking on a smell that could gag any living human, even Tuffy.
The woman at the desk asked Gretchen questions, she couldn’t answer. How he fell or what time he fell, she had no frigen idea. With the papers finally in order she was guided to the observation room where a doctor and a nurse were cleaning Al’s head. The nurse motioned with her hand for Gretchen to sit in the chair near his stretcher. But what Gretchen really wanted was to start the day all over again; she sat before she passed out.
Taking a few well - deserved breaths of air, Gretchen began to talk, “Excuse me doctor, have you given him something for his pain yet?”
“No I haven’t, until his blood test are back we can’t. I’m sorry.”
“Can’t you see, my husband’s in pain; he needs something. Can’t you do something?”
They both looked at her with disgust before they turned away and resumed to what they were doing.
As Gretchen sat numbed for words, she looked down to the floor and there she witnessed her sights on her old shed slippers soaked with blood on her feet. “Holy shit” was her thought. To not attract attention to them she skidded her feet under the chair. She raised her hand to her still wet hair and pushed it off to her right shoulder. If that weren’t enough she looked to her chest and there hung her boobs, visibly hanging through her shirt. With a quick shift of her hand she tugged her shed sweater over her shirt thinking,
“ I could slap his pain away this frigen minute. Shit… May.”
When they left the room Al was still moaning the word ribs…Gretchen wanted to break a few of his ribs herself. Just then she heard him whimper,
“ I’m sorry…pickle…really sorry.” He only called her “pickle” when he’d done something he knew she’d hated.
She quietly sat there listening to the conversation between the doctor and the nurse behind the partly opened glass window.
“Joe the blood test are back but I’m not sure what to think. Look for yourself. What’s your thought on this one?”
“What do you mean Kathy?”
“Just look at this! Then you tell me your take is on it.”
Gretchen kept silent, looking down at her bloody shed slippers, waiting for them to say more when the x-ray nurse brought in another report. A brave nerve had Gretchen look partially up, her eyes wincing, to watch Dr. Joe as he placed the x-ray on the screen. He nudged Kathy and with a tip of his head turned his brow toward the screen. She shook her head back and forth, when he pointed to a spot circling it a few times with his left index finger.
When Kathy re-entered the room, Gretchen could see it in her eyes that her news wasn’t going to be good.
“ May I call you Gretchen?” She asked.
“Yes, but before you tell me anything, can you please give my husband something for his pain; I can’t stand much more of his moaning rib’s… he sounds so miserable.”
“I’m very sorry Gretchen but I can’t give him anything at this time. Perhaps in a few hours we’ll take another sample of his blood, meanwhile, I can tell you he has four broken ribs. Because of the doctor’s concern for his good lung, he’s sending him to Saint John tonight. Did you want to go home to shower and change your clothes to travel with him later tonight?”
“What I really want, Kathy, is for you to give him something for his pain, please.”
“I’m sorry Gretchen, but your husbands blood level is .48, I can’t.”
Not to sound stupid but wanting to know Gretchen asked, “May I ask you, what does that have to do with his pain?”
“It means your husband is dangerously past the alcohol level of .08. He’s intoxicated! We can’t complicate him more. It would be very dangerous to do so.”
Gretchen’s face flushed with fireball heat and her body was about to erupt when she managed to stutter out, “what the hell are you talking about? My husband doesn’t even drink. Your blood test is wrong…wrong… wrong.”
Kathy responded, “sorry”’ as she fled the room.
The doctor came rushing in with a demanding voice that clearly meant business. He stood with his shoulders straight back and his head erect with his eyes focused on hers before he spoke in slow but strict sounding words, “ Gretchen… I’m sorry you disbelieve my nurse but… I confirm to you that your husband is indeed intoxicated. And let me warn you, I will ask you to not speak to my nurse in that manner again or you will be asked to leave. Now… do you wish to go to St. John with your husband or not?”
Gretchen looked directly into his eyes when she answered in a cold tone in her voice, “Absolutely not! You can give him the message not to call me when his alcohol level is normal. And you can tell him for me that he can call a cab when he gets released. I’ve had all my body can take for one day. I’m going home.”
She didn’t add, that she could choke Al with her bare hands at that moment nor did she thank the doctor. She rose to her feet and griped her sweater tighter, before she pranced herself out the door and down the hall. Her chicken stride skipped a few strides with those shed slippers of hers.
Gretchen thought she could hear Al’s Voice.
“Gretchen, Gretchen, wake up. You’ve been flinching and muttering ribs… for an hour now. You look exhausted to death. I let you sleep until you screamed; “I’m going to choke him with my bare hands. I am! Give him to me.”
‘’What… where are you…Al?”
“Gretchen you’re having a bad dream. Wake up.”
When she opened her eyes, Al wasn’t drunk or hurt. His breath did smell like Kentucky chicken ribs though.
“ I love you Al. You know, I love you… don’t you Al.”
“For heavens sake, Gretchen, wake up! You fell asleep and you look like the wreck of the Hesperia’s. What the hell have you been doing? Get yourself upstairs for a shower and for pity sakes, get your bra on before you trip over those booby twins of yours.”
Gretchen’s, “I love you smile” turned into a frown. She turned a look toward the entry but saw no evidence of the pool of blood she thought sure was there earlier. Jitter and Lilly were in their usual spot on each side of May. For the life in her, she couldn’t understand how she could sleep that sound let alone dream up such a true to life nightmare. Tuffy’s tail was wagging as he sat on the window- sill looking out at something that had caught his attention.
Al reached out his hand to help her from her chair.
“Get moving Gretchen, you’ll feel better after a nice hot bath. I’ll keep the chicken warm in the oven. And, yes, Pickle I do love you.”
As Gretchen stepped each step up the stairway she muttered, “he called me Pickle, didn’t he? I wonder!”
